Mr. Hardy Baldacre would have been sorely puzzled by a cross-examination, but no one had presence of mind to put it to the proof. He was rapid in conceiving his plans, wonderfully accurate and thoughtful in carrying them through. His endowments were exceptional in their way. Bold, even to audacity, he never hesitated; cunning and unscrupulous, he pursued his schemes, whether for money-making or for personal aggrandisement of the lower sort, with a swift and sure directness worthy of more exalted aim. Undaunted by failure, he was careless of partial loss of reputation. He was known by the superficial crowd as a successful operator whenever there was a bargain to be had in stock or station property. He was shunned and disliked by those better informed and more scrupulous in their acknowledgment of friends, as a gambler, a niggard, and a crafty profligate. Such was the man who had succeeded, by a lying device, in working present evil—it may be, incalculable future misery—to two persons who had never injured him. In this deliberate fabrication he had two ends in view. He secretly envied and disliked Ernest Neuchamp for qualities and attainments which he could never hope to rival. He was one of a class of Australians who cherish an ignorant prejudice against Englishmen, regarding them as conceited and prone to be contemptuous of the provincial magnate. With characteristic cunning he had kept this feeling to himself, always treating Mr. Neuchamp with apparent friendliness. But he was none the less determined to deal him an effectual blow when an opportunity should offer. The time had come, and he had struck a felon blow, which had pierced deeply the pure, passionate heart of Antonia Frankston. He had for some time past honoured that young lady with his very questionable approbation. He admired her personally after his fashion; but he thoroughly appreciated and heartily desired to possess himself of what constituted in his eyes her crowning charm and attribute—the large fortune which Paul Frankston’s heiress must, in spite of all changes of season and fluctuation of securities, inevitably inherit. Not unskilled in the ways of women, with whom his undeniable good looks and his prestige of wealth gave him a certain popularity, he thought he saw his way during her period of anger and mortification to a dash at the lady and the money, which needed but promptness and resolution to ensure a strong chance of success. He saw by her change of countenance, by her forced gaiety, by her every look and tone, that the barbed arrow had sped far and been surely lodged.