Annie watched her father continue down the street, then turned back to the window. ‘Well, we have Betty and I sorted, Mama. Which dress shall we pick out for you?’

They stood at the window for five minutes, admiring the dresses and inventing occasions to wear them to. When they moved on, they found Frank standing beside a window a few doors down.

‘This place is not quite the backwater I expected it to be, Frank,’ Maree called to him. He didn’t respond, but kept his gaze fixed firmly on whatever was on display.

‘Frank? I’m talking to you.’

He looked at her then, and at all of them, a smile on his face. ‘It’s true,’ he said. ‘The stories are all true.’

They came level with him and Annie could see into the building. It was a bank and there were iron bars inside the glass. Beyond the bars sat a table covered with a black velvet cloth. There was a rock on the table, shaped something like a peanut, but as long as her forearm. It seemed to catch the afternoon light and glittered like a fish seen in the depths of a stream. A printed card sat on the table in front of the rock. It read:

The Harrington Nugget

This large gold nugget was pulled from the soil of Canadian Flat at the Ballarat diggings.

It has been valued at £139,000.

As if the value of the nugget was not enough on its own, two stacks of gold sovereigns had been placed beside it. The sovereigns alone were more money than Annie had ever seen, yet they were only a fraction of the value of the nugget.

Frank stepped back from the window and kept walking until he was in the middle of the street. He looked about him, like a lost man looking for a familiar landmark.

‘I have no idea where it is, but that’s where we’re going.’

‘Where, Papa?’ asked Annie.

Frank looked at her, the smile still on his face. ‘Why, to Ballarat, of course.’ Pointing at the nugget, he added, ‘There has to be more where that came from. When we get our gear together and have a means of getting there that doesn’t involve pushing a wheelbarrow; when we have everything ready, we’re off to Ballarat.’

Paddy awoke in the cold chill of dawn and opened his eyes. At first he thought he was in his own bed in the little lean-to room behind the homestead that he shared with Toby. But, as the light strengthened and the walls and roof took on an ethereal glow, he realised he was in a tent, but he didn’t know where. Panic started to well up inside him.

He turned his head to search for something or someone familiar, and a bolt of pain, like liquid fire, shot from the middle of his back to the top of his head. Bright sparks of light danced in his eyes and he wanted to cry out, but all that came from his mouth was a guttural grunt, and even that had the flames dancing in his head and sending him to the very edge of consciousness.