Robbery under Arms
 A Story of Life and Adventure in the Bush and in the Australian Goldfields

ROBBERY UNDER ARMS

A Story of Life and Adventure in the Bush and in the Goldfields of

Australia

By Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood

An Australian writer. 1826-1915.

Author of 'The Miner's Right', 'The Squatter's Dream', 'A Colonial

Reformer', etc.

[Note on text: Italicized words or phrases are capitalised. Some obvious

errors have been corrected, as noted at the end of the text.]

Preface to New Edition

I dedicate this 'ower true tale' of the wilder aspects of Australian

life to my old comrade R. Murray Smith, late Agent-General in London for

the colony of Victoria, with hearty thanks for the time and trouble he

has devoted to its publication. I trust it will do no discredit to the

rising reputation of Australian romance. But though presented in the

guise of fiction, this chronicle of the Marston family must not be

set down by the reader as wholly fanciful or exaggerated. Much of the

narrative is literally true, as can be verified by official records.

A lifelong residence in Australia may be accepted as a guarantee

for fidelity as to local colour and descriptive detail. I take this

opportunity of acknowledging the prompt and liberal recognition of the

tale by the proprietors of the 'Sydney Mail', but for which it might

never have seen the light.

ROLF BOLDREWOOD.

117 Collins Street West,

Melbourne, 12th December 1888.

ROBBERY UNDER ARMS

Chapter 1

My name's Dick Marston, Sydney-side native. I'm twenty-nine years old,

six feet in my stocking soles, and thirteen stone weight. Pretty strong

and active with it, so they say. I don't want to blow--not here, any

road--but it takes a good man to put me on my back, or stand up to me

with the gloves, or the naked mauleys. I can ride anything--anything

that ever was lapped in horsehide--swim like a musk-duck, and track like

a Myall blackfellow. Most things that a man can do I'm up to, and that's

all about it. As I lift myself now I can feel the muscle swell on my arm

like a cricket ball, in spite of the--well, in spite of everything.

The morning sun comes shining through the window bars; and ever since he

was up have I been cursing the daylight, cursing myself, and them that

brought me into the world. Did I curse mother, and the hour I was born

into this miserable life?

Why should I curse the day? Why do I lie here, groaning; yes, crying

like a child, and beating my head against the stone floor? I am not mad,

though I am shut up in a cell. No. Better for me if I was. But it's all

up now; there's no get away this time; and I, Dick Marston, as strong as

a bullock, as active as a rock-wallaby, chock-full of life and spirits

and health, have been tried for bush-ranging--robbery under arms they

call it--and though the blood runs through my veins like the water in

the mountain creeks, and every bit of bone and sinew is as sound as the

day I was born, I must die on the gallows this day month.

Die--die--yes, die; be strung up like a dog, as they say. I'm blessed

if ever I did know of a dog being hanged, though, if it comes to that,

a shot or a bait generally makes an end of 'em in this country. Ha, ha!

Did I laugh? What a rum thing it is that a man should have a laugh in

him when he's only got twenty-nine days more to live--a day for every

year of my life. Well, laughing or crying, this is what it has come to

at last. All the drinking and recklessness; the flash talk and the idle

ways; the merry cross-country rides that we used to have, night or

day, it made no odds to us; every man well mounted, as like as not on a

racehorse in training taken out of his stable within the week; the sharp

brushes with the police, when now and then a man was wounded on each

side, but no one killed. That came later on, worse luck. The jolly

sprees we used to have in the bush townships, where we chucked our money

about like gentlemen, where all the girls had a smile and a kind word

for a lot of game upstanding chaps, that acted like men, if they did

keep the road a little lively. Our 'bush telegraphs' were safe to let

us know when the 'traps' were closing in on us, and then--why the coach

would be 'stuck up' a hundred miles away, in a different direction,

within twenty-four hours. Marston's gang again! The police are in

pursuit! That's what we'd see in the papers. We had 'em sent to us

regular; besides having the pick of 'em when we cut open the mail bags.

And now--that chain rubbed a sore, curse it!--all that racket's over.

It's more than hard to die in this settled, infernal, fixed sort of way,

like a bullock in the killing-yard, all ready to be 'pithed'. I used to

pity them when I was a boy, walking round the yard, pushing their noses

through the rails, trying for a likely place to jump, stamping and

pawing and roaring and knocking their heads against the heavy close

rails, with misery and rage in their eyes, till their time was up.

Nobody told THEM beforehand, though!

Have I and the likes of me ever felt much the same, I wonder, shut up

in a pen like this, with the rails up, and not a place a rat could creep

through, waiting till our killing time was come? The poor devils of

steers have never done anything but ramble off the run now and again,

while we--but it's too late to think of that. It IS hard. There's no

saying it isn't; no, nor thinking what a fool, what a blind, stupid,

thundering idiot a fellow's been, to laugh at the steady working life

that would have helped him up, bit by bit, to a good farm, a good wife,

and innocent little kids about him, like that chap, George Storefield,

that came to see me last week. He was real rightdown sorry for me,

I could tell, though Jim and I used to laugh at him, and call him a

regular old crawler of a milker's calf in the old days. The tears came

into his eyes reg'lar like a woman as he gave my hand a squeeze and

turned his head away. We was little chaps together, you know. A man

always feels that, you know. And old George, he'll go back--a fifty-mile

ride, but what's that on a good horse? He'll be late home, but he can

cross the rock ford the short way over the creek. I can see him turn his

horse loose at the garden-gate, and walk through the quinces that lead

up to the cottage, with his saddle on his arm. Can't I see it all, as

plain as if I was there?

And his wife and the young 'uns 'll run out when they hear father's

horse, and want to hear all the news. When he goes in there's his meal

tidy and decent waiting for him, while he tells them about the poor chap

he's been to see as is to be scragged next month. Ha! ha! what a rum

joke it is, isn't it?

And then he'll go out in the verandah, with the roses growin' all over

the posts and smellin' sweet in the cool night air. After that he'll

have his smoke, and sit there thinkin' about me, perhaps, and old days,

and what not, till all hours--till his wife comes and fetches him in.

And here I lie--my God! why didn't they knock me on the head when I was

born, like a lamb in a dry season, or a blind puppy--blind enough, God

knows! They do so in some countries, if the books say true, and what a

hell of misery that must save some people from!

Well, it's done now, and there's no get away. I may as well make the

best of it. A sergeant of police was shot in our last scrimmage, and

they must fit some one over that. It's only natural. He was rash, or

Starlight would never have dropped him that day. Not if he'd been sober

either. We'd been drinking all night at that Willow Tree shanty. Bad

grog, too! When a man's half drunk he's fit for any devilment that

comes before him. Drink! How do you think a chap that's taken to the

bush--regularly turned out, I mean, with a price on his head, and a

fire burning in his heart night and day--can stand his life if he don't

drink? When he thinks of what he might have been, and what he is! Why,

nearly every man he meets is paid to run him down, or trap him some way

like a stray dog that's taken to sheep-killin'. He knows a score of men,

and women too, that are only looking out for a chance to sell his blood

on the quiet and pouch the money. Do you think that makes a chap mad

and miserable, and tired of his life, or not? And if a drop of grog

will take him right out of his wretched self for a bit why shouldn't he

drink? People don't know what they are talking about. Why, he is that

miserable that he wonders why he don't hang himself, and save the

Government all the trouble; and if a few nobblers make him feel as if

he might have some good chances yet, and that it doesn't so much matter

after all, why shouldn't he drink?

He does drink, of course; every miserable man, and a good many women as

have something to fear or repent of, drink. The worst of it is that

too much of it brings on the 'horrors', and then the devil, instead of

giving you a jog now and then, sends one of his imps to grin in your

face and pull your heartstrings all day and all night long. By George,

I'm getting clever--too clever, altogether, I think. If I could forget

for one moment, in the middle of all the nonsense, that I was to die

on Thursday three weeks! die on Thursday three weeks! die on Thursday!

That's the way the time runs in my ears like a chime of bells. But it's

all mere bosh I've been reading these long six months I've been chained

up here--after I was committed for trial. When I came out of the

hospital after curing me of that wound--for I was hit bad by that black

tracker--they gave me some books to read for fear I'd go mad and cheat

the hangman. I was always fond of reading, and many a night I've read to

poor old mother and Aileen before I left the old place. I was that weak

and low, after I took the turn, and I felt glad to get a book to take

me away from sitting, staring, and blinking at nothing by the hour

together. It was all very well then; I was too weak to think much. But

when I began to get well again I kept always coming across something in

the book that made me groan or cry out, as if some one had stuck a knife

in me. A dark chap did once--through the ribs--it didn't feel so bad, a

little sharpish at first; why didn't he aim a bit higher? He never was

no good, even at that. As I was saying, there'd be something about a

horse, or the country, or the spring weather--it's just coming in now,

and the Indian corn's shooting after the rain, and I'LL never see it; or

they'd put in a bit about the cows walking through the river in the hot

summer afternoons; or they'd go describing about a girl, until I began

to think of sister Aileen again; then I'd run my head against the wall,

or do something like a madman, and they'd stop the books for a week; and

I'd be as miserable as a bandicoot, worse and worse a lot, with all

the devil's tricks and bad thoughts in my head, and nothing to put them

away.

I must either kill myself, or get something to fill up my time till

the day--yes, the day comes. I've always been a middling writer, tho' I

can't say much for the grammar, and spelling, and that, but I'll put it

all down, from the beginning to the end, and maybe it'll save some other

unfortunate young chap from pulling back like a colt when he's first

roped, setting himself against everything in the way of proper breaking,

making a fool of himself generally, and choking himself down, as I've

done.

The gaoler--he looks hard--he has to do that, there's more than one

or two within here that would have him by the throat, with his heart's

blood running, in half a minute, if they had their way, and the warder

was off guard. He knows that very well. But he's not a bad-hearted chap.

'You can have books, or paper and pens, anything you like,' he said,

'you unfortunate young beggar, until you're turned off.'

'If I'd only had you to see after me when I was young,' says I----

'Come; don't whine,' he said, then he burst out laughing. 'You didn't

mean it, I see. I ought to have known better. You're not one of that

sort, and I like you all the better for it.'

. . . . .

Well, here goes. Lots of pens, a big bottle of ink, and ever so much

foolscap paper, the right sort for me, or I shouldn't have been here.

I'm blessed if it doesn't look as if I was going to write copies again.

Don't I remember how I used to go to school in old times; the rides

there and back on the old pony; and pretty little Grace Storefield that

I was so fond of, and used to show her how to do her lessons. I believe

I learned more that way than if I'd had only myself to think about.

There was another girl, the daughter of the poundkeeper, that I wanted

her to beat; and the way we both worked, and I coached her up, was a

caution. And she did get above her in her class. How proud we were! She

gave me a kiss, too, and a bit of her hair. Poor Gracey! I wonder where

she is now, and what she'd think if she saw me here to-day. If I could

have looked ahead, and seen myself--chained now like a dog, and going to

die a dog's death this day month!

Anyhow, I must make a start. How do people begin when they set to work

to write their own sayings and doings? There's been a deal more doing

than talking in my life--it was the wrong sort--more's the pity.

Well, let's see; his parents were poor, but respectable. That's what

they always say. My parents were poor, and mother was as good a soul as

ever broke bread, and wouldn't have taken a shilling's worth that wasn't

her own if she'd been starving. But as for father, he'd been a poacher

in England, a Lincolnshire man he was, and got sent out for it. He

wasn't much more than a boy, he said, and it was only for a hare or

two, which didn't seem much. But I begin to think, being able to see the

right of things a bit now, and having no bad grog inside of me to turn a

fellow's head upside down, as poaching must be something like cattle

and horse duffing--not the worst thing in the world itself, but mighty

likely to lead to it.

Dad had always been a hard-working, steady-going sort of chap, good at

most things, and like a lot more of the Government men, as the convicts

were always called round our part, he saved some money as soon as he had

done his time, and married mother, who was a simple emigrant girl

just out from Ireland. Father was a square-built, good-looking chap,

I believe, then; not so tall as I am by three inches, but wonderfully

strong and quick on his pins. They did say as he could hammer any man

in the district before he got old and stiff. I never saw him 'shape' but

once, and then he rolled into a man big enough to eat him, and polished

him off in a way that showed me--though I was a bit of a boy then--that

he'd been at the game before. He didn't ride so bad either, though he

hadn't had much of it where he came from; but he was afraid of nothing,

and had a quiet way with colts. He could make pretty good play in thick

country, and ride a roughish horse, too.

Well, our farm was on a good little flat, with a big mountain in front,

and a scrubby, rangy country at the back for miles. People often asked

him why he chose such a place. 'It suits me,' he used to say, with a

laugh, and talk of something else. We could only raise about enough corn

and potatoes, in a general way, for ourselves from the flat; but there

were other chances and pickings which helped to make the pot boil, and

them we'd have been a deal better without.

First of all, though our cultivation paddock was small, and the good

land seemed squeezed in between the hills, there was a narrow tract up

the creek, and here it widened out into a large well-grassed flat. This

was where our cattle ran, for, of course, we had a team of workers and

a few milkers when we came. No one ever took up a farm in those days

without a dray and a team, a year's rations, a few horses and milkers,

pigs and fowls, and a little furniture. They didn't collar a 40-acre

selection, as they do now--spend all their money in getting the land and

squat down as bare as robins--a man with his wife and children all

under a sheet of bark, nothing on their backs, and very little in their

bellies. However, some of them do pretty well, though they do say they

have to live on 'possums for a time. We didn't do much, in spite of our

grand start.

The flat was well enough, but there were other places in the gullies

beyond that that father had dropped upon when he was out shooting. He

was a tremendous chap for poking about on foot or on horseback, and

though he was an Englishman, he was what you call a born bushman. I

never saw any man almost as was his equal. Wherever he'd been once,

there he could take you to again; and what was more, if it was in the

dead of the night he could do it just the same. People said he was as

good as a blackfellow, but I never saw one that was as good as he was,

all round. In a strange country, too. That was what beat me--he'd know

the way the creek run, and noticed when the cattle headed to camp, and

a lot of things that other people couldn't see, or if they did, couldn't

remember again. He was a great man for solitary walks, too--he and an

old dog he had, called Crib, a cross-bred mongrel-looking brute, most

like what they call a lurcher in England, father said. Anyhow, he could

do most anything but talk. He could bite to some purpose, drive cattle

or sheep, catch a kangaroo, if it wasn't a regular flyer, fight like a

bulldog, and swim like a retriever, track anything, and fetch and carry,

but bark he wouldn't. He'd stand and look at dad as if he worshipped

him, and he'd make him some sign and off he'd go like a child that's got

a message. Why he was so fond of the old man we boys couldn't make out.

We were afraid of him, and as far as we could see he never patted or

made much of Crib. He thrashed him unmerciful as he did us boys. Still

the dog was that fond of him you'd think he'd like to die for him there

and then. But dogs are not like boys, or men either--better, perhaps.

