He longed,
too, for the exquisite finishedness of the mother country, the soft
tints of cloud-veiled northern skies. His eyes ached, his brows had
grown wrinkled from gazing on iron roofs set against the hard blue
overhead; on dirty weatherboards innocent of paint; on higgledy-piggledy
backyards and ramshackle fences; on the straggling landscape with its
untidy trees--all the unrelieved ugliness, in short, of the colonial
scene.
He stopped only for want of breath. Mary was silent. He waited. Still
she did not speak.
He fell to earth with a bump, and was angry. "Come . . . out with it! I
suppose all this seems to you just the raving of a lunatic?"
"Oh, Richard, no. But a little . . . well, a little unpractical. I never
heard before of any one throwing up a good income because he didn't like
the scenery. It's a step that needs the greatest consideration."
"Good God! Do you think I haven't considered it?--and from every angle?
There isn't an argument for or against, that I haven't gone over a
thousand and one times."
"And with never a word to me, Richard?" Mary was hurt; and showed it.
"It really is hardly fair. For this is my home as well as yours.--But
now listen. You're tired out, run down with the heat and that last
attack of dysentery. Take a good holiday--stay away for three months if
you like. Sail over to Hobart Town, or up to Sydney, you who'er so fond
of the water. And when you come back strong and well we'll talk about
all this again.
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