Christina, from her place amongst her girls, watched him till he
disappeared in the quarries; and so did Ephraim Shine, but with very
different feelings. Many of the congregation were disappointed. They had
expected a sensational climax. Class II was inconsolable, and made not
the slightest effort to conceal its disgust, which lasted throughout the
remainder of the morning and was a source of great tribulation to poor
Brother Bowden.


CHAPTER VIII.

HARRY HARDY sought the seclusion of the bush, and there spent a very
miserable morning. He was forced to the conclusion that he had made a
fool of himself, and the thought that possibly that girl of Shine's was
now laughing with the rest rankled like a burn and impelled many of the
strange oaths that slipped between his clenched teeth. The more he
thought of his escapade the more ridiculous and theatrical it seemed. It
was born of an impulse, and would have been well enough had he carried
out his intention; but, oh the ignominy of that retreat from the side of
the grey-eyed, low-voiced girl under the gaze of the whole congregation!
It would not bear thinking of, so he thought of it for hours, and swung
his whip-lash against the log on which he sat, and quite convinced
himself that he was hating Shine's handsome daughter with all the
vehemence the occasion demanded.

In many respects Harry was a very ordinary young man; bush life is a
wonderful leveller, and he had known no other. His father had been a man
of education and talent, drawn from a profession in his earlier manhood
to the goldfields, who remained a miner and a poor man to the day of his