He was
in demand for consultations; sat on several committees; while a couple
of lodges had come his way as good as unsought.
Against this he had one piece of ill-luck to set. At the close of the
summer, when the hot winds were in blast, he had gone down under the
worst attack of dysentery he had had since the early days. He really
thought this time all was over with him. For six weeks, in spite of the
tenderest nursing, he had lain prostrate, and as soon as he could bear
the journey had to prescribe himself a change to the seaside. The
bracing air of Queenscliff soon picked him up; he had, thank God, a
marvellous faculty of recuperation: while others were still not done
pitying him, he was himself again, and well enough to take the daily
plunge in the Sea that was one of his dearest pleasures.--To feel the
warm, stinging fluid lap him round, after all these drewthy years of
dust and heat! He could not have enough of it, and stayed so long in the
water that his wife, sitting at a decent distance from the Bathing
Enclosure, grew anxious, and agitated her little white parasol.
"There's nothing to equal it, Mary, this side Heaven!" he declared as he
rejoined her, his towel about his neck. "I wish I could persuade you to
try a dip, my dear."
But Mary preferred to sit quietly on the beach. "The dressing and
undressing is such a trouble," said she. As it was, one of her
elastic-sides was full of sand.
Yes, Polly was Mary now, and had been, since the day Ned turned up again
on Ballarat, accompanied by a wife and child.
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