Well, we were all born at the hut by the creek, I suppose, for I

remember it as soon as I could remember anything. It was a snug hut

enough, for father was a good bush carpenter, and didn't turn his

back to any one for splitting and fencing, hut-building and

shingle-splitting; he had had a year or two at sawing, too, but after

he was married he dropped that. But I've heard mother say that he took

great pride in the hut when he brought her to it first, and said it was

the best-built hut within fifty miles. He split every slab, cut every

post and wallplate and rafter himself, with a man to help him at odd

times; and after the frame was up, and the bark on the roof, he camped

underneath and finished every bit of it--chimney, flooring, doors,

windows, and partitions--by himself. Then he dug up a little garden

in front, and planted a dozen or two peaches and quinces in it; put a

couple of roses--a red and a white one--by the posts of the verandah,

and it was all ready for his pretty Norah, as she says he used to call

her then. If I've heard her tell about the garden and the quince trees

and the two roses once, I've heard her tell it a hundred times. Poor

mother! we used to get round her--Aileen, and Jim, and I--and say, 'Tell

us about the garden, mother.' She'd never refuse; those were her happy

days, she always said. She used to cry afterwards--nearly always.

The first thing almost that I can remember was riding the old pony,

'Possum, out to bring in the milkers. Father was away somewhere, so

mother took us all out and put me on the pony, and let me have a

whip. Aileen walked alongside, and very proud I was. My legs stuck out

straight on the old pony's fat back. Mother had ridden him up when she

came--the first horse she ever rode, she said. He was a quiet little old

roan, with a bright eye and legs like gate-posts, but he never fell down

with us boys, for all that. If we fell off he stopped still and began

to feed, so that he suited us all to pieces. We soon got sharp enough

to flail him along with a quince stick, and we used to bring up the

milkers, I expect, a good deal faster than was good for them. After a

bit we could milk, leg-rope, and bail up for ourselves, and help dad

brand the calves, which began to come pretty thick. There were only

three of us children--my brother Jim, who was two years younger than I

was, and then Aileen, who was four years behind him. I know we were both

able to nurse the baby a while after she came, and neither of us wanted

better fun than to be allowed to watch her, or rock the cradle, or as a

great treat to carry her a few steps. Somehow we was that fond and proud

of her from the first that we'd have done anything in the world for her.

And so we would now--I was going to say--but that poor Jim lies under a

forest oak on a sandhill, and I--well, I'm here, and if I'd listened

to her advice I should have been a free man. A free man! How it sounds,

doesn't it? with the sun shining, and the blue sky over your head, and

the birds twittering, and the grass beneath your feet! I wonder if I

shall go mad before my time's up.

Mother was a Roman Catholic--most Irishwomen are; and dad was a

Protestant, if he was anything. However, that says nothing. People that

don't talk much about their religion, or follow it up at all, won't

change it for all that. So father, though mother tried him hard enough

when they were first married, wouldn't hear of turning, not if he was to

be killed for it, as I once heard him say. 'No!' he says, 'my father and

grandfather, and all the lot, was Church people, and so I shall live

and die. I don't know as it would make much matter to me, but such as

my notions is, I shall stick to 'em as long as the craft holds together.

You can bring up the girl in your own way; it's made a good woman of

you, or found you one, which is most likely, and so she may take her

chance. But I stand for Church and King, and so shall the boys, as sure

as my name's Ben Marston.'

Chapter 2

Father was one of those people that gets shut of a deal of trouble in

this world by always sticking to one thing. If he said he'd do this or

that he always did it and nothing else. As for turning him, a wild bull

half-way down a range was a likelier try-on. So nobody ever bothered him

after he'd once opened his mouth. They knew it was so much lost labour.

I sometimes thought Aileen was a bit like him in her way of sticking to

things. But then she was always right, you see.

So that clinched it. Mother gave in like a wise woman, as she was. The

clergyman from Bargo came one day and christened me and Jim--made one

job of it. But mother took Aileen herself in the spring cart all the way

to the township and had her christened in the chapel, in the middle of

the service all right and regular, by Father Roche.

There's good and bad of every sort, and I've met plenty that were no

chop of all churches; but if Father Roche, or Father anybody else, had

any hand in making mother and Aileen half as good as they were, I'd turn

to-morrow, if I ever got out again. I don't suppose it was the religion

that made much difference in our case, for Patsey Daly and his three

brothers, that lived on the creek higher up, were as much on the cross

as men could be, and many a time I've seen them ride to chapel and

attend mass, and look as if they'd never seen a 'clearskin' in their

lives. Patsey was hanged afterwards for bush-ranging and gold robbery,

and he had more than one man's blood to answer for. Now we weren't like

that; we never troubled the church one way or the other. We knew we were

doing what we oughtn't to do, and scorned to look pious and keep two

faces under one hood.

By degrees we all grew older, began to be active and able to do half a

man's work. We learned to ride pretty well--at least, that is we could

ride a bare-backed horse at full gallop through timber or down a range;

could back a colt just caught and have him as quiet as an old cow in

a week. We could use the axe and the cross-cut saw, for father dropped

that sort of work himself, and made Jim and I do all the rough jobs of

mending the fences, getting firewood, milking the cows, and, after a

bit, ploughing the bit of flat we kept in cultivation.

Jim and I, when we were fifteen and thirteen--he was bigger for his

age than I was, and so near my own strength that I didn't care about

touching him--were the smartest lads on the creek, father said--he

didn't often praise us, either. We had often ridden over to help at the

muster of the large cattle stations that were on the side of the range,

and not more than twenty or thirty miles from us.

Some of our young stock used to stray among the squatters' cattle, and

we liked attending the muster because there was plenty of galloping

about and cutting out, and fun in the men's hut at night, and often a

half-crown or so for helping some one away with a big mob of cattle or

a lot for the pound. Father didn't go himself, and I used to notice that

whenever we came up and said we were Ben Marston's boys both master and

super looked rather glum, and then appeared not to think any more about

it. I heard the owner of one of these stations say to his managing man,

'Pity, isn't it? fine boys, too.' I didn't understand what they meant. I

do now.

We could do a few things besides riding, because, as I told you before,

we had been to a bit of a school kept by an old chap that had once seen

better days, that lived three miles off, near a little bush township.

This village, like most of these places, had a public-house and a

blacksmith's shop. That was about all. The publican kept the store, and

managed pretty well to get hold of all the money that was made by the

people round about, that is of those that were 'good drinking men'. He

had half-a-dozen children, and, though he was not up to much, he wasn't

that bad that he didn't want his children to have the chance of being

better than himself. I've seen a good many crooked people in my day, but

very few that, though they'd given themselves up as a bad job, didn't

hope a bit that their youngsters mightn't take after them. Curious,

isn't it? But it is true, I can tell you. So Lammerby, the publican,

though he was a greedy, sly sort of fellow, that bought things he knew

were stolen, and lent out money and charged everybody two prices for the

things he sold 'em, didn't like the thought of his children growing up

like Myall cattle, as he said himself, and so he fished out this old Mr.

Howard, that had been a friend or a victim or some kind of pal of his in

old times, near Sydney, and got him to come and keep school.

He was a curious man, this Mr. Howard. What he had been or done none

of us ever knew, but he spoke up to one of the squatters that said

something sharp to him one day in a way that showed us boys that he

thought himself as good as he was. And he stood up straight and looked

him in the face, till we hardly could think he was the same man that

was so bent and shambling and broken-down-looking most times. He used

to live in a little hut in the township all by himself. It was just big

enough to hold him and us at our lessons. He had his dinner at the inn,

along with Mr. and Mrs. Lammerby. She was always kind to him, and made

him puddings and things when he was ill. He was pretty often ill, and

then he'd hear us our lessons at the bedside, and make a short day of

it.

Mostly he drank nothing but tea. He used to smoke a good deal out of a

big meerschaum pipe with figures on it that he used to show us when he

was in a good humour. But two or three times a year he used to set-to

and drink for a week, and then school was left off till he was right.

We didn't think much of that. Everybody, almost, that we knew did the

same--all the men--nearly all, that is--and some of the women--not

mother, though; she wouldn't have touched a drop of wine or spirits to

save her life, and never did to her dying day. We just thought of it

as if they'd got a touch of fever or sunstroke, or broke a rib or

something. They'd get over it in a week or two, and be all right again.

All the same, poor old Mr. Howard wasn't always on the booze, not by

any manner of means. He never touched a drop of anything, not even

ginger-beer, while he was straight, and he kept us all going from nine

o'clock in the morning till three in the afternoon, summer and winter,

for more than six years. Then he died, poor old chap--found dead in his

bed one morning. Many a basting he gave me and Jim with an old malacca

cane he had with a silver knob to it. We were all pretty frightened of

him. He'd say to me and Jim and the other boys, 'It's the best chance

of making men of yourselves you ever had, if you only knew it. You'll be

rich farmers or settlers, perhaps magistrates, one of these days--that

is, if you're not hanged. It's you, I mean,' he'd say, pointing to me

and Jim and the Dalys; 'I believe some of you WILL be hanged unless

you change a good deal. It's cold blood and bad blood that runs in your

veins, and you'll come to earn the wages of sin some day. It's a strange

thing,' he used to say, as if he was talking to himself, 'that the girls

are so good, while the boys are delivered over to the Evil One, except a

case here and there. Look at Mary Darcy and Jane Lammerby, and my

little pet Aileen here. I defy any village in Britain to turn out such

girls--plenty of rosy-cheeked gigglers--but the natural refinement and

intelligence of these little damsels astonishes me.'

Well, the old man died suddenly, as I said, and we were all very sorry,

and the school was broken up. But he had taught us all to write fairly

and to keep accounts, to read and spell decently, and to know a little

geography. It wasn't a great deal, but what we knew we knew well, and

I often think of what he said, now it's too late, we ought to have made

better use of it. After school broke up father said Jim and I knew quite

as much as was likely to be any good to us, and we must work for our

living like other people. We'd always done a pretty fair share of that,

and our hands were hard with using the axe and the spade, let alone

holding the plough at odd times and harrowing, helping father to kill

and brand, and a lot of other things, besides getting up while the stars

were in the sky so as to get the cows milked early, before it was time

to go to school.

All this time we had lived in a free kind of way--we wanted for nothing.

We had plenty of good beef, and a calf now and then. About this time I

began to wonder how it was that so many cattle and horses passed through

father's hands, and what became of them.

I hadn't lived all my life on Rocky Creek, and among some of the

smartest hands in that line that old New South Wales ever bred, without

knowing what 'clearskins' and 'cross' beasts meant, and being well aware

that our brand was often put on a calf that no cow of ours ever suckled.

Don't I remember well the first calf I ever helped to put our letters

on? I've often wished I'd defied father, then taken my licking, and

bolted away from home. It's that very calf and the things it led to

that's helped to put me where I am!

Just as I sit here, and these cursed irons rattle whenever I move my

feet, I can see that very evening, and father and the old dog with a

little mob of our crawling cattle and half-a-dozen head of strangers,

cows and calves, and a fat little steer coming through the scrub to the

old stockyard.

It was an awkward place for a yard, people used to say; scrubby and

stony all round, a blind sort of hole--you couldn't see till you were

right on the top of it. But there was a 'wing' ran out a good way

through the scrub--there's no better guide to a yard like that--and

there was a sort of track cattle followed easy enough once you were

round the hill. Anyhow, between father and the dog and the old mare he

always rode, very few beasts ever broke away.

These strange cattle had been driven a good way, I could see. The

cows and calves looked done up, and the steer's tongue was out--it was

hottish weather; the old dog had been 'heeling' him up too, for he was

bleeding up to the hocks, and the end of his tail was bitten off. He

was a savage old wretch was Crib. Like all dogs that never bark--and men

too--his bite was all the worse.

'Go and get the brands--confound you--don't stand there frightening the

cattle,' says father, as the tired cattle, after smelling and jostling a

bit, rushed into the yard. 'You, Jim, make a fire, and look sharp about

it. I want to brand old Polly's calf and another or two.' Father came

down to the hut while the brands were getting ready, and began to look

at the harness-cask, which stood in a little back skillion. It was

pretty empty; we had been living on eggs, bacon, and bread and butter

for a week.

'Oh, mother! there's such a pretty red calf in the yard,' I said, 'with

a star and a white spot on the flank; and there's a yellow steer fat

enough to kill!'

'What!' said mother, turning round and looking at father with her eyes

staring--a sort of dark blue they were--people used to say mine and

Jim's were the same colour--and her brown hair pushed back off her face,

as if she was looking at a ghost. 'Is it doing that again you are,

after all you promised me, and you so nearly caught--after the last one?

Didn't I go on my knees to ye to ask ye to drop it and lead a good

life, and didn't ye tell me ye'd never do the like again? And the poor

innocent children, too, I wonder ye've the heart to do it.'

It came into my head now to wonder why the sergeant and two policemen

had come down from Bargo, very early in the morning, about three months

ago, and asked father to show them the beef in his cask, and the hide

belonging to it. I wondered at the time the beast was killed why father

made the hide into a rope, and before he did that had cut out the brand

and dropped it into a hot fire. The police saw a hide with our brand on,

all right--killed about a fortnight. They didn't know it had been taken

off a cancered bullock, and that father took the trouble to 'stick' him

and bleed him before he took the hide off, so as it shouldn't look dark.

Father certainly knew most things in the way of working on the cross.

I can see now he'd have made his money a deal easier, and no trouble of

mind, if he'd only chosen to go straight.

When mother said this, father looked at her for a bit as if he was sorry

for it; then he straightened himself up, and an ugly look came into his

face as he growled out--

'You mind your own business; we must live as well as other people.

There's squatters here that does as bad. They're just like the squires

at home; think a poor man hasn't a right to live. You bring the brand

and look alive, Dick, or I'll sharpen ye up a bit.'

The brand was in the corner, but mother got between me and it, and

stretched out her hand to father as if to stop me and him.

'In God's name,' she cried out, 'aren't ye satisfied with losing your

own soul and bringing disgrace upon your family, but ye must be the ruin

of your innocent children? Don't touch the brand, Dick!'

But father wasn't a man to be crossed, and what made it worse he had

a couple of glasses of bad grog in him. There was an old villain of a

shanty-keeper that lived on a back creek. He'd been there as he came

by and had a glass or two. He had a regular savage temper, father had,

though he was quiet enough and not bad to us when he was right. But the

grog always spoiled him.

He gave poor mother a shove which sent her reeling against the wall,

where she fell down and hit her head against the stool, and lay there.

Aileen, sitting down in the corner, turned white, and began to cry,

while father catches me a box on the ear which sends me kicking, picks

up the brand out of the corner, and walks out, with me after him.

I think if I'd been another year or so older I'd have struck back--I

felt that savage about poor mother that I could have gone at him

myself--but we had been too long used to do everything he told us; and

somehow, even if a chap's father's a bad one, he don't seem like other

men to him. So, as Jim had lighted the fire, we branded the little red

heifer calf first--a fine fat six-months-old nugget she was--and then

three bull calves, all strangers, and then Polly's calf, I suppose just

for a blind. Jim and I knew the four calves were all strangers, but we

didn't know the brands of the mothers; they all seemed different.

After this all was made right to kill a beast. The gallows was ready

rigged in a corner of the yard; father brought his gun and shot the

yellow steer. The calves were put into our calf-pen--Polly's and

all--and all the cows turned out to go where they liked.

We helped father to skin and hang up the beast, and pretty late it was

when we finished. Mother had laid us out our tea and gone to bed with

Aileen. We had ours and then went to bed. Father sat outside and smoked

in the starlight. Hours after I woke up and heard mother crying. Before

daylight we were up again, and the steer was cut up and salted and in

the harness-cask soon after sunrise. His head and feet were all popped

into a big pot where we used to make soup for the pigs, and by the time

it had been boiling an hour or two there was no fear of any one swearing

to the yellow steer by 'head-mark'.

