Page 262 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

Rufus Dawes, still keeping his face away, caught his
breath as if in astonishment, and then, recovering himself,
he said in a harsh voice, ‘A fortunate fellow—that son!’
‘Fortunate!’ cries Frere, with another oath. ‘Oh yes, he was
fortunate! He was burnt to death in the Hydaspes, and nev-
er heard of his luck. His mother has got the money, though.
I never saw a shilling of it.’ And then, seemingly displeased
with himself for having allowed his tongue to get the better
of his dignity, he walked away to the fire, musing, doubtless,
on the difference between Maurice Frere, with a quarter of a
million, disporting himself in the best society that could be
procured, with command of dog-carts, prize-fighters, and
gamecocks galore; and Maurice Frere, a penniless lieuten-
ant, marooned on the barren coast of Macquarie Harbour,
and acting as boat-builder to a runaway convict.
Rufus Dawes was also lost in reverie. He leant upon the
gunwale of the much-vaunted boat, and his eyes were fixed
upon the sea, weltering golden in the sunset, but it was evi-
dent that he saw nothing of the scene before him. Struck
dumb by the sudden intelligence of his fortune, his imag-
ination escaped from his control, and fled away to those
scenes which he had striven so vainly to forget. He was
looking far away—across the glittering harbour and the
wide sea beyond it—looking at the old house at Hampstead,
with its well-remembered gloomy garden. He pictured
himself escaped from this present peril, and freed from the
sordid thraldom which so long had held him. He saw him-
self returning, with some plausible story of his wanderings,
to take possession of the wealth which was his—saw him-

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