rouble as a child and as a man; and so, mother fashion, she loved him
best.

CHAPTER XIII.

A CONTEMPLATED VOYAGE.

Frederick Massingbird sat perched on the gate of a ploughed field,
softly whistling. His brain was busy, and he was holding counsel with
himself, under the gray February skies. Three weeks had gone by since
the tidings arrived of the death of his brother, and Frederick was
deliberating whether he should, or should not, go out. His own letter
from Luke Roy had been in substance the same as that which Luke had
written to his father. It was neither more explanatory, nor less so.
Luke Roy was not a first-hand at epistolary correspondence. John had
been attacked and killed for the sake of his gold, and the attackers and
the gold had been taken hold of by the law; so far it said, and no
further. That the notion should occur to Frederick to go out to
Melbourne, and lay claim to the gold and any other property left by
John, was only natural. He had been making up his mind to do so for the
last three weeks; and perhaps the vision of essaying a little business
in the gold-fields on his own account, urged him on. But he had not
fully made up his mind yet. The journey was a long and hazardous one;
and--he did not care to leave Sibylla.

"To be, or not to be?" soliloquised he, from his seat on the gate, as he
plucked thin branches off from the bare winter hedge, and scattered
them. "Old stepfather's wiry yet, he may last an age, and this is
getting a horrid, humdrum life. I wonder what he'll leave me, when he
does go off? Mother said one day she thought it wouldn't be more than
five hundred pounds. _She_ doesn't know; he does not tell her about his
private affairs--never has told her. Five hundred pounds! If he left me
a paltry sum such as that, I'd fling it in the heir's face--Master
Lionel's."

He put a piece of the thorn into his mouth, bit it up, spat it out
again, and went on with his soliloquy.

"I had better go. Why, if nothing to speak of does come to me from old
Verner, this money of John's would be a perfect windfall. I must not
lose the chance of it--and lose it I should, unless I go out and see
after it. No, it would never do. I'll go. It's hard to say how much he
has left, poor fellow. Thousands--if one may judge by his
letters--besides this great nugget that they killed him for, the
villains! Yes, I'll go--that's settled. And now, to try to get Sibylla.
She'll accompany me fast enough. At