We had a hearty breakfast off the 'skirt', but mother wouldn't touch a

bit, nor let Aileen take any; she took nothing but a bit of bread and

a cup of tea, and sat there looking miserable and downcast. Father said

nothing, but sat very dark-looking, and ate his food as if nothing was

the matter. After breakfast he took his mare, the old dog followed;

there was no need to whistle for him--it's my belief he knew more than

many a Christian--and away they went. Father didn't come home for

a week--he had got into the habit of staying away for days and days

together. Then things went on the old way.

Chapter 3

So the years went on--slow enough they seemed to us sometimes--the green

winters, pretty cold, I tell you, with frost and hail-storms, and the

long hot summers. We were not called boys any longer, except by mother

and Aileen, but took our places among the men of the district. We lived

mostly at home, in the old way; sometimes working pretty hard, sometimes

doing very little. When the cows were milked and the wood chopped, there

was nothing to do for the rest of the day. The creek was that close that

mother used to go and dip the bucket into it herself, when she wanted

one, from a little wooden step above the clear reedy waterhole.

Now and then we used to dig in the garden. There was reaping and

corn-pulling and husking for part of the year; but often, for weeks at

a time, there was next to nothing to do. No hunting worth much--we were

sick of kangarooing, like the dogs themselves, that as they grew old

would run a little way and then pull up if a mob came, jump, jump, past

them. No shooting, except a few ducks and pigeons. Father used to laugh

at the shooting in this country, and say they'd never have poachers

here--the game wasn't worth it. No fishing, except an odd codfish, in

the deepest waterholes; and you might sit half a day without a bite.

Now this was very bad for us boys. Lads want plenty of work, and a

little play now and then to keep them straight. If there's none, they'll

make it; and you can't tell how far they'll go when they once start.

Well, Jim and I used to get our horses and ride off quietly in the

afternoon, as if we were going after cattle; but, in reality, as soon

as we were out of sight of mother, to ride over to that old villain,

Grimes, the shanty-keeper, where we met the young Dalys, and others of

the same sort--talked a good deal of nonsense and gossip; what was worse

played at all-fours and euchre, which we had learned from an American

harvest hand, at one of the large farms.

Besides playing for money, which put us rather into trouble sometimes,

as we couldn't always find a half-crown if we lost it, we learned

another bad habit, and that was to drink spirits. What burning nasty

stuff I thought it at first; and so did we all! But every one wanted to

be thought a man, and up to all kinds of wickedness, so we used to make

it a point of drinking our nobbler, and sometimes treating the others

twice, if we had cash.

There was another family that lived a couple of miles off, higher up the

creek, and we had always been good friends with them, though they

never came to our house, and only we boys went to theirs. They were the

parents of the little girl that went to school with us, and a boy who

was a year older than me.

Their father had been a gardener at home, and he married a native girl

who was born somewhere about the Hawkesbury, near Windsor. Her father

had been a farmer, and many a time she told us how sorry she was to go

away from the old place, and what fine corn and pumpkins they grew; and

how they had a church at Windsor, and used to take their hay and fruit

and potatoes to Sydney, and what a grand place Sydney was, with stone

buildings called markets for people to sell fruit and vegetables and

poultry in; and how you could walk down into Lower George Street and see

Sydney Harbour, a great shining salt-water plain, a thousand times as

big as the biggest waterhole, with ships and boats and sailors, and

every kind of strange thing upon it.

Mrs. Storefield was pretty fond of talking, and she was always fond of

me, because once when she was out after the cows, and her man was away,

and she had left Grace at home, the little thing crawled down to the

waterhole and tumbled in. I happened to be riding up with a message for

mother, to borrow some soap, when I heard a little cry like a lamb's,

and there was poor little Gracey struggling in the water like a drowning

kitten, with her face under. Another minute or two would have finished

her, but I was off the old pony and into the water like a teal flapper.

I had her out in a second or two, and she gasped and cried a bit, but

soon came to, and when Mrs. Storefield came home she first cried over

her as if she would break her heart, and kissed her, and then she kissed

me, and said, 'Now, Dick Marston, you look here. Your mother's a good

woman, though simple; your father I don't like, and I hear many stories

about him that makes me think the less we ought to see of the lot of

you the better. But you've saved my child's life to-day, and I'll be a

friend and a mother to you as long as I live, even if you turn out bad,

and I'm rather afraid you will--you and Jim both--but it won't be my

fault for want of trying to keep you straight; and John and I will

be your kind and loving friends as long as we live, no matter what

happens.'

After that--it was strange enough--but I always took to the little

toddling thing that I'd pulled out of the water. I wasn't very big

myself, if it comes to that, and she seemed to have a feeling about it,

for she'd come to me every time I went there, and sit on my knee and

look at me with her big brown serious eyes--they were just the same

after she grew up--and talk to me in her little childish lingo. I

believe she knew all about it, for she used to say, 'Dick pull Gracey

out of water;' and then she'd throw her arms round my neck and kiss me,

and walk off to her mother. If I'd let her drown then, and tied a stone

round my neck and dropped through the reeds to the bottom of the big

waterhole, it would have been better for both of us.

When John came home he was nearly as bad as the old woman, and wanted to

give me a filly, but I wouldn't have it, boy as I was. I never cared for

money nor money's worth, and I was not going to be paid for picking a

kid out of the water.

George Storefield, Gracey's brother, was about my own age. He thought a

lot of what I'd done for her, and years afterwards I threatened to punch

his head if he said anything more about it. He laughed, and held out his

hand.

'You and I might have been better friends lately,' says he; 'but don't

you forget you've got another brother besides Jim--one that will stick

to you, too, fair weather or foul.'

I always had a great belief in George, though we didn't get on over

well, and often had fallings out. He was too steady and hardworking

altogether for Jim and me. He worked all day and every day, and saved

every penny he made. Catch him gaffing!--no, not for a sixpence. He

called the Dalys and Jacksons thieves and swindlers, who would be locked

up, or even hanged, some day, unless they mended themselves. As for

drinking a glass of grog, you might just as soon ask him to take a

little laudanum or arsenic.

'Why should I drink grog,' he used to say--'such stuff, too, as you

get at that old villain Grimes's--with a good appetite and a good

conscience? I'm afraid of no man; the police may come and live on my

ground for what I care. I work all day, have a read in the evening, and

sleep like a top when I turn in. What do I want more?'

'Oh, but you never see any life,' Jim said; 'you're just like an old

working bullock that walks up to the yoke in the morning and never stops

hauling till he's let go at night. This is a free country, and I don't

think a fellow was born for that kind of thing and nothing else.'

'This country's like any other country, Jim,' George would say, holding

up his head, and looking straight at him with his steady gray eyes; 'a

man must work and save when he's young if he don't want to be a beggar

or a slave when he's old. I believe in a man enjoying himself as well as

you do, but my notion of that is to have a good farm, well stocked and

paid for, by and by, and then to take it easy, perhaps when my back is a

little stiffer than it is now.'

'But a man must have a little fun when he is young,' I said. 'What's the

use of having money when you're old and rusty, and can't take pleasure

in anything?'

'A man needn't be so very old at forty,' he says then, 'and twenty

years' steady work will put all of us youngsters well up the ladder.

Besides, I don't call it fun getting half-drunk with a lot of

blackguards at a low pothouse or a shanty, listening to the stupid

talk and boasting lies of a pack of loafers and worse. They're fit for

nothing better; but you and Jim are. Now, look here, I've got a small

contract from Mr. Andrews for a lot of fencing stuff. It will pay us

wages and something over. If you like to go in with me, we'll go share

and share. I know what hands you both are at splitting and fencing. What

do you say?'

Jim, poor Jim, was inclined to take George's offer. He was that

good-hearted that a kind word would turn him any time. But I was put out

at his laying it down so about the Dalys and us shantying and gaffing,

and I do think now that some folks are born so as they can't do without

a taste of some sort of fun once in a way. I can't put it out clear, but

it ought to be fixed somehow for us chaps that haven't got the gift of

working all day and every day, but can do two days' work in one when

we like, that we should have our allowance of reasonable fun and

pleasure--that is, what we called pleasure, not what somebody thinks we

ought to take pleasure in. Anyway, I turned on George rather rough, and

I says, 'We're not good enough for the likes of you, Mr. Storefield.

It's very kind of you to think of us, but we'll take our own line and

you take yours.'

'I'm sorry for it, Dick, and more sorry that you take huff at an

old friend. All I want is to do you good, and act a friend's part.

Good-bye--some day you'll see it.'

'You're hard on George,' says Jim, 'there's no pleasing you to-day; one

would think there were lots of chaps fighting how to give us a lift.

Good-bye, George, old man; I'm sorry we can't wire in with you; we'd

soon knock out those posts and rails on the ironbark range.'

'You'd better stop, Jim, and take a hand in the deal,' says I (or,

rather, the devil, for I believe he gets inside a chap at times), 'and

then you and George can take a turn at local-preaching when you're cut

out. I'm off.' So without another word I jumped on to my horse and went

off down the hill, across the creek, and over the boulders the other

side, without much caring where I was going. The fact was, I felt I had

acted meanly in sneering at a man who only said what he did for my good;

and I wasn't at all sure that I hadn't made a breach between Gracey and

myself, and, though I had such a temper when it was roused that all the

world wouldn't have stopped me, every time I thought of not seeing that

girl again made my heart ache as if it would burst.

I was nearly home before I heard the clatter of a horse's feet, and Jim

rode up alongside of me. He was just the same as ever, with a smile on

his face. You didn't often see it without one.

I knew he had come after me, and had given up his own fancy for mine.

'I thought you were going to stay and turn good,' I said. 'Why didn't

you?'

'It might have been better for me if I had,' he said, 'but you know very

well, Dick, that whatever turns up, whether it's for good or evil, you

and I go together.'

We looked at one another for a moment. Our eyes met. We didn't say

anything; but we understood one another as well as if we had talked for

a week. We rode up to the door of our cottage without speaking. The sun

had set, and some of the stars had come out, early as it was, for it

was late autumn. Aileen was sitting on a bench in the verandah reading,

mother was working away as usual at something in the house. Mother

couldn't read or write, but you never caught her sitting with her hands

before her. Except when she was asleep I don't think she ever was quite

still.

Aileen ran out to us, and stood while we let go our horses, and brought

the saddles and bridles under the verandah.

'I'm glad you're come home for one thing,' she said. 'There is a message

from father. He wants you to meet him.'

'Who brought it?' I said.

'One of the Dalys--Patsey, I think.'

'All right,' said Jim, kissing her as he lifted her up in his great

strong arms. 'I must go in and have a gossip with the old woman. Aileen

can tell me after tea. I daresay it's not so good that it won't keep.'

Mother was that fond of both of us that I believe, as sure as I sit

here, she'd have put her head on the block, or died in any other way for

either of her boys, not because it was her duty, but glad and cheerful

like, to have saved us from death or disgrace. I think she was fonder

of us two than she was of Aileen. Mothers are generally fonder of their

sons. Why I never could see; and if she thought more of one than the

other it was Jim. He was the youngest, and he had that kind of

big, frolicsome, loving way with him, like a Newfoundland pup about

half-grown. I always used to think, somehow, nobody ever seemed to be

able to get into a pelter with Jim, not even father, and that was a

thing as some people couldn't be got to believe. As for mother and

Aileen, they were as fond of him as if he'd been a big baby.

So while he went to sit down on the stretcher, and let mother put her

arms round his neck and hug him and cry over him, as she always did if

he'd been away more than a day or two, I took a walk down the creek with

Aileen in the starlight, to hear all about this message from father.

Besides, I could see that she was very serious over it, and I thought

there might be something in it more than common.

'First of all, did you make any agreement with George Storefield?' she

said.

'No; why should I? Has he been talking to you about me? What right has

he to meddle with my business?'

'Oh, Dick, don't talk like that. Anything that he said was only to do

you a kindness, and Jim.'

'Hang him, and his kindness too,' I said. 'Let him keep it for those

that want it. But what did he tell you?'

'He said, first of all,' answered poor Aileen, with the tears in her

eyes, and trying to take hold of my hand, 'that he had a contract for

fencing timber, which he had taken at good prices, which he would share

with you and Jim; that he knew you two and himself could finish it in a

few weeks, and that he expected to get the contract for the timber for

the new bridge at Dargo, which he would let you go shares in too. He

didn't like to speak about that, because it wasn't certain; but he had

calculated all the quantities and prices, and he was sure you would make

70 or 80 Pounds each before Christmas. Now, was there any harm in that;

and don't you think it was very good of him to think of it?'

'Well, he's not a bad fellow, old George,' I said, 'but he's a little

too fond of interfering with other people's business. Jim and I are

quite able to manage our own affairs, as I told him this evening, when I

refused to have anything to do with his fencing arrangement.'

'Oh, Dick, did you?' she said. 'What a pity! I made sure Jim would have

liked it so, for only last week he said he was sick and tired of having

nothing to do--that he should soon lose all his knack at using tools

that he used to be so proud of. Didn't he say he'd like to join George?'

'He would, I daresay, and I told him to do as he liked. I came away

by myself, and only saw him just before we crossed the range. He's big

enough and old enough to take his own line.'

'But you know he thinks so much of you,' she groaned out, 'that he'd

follow you to destruction. That will be the end of it, depend upon it,

Dick. I tell you so now; you've taken to bad ways; you'll have his blood

on your head yet.'

'Jim's old enough and big enough to take care of himself,' I said

sulkily. 'If he likes to come my way I won't hinder him; I won't try to

persuade him one way or the other. Let him take his own line; I don't

believe in preaching and old women's talk. Let a man act and think for

himself.'

'You'll break my heart and poor mother's, too,' said Aileen, suddenly

taking both my hands in hers. 'What has she done but love us ever since

we were born, and what does she live for? You know she has no pleasure

of any kind, you know she's afraid every morning she wakes that the

police will get father for some of his cross doings; and now you and Jim

are going the same wild way, and what ever--what ever will be the end of

it?'

Here she let go my hands, and sobbed and cried as if she was a child

again, much as I remember her doing one day when my kangaroo dog killed

her favourite cat. And Aileen was a girl that didn't cry much generally,

and never about anything that happened to herself; it was always about

somebody else and their misfortunes. She was a quiet girl, too, very

determined, and not much given to talking about what she was going to

do; but when she made up her mind she was sure to stick to it. I used to

think she was more like father than any of us. She had his coloured hair

and eyes, and his way of standing and looking, as if the whole world

wouldn't shift him. But she'd mother's soft heart for all that, and I

took the more notice of her crying and whimpering this time because it

was so strange for her.

If any one could have seen straight into my heart just then I was

regularly knocked over, and had two minds to go inside to Jim and tell

him we'd take George's splitting job, and start to tackle it first thing

to-morrow morning; but just then one of those confounded night-hawks

flitted on a dead tree before us and began his 'hoo-ho', as if it was

laughing at me. I can see the place now--the mountain black and dismal,

the moon low and strange-looking, the little waterhole glittering in the

half-light, and this dark bird hooting away in the night. An odd feeling

seemed to come over my mind, and if it had been the devil himself

standing on the dead limb it could not have had a worse effect on me as

I stopped there, uncertain whether to turn to the right or the left.

We don't often know in this world sometimes whether we are turning off

along a road where we shall never come back from, or whether we can go

just a little way and look at the far-off hills and new rivers, and come

home safe.

