"Chinkie's Flat"

“Did she send in her card, Mary?”

“Did she sind in her what?”

“Her card, you stupid girl.”

“Don’t you be after miscallin’ me, ma’am. Sure I can get forty shillings a wake annywhere an’ not be insulted by anny wan, instead av thirty here, which I do be thinkin’ is not the place to shuit me”—and the indignant daughter of the Emerald Isle, a fresh-complexioned, handsome young woman, tossed her pretty head and marched out.

So Mrs. Trappème went into the room “wid the sthuffed burd in it,” and there rose to meet her a fair-haired girl of about eighteen, with long-lashed, dark-grey eyes, and a somewhat worn and drawn expression about her small mouth, as if she were both mentally and physically tired. Her dress was of the simplest—a neatly fitting, dark-blue, tailor-made gown.

“I saw your advertisement in the Champion this morning,” she said, “and called to ascertain your terms.” Mrs. Trappème’s big, protruding, and offensive pale-blue eyes stared at and took in the girl’s modest attire and her quiet demeanour as a shark looks at an unsuspecting or disabled fish which cannot escape its maws.

“Please sit down,” she said with a mingled ponderous condescension and affability. “I did not advertise. I merely notified in the Champion that I would receive paying guests. But my terms are very exclusive.” “What are they?”

“Five guineas a week exclusive of extras, which, in this place, amount to quite a guinea more. You could not afford that, I suppose?”

The dark-grey eyes flashed, and then looked steadily at those of the fishy blue.

“Your terms are certainly very high, but I have no option. I find it impossible to get accommodation in Townsville. I only arrived from Sydney this morning in the Corea, and as I am very tired, I should like to rest in an hour or so—as soon as you can conveniently let me have my room,” and taking out her purse she placed a £5 note, a sovereign, and six shillings on the table.

“Will you allow me to pay you in advance?” she said, with a tinge of sarcasm in her clear voice. “I will send my luggage up presently.”

Mrs. Trappème at once became most affable. She had noticed that the purse the girl had produced was literally stuffed with new £5 notes.

“May I send for it?” she said beamingly, “and will you not stay and go to your room now?”

“No, thank you,” was the cold reply, “I have some business to attend to first. Can you tell me where Mr. Mallard, the editor of the Champion, lives? I know where the office is, but as it is a morning paper, I should not be likely to find him there at this early hour.”

Mrs. Trappème was at once devoured with curiosity. “How very extraordinary! Mr. Mallard was here only half an hour ago with a Mr. Grainger and Miss Grainger. They are coming here to stay for a few weeks.”

The girl’s fair face lit up. “Oh, indeed! I am sorry I was not here, as I particularly wish to see Mr. Grainger also. I had no idea that he was in Townsville, and was calling on Mr. Mallard—who, I know, is a friend of his—to ascertain when he was likely to be in town.”

“They will all be here for dinner, Miss–”

“My name is Carolan,” and taking out her cardcase she handed Mrs. Trappème a card on which was inscribed, “Miss Sheila Carolan.”

“Then Mr. Grainger is a friend of yours?” said Mrs. Trappème inquisitively, thinking of the poor chance Juliette would have with such a Richmond in the field as Miss Sheila Carolan.

“No, I have never even seen him,” said the girl stiffly, and then she rose.

“Then you will send for my luggage, Mrs. Trappème?”

“With pleasure, Miss Carolan. But will you not look at your room, and join my daughter and myself in our afternoon tea?”

“No, thank you, I think I shall first try and see either Mr. Mallard or Mr. Grainger. Do you know where Mr. Mallard lives?”

“At the Royal Hotel in Flinders Street. My daughter Lilla will be delighted to show you the way.”

But Miss Sheila Carolan was stubborn, and declined the kind offer, and Mrs. Trappème, whose curiosity was now at such a pitch that she was beginning to perspire, saw her visitor depart, and then called for Juliette.

“I wonder who she is and what she wants to see Mr. Grainger for?” she said excitedly, as she mopped her florid face: “doesn’t know him, and yet wants to see him particularly. There is something mysterious about her.”

“What is she like?” asked Miss Trappème eagerly. “I didn’t see her face, but her clothes are all right, I can tell you.” (She knew all about clothes, having been a forewoman in a Sydney drapery establishment for many years.)

“Oh, a little, common-looking thing, but uppish. I wonder what on earth she does want to see Mr. Grainger for?”

Half an hour later, when Miss Carolan’s luggage arrived, it was duly inspected and criticised by the whole Trappème family. Each trunk bore a painted address: “Miss Carolan, Minerva Downs, Dalrymple, North Queensland.”

