Chapters (53)
- Cover
- About Alison Stuart
- Also by Alison Stuart
- Title Page
- Dedication
- Prologue
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-One
- Twenty-Two
- Twenty-Three
- Twenty-Four
- Twenty-Five
- Twenty-Six
- Twenty-Seven
- Twenty-Eight
- Twenty-Nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-One
- Thirty-Two
- Thirty-Three
- Thirty-Four
- Thirty-Five
- Thirty-Six
- Thirty-Seven
- Thirty-Eight
- Thirty-Nine
- Forty
- Forty-One
- Forty-Two
- Forty-Three
- Forty-Four
- Author’s Note
- Acknowledgements
- Preview of The Goldminer's Sister
‘I’m ’oping you’ve settled your score with Sissy,’ she said. ‘She’s a working girl and don’t ’ave time for freeloaders.’
‘That is between Sissy and I,’ Penrose said.
Lil poked him in the chest. ‘No, it’s not. Sissy works for me. If you want to make an ’onest woman of ’er then stop wasting ’er time.’
They took their drinks across to Penrose’s table.
‘So, what’s between you and the lovely Miss Sissy?’ Caleb enquired.
Penrose stared into his glass. ‘I want to marry her.’
‘And what’s stopping you? Is it the fact she’s a dancing girl?’
Penrose sighed. ‘Yes … No … It’s my uncle,’ he said. ‘You haven’t met him yet. He owns me, body and soul.’
‘How?’
‘I come from a long line of tin miners in Cornwall. My father made a couple of unwise speculations and about five years ago we lost everything, and I mean everything. The bastard took the easy way out and shot himself, leaving my mother, my sister and I with little more than what we stood up in. Uncle Charles stepped in and settled my father’s debts on the condition I came and worked for him.’
‘Does he pay you?’
‘An allowance. He’s holding my father’s debts against the real value of my wages.’ He took a long draught of his beer and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. ‘I probably made that sound worse than it is. He gives me free board and lodging, but I am conscious of the debt I can probably never repay in full.’
‘And your sister?’
‘Eliza is eking out her life as a teacher in a school for young ladies back in England. She hates it, but I have promised her that, when my lot has improved, I’ll bring her out here—and I will. There are opportunities here we’d never have in England. So you can see why I can’t make an honest woman out of Sissy.’ He toyed with the now empty glass. ‘Enough of my problems. Do you think you could sit a horse?’
Caleb rubbed his leg, which ached from the exertion of walking from one end of town to the other. ‘Maybe,’ he said.
‘Then let’s go and find this mine tomorrow,’ Penrose said. ‘I’ll hire a couple of nags from the livery stable. Pretty Sally’s about an hour’s ride north of here.’
‘What about your uncle?’
Penrose shrugged. ‘God knows he owes me a few hours off. But he’s in Melbourne. The old hypocrite is probably bedded down in a whorehouse in Little Lon. Are you up for it?
‘Yes,’ Caleb said. He drained the last of his beer. Time to see what the fall of those pennies back in Williamstown really meant.
Eleven
Eleven
Pretty Sally
30 December 1871