I remember the whole lot of bad-meaning thoughts coming with a rush

over my heart, and I laughed at myself for being so soft as to choose

a hard-working, pokey kind of life at the word of a slow fellow like

George, when I might be riding about the country on a fine horse, eating

and drinking of the best, and only doing what people said half the old

settlers had made their money by.

Poor Aileen told me afterwards that if she'd thought for a moment I

could be turned she'd have gone down on her knees and never got up till

I promised to keep straight and begin to work at honest daily labour

like a man--like a man who hoped to end his days in a good house, on a

good farm, with a good wife and nice children round him, and not in a

prison cell. Some people would call the first, after years of honest

work, and being always able to look every one in the face, being more

of a man than the other. But people have different ways and different

ideas.

'Come, Ailie,' I said, 'are you going to whine and cry all night? I

shall be afraid to come home if you're going to be like this. What's the

message from father?'

She wiped away her tears, and, putting her hand on my shoulder, looked

steadily into my face.

'Poor boy--poor, dear Dick,' she said, 'I feel as if I should see that

fresh face of yours looking very different some day or other. Something

tells me that there's bad luck before you. But never mind, you'll never

lose your sister if the luck's ever so bad. Father sent word you and Jim

were to meet him at Broken Creek and bring your whips with you.'

'What in the world's that for?' I said, half speaking to myself. 'It

looks as if there was a big mob to drive, and where's he to get a big

mob there in that mountainous, beastly place, where the cattle all bolt

like wallabies, and where I never saw twenty head together?'

'He's got some reason for it,' said Aileen sorrowfully. 'If I were you

I wouldn't go. It's no good, and father's trying now to drag you and Jim

into the bad ways he's been following these years.'

'How do you know it's so bad?' said I. 'How can a girl like you know?'

'I know very well,' she said. 'Do you think I've lived here all these

years and don't know things? What makes him always come home after dark,

and be that nervous every time he sees a stranger coming up you'd think

he was come out of gaol? Why has he always got money, and why does

mother look so miserable when he's at home, and cheer up when he goes

away?'

'He may get jobs of droving or something,' I said. 'You have no right

to say that he's robbing, or something of that sort, because he doesn't

care about tying himself to mother's apron-string.'

Aileen laughed, but it was more like crying.

'You told me just now,' she said--oh! so sorrowfully--'that you and Jim

were old enough to take a line of your own. Why don't you do it now?'

'And tell father we'll have nothing more to do with him!'

'Why not?' she said, standing up straight before me, and facing me just

as I saw father face the big bullock-driver before he knocked him down.

'Why not? You need never ask him for another meal; you can earn an easy

living in half-a-dozen ways, you and Jim. Why should you let him spoil

your life and ruin your soul for evermore?'

'The priest put that into your head,' I said sneeringly; 'Father

Doyle--of course he knows what they'll do with a fellow after he's

dead.'

'No!' she said, 'Father Doyle never said a word about you that wasn't

good and kind. He says mother's a good Catholic, and he takes an

interest in you boys and me because of her.'

'He can persuade you women to do anything,' I said, not that I had any

grudge against poor old Father Doyle, who used to come riding up the

rough mountain track on his white horse, and tiring his old bones,

just 'to look after his flock,' as he said--and nice lambs some of them

were--but I wanted to tease her and make her break off with this fancy

of hers.

'He never does, and couldn't persuade me, except for my good,' said she,

getting more and more roused, and her black eyes glowed again, 'and I'll

tell you what I'll do to prove it. It's a sin, but if it is I'll stand

by it, and now I'll swear it (here she knelt down), as Almighty God

shall help me at the last day, if you and Jim will promise me to start

straight off up the country and take bush-work till shearing comes on,

and never to have any truck with cross chaps and their ways, I'll turn

Protestant. I'll go to church with you, and keep to it till I die.'

Wasn't she a trump? I've known women that would give up a lot for a man

they were sweet on, and wives that would follow their husbands about

like spaniels, and women that would lie and deceive and all but rob and

murder for men they were fond of, and sometimes do nearly as much to

spite other women. But I don't think I ever knew a woman that would

give up her religion for any one before, and it's not as if she

wasn't staunch to her own faith. She was as regular in her prayers and

crossings and beads and all the rest of it as mother herself, and if

there ever was a good girl in the whole world she was one. She turned

faint as she said this, and I thought she was going to drop down. If

anything could have turned me then it would have been this. It was

almost like giving her life for ours, and I don't think she'd have

valued hers two straws if she could have saved us. There's a great

deal said about different kinds of love in this world, but I can't

help thinking that the love between brothers and sisters that have been

brought up together and have had very few other people to care about

is a higher, better sort than any other in the world. There's less

selfishness about it--no thought but for the other's good. If that

can be made safe, death and pain and poverty and misery are all little

things. And wasn't I fond of Aileen, in spite of all my hardness and

cross-grained obstinacy?--so fond that I was just going to hug her to me

and say, 'Take it all your own way, Ailie dear,' when Jim came tearing

out of the hut, bareheaded, and stood listening to a far-off sound that

caught all our ears at once. We made out the source of it too well--far

too well.

What was the noise at that hour of the night?

It was a hollow, faint, distant roaring that gradually kept getting

louder. It was the strange mournful bellowing that comes from a drove

of cattle forced along an unknown track. As we listened the sound came

clearly on the night wind, faint, yet still clearly coming nearer.

'Cattle being driven,' Jim cried out; 'and a big mob too. It's

father--for a note. Let's get our horses and meet him.'

Chapter 4

'All right,' said I, 'he must have got there a day before his time. It

is a big mob and no mistake. I wonder where they're taking them to.'

Aileen shrugged her shoulders and walked in to mother with a look of

misery and despair on her face such as I never saw there before.

She knew it was no use talking to me now. The idea of going out to meet

a large lot of unknown cattle had strongly excited us, as would have

been the case with every bush-bred lad. All sorts of wonders passed

through our minds as we walked down the creek bank, with our bridles in

our hands, towards where our horses usually fed. One was easy to catch,

the other with a little management was secured. In ten minutes we were

riding fast through the dark trees and fallen timber towards the wild

gullies and rock-strewed hills of Broken Creek.

It was not more than an hour when we got up to the cattle. We could hear

them a good while before we saw them. 'My word,' said Jim, 'ain't they

restless. They can't have come far, or they wouldn't roar so. Where can

the old man have “touched” for them?'

'How should I know?' I said roughly. I had a kind of idea, but I thought

he would never be so rash.

When we got up I could see the cattle had been rounded up in a flat with

stony ridges all round. There must have been three or four hundred of

them, only a man and a boy riding round and wheeling them every now and

then. Their horses were pretty well knocked up. I knew father at once,

and the old chestnut mare he used to ride--an animal with legs like

timbers and a mule rump; but you couldn't tire her, and no beast that

ever was calved could get away from her. The boy was a half-caste that

father had picked up somewhere; he was as good as two men any day.

'So you've come at last,' growled father, 'and a good thing too. I

didn't expect to be here till to-morrow morning. The dog came home, I

suppose--that's what brought you here, wasn't it? I thought the infernal

cattle would beat Warrigal and me, and we'd have all our trouble for

nothing.'

'Whose cattle are they, and what are you going to do with them?'

'Never you mind; ask no questions, and you'll see all about it

to-morrow. I'll go and take a snooze now; I've had no sleep for three

nights.'

With our fresh horses and riding round so we kept the cattle easily

enough. We did not tell Warrigal he might go to rest, not thinking a

half-caste brat like him wanted any. He didn't say anything, but went to

sleep on his horse, which walked in and out among the angry cattle as he

sat on the saddle with his head down on the horse's neck. They sniffed

at him once or twice, some of the old cows, but none of them horned him;

and daylight came rather quicker than one would think.

Then we saw whose cattle they were; they had all Hunter's and Falkland's

brands on, which showed that they belonged to Banda and Elingamah

stations.

'By George!' says Jim, 'they're Mr. Hunter's cattle, and all these

circle dots belong to Banda. What a mob of calves! not one of them

branded! What in the world does father intend to do with them?'

Father was up, and came over where we stood with our horses in our hands

before we had time to say more. He wasn't one of those that slept after

daylight, whether he had work to do or not. He certainly COULD work;

daylight or dark, wet or dry, cold or hot, it was all one to father. It

seems a pity what he did was no use to him, as it turned out; for he was

a man, was old dad, every inch of him.

'Now, boys,' he said, quite brisk and almost good-natured for him, 'look

alive and we'll start the cattle; we've been long enough here; let 'em

head up that gully, and I'll show you something you've never seen before

for as long as you've known Broken Creek Ranges.'

'But where are you going to take 'em to?' I said. 'They're all Mr.

Hunter's and Mr. Falkland's; the brands are plain enough.'

'Are the calves branded, you blasted fool?' he said, while the black

look came over his face that had so often frightened me when I was a

child. 'You do what I tell you if you've any pluck and gumption about

you; or else you and your brother can ride over to Dargo Police Station

and “give me away” if you like; only don't come home again, I warn you,

sons or no sons.'

If I had done what I had two minds to do--for I wasn't afraid of him

then, savage as he looked--told him to do his own duffing and ridden

away with Jim there and then--poor Jim, who sat on his horse staring at

both of us, and saying nothing--how much better it would have been for

all of us, the old man as well as ourselves; but it seemed as if it

wasn't to be. Partly from use, and partly from a love of danger and

something new, which is at the bottom of half the crime in the bush

districts, I turned my horse's head after the cattle, which were now

beginning to straggle. Jim did the same on his side. How easy is it for

chaps to take the road to hell! for that was about the size of it, and

we were soon too busy to think about much else.

The track we were driving on led along a narrow rocky gully which looked

as if it had been split up or made out of a crack in the earth thousands

of years ago by an earthquake or something of that kind. The hills were

that steep that every now and then some of the young cattle that were

not used to that sort of country would come sliding down and bellow as

if they thought they were going to break their necks.

The water rushed down it like a torrent in wet winters, and formed a

sort of creek, and the bed of it made what track there was. There were

overhanging rocks and places that made you giddy to look at, and some

of these must have fallen down and blocked up the creek at one time or

other. We had to scramble round them the best way we could.

When we got nearly up to the head of the gully--and great work it was

to force the footsore cattle along, as we couldn't use our whips

overmuch--Jim called out--

'Why, here comes old Crib. Who'd have thought he'd have seen the track?

Well done, old man. Now we're right.'

Father never took any notice of the poor brute as he came limping along

the stones. Woman or child, horse or dog, it's the same old thing--the

more any creature loves a man in this world the worse they're treated.

It looks like it, at any rate. I saw how it was; father had given Crib

a cruel beating the night before, when he was put out for some trifling

matter, and the dog had left him and run home. But now he had thought

better of it, and seen our tracks and come to work and slave, with his

bleeding feet--for they were cut all to pieces--and got the whip across

his back now and then for his pains. It's a queer world!

When we got right to the top of this confounded gully, nearly dead-beat

all of us, and only for the dog heeling them up every now and then, and

making his teeth nearly meet in them, without a whimper, I believe the

cattle would have charged back and beat us. There was a sort of rough

table-land--scrubby and stony and thick it was, but still the grass

wasn't bad in summer, when the country below was all dried up. There

were wild horses in troops there, and a few wild cattle, so Jim and I

knew the place well; but it was too far and too much of a journey for

our own horses to go often.

'Do you see that sugar-loaf hill with the bald top, across the range?'

said father, riding up just then, as we were taking it easy a little.

'Don't let the cattle straggle, and make straight for that.'

'Why, it's miles away,' said Jim, looking rather dismal. 'We could never

get 'em there.'

'We're not going there, stupid,' says father; 'that's only the line to

keep. I'll show you something about dinner-time that'll open your eyes a

bit.'

Poor Jim brightened up at the mention of dinner-time, for, boylike, he

was getting very hungry, and as he wasn't done growing he had no end of

an appetite. I was hungry enough for the matter of that, but I wouldn't

own to it.

'Well, we shall come to somewhere, I suppose,' says Jim, when father was

gone. 'Blest if I didn't think he was going to keep us wandering in

this blessed Nulla Mountain all day. I wish I'd never seen the blessed

cattle. I was only waiting for you to hook it when we first seen the

brands by daylight, and I'd ha' been off like a brindle “Mickey” down a

range.'

'Better for us if we had,' I said; 'but it's too late now. We must stick

to it, I suppose.'

We had kept the cattle going for three or four miles through the

thickest of the country, every now and then steering our course by the

clear round top of Sugarloaf, that could be seen for miles round,

but never seemed to get any nearer, when we came on a rough sort of

log-fence, which ran the way we were going.

'I didn't think there were any farms up here,' I said to Jim.

'It's a “break”,' he said, almost in a whisper. 'There's a

“duffing-yard” somewhere handy; that's what's the matter.'

'Keep the cattle along it, anyway. We'll soon see what it leads to.'

The cattle ran along the fence, as if they expected to get to the end of

their troubles soon. The scrub was terribly thick in places, and every

now and then there was a break in the fence, when one of us had to go

outside and hunt them until we came to the next bit. At last we came to

a little open kind of flat, with the scrub that thick round it as you

couldn't hardly ride through it, and, just as Jim said, there was the

yard.

It was a 'duffing-yard' sure enough. No one but people who had cattle to

hide and young stock they didn't want other people to see branded would

have made a place there.

Just on the south side of the yard, which was built of great heavy

stringy-bark trees cut down in the line of the fence, and made up with

limbs and logs, the range went up as steep as the side of a house. The

cattle were that tired and footsore--half their feet were bleeding, poor

devils--that they ran in through the sliprails and began to lay down.

'Light a fire, one of you boys,' says father, putting up the heavy

sliprails and fastening them. 'We must brand these calves before dark.

One of you can go to that gunyah, just under the range where that big

white rock is, and you'll find tea and sugar and something to eat.'

Jim rushed off at once, while I sulkily began to put some bark and twigs

together and build a fire.

'What's the use of all this cross work?' I said to father; 'we're bound

to be caught some day if we keep on at it. Then there'll be no one left

to take care of mother and Aileen.'

He looked rather struck at this, and then said quietly--

'You and your brother can go back now. Never say I kept you against your

will. You may as well lend a hand to brand these calves; then you may

clear out as soon as you like.'

Well, I didn't quite like leaving the old chap in the middle of the work

like that. I remember thinking, like many another young fool, I suppose,

that I could draw back in time, just after I'd tackled this job.

Draw back, indeed! When does a man ever get the chance of doing that,

once he's regularly gone in for any of the devil's work and wages? He

takes care there isn't much drawing back afterwards. So I said--

'We may as well give you a hand with this lot; but we'll go home then,

and drop all this duffing work. It don't pay. I'm old enough to know

that, and you'll find it out yet, I expect, father, yourself.'

'The fox lives long, and gives the hounds many a long chase before he's

run into,' he said, with a grim chuckle. 'I swore I'd be revenged on 'em

all when they locked me up and sent me out here for a paltry hare; broke

my old mother's heart, so it did. I've had a pound for every hair in

her skin, and I shall go on till I die. After all, if a man goes to work

cautious and runs mute it's not so easy to catch him in this country, at

any rate.'

Jim at this came running out of the cave with a face of joy, a bag of

ship-biscuit, and a lot of other things.

'Here's tea and sugar,' he said; 'and there's biscuits and jam, and a

big lump of cheese. Get the fire right, Dick, while I get some water.

