leader. Well, we shall see. Yes, Miss Valliant, that's my ambition and my intention. I mean to be a political leader, and I think that if a man has pluck and perseverance and a certain amount of brains, as well as a certain amount of money to make him independent of place, he is bound to get to the front and to make a position that he wouldn't be ashamed to offer to a woman he cared for." The young man's voice shook. "I think that before very long I shall be on the Ministerial bench, or at any rate in the front rank of the Opposition, and when that day comes I shall ask you for your congratulations. "
"And no one will give them with a more sincere heart than I," said Elsie gravely. "And you didn't understand me, Mr. Hallett. I never meant to laugh at you, or to doubt you. Oh, I know well enough that you are considered a coming man. Mamma and Ina and Horace and heaps of other people have told me that of you."
She stopped and blushed. She knew, though Frank did not, why she in particular had had all Frank's advantageous prospects impressed upon her. Oh, of course he would be a very good match for a penniless Leichardt's Town belle, and her mother knew it, and Lord Horace, and Ina, and all the rest of their world knew it too.
"Thank you for saying that, Elsie! If you only knew" the young man began passionately. He came a step nearer her, but Elsie moved and put out her hand in a half laughing, half rebuking manner.
"But I don't know, and perhaps I don't want to know—there, never mind. ... I want you to tell me something"
"Tell you—what?"
"Oh, it's nothing—only"
"Tell me," she went on with the slightest confidential movement. "I'm so interested in Moonlight. Do you think it is true—what they say—that he has some secret hiding-place under Mount Luya?"
"How can I know, and why should I care!" exclaimed Hallett exasperated.
