He took his dinner of stew washed down with a beer in the front parlour of the hotel. Dry and replete, he sat back with another beer and watched the rain dripping through the ceiling into a wooden bucket.

A family seated at a table in the far corner appeared to be the only other travellers. Caleb studied them without much interest. A husband, a wife, a fretful boy of about three or four and a young woman with a pockmarked face. From her plain clothes and subservient manner, Caleb took to her be the maid.

The wife rubbed her temples and grimaced. ‘Take Robbie to bed. I simply can’t take his grizzling any more.’

‘Yes, ma’am,’ the maid replied and shepherded the child out of the parlour with a quick apologetic smile at Caleb.

The husband and wife turned back to their meal.

‘Come on, dear, eat up,’ the husband said. ‘It’s been a long day.’

The woman pushed the food around her plate and stared at it with distaste. ‘I’m sorry, I have a terrible headache. Forgive me, but I will retire for the night.’

She pushed back her chair and Caleb watched her unsteady progress through to the accommodation in the back rooms. Something about her high colour and bright eyes made him uneasy.

Her husband caught Caleb’s glance and shrugged. ‘It’s probably something we ate last night,’ he said. ‘Nothing a good night’s sleep won’t mend.’

Caleb nodded and looked down at the gristly remains of his own dinner, congealing on the tin plate. ‘Indeed, sir,’ he agreed. ‘It is no surprise more of us don’t succumb.’

But he watched the door through which the woman had gone with a troubled feeling that something more than just a queasy stomach ailed her.

Caleb woke to the patter of rain on the tin roof. He lay on the bunk bed with his hands behind his head. Shady Creek stood at the crossroads. One path led to Melbourne and onto the western goldfields and the other path led back to Maiden’s Creek. To take that step down the path to Melbourne would take him away from Maiden’s Creek, from Adelaide.

The old restlessness tugged at him and he pushed thoughts of Adelaide to the back of his mind. Even if he didn’t find Hannigan at Creswick or beyond, there was always the lure of adventures in another part of the colony. Money to be made or lost at cards or even the prospect of that speck of gold at the bottom of a pan. Adelaide would be better off without him.

Caleb swung his feet off the bed and scratched his chin. He would push on to Buneep, the next major town on the road to Melbourne, when the weather cleared.