We'll soon have some tea, and these biscuits are jolly.'

The tea was made, and we all had a good meal. Father found a bottle of

rum, too; he took a good drink himself, and gave Jim and me a sip each.

I felt less inclined to quarrel with father after that. So we drafted

all the calves into a small pen-yard, and began to put our brand on them

as quick as we could catch 'em.

A hundred and sixty of 'em altogether--all ages, from a month old to

nearly a year. Fine strong calves, and in rare condition, too. We could

see they were all belonging to Mr. Hunter and Mr. Falkland. How they

came to leave them all so long unbranded I can't say. Very careless

they often are on these large cattle-stations, so that sharp people like

father and the Dalys, and a lot more, get an easy chance at them.

Whatever father was going to do with them all when he had branded 'em,

we couldn't make out.

'There's no place to tail or wean 'em,' whispered Jim. 'We're not above

thirty miles from Banda in a straight line. These cows are dead sure to

make straight back the very minute they're let out, and very nice work

it'll look with all these calves with our brand on sucking these cows.'

Father happened to come round for a hot brand just as Jim finished.

'Never you mind about the weaning,' he snarled. 'I shan't ask you to

tail them either. It wouldn't be a nice job here, would it?' and father

actually laughed. It wasn't a very gay kind of a laugh, and he shut up

his mouth with a sort of snap again. Jim and I hadn't seen him laugh for

I don't know how long, and it almost frightened us.

As Jim said, it wouldn't do to let the cattle out again. If calves are

weaned, and have only one brand on, it is very hard for any man to swear

that they are not the property of the man to whom that brand belongs.

He may believe them to be his, but may never have seen them in his life;

and if he has seen them on a camp or on the run, it's very hard to swear

to any one particular red or spotted calf as you would to a horse.

The great dart is to keep the young stock away from their mothers until

they forget one another, and then most of the danger is past. But if

calves with one man's brand on are seen sucking another man's cows, it

is pretty plain that the brand on the calves has been put on without the

consent of the owner of the cows--which is cattle-stealing; a felony,

according to the Act 7 and 8 George IV, No. 29, punishable with three

years' imprisonment, with hard labour on the roads of the colony or

other place, as the Judge may direct.

There's a lot of law! How did I learn it? I had plenty of time in

Berrima Gaol--worse luck--my first stretch. But it was after I'd done

the foolishness, and not before.

Chapter 5

'Now then, you boys!' says father, coming up all of a sudden like, and

bringing out his words as if it was old times with us, when we didn't

know whether he'd hit first and talk afterwards, or the other way on,

'get out the lot we've just branded, and drive 'em straight for that

peak, where the water shines dripping over the stones, right again the

sun, and look slippy; we're burning daylight, and these cows are making

row enough, blast 'em! to be heard all the way to Banda. I'll go on and

steady the lead; you keep 'em close up to me.'

Father mounted the old mare. The dog stopped behind; he knew he'd

have to mind the tail--that is the hindmost cattle--and stop 'em from

breaking or running clear away from the others. We threw down the rails.

Away the cattle rushed out, all in a long string. You'd 'a thought no

mortal men could 'a kept 'em in that blind hole of a place. But father

headed 'em, and turned 'em towards the peak. The dog worried those that

wanted to stay by the yard or turn another way. We dropped our whip on

'em, and kept 'em going. In five minutes they were all a-moving along

in one mob at a pretty sharpish trot like a lot of store cattle. Father

knew his way about, whether the country was thick or open. It was all as

one to him. What a slashing stockman he would have made in new country,

if he only could have kept straight.

It took us an hour's hard dinkum to get near the peak. Sometimes it was

awful rocky, as well as scrubby, and the poor devils of cattle got as

sore-footed as babies--blood up to the knee, some of 'em; but we crowded

'em on; there was no help for it.

At last we rounded up on a flat, rocky, open kind of a place; and here

father held up his hand.

'Let 'em ring a bit; some of their tongues are out. These young things

is generally soft. Come here, Dick.' I rode up, and he told me to follow

him.

We walked our horses up to the edge of the mountain and looked over. It

was like the end of the world. Far down there was a dark, dreadful drop

into a sort of deep valley below. You couldn't see the bottom of it.

The trees on the mountain side looked like bushes, and they were big

ironbarks and messmates too. On three sides of us was this awful,

desolate-looking precipice--a dreary, gloomy, God-forsaken kind of spot.

The sky got cloudy, and the breeze turned cold and began to murmur

and whistle in an odd, unnatural kind of way, while father, seeing how

scared and puzzled I was, began to laugh. I shuddered. A thought crossed

my mind that it might be the Enemy of Souls, in his shape, going to

carry us off for doing such a piece of wickedness.

'Looks queer, doesn't it?' says father, going to the brink and kicking

down a boulder, that rolled and crashed down the steep mountain side,

tearing its way through scrub and heath till it settled down in the glen

below. 'It won't do for a man's horse to slip, will it, boy? And yet

there's a track here into a fine large paddock, open and clear, too,

where I'm going to put these cattle into.'

I stared at him, without speaking, thinking was he mad.

'No! the old man isn't mad, youngster,' he said; 'not yet, at least. I'm

going to show you a trick that none of you native boys are up to, smart

as you think yourselves.' Here he got off the old mare, and began to

lead her to the edge of the mountain.

'Now, you rally the cattle well after me,' he said; 'they'll follow the

old mare after a bit. I left a few cows among 'em on purpose, and when

they “draw” keep 'em going well up, but not too fast.'

He had lengthened the bridle of the mare, and tied the end of a light

tether rope that he had round her neck to it. I saw her follow him

slowly, and turn down a rocky track that seemed to lead straight over a

bluff of the precipice.

However, I gave the word to 'head on'. The dog had started rounding 'em

up as soon as he saw the old mare walk towards the mountain side, and

the cattle were soon crushed up pretty close to the mare's heels.

Mind this, that they were so footsore and tender about the hoofs that

they could not have run away from us on foot if they had tried.

After 'ringing' a bit, one of the quiet cows followed up the old mare

that was walking step by step forward, and all the rest followed her

like sheep. Cattle will do that. I've seen a stockrider, when all the

horses were dead beat, trying to get fat cattle to take a river in

flood, jump off and turn his horse loose into the stream. If he went

straight, and swam across, all the cattle would follow him like sheep.

Well, when the old mare got to the bluff she turned short round to the

right, and then I saw that she had struck a narrow path down a gully

that got deeper and deeper every yard we went. There was just room for

a couple or three calves to go abreast, and by and by all of 'em was

walking down it like as if they was the beasts agoing into Noah's Ark.

It wound and wound and got deeper and deeper till the walls of rock were

ever so far above our heads. Our work was done then; the cattle had to

walk on like sheep in a race. We led our horses behind them, and the dog

walked along, saving his sore feet as well as he could, and never tried

to bite a beast once he got within the walls. He looked quite satisfied,

and kept chuckling almost to himself. I really believe I've seen dogs

laugh. Once upon a time I've read of they'd have taken poor Crib for a

familiar spirit, and hanged or burnt him. Well, he knew a lot, and no

mistake. I've seen plenty of Christians as he could buy and sell, and no

trouble to him. I'm dashed if the old mare, too, didn't take a pleasure

in working cattle on the cross. She was the laziest old wretch bringing

up the cows at home, or running in the horses. Many a time Jim and I

took a turn out of her when father didn't know. But put her after a

big mob of cattle--she must have known they couldn't be ours--and she'd

clatter down a range like the wall of a house, and bite and kick the

tail cattle if they didn't get out of her way. They say dogs and horses

are all honest, and it's only us as teaches 'em to do wrong. My notion's

they're a deal like ourselves, and some of 'em fancies the square racket

dull and safe, while some takes a deal kindlier to the other. Anyhow, no

cattle-duffer in the colonies could have had a better pair of mates than

old Sally and Crib, if the devil himself had broken 'em in special for

the trade.

It was child's play now, as far as the driving went. Jim and I walked

along, leading our horses and yarning away as we used to do when we were

little chaps bringing in the milkers.

'My word, Dick, dad's dropped into a fine road through this thundering

mountain, hasn't he? I wonder where it leads to? How high the rock-walls

are getting above us!' he says. 'I know now. I think I heard long ago

from one of the Crosbies of a place in the ranges down towards behind

the Nulla Mountain, “Terrible Hollow”. He didn't know about it himself,

but said an old stockman told him about it when he was drunk. He said

the Government men used to hide the cattle and horses there in old

times, and that it was never found out.'

'Why wasn't it found out, Jim? If the old fellow “split” about it some

one else would get to know.'

'Well, old Dan said that they killed one man that talked of telling; the

rest were too frightened after that, and they all swore a big oath never

to tell any one except he was on the cross.'

'That's how dad come to know, I suppose,' said Jim. 'I wish he never

had. I don't care about those cross doings. I never did. I never seen

any good come out of them yet.'

'Well, we must go through with it now, I suppose. It won't do to leave

old dad in the lurch. You won't, will you, Jim?'

'You know very well I won't,' says Jim, very soberlike. 'I don't like

it any the more for that. But I wish father had broke his leg, and was

lying up at home, with mother nursing him, before he found out this

hell-hole of a place.'

'Well, we're going to get out of it, and soon too. The gully seems

getting wider, and I can see a bit of open country through the trees.'

'Thank God for that!' says Jim. 'My boots'll part company soon, and the

poor devils of calves won't have any hoofs either, if there's much more

of this.'

'They're drawing faster now. The leading cattle are beginning to run.

We're at the end of the drive.'

So it was. The deep, rocky gully gradually widened into an open and

pretty smooth flat; this, again, into a splendid little plain, up to

the knees in grass; a big natural park, closed round on every side with

sandstone rockwalls, as upright as if they were built, and a couple of

thousand feet above the place where we stood.

This scrub country was crossed by two good creeks; it was several miles

across, and a trifle more in length. Our hungry weaners spread out and

began to feed, without a notion of their mothers they'd left behind; but

they were not the only ones there. We could see other mobs of cattle,

some near, some farther off; horses, too; and the well-worn track in

several ways showed that this was no new grazing ground.

Father came riding back quite comfortable and hearty-like for him.

'Welcome to Terrible Hollow, lads,' says he. 'You're the youngest chaps

it has ever been shown to, and if I didn't know you were the right

stuff, you'd never have seen it, though you're my own flesh and blood.

Jump off, and let your horses go. They can't get away, even if they

tried; they don't look much like that.'

Our poor nags were something like the cattle, pretty hungry and stiff.

They put their heads down to the thick green grass, and went in at it

with a will.

'Bring your saddles along with you,' father said, 'and come after me.

I'll show you a good camping place. You deserve a treat after last

night's work.'

We turned back towards the rocky wall, near to where we had come in, and

there, behind a bush and a big piece of sandstone that had fallen

down, was the entrance to a cave. The walls of it were quite clean and

white-looking, the floor was smooth, and the roof was pretty high, well

blackened with smoke, too, from the fires which had been lighted in it

for many a year gone by.

A kind of natural cellar had been made by scooping out the soft

sandstone behind a ledge. From this father took a bag of flour and

corn-meal. We very soon made some cakes in the pan, that tasted well,

I can tell you. Tea and sugar too, and quart pots, some bacon in a

flour-bag; and that rasher fried in the pan was the sweetest meat I ever

ate in all my born days.

Then father brought out a keg and poured some rum into a pint pot. He

took a pretty stiff pull, and then handed it to us. 'A little of it

won't hurt you, boys,' he said, 'after a night's work.'

I took some--not much; we hadn't learned to drink then--to keep down

the fear of something hanging over us. A dreadful fear it is. It makes

a coward of every man who doesn't lead a square life, let him be as game

as he may.

Jim wouldn't touch it. 'No,' he said, when I laughed at him, 'I promised

mother last time I had more than was good for me at Dargo Races that I

wouldn't touch it again for two years; and I won't either. I can stand

what any other man can, and without the hard stuff, either.'

'Please yourself,' said father. 'When you're ready we'll have a ride

through the stock.'

We finished our meal, and a first-rate one it was. A man never has

the same appetite for his meals anywhere else that he has in the bush,

specially if he has been up half the night. It's so fresh, and the air

makes him feel as if he'd ate nothing for a week. Sitting on a log, or

in the cave, as we were, I've had the best meal I've ever tasted since

I was born. Not like the close-feeling, close-smelling, dirty-clean

graveyard they call a gaol. But it's no use beginning on that. We were

young men, and free, too. Free! By all the devils in hell, if there are

devils--and there must be to tempt a man, or how could he be so great a

fool, so blind a born idiot, as to do anything in this world that would

put his freedom in jeopardy? And what for? For folly and nonsense. For

a few pounds he could earn with a month's honest work and be all the

better man for it. For a false woman's smile that he could buy, and ten

like her, if he only kept straight and saving. For a bit of sudden pride

or vanity or passion. A short bit of what looks like pleasure, against

months and years of weariness, and cold and heat, and dull half-death,

with maybe a dog's death at the end!

I could cry like a child when I think of it now. I have cried many's

the time and often since I have been shut up here, and dashed my head

against the stones till I pretty nigh knocked all sense and feeling out

of it, not so much in repentance, though I don't say I feel sorry,

but to think what a fool, fool, fool I'd been. Yes, fool, three times

over--a hundred times--to put my liberty and life against such a

miserable stake--a stake the devil that deals the pack is so safe to win

at the end.

I may as well go on. But I can't help breaking out sometimes when I hear

the birds calling to one another as they fly over the yard, and know

it's fresh air and sun and green grass outside that I never shall see

again. Never see the river rippling under the big drooping trees, or

the cattle coming down in the twilight to drink after the long hot day.

Never, never more! And whose fault is it? Who have I to blame? Perhaps

father helped a bit; but I knew better, and no one is half as much to

blame as myself.

Where were we? Oh, at the cave-mouth, coming out with our bridles in our

hands to catch our horses. We soon did that, and then we rode away to

the other cattle. They were a queer lot, in fine condition, but all

sorts of ages and breeds, with every kind of brand and ear-mark.

Lots of the brands we didn't know, and had never heard of. Some had

no brands at all--full-grown beasts, too; that was a thing we had very

seldom seen. Some of the best cattle and some of the finest horses--and

there were some real plums among the horses--had a strange brand, JJ.

'Who does the JJ brand belong to?' I said to father. 'They're the pick

of the lot, whose ever they are.'

Father looked black for a bit, and then he growled out, 'Don't you ask

too many questions, lad. There's only four living men besides yourselves

knows about this place; so take care and don't act foolishly, or you'll

lose a plant that may save your life, as well as keep you in cash for

many a year to come. That brand belongs to Starlight, and he was the

only man left alive of the men that first found it and used it to put

away stock in. He wanted help, and told me five years ago. He took in a

half-caste chap, too, against my will. He helped him with that last lot

of cattle that you noticed.'

'But where did those horses come from?' Jim said. 'I never hardly saw

such a lot before. All got the JJ brand on, too, and nothing else; all

about three year old.'

'They were brought here as foals,' says father, 'following their

mothers. Some of them was foaled here; and, of course, as they've only

the one brand on they never can be claimed or sworn to. They're from

some of Mr. Maxwell's best thoroughbred mares, and their sire was Earl

of Atheling, imported. He was here for a year.'

'Well, they might look the real thing,' said Jim, his eyes brightening

as he gazed at them. 'I'd like to have that dark bay colt with the star.

