Catherine Carmichael ; Or, Three Years Running .

theless ho spent small sums of money for thorn , eking out what be collected from the sale of their few goods , lie settled this , and he settled that , as men do settle things when they have

money to spend . By degrees , —not very slowly , but still gradually , —it was notified to Catherine that she might go across the mountains , and become mistress of Warriwa . It was very little that he said to her in the wav of love-maki ' .

" You mig ht as well come home with me , Kate , and I'll send word on , and we'll get ourselves spliced as we go through Christchurch . "

When he put it thus clearly to her , she certainly already knew what was intended . Her elder brother had spoken of it . It did not surprise her , nor did she start back and say at once thafc it should not be so .

From the moment in which Peter Carmichael had appeared upon the scene all Kate ' s intimacy with John seemed to come to end . The two men , whose relationship was distant , did not renew their quarrel . The elder , indeed , was gracious , and said

something to his younger kinsman as to the expediency * of his returning to Warriwa . But John seemed to be oppressed by the other's presence , and certainly offered no advice as to Kate's future life . Nor did Kate say a word to him . When first an allusion to the suggested marriage was made in her presence she did not dare , indeed , to look at him , but she could perceive that

neither did he look at her . She did not look , but yet she could see . There was not a start , not a change of colour , not a motion

even of her foot . He expressed no consent , but she told herself that , by his silence , he gave it . There was no need for a question , even had it been possible that she should ask one .

And so it was settled . Peter Carmichael was a just man , in his way , but coarse , and altogether without sentiment . He spoke of the arrangement that had been made as he mis-lit

have done of the purchase of a . a lot of sheep , not , however , omitting to point out that in this bargain he was giving everything and getting almost

nothing . As . a wife , Catherine might , perhaps , bo of some service about the house ; but he did not think that heshould have cared ro take a wife reallv

for the sake of the wife . Put it would do . They could get themselves married as they went through Christchurch ,

and then settle down comfortably . The brothershad nothing lo say against it , and to . lohn it seemed to be a matter of

indifference . So it was settled . What , did it signify to Catherine , as no one else cared for her ? Peter Carmichael was a hardworking man , who had the name of considerable wealth .

lie CXI > I-I'K S < MI no C-IIISIMII , bill ulic mid licrsi'lf tlr . u . Iiv his siU'iici ' , hi- * > 'im > it

But he was said to be hard of hand and hard of heart , — a stern , stubborn man , who was fond only of his money . There had been much said about him between •lohn and Catherine before he had come to Hokitika , — when there had been no probability of his coming . "He is

just , " John had said , "but so ungenial that it seems to me impossible that a human being should stay with liim . " And yet ( his young man , of whose love she had dreamt , had not had a word to say when it was being arranged that she should be la ken off to live all her future life with this companionship and

no other ! She would not condescend to ask even a question about her future home . What did it matter ? She must be lakeii somewhere , because she could not be got rid of and buried at once beneath the sod . Nobody wanted her . She was only a burden . She might as well be taken to Warriwa and die there as elsewhere , *—and so she went .

They travelled for two days and two ni ghts , across the mountains to Christchurch , and there they were married , as it happened , on Christmas Day , —on Christmas Day , because they passed that day and no other in the town as they wont on . Tliere was a further journey , two other days and two other

Catherine Carmichael ; Or, Three Years Running .

nights , down nearly to the southern boundary of the Canterbury Province ; and thither they went on with no great change between them , having become merely man and wife during that

day they had remained at Christchurch . As they passed one great river after another on their passage down Kate felt how well it would be that the waters should pass over her head . But the waters refused to relieve her of the burden of her life . So

she went on and reached her new home at Warriwa . Catherine Carmichael , as she must now be called , was a wellgrown , handsome young * woman , who , through fche hardships of her young life , still showed traces of the gentle blood from which she had sprung . And ideas had come to her from her

mother of things better than those around her . To do something for others , and then something , if possible , for herself , — these had been the objects nearest to her . Of the amusements , of the lightness and pleasures of life , she had never known anything . To sit vacant for an . hour dreaming over a book had

never como to her ; nor had it been for her to make the time run softly with some apology for women ' s work in her hands . The hard garments , fit for a- miner ' s work , passed through her hands . The care of the children , the preparation of tbeir food , the doing the best she could for tlie rough household , —these things had

kept her busy , from her early rising till she would go late to her bed . But she had loved her work because it had been done

for her father and her mother , for her brothers and her sisters . And she had respected herself never despising * the work she

did ; no man had ever dared to say an uncivil word to Kate Baird , among all those rough

miners with whom her father associated . Something had come to her from her mother which , while her mother lived , —even while her father lived , —had made her feel herself to

be mistress of herself . But all that independence had passed away from her , —all that

consciousness of doing the best she could , —as soon as Peter Carmichael had crossed her path . It was not till the hard , dry , middle-aged man had taken

possession ol : her that she acknowledged to herself thai she had really loved John Carmichael . When Peter had

come among them , he had seemed to dominate her as well as the others . He and he only had money , lie and he only could cause auy-hfc to be done .

And then it had seemed that for all the others tliere was a way of escape open , but none for her . No one wanted her , unless it was this dry oldman

Ihe young man certainty did not want her . Then in her sorrow sho allowed herself to be crushed , in spite of the strength for which she had given herself credit . She was

astounded , almost stupefied , so that she had no words wifch which to assert herself . When she was told that the hard , dry man would find a home for her , she had no reason to give winit should not be so . When she did not at first refuse to be

taken away across the mountains , she had failed to realize what it all meant . When she reached Warriwa , and the waters in the pathless , unbridged rivers had not closed over her head , — then she realized it .

She was the man ' s wife , and she hated him . She hated him . She had never known before what it was to hate a human being . She had always been helpful , and it is our nature to love those wo help . Even the rough men who would lure her father away to drink had been her friends . "Oh , Dick , " she

would say , to the roughest of the rough , putting her hand prayerfully on his sleeve , "do not ask him to-night ; " and the rough man would go from the shanty for the time . She would have mended his jacket for him willingly , or have washed his

shirt . Though the world had beon very hard to her , sho had hated no one . Now , she hated a man with all fche strength of her heart , and he was her husband . ft was good for the man , though whether good for herself