“Now where in the world is Minerva Downs?” said Mrs. Trappème, “and why on earth is she going there? And her name too—Carolan—Sheila Carolan! I suppose she’s a Jewess.”

“Indade, an’ it’s not that she is, ma’am, whatever it manes,” indignantly broke in Mary, who had helped to carry in the luggage, and now stood erect with flaming face and angry eyes. “Sure an’ I tould yez she was a lady, an’ anny wan cud see she was a lady, an’ Carolan is wan av the best names in Ireland—indade it is.”

“You may leave the room, Mary,” said Miss Trappème loftily.

“Lave the room, is it, miss? Widout maning anny disrespect to yez, I might as well be telling yez that I’m ready to lave the place intirely, an’ so is the cook an’ stableman, an’ the gardener. Sure none av us—having been used to the gintry—want to sthay in a place where we do be getting talked at all day.”

The prospect of all her servants leaving simultaneously was too awful for Mrs. Trappème to contemplate. So she capitulated.

“Don’t be so hasty, Mary. I suppose, then, that Miss Carolan is an Irishwoman?”

“She is that, indade. Sore an’ her swate face toold me so before she spoke to me at all, at all.”

“Then you must look after her wants yery carefully, Mary. She will only be here for a few weeks.”

Mary’s angry eyes softened. “I will that ma’am. Sure she’s a sweet young lady wid the best blood in her, I’m thinkin’.”

Miss Trappème sniffed.

CHAPTER VIII ~ MYRA AND SHEILA

There was nothing mysterious about Sheila Carolan; her story was a very simple one. Her parents were both dead, and she had no relatives, with the exception of an aunt, and with her she had lived for the last five years. The two, however, did not agree very well, and Sheila being of a very independent spirit, and possessing a few hundred pounds of her own, frankly told her relative that she intended to make her own way in the world. There was living in North Queensland a former great friend of her mother’s—a Mrs. Farrow, whose husband was the owner of a large cattle station near Dalrymple—and to her she wrote asking her if she could help her to obtain a situation as a governess. Six weeks later she received a warmly worded and almost affectionate letter.

“My dear Sheila,—Why did you not write to me long, long ago, and tell me that you and your Aunt Margaret did not get on well together! I remember as a girl that she was somewhat ‘crotchetty.’ I am not going to write you a long letter. I want you to come to us. Be my children’s governess—and I really do want a governess for them—but remember that you are coming to your mother’s friend and schoolmate, and that although you will receive £100 a year—if that is too little let us agree for £160—it does not mean that you will be anything else to me but the daughter of your dear mother. Now I must tell you that Minerva Downs is a difficult place to reach, and that you will have to ride all the way from Townsville—250 miles—but that will be nothing to an Australian-born girl ‘wid Oirish blood in her.’ When you get to Townsville call on Mr. Mallard, the editor of the Champion, who is a friend of ours (I’ve written him), and he will ‘pass’ you on to another friend of ours, a Mr. Grainger, who lives at a mining town called Chinkie’s Flat, ninety miles from here, and Mr. Grainger (don’t lose your heart to him, and defraud my children of their governess) will ‘pass’ you on with the mailman for Minerva Downs. The enclosed will perhaps be useful (it is half a year’s salary you advance), and my husband and all my large and furious family of rough boys and rougher girls will be delighted to see you.

“Very sincerely yours, my dear Sheila,

“Noba Fabbow.”

With the letter was enclosed a cheque for £50 on a Sydney bank.

As the girl descended Melton Hill into hot, dusty, and noisy Flinders Street, she smiled to herself as she thought how very much she had stimulated the curiosity of Mrs. Trappème—to whom she had, almost unconsciously, taken an instinctive dislike.

As she entered the crowded vestibule of the Royal Hotel, a group of men—diggers, sugar planters, storekeepers, bankers, ship captains, and policemen, who were all laughing hilariously at some story which was being told by one of their number—at once made a lane for her to approach the office, for ladies—especially young and pretty ladies—were few in comparison to the men in North Queensland in those days, and a murmured whisper of admiration was quite audible to her as she made her inquiry of the clerk.

“No; Mr. Mallard is with Mr. and, Miss Grainger at the ‘Queen’s.’ He left here a few minutes ago.”

“May I show you the way, miss?” said a huge bearded man, who, booted and spurred, took off his hat to her in an awkward manner. “I’m Dick Scott, one of Mr. Grainger’s men.”

“Thank you,” replied Sheila, “it is very kind of you,” and, escorted by the burly digger, she went out into the street again.