My word, what a forehand he's got; and what quarters, too. If he can't

gallop I'll never say I know a horse from a poley cow.'

'You shall have him, or as good, never fear, if you stick to your work,'

says father. 'You mustn't cross Starlight, for he's a born devil when

he's taken the wrong way, though he talks so soft. The half-caste is an

out-and-out chap with cattle, and the horse doesn't stand on four legs

that he can't ride--and make follow him, for the matter of that. But

he's worth watching. I don't believe in him myself. And now ye have the

lot.'

'And a d----d fine lot they are,' I said, for I was vexed with Jim for

taking so easy to the bait father held out to him about the horse. 'A

very smart crowd to be on the roads inside of five years, and drag us in

with 'em.'

'How do you make that out?' says father. 'Are you going to turn dog, now

you know the way in? Isn't it as easy to carry on for a few years more

as it was twenty years ago?'

'Not by a long chalk,' I said, for my blood was up, and I felt as if I

could talk back to father and give him as good as he sent, and all for

Jim's sake. Poor Jim! He'd always go to the mischief for the sake of a

good horse, and many another 'Currency' chap has gone the same way. It's

a pity for some of 'em that a blood horse was ever foaled.

'You think you can't be tracked,' says I, 'but you must bear in mind you

haven't got to do with the old-fashioned mounted police as was potterin'

about when this “bot” was first hit on. There's chaps in the police

getting now, natives or all the same, as can ride and track every bit

as well as the half-caste you're talking about. Some day they'll drop on

the track of a mob coming in or getting out, and then the game will be

all up.'

'You can cut it if you like now,' said father, looking at me curious

like. 'Don't say I dragged you in. You and your brother can go home, and

no one will ever know where you were; no more than if you'd gone to the

moon.'

Jim looked at the brown colt that just came trotting up as dad finished

speaking--trotting up with his head high and his tail stuck out like

a circus horse. If he'd been the devil in a horsehide he couldn't have

chosen a better moment. Then his eyes began to glitter.

We all three looked at each other. No one spoke. The colt stopped,

turned, and galloped back to his mates like a red flyer with the dogs

close behind him.

It was not long. We all began to speak at once. But in that time the die

was cast, the stakes were down, and in the pool were three men's lives.

'I don't care whether we go back or not,' says Jim; 'I'll do either way

that Dick likes. But that colt I must have.'

'I never intended to go back,' I said. 'But we're three d----d fools all

the same--father and sons. It'll be the dearest horse you ever bought,

Jim, old man, and so I tell you.'

'Well, I suppose it's settled now,' says father; 'so let's have no more

chat. We're like a pack of old women, blessed if we ain't.'

After that we got on more sociably. Father took us all over the place,

and a splendid paddock it was--walled all round but where we had come

in, and a narrow gash in the far side that not one man in a thousand

could ever hit on, except he was put up to it; a wild country for miles

when you did get out--all scrub and rock, that few people ever had call

to ride over. There was splendid grass everywhere, water, and shelter.

It was warmer, too, than the country above, as you could see by the

coats of the cattle and horses.

'If it had only been honestly come by,' Jim said, 'what a jolly place it

would have been!'

Towards the north end of the paddock was a narrow gully with great

sandstone walls all round, and where it narrowed the first discoverers

had built a stockyard, partly with dry stone walls and partly with logs

and rails.

There was no trouble in getting the cattle or horses into this, and

there were all kinds of narrow yards and pens for branding the stock if

they were clearskins, and altering or 'faking' the brands if they were

plain. This led into another yard, which opened into the narrowest part

of the gully. Once in this, like the one they came down, and the cattle

or horses had no chance but to walk slowly up, one behind the other,

till they got on the tableland above. Here, of course, every kind of

work that can be done to help disguise cattle was done. Ear-marks were

cut out and altered in shape, or else the whole ear was cropped off;

every letter in the alphabet was altered by means of straight bars or

half-circles, figures, crosses, everything you could think of.

'Mr. Starlight is an edicated man,' said father. 'This is all his

notion; and many a man has looked at his own beast, with the ears

altered and the brand faked, and never dreamed he ever owned it. He's a

great card is Starlight. It's a pity he ever took to this kind of life.'

Father said this with a kind of real sorrow that made me look at him to

see if the grog had got into his head; just as if his life, mine, and

Jim's didn't matter a straw compared to this man's, whoever he was, that

had had so many better chances than we had and had chucked 'em all away.

But it's a strange thing that I don't think there's any place in the

world where men feel a more real out-and-out respect for a gentleman

than in Australia. Everybody's supposed to be free and equal now; of

course, they couldn't be in the convict days. But somehow a man that's

born and bred a gentleman will always be different from other men to the

end of the world. What's the most surprising part of it is that men like

father, who have hated the breed and suffered by them, too, can't help

having a curious liking and admiration for them. They'll follow them

like dogs, fight for them, shed their blood, and die for them; must be

some sort of a natural feeling. Whatever it is, it's there safe enough,

and nothing can knock it out of nine-tenths of all the men and women you

meet. I began to be uneasy to see this wonderful mate of father's,

who was so many things at once--a cattle-stealer, a bush-ranger, and a

gentleman.

Chapter 6

After we'd fairly settled to stay, father began to be more pleasant than

he'd ever been before. We were pretty likely, he said, to have a visit

from Starlight and the half-caste in a day or two, if we'd like to wait.

He was to meet him at the Hollow on purpose to help him out with the mob

of fat bullocks we had looked at. Father, it appears, was coming here

by himself when he met this outlying lot of Mr. Hunter's cattle, and

thought he and old Crib could bring them in by themselves. And a mighty

good haul it was. Father said we should share the weaners between the

three of us; that meant 50 Pounds a piece at least. The devil always

helps beginners.

We put through a couple of days pleasantly enough, after our hardish bit

of work. Jim found some fish-hooks and a line, and we caught plenty

of mullet and eels in the deep, clear waterholes. We found a couple

of double-barrelled guns, and shot ducks enough to last us a week. No

wonder the old frequenters of the Hollow used to live here for a month

at a time, having great times of it as long as their grog lasted; and

sometimes having the tribe of blacks that inhabited the district to make

merry and carouse with them, like the buccaneers of the Spanish Main

that I've read about, till the plunder was all gone. There were scrawls

on the wall of the first cave we had been in that showed all the

visitors had not been rude, untaught people; and Jim picked up part of

a woman's dress splashed with blood, and in one place, among some

smouldering packages and boxes, a long lock of woman's hair, fair,

bright-brown, that looked as if the name of Terrible Hollow might not

have been given to this lonely, wonderful glen for nothing.

We spent nearly a week in this way, and were beginning to get rather

sick of the life, when father, who used always to be looking at a bare

patch in the scrub above us, said--

'They're coming at last.'

'Who are coming--friends?'

'Why, friends, of course. That's Starlight's signal. See that smoke? The

half-caste always sends that up--like the blacks in his mother's tribe,

I suppose.'

'Any cattle or horses with them?' said Jim.

'No, or they'd send up two smokes. They'll be here about dinner-time, so

we must get ready for them.'

We had plenty of time to get ourselves or anything else ready. In about

four hours we began to look at them through a strong spyglass which

father brought out. By and by we got sight of two men coming along on

horseback on the top of the range the other side of the far wall. They

wasn't particularly easy to see, and every now and then we'd lose sight

of 'em as they got into thick timber or behind rocks.

Father got the spyglass on to 'em at last, pretty clear, and nearly

threw it down with an oath.

'By----!' he says, 'I believe Starlight's hurt somehow. He's so infernal

rash. I can see the half-caste holding him on. If the police are on his

tracks they'll spring the plant here, and the whole thing'll be blown.'

We saw them come to the top of the wall, as it were, then they stopped

for a long while, then all of a sudden they seemed to disappear.

'Let's go over to the other side,' says father; 'they're coming down the

gully now. It's a terrible steep, rough track, worse than the other. If

Starlight's hurt bad he'll never ride down. But he has the pluck of the

devil, sure enough.'

We rode over to the other side, where there was a kind of gully that

came in, something like the one we came in by, but rougher, and full of

gibbers (boulders). There was a path, but it looked as if cattle could

never be driven or forced up it. We found afterwards that they had an

old pack bullock that they'd trained to walk up this, and down, too,

when they wanted him, and the other cattle followed in his track, as

cattle will.

Father showed us a sort of cave by the side of the track, where one man,

with a couple of guns and a pistol or two, could have shot down a small

regiment as they came down one at a time.

We stayed in there by the track, and after about half-an-hour we heard

the two horses coming down slowly, step by step, kicking the stones down

before them. Then we could hear a man groaning, as if he couldn't bear

the pain, and partly as if he was trying to smother it. Then another

man's voice, very soft and soothing like, trying to comfort another.

'My head's a-fire, and these cursed ribs are grinding against one

another every step of this infernal ladder. Is it far now?' How he

groaned then!

'Just got the bottom; hold on a bit longer and you'll be all right.'

Just then the leading horse came out into the open before the cave. We

had a good look at him and his rider. I never forgot them. It was a bad

day I ever saw either, and many a man had cause to say the same.

The horse held up his head and snorted as he came abreast of us, and

we showed out. He was one of the grandest animals I'd ever seen, and

I afterwards found he was better than he looked. He came stepping down

that beastly rocky goat-track, he, a clean thoroughbred that ought never

to have trod upon anything rougher than a rolled training track, or

the sound bush turf. And here he was with a heavy weight on his back--a

half-dead, fainting man, that couldn't hold the reins--and him walking

down as steady as an old mountain bull or a wallaroo on the side of a

creek bank.

I hadn't much time to look him over. I was too much taken up with the

rider, who was lying forward on his chest across a coat rolled round and

strapped in front of the saddle, and his arms round the horse's neck. He

was as pale as a ghost. His eyes--great dark ones they were, too--were

staring out of his head. I thought he was dead, and called out to father

and Jim that he was.

They ran up, and we lifted him off after undoing some straps and a rope.

He was tied on (that was what the half-caste was waiting for at the top

of the gully). When we laid him down his head fell back, and he looked

as much like a corpse as if he had been dead a day.

Then we saw he had been wounded. There was blood on his shirt, and the

upper part of his arm was bandaged.

'It's too late, father,' said I; 'he's a dead man. What pluck he must

have had to ride down there!'

'He's worth two dead 'uns yet,' said father, who had his hand on his

pulse. 'Hold his head up one of you while I go for the brandy. How did

he get hit, Warrigal?'

'That----Sergeant Goring,' said the boy, a slight, active-looking chap,

about sixteen, that looked as if he could jump into a gum tree and back

again, and I believe he could. 'Sergeant Goring, he very near grab us

at Dilligah. We got a lot of old Jobson's cattle when he came on us. He

jump off his horse when he see he couldn't catch us, and very near drop

Starlight. My word, he very nearly fall off--just like that' (here he

imitated a man reeling in his saddle); 'but the old horse stop steady

with him, my word, till he come to. Then the sergeant fire at him again;

hit him in the shoulder with his pistol. Then Starlight come to his

senses, and we clear. My word, he couldn't see the way the old horse

went. Ha, ha!'--here the young devil laughed till the trees and rocks

rang again. 'Gallop different ways, too, and met at the old needle-rock.

But they was miles away then.'

Before the wild boy had come to the end of his story the wounded man had

proved that it was only a dead faint, as the women call it, not the

real thing. And after he had tasted a pannikin full of brandy and water,

which father brought him, he sat up and looked like a living man once

more.

'Better have a look at my shoulder,' he said. 'That----fellow shot like

a prize-winner at Wimbledon. I've had a squeak for it.'

'Puts me in mind of our old poaching rows,' said father, while he

carefully cut the shirt off, that was stiffened with blood and showed

where the bullet had passed through the muscle, narrowly missing

the bone of the joint. We washed it, and relieved the wounded man by

discovering that the other bullet had only been spent, after striking

a tree most like, when it had knocked the wind out of him and nearly

unhorsed him, as Warrigal said.

'Fill my pipe, one of you. Who the devil are these lads? Yours, I

suppose, Marston, or you wouldn't be fool enough to bring them here. Why

didn't you leave them at home with their mother? Don't you think you and

I and this devil's limb enough for this precious trade of ours?'

'They'll take their luck as it comes, like others,' growled father;

'what's good enough for me isn't too bad for them. We want another hand

or two to work things right.'

'Oh! we do, do we?' said the stranger, fixing his eyes on father as if

he was going to burn a hole in him with a burning-glass; 'but if I'd a

brace of fine boys like those of my own I'd hang myself before I'd drag

them into the pit after myself.'

'That's all very fine,' said father, looking very dark and dangerous.

'Is Mr. Starlight going to turn parson? You'll be just in time, for

we'll all be shopped if you run against the police like this, and next

thing to lay them on to the Hollow by making for it when you're too weak

to ride.'

'What would you have me do? Pull up and hold up my hands? There was

nowhere else to go; and that new sergeant rode devilish well, I can tell

you, with a big chestnut well-bred horse, that gave old Rainbow here all

he knew to lose him. Now, once for all, no more of that, Marston,

and mind your own business. I'm the superior officer in this ship's

company--you know that very well--your business is to obey me, and take

second place.'

Father growled out something, but did not offer to deny it. We could see

plainly that the stranger was or had been far above our rank, whatever

were the reasons which had led to his present kind of life.

We stayed for about ten days, while the stranger's arm got well. With

care and rest, it soon healed. He was pleasant enough, too, when the

pain went away. He had been in other countries, and told us all kinds of

stories about them.

He said nothing, though, about his own former ways, and we often

wondered whatever could have made him take to such a life. Unknown to

father, too, he gave us good advice, warned us that what we were in

was the road to imprisonment or death in due course, and not to flatter

ourselves that any other ending was possible.

'I have my own reasons for leading the life I do,' he said, 'and must

run my own course, of which I foresee the end as plainly as if it was

written in a book before me. Your father had a long account to square

with society, and he has a right to settle it his own way. That yellow

whelp was never intended for anything better. But for you lads'--and

here he looked kindly in poor old Jim's honest face (and an honest face

and heart Jim's was, and that I'll live and die on)--'my advice to you

is, to clear off home, when we go, and never come back here again. Tell

your father you won't come; cut loose from him, once and for all. You'd

better drown yourselves comfortably at once than take to this cursed

trade. Now, mind what I tell you, and keep your own counsel.'

By and by, the day came when the horses were run in for father and Mr.

Starlight and Warrigal, who packed up to be off for some other part.

When they were in the yard we had a good look at his own horse--a good

look--and if I'd been a fellow that painted pictures, and that kind of

thing, I could draw a middlin' good likeness of him now.

By George! how fond I am of a good horse--a real well-bred clinker. I'd

never have been here if it hadn't been for that, I do believe; and many

another Currency chap can say the same--a horse or a woman--that's about

the size of it, one or t'other generally fetches us. I shall never put

foot in stirrup again, but I'll try and scratch out a sort of likeness

of Rainbow.

He was a dark bay horse, nearly brown, without a white hair on him. He

wasn't above 15 hands and an inch high, but looked a deal bigger than

he was, for the way he held his head up and carried himself. He was deep

and thick through behind the shoulders, and girthed ever so much more

than you'd think. He had a short back, and his ribs went out like a

cask, long quarter, great thighs and hocks, wonderful legs, and feet of

course to do the work he did. His head was plainish, but clean and bony,

and his eye was big and well opened, with no white showing. His shoulder

was sloped back that much that he couldn't fall, no matter what

happened his fore legs. All his paces were good too. I believe he could

jump--jump anything he was ridden at, and very few horses could get the

better of him for one mile or three.

