The Gold Seekers (54 page)

“Yes,” she admitted huskily, the brave pretense at an end. “Yes, and this letter is from him, Johnny. He wrote it the— the night before, and he sent a sketch for you.” She gave him the sketch, her hand shaking, and, suddenly unable to keep it to herself any longer, she told him of her dream.

Johnny listened gravely. “Will may not be dead, you know,” he offered in an attempt to console her.

“But the paper said—”

“The paper did not have a detailed list of casualties when that report was published, Jenny. It hadn’t come through then. It—” Johnny broke off, smothering an exclamation. “But the mail’s in—Will’s letter came in the mail, for God’s sake! The full casualty lists will have come in the mail, too, I’m pretty sure. I’ll go to the office and find out. Don’t despair yet. Just wait here—I’ll be back right away if there’s any news, I promise you.”

Jenny waited, the letter in her hand, staring out, as she so often did, at the sun-dappled waters of Elizabeth Bay. The memory of her dream returned, so vividly that she turned away from the window, blinded by tears. And then Johnny was back. She heard his footsteps in the hall and then his

voice, calling her, and the dream vanished as swiftly and suddenly as if it had never been.

“The lists have come in,” Johnny told her, and he was smiling. “Will’s reported severely wounded and in a hospital at Scutari. But he’s alive, Jenny!”

“Alive?” Jenny echoed, scarcely able to believe that it could be true. “Oh, Johnny, are you sure?”

“His name’s there in black and white,” her brother assured her. “And I met the judge, his father, who had come to the Herald office on the same quest as myself. He told me that he intended to use all the influence at his command to have Will granted a passage back to the colony. He’ll be home before you know it, little sister!”

“When this is over, I’ll come home, ” William had written. “Please wait until I come to you. …” And he had said that he loved her… .

Jenny’s eyes were shining as she looked up to meet her brother’s gaze.

“I shall be waiting for him,” she whispered softly. “However long it is.”