The Foot of Time: A Novel of Australia and the South Seas: (1933)

186 THE FOOT OF TIME
being disengaged for the evening, she has peculiar
pleasure in requesting the pleasure of your company
to dinner HERE, at 7 p.m. R.S.V.P."
The peon had yet another long run across the
mountain track which separated Goombah and
Publoo to convey Sir Bruce's reply. This read:
"With you both 7 p.m. Arbuthnot."
Sir Bruce turned up to time, as was his invariable
wont, and was treated with the true Scotch cordiality
given to friends who have passed their difficult
rubicon. There was nothing to indicate in the
manner adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Mackenzie that
they were entertaining their employer, and nothing
in Sir Bruce's mien to them to suggest that the
Mackenzies were anything but independent host
and hostess. If anything, Sir Bruce might almost
have appeared to be deferring to his hosts. Almost,
but not quite, for the magnetic personality of the
owner was overwhelming. It grew upon Mrs. Mackenzie
more and more as the evening progressed,
till she came to forget his past life, forget everything
but an absorbed interest in the man himself.
It was after dinner, when sitting out in long
deck chairs, the men regaling themselves with
cheroots, and Mrs. Mackenzie—who was never idle
for one minute from the time she rose until the
time she retired—busy at her knitting, that Sir
Bruce opened up the subject matter which had led
him to sent out his invitation.
"I'm a wealthy man, Mackenzie," he remarked,
throwing out a cloud of blue-grey tobacco smoke,
and watching it mingle with the cool night air.
THE FOOT OF TIME
187
"Ay!" agreed the Scotchman. "'Am thinking
you're recht there, Sir Bruce. 'Am not in queer
streets mysel', ye ken."
Sir Bruce Arbuthnot stifled a quiet smile at the
merited boast. "You will have saved, thanks to
the help of Mrs. Mackenzie here, I make no doubt,
Mackenzie?"
"I hae that, mon," the Scotchman agreed, his
rugged face alight with the tactful drawing-in of
his wife's hand in the matter. "Mrs. Mackenzie is
ay the best womman the Almighty ever sent into a
mortal, sinful worrlld. We've all three thousand
pounds saved up, and lying at this minute on deposit
in the Scottish Bank."
"Why, that's splendid, Mac!"
"Ay, mon, it is that," agreed the planter.
"May I congratulate you, Mrs. Mackenzie?" requested
Sir Bruce.
Mrs. Mackenzie told him that he might. She
added that they had to admit the little nest egg
would have been less had the Almighty blessed
them with children, and much to the same effect.
When Mrs. Mac spoke, her husband, never a talkative
man, held his peace. All he could have said was
so well delivered by his spouse that it appeared in
his judgment unnecessary for him to waste futile
words by way of repetition.
Sir Bruce went on to talk about himself. "I've
a notion to take a long spell at home," he told them.
"It's long since I took a real holiday, and I feel
I'm due for a change."
"Ay, mon, a change," remarked Mackenzie, and