Where he'd come from, of course, we were not to know then. He had a

small private sort of brand that didn't belong to any of the big studs;

but he was never bred by a poor man. I afterwards found out that he was

stolen before he was foaled, like many another plum, and his dam killed

as soon as she had weaned him. So, of course, no one could swear to him,

and Starlight could have ridden past the Supreme Court, at the assizes,

and never been stopped, as far as this horse was concerned.

Before we went away father and Starlight had some terrible long talks,

and one evening Jim came to me, and says he--

'What do you think they're up to now?'

'How should I know? Sticking up a bank, or boning a flock of maiden ewes

to take up a run with? They seem to be game for anything. There'll be a

hanging match in the family if us boys don't look out.'

'There's no knowing,' says Jim, with a roguish look in his eye (I didn't

think then how near the truth I was), 'but it's about a horse this

time.'

'Oh! a horse; that alters the matter. But what's one horse to make such

a shine about?'

'Ah, that's the point,' says poor old Jim, 'it's a horse worth talking

about. Don't you remember the imported entire that they had his picture

in the papers--him that Mr. Windhall gave 2000 Pounds for?'

'What! the Marquis of Lorne? Why, you don't mean to say they're going

for him?'

'By George, I do!' says Jim; 'and they'll have him here, and twenty

blood mares to put to him, before September.'

'They're all gone mad--they'll raise the country on us. Every police

trooper in the colony'll be after us like a pack of dingoes after an old

man kangaroo when the ground's boggy, and they'll run us down, too; they

can't be off it. Whatever made 'em think of such a big touch as that?'

'That Starlight's the devil, I think,' said Jim slowly. 'Father didn't

seem to like it at first, but he brought him round bit by bit--said he

knew a squatter in Queensland he could pass him on to; that they'd

keep him there for a year and get a crop of foals by him, and when the

“derry” was off he'd take him over himself.'

'But how's he going to nail him? People say Windhall keeps him locked up

at night, and his box is close to his house.'

'Starlight says he has a friend handy; he seems to have one or

two everywhere. It's wonderful, as father told him, where he gets

information.'

'By George! it would be a touch, and no mistake. And if we could get a

few colts by him out of thoroughbred mares we might win half the races

every year on our side and no one a bit the wiser.'

It did seem a grand sort of thing--young fools that we were--to get hold

of this wonderful stallion that we'd heard so much of, as thoroughbred

as Eclipse; good as anything England could turn out. I say again, if

it weren't for the horse-flesh part of it, the fun and hard-riding and

tracking, and all the rest of it, there wouldn't be anything like the

cross-work that there is in Australia. It lies partly between that and

the dry weather. There's the long spells of drought when nothing can be

done by young or old. Sometimes for months you can't work in the garden,

nor plough, nor sow, nor do anything useful to keep the devil out of

your heart. Only sit at home and do nothing, or else go out and watch

the grass witherin' and the water dryin' up, and the stock dyin' by

inches before your eyes. And no change, maybe, for months. The ground

like iron and the sky like brass, as the parson said, and very true,

too, last Sunday.

Then the youngsters, havin' so much idle time on their hands, take to

gaffin' and flash talk; and money must be got to sport and pay up if

they lose; and the stock all ramblin' about and mixed up, and there's a

temptation to collar somebody's calves or foals, like we did that first

red heifer. I shall remember her to my dying day. It seems as if I had

put that brand on my own heart when I jammed it down on her soft skin.

Anyhow, I never forgot it, and there's many another like me, I'll be

bound.

The next morning Jim and I started off home. Father said he should stay

in the Hollow till Starlight got round a bit. He told us not to tell

mother or Ailie a word about where we'd been. Of course they couldn't

be off knowin' that we'd been with him; but we were to stall them off

by saying we'd been helping him with a bit of bush-work or anything we

could think off. 'It'll do no good, and your mother's quite miserable

enough as it is, boys,' he said. 'She'll know time enough, and maybe

break her heart over it, too. Poor Norah!'

Dashed if I ever heard father say a soft thing before. I couldn't 'a

believed it. I always thought he was ironbark outside and in. But he

seemed real sorry for once. And I was near sayin', 'Why don't ye cut the

whole blessed lot, then, and come home and work steady and make us all

comfortable and happy?' But when I looked again his face was all changed

and hard-like. 'Off you go,' he says, with his old voice. 'Next time I

want either of you I'll send Warrigal for you.'

And with that he walked off from the yard where we had been catching our

horses, and never looked nigh us again.

We rode away to the low end of the gully, and then we led the horses

up, foot by foot, and hard work it was--like climbing up the roof of a

house. We were almost done when we got to the tableland at the top.

We made our way to the yard, where there were the tracks of the cows

all round about it, but nothing but the wild horses had ever been there

since.

'What a scrubby hole it is!' said Jim; 'I wonder how in the world they

ever found out the way to the Hollow?'

'Some runaway Government men, I believe, so that half-caste chap told

me, and a gin [*] showed 'em the track down, and where to get water and

everything. They lived on kangaroos at first. Then, by degrees, they

used to crawl out by moonlight and collar a horse or two or a few

cattle. They managed to live there years and years; one died, one was

killed by the blacks; the last man showed it to the chaps that passed

it on to Starlight. Warrigal's mother, or aunt or something, was the gin

that showed it to the first white men.'

* A black woman.

Chapter 7

It was pretty late that night when we got home, and poor mother and

Aileen were that glad to see us that they didn't ask too many questions.

Mother would sit and look at the pair of us for ever so long without

speaking, and then the tears would come into her eyes and she'd turn

away her head.

The old place looked very snug, clean, and comfortable, too, after all

the camping-out, and it was first-rate to have our own beds again. Then

the milk and fresh butter, and the eggs and bacon--my word! how Jim did

lay in; you'd have thought he was goin' on all night.

'By George! home's a jolly place after all,' he said. 'I am going to

stay ever so long this time, and work like an old near-side poler--see

if I don't. Let's look at your hands, Aileen; my word, you've been doin'

your share.'

'Indeed, has she,' said mother. 'It's a shame, so it is, and her with

two big brothers, too.'

'Poor Ailie,' said Jim, 'she had to take an axe, had she, in her pretty

little hands; but she didn't cut all that wood that's outside the door

and I nearly broke my neck over, I'll go bail.'

'How do you know?' says she, smiling roguish-like. 'All the world might

have been here for what you'd been the wiser--going away nobody knows

where, and coming home at night like--like----'

'Bush-rangers,' says I. 'Say it out; but we haven't turned out yet, if

that's what you mean, Miss Marston.'

'I don't mean anything but what's kind and loving, you naughty boy,'

says she, throwing her arms about my neck; 'but why will you break our

hearts, poor mother's and mine, by going off in such a wild way and

staying away, as if you were doing something that you were ashamed of?'

'Women shouldn't ask questions,' I said roughly. 'You'll know time

enough, and if you never know, perhaps it's all the better.'

Jim was alongside of mother by this time, lying down like a child on the

old native dogskin rug that we tanned ourselves with wattle bark. She

had her hand on his hair--thick and curly it was always from a child.

She didn't say anything, but I could see the tears drip, drip down from

her face; her head was on Jim's shoulder, and by and by he put his arms

round her neck. I went off to bed, I remember, and left them to it.

Next morning Jim and I were up at sunrise and got in the milkers, as we

always did when we were at home. Aileen was up too. She had done all the

dairying lately by herself. There were about a dozen cows to milk, and

she had managed it all herself every day that we were away; put up the

calves every afternoon, drove up the cows in the cold mornings, made

the butter, which she used to salt and put into a keg, and feed the pigs

with the skim milk. It was rather hard work for her, but I never saw her

equal for farm work--rough or smooth. And she used to manage to dress

neat and look pretty all the time; not like some small settlers'

daughters that I have seen, slouching about with a pair of Blucher boots

on, no bonnet, a dirty frock, and a petticoat like a blanket rag--not

bad-looking girls either--and their hair like a dry mop. No, Aileen was

always neat and tidy, with a good pair of thick boots outside and a thin

pair for the house when she'd done her work.

She could frighten a wildish cow and bail up anything that would stay

in a yard with her. She could ride like a bird and drive bullocks on a

pinch in a dray or at plough, chop wood, too, as well as here and there

a one. But when she was in the house and regularly set down to her

sewing she'd look that quiet and steady-going you'd think she was only

fit to teach in a school or sell laces and gloves.

And so she was when she was let work in her own way, but if she was

crossed or put upon, or saw anything going wrong, she'd hold up her

head and talk as straight as any man I ever saw. She'd a look just like

father when he'd made up his mind, only her way was always the right

way. What a difference it makes, doesn't it? And she was so handsome

with it. I've seen a goodish lot of women since I left the old place,

let alone her that's helped to put me where I am, but I don't think

I ever saw a girl that was a patch on Aileen for looks. She had

a wonderful fair skin, and her eyes were large and soft like poor

mother's. When she was a little raised-like you'd see a pink flush come

on her cheeks like a peach blossom in September, and her eyes had a

bright startled look like a doe kangaroo when she jumps up and looks

round. Her teeth were as white and even as a black gin's. The mouth was

something like father's, and when she shut it up we boys always knew

she'd made up her mind, and wasn't going to be turned from it. But her

heart was that good that she was always thinking of others and not of

herself. I believe--I know--she'd have died for any one she loved. She

had more sense than all the rest of us put together. I've often thought

if she'd been the oldest boy instead of me she'd have kept Jim straight,

and managed to drive father out of his cross ways--that is, if any one

living could have done it. As for riding, I have never seen any one that

could sit a horse or handle him through rough, thick country like her.

She could ride barebacked, or next to it, sitting sideways on nothing

but a gunny-bag, and send a young horse flying through scrub and rocks,

or down ranges where you'd think a horse could hardly keep his feet. We

could all ride a bit out of the common, if it comes to that. Better if

we'd learned nothing but how to walk behind a plough, year in year out,

like some of the folks in father's village in England, as he used to

tell us about when he was in a good humour. But that's all as people are

reared, I suppose. We'd been used to the outside of a horse ever since

we could walk almost, and it came natural to us. Anyhow, I think Aileen

was about the best of the lot of us at that, as in everything else.

Well, for a bit all went on pretty well at home. Jim and I worked away

steady, got in a tidy bit of crop, and did everything that lay in our

way right and regular. We milked the cows in the morning, and brought in

a big stack of firewood and chopped as much as would last for a month

or two. We mended up the paddock fence, and tidied the garden. The old

place hadn't looked so smart for many a day.

When we came in at night old mother used to look that pleased and happy

we couldn't help feeling better in our hearts. Aileen used to read

something out of the paper that she thought might amuse us. I could read

pretty fair, and so could Jim; but we were both lazy at it, and after

working pretty hard all day didn't so much care about spelling out the

long words in the farming news or the stories they put in. All the same,

it would have paid us better if we'd read a little more and put the

'bullocking' on one side, at odd times. A man can learn as much out of

a book or a paper sometimes in an hour as will save his work for a week,

or put him up to working to better purpose. I can see that now--too

late, and more's the pity.

Anyhow, Aileen could read pretty near as fast as any one I ever saw, and

she used to reel it out for us, as we sat smoking over the fire, in a

way that kept us jolly and laughing till it was nearly turning-in time.

Now and then George Storefield would come and stay an hour or two.

He could read well; nearly as well as she could. Then he had always

something to show her that she'd been asking about. His place was eight

miles off, but he'd always get his horse and go home, whatever the night

was like.

'I must be at my work in the morning,' he'd say; 'it's more than half

a day gone if you lose that, and I've no half-days to spare, or

quarter-days either.'

. . . . .

So we all got on first-rate, and anybody would have thought that there

wasn't a more steady-going, hard-working, happy family in the colony. No

more there wasn't, while it lasted. After all, what is there that's half

as good as being all right and square, working hard for the food you

eat, and the sleep you enjoy, able to look all the world in the face,

and afraid of nothing and nobody!

We were so quiet and comfortable till the winter was over and the spring

coming on, till about September, that I almost began to believe we'd

never done anything in our lives we could be made to suffer for.

Now and then, of course, I used to wake up in the night, and my thoughts

would go back to 'Terrible Hollow', that wonderful place; and one night

with the unbranded cattle, and Starlight, with the blood dripping on

to his horse's shoulder, and the half-caste, with his hawk's eye

and glittering teeth--father, with his gloomy face and dark words. I

wondered whether it was all a dream; whether I and Jim had been in at

all; whether any of the 'cross-work' had been found out; and, if so,

what would be done to me and Jim; most of all, though, whether father

and Starlight were away after some 'big touch'; and, if so, where and

what it was, and how soon we should hear of it.

As for Jim, he was one of those happy-go-lucky fellows that didn't

bother himself about anything he didn't see or run against. I don't

think it ever troubled him. It was the only bad thing he'd ever been

in. He'd been drawn in against his will, and I think he had made up his

mind--pretty nearly--not to go in for any more.

I have often seen Aileen talking to him, and they'd walk along in the

evening when the work was done--he with his arm round her waist, and she

looking at him with that quiet, pleased face of hers, seeming so proud

and fond of him, as if he'd been the little chap she used to lead

about and put on the old pony, and bring into the calf-pen when she was

milking. I remember he had a fight with a little bull-calf, about a week

old, that came in with a wild heifer, and Aileen made as much of his

pluck as if it had been a mallee scrubber. The calf baaed and butted

at Jim, as even the youngest of them will, if they've the wild blood

in 'em, and nearly upset him; he was only a bit of a toddler. But Jim

picked up a loose leg of a milking-stool, and the two went at it hammer

and tongs. I could hardly stand for laughing, till the calf gave him

best and walked.

Aileen pulled him out, and carried him in to mother, telling her that he

was the bravest little chap in the world; and I remember I got scolded

for not going to help him. How these little things come back!

'I'm beginning to be afraid,' says George, one evening, 'that it's going

to be a dry season.'

'There's plenty of time yet,' says Jim, who always took the bright side

of things; 'it might rain towards the end of the month.'

'I was thinking the same thing,' I said. 'We haven't had any rain

to speak of for a couple of months, and that bit of wheat of ours is

beginning to go back. The oats look better.'

'Now I think of it,' put in Jim, 'Dick Dawson came in from outside, and

he said things are shocking bad; all the frontage bare already, and the

water drying up.'

'It's always the way,' I said, bitter-like. 'As soon as a poor man's

got a chance of a decent crop, the season turns against him or prices go

down, so that he never gets a chance.'

'It's as bad for the rich man, isn't it?' said George. 'It's God's will,

and we can't make or mend things by complaining.'

'I don't know so much about that,' I said sullenly. 'But it's not as

bad for the rich man. Even if the squatters suffer by a drought and lose

their stock, they've more stock and money in the bank, or else credit to

fall back on; while the like of us lose all we have in the world, and no

one would lend us a pound afterwards to save our lives.'

'It's not quite so bad as that,' said George. 'I shall lose my year's

work unless rain comes, and most of the cattle and horses besides; but

I shall be able to get a few pounds to go on with, however the season

goes.'

'Oh! if you like to bow and scrape to rich people, well and good,' I

said; 'but that's not my way. We have as good a right to our share of

the land and some other good things as they have, and why should we be

done out of it?'

