Guy Boothby - Sheilah McLeod - A Heroine of the Back Blocks

Next morning a foaming sea of water cut us off from the township, or what few houses remained of it, and for this reason it was manifestly impossible that old McLeod could continue his journey. I remember that poor, little motherless Sheilah and I played together all day long in the verandah, as happy as two birds, while her father watched us from a deep chair, with grave, tear-stained eyes. In the death of his wife he had sustained a grievous loss, from which somehow I don't think he ever thoroughly recovered.

Three days later the water fell as rapidly as it had risen, and as soon as it had sufficiently abated, McLeod, having thanked my father for his hospitality, which I could not help thinking had been grudgingly enough bestowed, took Sheilah in his arms, right up from the middle of our play, and tramped off, a forlorn black figure, down the path towards the township. As far as the turn of the track, and until the scrub timber hid her from my gaze, I could see the little mite waving her hand to me in farewell.

That week McLeod purchased Gregory's farm on the other side of the township, and installed himself in the house on the knoll overlooking the river, taking care this time to choose a position that was safely out of water reach. Once he had settled in, I was as often to be found there as at my own home, and continued to be Sheilah's constant companion and playmate from that time forward.

And so the years went by, every one finding us firmer friends. It was I who held her while she took her first ride upon the old grey pony McLeod bought for the boy to run up the milkers on. It was I who taught her to row the cranky old tub they called a boat on the Long Reach; it was I who baited the hook that caught her first fish; it was I who taught her the difference in the nests in the trees behind the homestead, and how to distinguish between the birds that built them; in everything I was her guide, philosopher and her constant friend. And surely there never was so sweet a child to teach as Sheilah – her quickness was extraordinary, and, bush-bred boy though I was, it was not long before she was my equal at everything where strength was not absolutely required. By the time she was twelve and I sixteen, she could have beaten any other girl in the township at anything they pleased, and, what made them the more jealous, her beauty was becoming more and more developed every day. Even in the hottest sun her sweet complexion seemed to take no hurt, and now the hair, that I remembered curling closely round her head on the morning when we first became acquainted, descended like a fall of rippling gold far below her shoulders. And her eyes – but there, surely there never were such eyes as Sheilah's – for truth and innocence. Oh, Sheilah, my own sweetheart, if only we could have foreseen then all the bitterness and agony of the rocky path that we were some day to tread, what would we not have done to ward off the fatal time? But, of course, we could not see it, and so we went on blindfold upon our happy-go-lucky way, living only in the present, and having no thought of the cares of the morrow. And the strangest part about it all was that, thrown together continually as we were, neither of us had taken any account of love. The little god had so far kept his arrows in his quiver. But he was to shoot them soon enough in all conscience.

To say that my father forbade my intercourse with the McLeods would not be the truth. But if I said that he lost no opportunity of sneering at the old man and his religion (he was a Dissenter of the most vigorous description, and used to preach on Sundays in the township) I should not be overstepping the mark.

I don't believe there was another man in the world who could sneer as could my father. He had cultivated that accomplishment to perfection, and in a dozen words would bring me to such a pitch of indignation that it was as much as I could do to refrain from laying violent hands upon him. I can see him now lying back in his chair in the old dining-room, when he was hearing me my lessons (for he taught me all I know), a book half-closed upon his knee, looking me up and down with an expression upon his face that seemed to say, 'Who ever would have thought I should have been plagued with such a dolt of a son!' Then, as likely as not, he would lose his temper over my stupidity, box my ears, and send me howling from the room, hating him with all the intensity of which my nature was capable. I wonder if ever a boy before had so strange and unnatural a parent.

It was the morning of my eighteenth birthday, and, to celebrate it, Sheilah and I had long before made up our minds to ride to, and spend the day at, the Blackfellow's Cave – a large natural cavern in the mountains, some fifteen or sixteen miles distant from the township. It was one of our favourite jaunts, and according to custom we arranged to start early.

For this reason, as soon as light was in the sky, I was astir, took a plunge in the creek, and then ran down to the paddock and caught the horse I intended riding that day – a fine, well set-up thoroughbred of our own breeding. And, by the same token, there were no horses like ours in the district, either for looks, pace, stamina, or pedigree. What my father did not know about horse and cattle breeding no man in the length and breadth of Australia could teach him. And a good bushman he was too, for all his scholarly ways and habits, a first-class rider, and second to none in his work among the beasts in the stockyard. All I know myself I learnt from him, and I should be less than grateful if I were above owning it. But that has nothing to do with my story. Having caught my horse, I took him up to the stable and put a first-class polish on him with the brush, then, fastening him up to the bough-shade to be ready when I wanted him, hurried in to my breakfast. When I entered the room my father was already seated at the table. He received me after his usual fashion, which was to look me up and down, smile in a way that was quite his own, and then, with a heavy sigh, return to his reading as if it were a matter of pain to him to have anything at all to do with me. When we were half through the meal he glanced up from his book, and said, —

'As soon as you've done your breakfast, you'd better be off and muster Kidgeree paddock. If you come across Bates's bull bring him in with you and let him remain in the yard until I see him.'

This was not at all what I had looked forward to on my birthday, so I said, —

'I can't muster to-day. It's my birthday, and I'm going out.'

He stared at me for nearly a minute without speaking, and then said with a sneer, —

'I'm sure I very much regret that I should have inadvertently interfered with your arrangements. Miss McLeod accompanies you, of course!'

'I am going out with Sheilah! Yes!'

Again he was silent for a few moments – then he looked up once more.

'As it is your birthday of course you consider you have an excuse for laziness. Well, I suppose you must go, but if you should chance to honour the father with your society you might point out to him that, on two occasions this week, his sheep have been on my frontage.'

'It's our own fault; we should mend our boundary.'

'Indeed! And pray how long have you been clear-headed enough to see that?'

'Anyone could see it. It's not fair to blame Mr McLeod for what is not his fault.'

'Dear me! This perspicuity is really most pleasing. An unexpected Daniel come to judgment, I declare. Well, at anyrate, I'll give you a note to take to the snuffling old hound and in it I'll tell him that the next beast of his I catch on my property I'll shoot. That's a fair warning. You can come in for it when you are starting.'

'I shall not take it.'

'Indeed! I am sorry to hear that. Your civility is evidently on a par with your industry.'