Meadows, having the postmaster at Farnborough under his thumb, read all George’s letters to Susan before they were delivered.  As long as George was in difficulties—­and the thousand pounds seemed as far off as ever until Tom Robinson struck gold and shared the luck with his partner—­the letters gave Meadows no uneasiness.  With the discovery of gold he decided Susan must hear no more from her lover, and that Fielding must not return.  By this time, old Merton was heavily in debt to Meadows, and saw escape from bankruptcy only in Meadows becoming his son-in-law, while Susan was kindly disposed to Meadows because he said nothing of love, and was willing to talk about Australia.

Meadows confided his plan to Peter Crawley.

“My plan has two hands; I must be one, you the other. I work thus:  I stop all letters from him to her.  Presently comes a letter from Australia telling how George Fielding has made his fortune and married a girl out there.  She won’t believe it at first, perhaps, but when she gets no more letters from him she will.  Of course, I shall never mention his name, but I make one of my tools hang gaol over old Merton.  Susan thinks George married.  I strike upon her pique and her father’s distress.  I ask him for his daughter; offer to pay my father-in-law’s debts and start him afresh.  Susan likes me already.  She will say no, perhaps, three or four times, but the fifth she will say yes.  Crawley, the day that John and Susan Meadows walk out of church man and wife I put a thousand pounds into your hand and set you up in any business you like; in any honest business, that is.  But suppose, Crawley, while I am working, this George Fielding were to come home with money in both pockets?”

“He would kick it all down in a moment.”

“Crawley, George Fielding must not come back this year with a thousand pounds.  That paper will prevent him; it is a paper of instructions.  My very brains lie in that paper; put it in your pocket.  You are going a journey, and you will draw on me for one hundred pounds per month.”

“When am I to start, sir?  Where am I to go to?”

“To-morrow morning.  To Australia.”

A dead silence on both sides followed these words, as the two colourless faces looked into one another’s eyes across the table.

To Australia Peter Crawley went, and with half-a-dozen of the most villainous ruffians on earth in his pay, it seemed impossible for Fielding and Robinson to escape.  But here the ex-thief’s alertness came to George Fielding’s aid, and the two men managed to get the better of all the robbers and assassins who attacked their tent.  Robinson, in fact, not only saved his own and his partner’s lives, by common consent he was elected captain at the gold-diggings, and by his authority some sort of law and order were established throughout the camp, and all thefts were heavily punished.

The finding of a large nugget by Robinson ended gold-digging for these two men.  The nugget was taken to Sydney and fetched L3,800, and when Crawley, who had pursued them from the camp, reached the city, he found they had already sailed for England.