engine.”
“Why,” she managed, “is the car so big?”
“The miners use it too. Apocalypse’s poppet heads—those derricks holding winches—are on that wide shelf we just passed. Easier for the men than going in through the tunnel at the bottom because of giant ore skips and the close proximity of locomotives outside. Cages let them down into the main gallery and bring them up again at the end of the shift.”
A coolness descended as they passed into the trees, as much, she divined, from altitude as from the sheltering boughs.
“Kinross House is over three thousand feet above sea level,” he said with that eerie habit he had of reading her mind. “In summer, comfortably cool. In winter, much warmer.”
THE CAR RAN on to flat ground at last, tilting them, and came to a halt. Elizabeth scrambled out before Alexander could help her, marveling at how quickly night fell in New South Wales. No long Scottish gloaming, no witching hour of soft radiance.
Hedge screened the car siding; as she came around it she stopped dead. Her husband had built a veritable mansion in this remoteness, of what looked like limestone blocks. Of three full stories, it had big Georgian-paned windows, a pillared porch at the top of a sweeping flight of steps, and an air of having stood there for five hundred years. At the foot of the steps was a lawned terrace; a great effort had been made to create an English garden, from trimmed box hedges to rose beds and even a Grecian temple folly.
The door was open, light streamed from every window.
“Welcome home, Elizabeth.” Alexander Kinross took her hand and led her up the steps and inside.
Everything of the best, brought here at what her Scottish canniness said was astronomical cost. The carpets, furniture, chandeliers, ornaments, paintings, drapes. Everything, including, for all she knew, the house itself. Only the faint reek of kerosene gave the lie to its being situated in a gas-lit city.
It turned out that the ubiquitous Summers was Alexander’s chief factotum, while his wife was housekeeper; an arrangement that seemed to give Alexander a peculiar pleasure.
“Begging your pardon, Marm, would you like to refresh yourself after your trip?” asked Mrs. Summers, and led Elizabeth to a properly functioning water closet.
Never had she been more grateful for anything than for that invitation; like all carefully brought-up women of her era, she sometimes had to go for hours upon hours without any opportunity to empty her bladder, thus dared not drink so much as one sip of water before leaving on an expedition, no matter of what kind. Thirst led to dehydration, concentrated urine to bladder and kidney stones; dropsy was a great killer of women.
After several cups of tea, some sandwiches and a piece of delicious seed cake, Elizabeth went to bed so tired that she remembered nothing beyond the foot of the staircase.
“IF YOU DON’T like your quarters, Elizabeth, please tell me what you’d prefer,” said Alexander over breakfast, taken in the loveliest room Elizabeth had ever seen; its walls and roof were of glass panes joined together by a delicate tracery of white-painted iron, and it contained a jungle of palms and ferns.
“I like them very much, but not as much as this.”
“This is a conservatory—so named because in cold climates it conserves frost-vulnerable plants from death during winter.”
He was dressed in his skins, as Elizabeth had privately christened them, his hat dumped on a spare chair.
“Are you going out?”
“I’m home, so from now on you’ll not see much of me until the evening. Mrs. Summers will take you over the house, and you must tell me what you don’t like about it. It’s your house far more than it’s mine—you’re the one will do most of the living in it. I don’t suppose you play the piano?”
“No. We couldn’t afford a piano.”
“Then I’ll have you taught. Music is one of my passions, so you’ll have to learn to
“Why,” she managed, “is the car so big?”
“The miners use it too. Apocalypse’s poppet heads—those derricks holding winches—are on that wide shelf we just passed. Easier for the men than going in through the tunnel at the bottom because of giant ore skips and the close proximity of locomotives outside. Cages let them down into the main gallery and bring them up again at the end of the shift.”
A coolness descended as they passed into the trees, as much, she divined, from altitude as from the sheltering boughs.
“Kinross House is over three thousand feet above sea level,” he said with that eerie habit he had of reading her mind. “In summer, comfortably cool. In winter, much warmer.”
THE CAR RAN on to flat ground at last, tilting them, and came to a halt. Elizabeth scrambled out before Alexander could help her, marveling at how quickly night fell in New South Wales. No long Scottish gloaming, no witching hour of soft radiance.
Hedge screened the car siding; as she came around it she stopped dead. Her husband had built a veritable mansion in this remoteness, of what looked like limestone blocks. Of three full stories, it had big Georgian-paned windows, a pillared porch at the top of a sweeping flight of steps, and an air of having stood there for five hundred years. At the foot of the steps was a lawned terrace; a great effort had been made to create an English garden, from trimmed box hedges to rose beds and even a Grecian temple folly.
The door was open, light streamed from every window.
“Welcome home, Elizabeth.” Alexander Kinross took her hand and led her up the steps and inside.
Everything of the best, brought here at what her Scottish canniness said was astronomical cost. The carpets, furniture, chandeliers, ornaments, paintings, drapes. Everything, including, for all she knew, the house itself. Only the faint reek of kerosene gave the lie to its being situated in a gas-lit city.
It turned out that the ubiquitous Summers was Alexander’s chief factotum, while his wife was housekeeper; an arrangement that seemed to give Alexander a peculiar pleasure.
“Begging your pardon, Marm, would you like to refresh yourself after your trip?” asked Mrs. Summers, and led Elizabeth to a properly functioning water closet.
Never had she been more grateful for anything than for that invitation; like all carefully brought-up women of her era, she sometimes had to go for hours upon hours without any opportunity to empty her bladder, thus dared not drink so much as one sip of water before leaving on an expedition, no matter of what kind. Thirst led to dehydration, concentrated urine to bladder and kidney stones; dropsy was a great killer of women.
After several cups of tea, some sandwiches and a piece of delicious seed cake, Elizabeth went to bed so tired that she remembered nothing beyond the foot of the staircase.
“IF YOU DON’T like your quarters, Elizabeth, please tell me what you’d prefer,” said Alexander over breakfast, taken in the loveliest room Elizabeth had ever seen; its walls and roof were of glass panes joined together by a delicate tracery of white-painted iron, and it contained a jungle of palms and ferns.
“I like them very much, but not as much as this.”
“This is a conservatory—so named because in cold climates it conserves frost-vulnerable plants from death during winter.”
He was dressed in his skins, as Elizabeth had privately christened them, his hat dumped on a spare chair.
“Are you going out?”
“I’m home, so from now on you’ll not see much of me until the evening. Mrs. Summers will take you over the house, and you must tell me what you don’t like about it. It’s your house far more than it’s mine—you’re the one will do most of the living in it. I don’t suppose you play the piano?”
“No. We couldn’t afford a piano.”
“Then I’ll have you taught. Music is one of my passions, so you’ll have to learn to