'If we pay for the land as they do, certainly,' said George.

'But why should we pay? God Almighty, I suppose, made the land and the

people too, one to live on the other. Why should we pay for what is our

own? I believe in getting my share somehow.'

'That's a sort of argument that doesn't come out right,' said George.

'How would you like another man to come and want to halve the farm with

you?'

'I shouldn't mind; I should go halves with some one else who had a

bigger one,' I said. 'More money too, more horses, more sheep, a bigger

house! Why should he have it and not me?'

'That's a lazy man's argument, and--well, not an honest man's,' said

George, getting up and putting on his cabbage-tree. 'I can't sit and

hear you talk such rot. Nobody can work better than you and Jim, when

you like. I wonder you don't leave such talk to fellows like Frowser,

that's always spouting at the Shearers' Arms.'

'Nonsense or not, if a dry season comes and knocks all our work over, I

shall help myself to some one's stuff that has more than he knows what

to do with.'

'Why can't we all go shearing, and make as much as will keep us for six

months?' said George. 'I don't know what we'd do without the squatters.'

'Nor I either; more ways than one; but Jim and I are going shearing next

week. So perhaps there won't be any need for “duffing” after all.'

'Oh, Dick!' said Aileen, 'I can't bear to hear you make a joke of that

kind of thing. Don't we all know what it leads to! Wouldn't it be better

to live on dry bread and be honest than to be full of money and never

know the day when you'd be dragged to gaol?'

'I've heard all that before; but ain't there lots of people that have

made their money by all sorts of villainy, that look as well as the

best, and never see a gaol?'

'They're always caught some day,' says poor Aileen, sobbing, 'and what a

dreadful life of anxiety they must lead!'

'Not at all,' I said. 'Look at Lucksly, Squeezer, and Frying-pan Jack.

Everybody knows how they got their stock and their money. See how they

live. They've got stations, and public-house and town property, and they

get richer every year. I don't think it pays to be too honest in a dry

country.'

'You're a naughty boy, Dick; isn't he, Jim?' she said, smiling through

her tears. 'But he doesn't mean half what he says, does he?'

'Not he,' says Jim; 'and very likely we'll have lots of rain after all.'

Chapter 8

The 'big squatter', as he was called on our side of the country, was Mr.

Falkland. He was an Englishman that had come young to the colony, and

worked his way up by degrees. He had had no money when he first came,

people said; indeed, he often said so himself. He was not proud, at any

rate in that way, for he was not above telling a young fellow that he

should never be downhearted because he hadn't a coat to his back or a

shilling in his pocket, because he, Herbert Falkland, had known what

it was to be without either. 'This was the best country in the whole

world,' he used to say, 'for a gentleman who was poor or a working man.'

The first sort could always make an independence if they were moderately

strong, liked work, and did not drink. There were very few countries

where idle, unsteady people got rich. 'As for the poor man, he was the

real rich man in Australia; high wages, cheap food, lodging, clothing,

travelling. What more did he want? He could save money, live happily,

and die rich, if he wasn't a fool or a rogue. Unfortunately, these last

were highly popular professions; and many people, high and low, belonged

to them here--and everywhere else.'

We were all well up in this kind of talk, because for the last two or

three years, since we had begun to shear pretty well, we had always

shorn at his shed. He was one of those gentlemen--and he was a

gentleman, if ever there was one--that takes a deal of notice of his

working hands, particularly if they were young. Jim he took a great

fancy to the first moment he saw him. He didn't care so much about me.

'You're a sulky young dog, Richard Marston,' he used to say. 'I'm not

sure that you'll come to any good; and though I don't like to say all

I hear about your father before you, I'm afraid he doesn't teach you

anything worth knowing. But Jim there's a grand fellow; if he'd been

caught young and weaned from all of your lot, he'd have been an honour

to the land he was born in. He's too good for you all.'

'Every one of you gentlemen wants to be a small God Almighty,' I said

impudently. 'You'd like to break us all in and put us in yokes and bows,

like a lot of working bullocks.'

'You mistake me, my boy, and all the rest of us who are worth calling

men, let alone gentlemen. We are your best friends, and would help you

in every way if you'd only let us.'

'I don't see so much of that.'

'Because you often fight against your own good. We should like to see

you all have farms of your own--to be all well taught and able to make

the best of your lives--not driven to drink, as many of you are, because

you have no notion of any rational amusement, and anything between hard

work and idle dissipation.'

'And suppose you had all this power,' I said--for if I was afraid of

father there wasn't another man living that could overcrow me--'don't

you think you'd know the way to keep all the good things for yourselves?

Hasn't it always been so?'

'I see your argument,' he said, quite quiet and reasonable, just as if I

had been a swell like himself--that was why he was unlike any other man

I ever knew--'and it is a perfectly fair way of putting it. But your

class might, I think, always rely upon there being enough kindness and

wisdom in ours to prevent that state of things. Unfortunately, neither

side trusts the other enough. And now the bell is going to ring, I

think.'

Jim and I stopped at Boree shed till all the sheep were cut out. It pays

well if the weather is pretty fair, and it isn't bad fun when there's

twenty or thirty chaps of the right sort in the shearers' hut; there's

always some fun going on. Shearers work pretty hard, and as they buy

their own rations generally, they can afford to live well. After a hard

day's shearing--that is, from five o'clock in the morning to seven at

night, going best pace all the time, every man working as hard as if he

was at it for his life--one would think a man would be too tired to do

anything. But we were mostly strong and hearty, and at that age a man

takes a deal of killing; so we used to have a little card-playing at

night to pass away the time.

Very few of the fellows had any money to spend. They couldn't get any

either until shearing was over and they were paid off; but they'd get

some one who could write to scribble a lot of I O U's, and they did as

well.

We used to play 'all-fours' and 'loo', and now and then an American

game which some of the fellows had picked up. It was strange how soon we

managed to get into big stakes. I won at first, and then Jim and I began

to lose, and had such a lot of I O U's out that I was afraid we'd have

no money to take home after shearing. Then I began to think what a fool

I'd been to play myself and drag Jim into it, for he didn't want to play

at first.

One day I got a couple of letters from home--one from Aileen and another

in a strange hand. It had come to our little post-office, and Aileen had

sent it on to Boree.

When I opened it there were a few lines, with father's name at the

bottom. He couldn't write, so I made sure that Starlight had written

it for him. He was quite well, it said; and to look out for him about

Christmas time; he might come home then, or send for us; to stop at

Boree if we could get work, and keep a couple of horses in good trim, as

he might want us. A couple of five-pound notes fell out of the letter as

I opened it.

When I looked at them first I felt a kind of fear. I knew what they came

from. And I had a sort of feeling that we should be better without them.

However, the devil was too strong for me. Money's a tempting thing,

whether it's notes or gold, especially when a man's in debt. I had begun

to think the fellows looked a little cool on us the last three or four

nights, as our losses were growing big.

So I gave Jim his share; and after tea, when we sat down again, there

weren't more than a dozen of us that were in the card racket. I flung

down my note, and Jim did his, and told them that we owed to take the

change out of that and hand us over their paper for the balance.

They all stared, for such a thing hadn't been seen since the shearing

began. Shearers, as a rule, come from their homes in the settled

districts very bare. They are not very well supplied with clothes; their

horses are poor and done up; and they very seldom have a note in their

pockets, unless they have managed to sell a spare horse on the journey.

So we were great men for the time, looked at by the others with wonder

and respect. We were fools enough to be pleased with it. Strangely, too,

our luck turned from that minute, and it ended in our winning not only

our own back, but more than as much more from the other men.

I don't think Mr. Falkland liked these goings on. He wouldn't have

allowed cards at all if he could have helped it. He was a man that hated

what was wrong, and didn't value his own interest a pin when it came in

the way. However, the shearing hut was our own, in a manner of speaking,

and as long as we shore clean and kept the shed going the overseer, Mr.

M'Intyre, didn't trouble his head much about our doings in the hut.

He was anxious to get done with the shearing, to get the wool into

the bales before the dust came in, and the grass seed ripened, and the

clover burrs began to fall.

'Why should ye fash yoursel',' I heard him say once to Mr. Falkland,

'aboot these young deevils like the Marstons? They're as good's ready

money in auld Nick's purse. It's bred and born and welded in them. Ye'll

just have the burrs and seeds amang the wool if ye keep losing a smart

shearer for the sake o' a wheen cards and dice; and ye'll mak' nae heed

of convairtin' thae young caterans ony mair than ye'll change a Norroway

falcon into a barn-door chuckie.'

I wonder if what he said was true--if we couldn't help it; if it was in

our blood? It seems like it; and yet it's hard lines to think a fellow

must grow up and get on the cross in spite of himself, and come to the

gallows-foot at last, whether he likes it or not. The parson here isn't

bad at all. He's a man and a gentleman, too; and he's talked and read

to me by the hour. I suppose some of us chaps are like the poor stupid

tribes that the Israelites found in Canaan, only meant to live for a bit

and then to be rubbed out to make room for better people.

When the shearing was nearly over we had a Saturday afternoon to

ourselves. We had finished all the sheep that were in the shed, and old

M'Intyre didn't like to begin a fresh flock. So we got on our horses and

took a ride into the township just for the fun of the thing, and for

a little change. The horses had got quite fresh with the rest and

the spring grass. Their coats were shining, and they all looked very

different from what they did when we first came. Our two were not so

poor when they came, so they looked the best of the lot, and jumped

about in style when we mounted. Ah! only to think of a good horse.

All the men washed themselves and put on clean clothes. Then we had our

dinner and about a dozen of us started off for the town.

Poor old Jim, how well he looked that day! I don't think you could pick

a young fellow anywhere in the countryside that was a patch on him for

good looks and manliness, somewhere about six foot or a little over, as

straight as a rush, with a bright blue eye that was always laughing and

twinkling, and curly dark brown hair. No wonder all the girls used to

think so much of him. He could do anything and everything that a man

could do. He was as strong as a young bull, and as active as a rock

wallaby--and ride! Well, he sat on his horse as if he was born on one.

With his broad shoulders and upright easy seat he was a regular picture

on a good horse.

And he had a good one under him to-day; a big, brown, resolute,

well-bred horse he had got in a swap because the man that had him was

afraid of him. Now that he had got a little flesh on his bones he looked

something quite out of the common. 'A deal too good for a poor man, and

him honest,' as old M'Intyre said.

But Jim turned on him pretty sharp, and said he had got the horse in a

fair deal, and had as much right to a good mount as any one else--super

or squatter, he didn't care who he was.

And Mr. Falkland took Jim's part, and rather made Mr. M'Intyre out in

the wrong for saying what he did. The old man didn't say much more, only

shook his head, saying--

'Ah, ye're a grand laddie, and buirdly, and no that thrawn, either--like

ye, Dick, ye born deevil,' looking at me. 'But I misdoot sair ye'll die

wi' your boots on. There's a smack o' Johnnie Armstrong in the glint o'

yer e'e. Ye'll be to dree yer weird, there's nae help for't.'

'What's all that lingo, Mr. M'Intyre?' called out Jim, all good-natured

again. 'Is it French or Queensland blacks' yabber? Blest if I understand

a word of it. But I didn't want to be nasty, only I am regular shook on

this old moke, I believe, and he's as square as Mr. Falkland's dogcart

horse.'

'Maybe ye bocht him fair eneugh. I'll no deny you. I saw the receipt

mysel'. But where did yon lang-leggit, long-lockit, Fish River

moss-trooping callant win haud o' him? Answer me that, Jeems.'

'That says nothing,' answered Jim. 'I'm not supposed to trace back every

horse in the country and find out all the people that owned him since he

was a foal. He's mine now, and mine he'll be till I get a better one.'

'A contuma-acious and stiff-necked generation,' said the old man,

walking off and shaking his head. 'And yet he's a fine laddie; a gra-and

laddie wad he be with good guidance. It's the Lord's doing, nae doot,

and we daurna fault it; it's wondrous in our een.'

That was the way old Mac always talked. Droll lingo, wasn't it?

Chapter 9

Well, away we went to this township. Bundah was the name of it; not that

there was anything to do or see when we got there. It was the regular

up-country village, with a public-house, a store, a pound, and a

blacksmith's shop. However, a public-house is not such a bad place--at

any rate it's better than nothing when a fellow's young and red-hot for

anything like a bit of fun, or even a change. Some people can work away

day after day, and year after year, like a bullock in a team or a horse

in a chaff-cutting machine. It's all the better for them if they can,

though I suppose they never enjoy themselves except in a cold-blooded

sort of way. But there's other men that can't do that sort of thing, and

it's no use talking. They must have life and liberty and a free range.

There's some birds, and animals too, that either pine in a cage or kill

themselves, and I suppose it's the same way with some men. They can't

stand the cage of what's called honest labour, which means working

for some one else for twenty or thirty years, never having a day to

yourself, or doing anything you like, and saving up a trifle for your

old age when you can't enjoy it. I don't wonder youngsters break traces

and gallop off like a colt out of a team.

Besides, sometimes there's a good-looking girl even at a bush public,

the daughter or the barmaid, and it's odd, now, what a difference that

makes. There's a few glasses of grog going, a little noisy, rattling

talk, a few smiles and a saucy answer or two from the girl, a look at

the last newspaper, or a bit of the town news from the landlord; he's

always time to read. Hang him--I mean confound him--for he's generally a

sly old spider who sucks us fellows pretty dry, and then don't care what

becomes of us. Well, it don't amount to much, but it's life--the only

taste of it that chaps like us are likely to get. And people may talk as

much as they like; boys, and men too, will like it, and take to it, and

hanker after it, as long as the world lasts. There's danger in it, and

misery, and death often enough comes of it, but what of that? If a man

wants a swim on the seashore he won't stand all day on the beach because

he may be drowned or snapped up by a shark, or knocked against a rock,

or tired out and drawn under by the surf. No, if he's a man he'll jump

in and enjoy himself all the more because the waves are high and the

waters deep. So it was very good fun to us, simple as it might sound

to some people. It was pleasant to be bowling along over the firm green

turf, along the plain, through the forest, gully, and over the creek.

Our horses were fresh, and we had a scurry or two, of course; but there

wasn't one that could hold a candle to Jim's brown horse. He was a

long-striding, smooth goer, but he got over the ground in wonderful

style. He could jump, too, for Jim put him over a big log fence or two,

and he sailed over them like a forester buck over the head of a fallen

wattle.

Well, we'd had our lark at the Bundah Royal Hotel, and were coming home

to tea at the station, all in good spirits, but sober enough, when, just

as we were crossing one of the roads that came through the run--over the

'Pretty Plain', as they called it--we heard a horse coming along best

pace. When we looked who should it be but Miss Falkland, the owner's

only daughter.

She was an only child, and the very apple of her father's eye, you may

be sure. The shearers mostly knew her by sight, because she had taken

a fancy to come down with her father a couple of times to see the shed

when we were all in full work.

A shed's not exactly the best place for a young lady to come into.

Shearers are rough in their language now and then. But every man

liked and respected Mr. Falkland, so we all put ourselves on our best

behaviour, and the two or three flash fellows who had no sense or

decent feeling were warned that if they broke out at all they would get

something to remember it by.

But when we saw that beautiful, delicate-looking creature stepping down

the boards between the two rows of shearers, most of them stripped to

their jerseys and working like steam-engines, looking curiously and

pitifully at the tired men and the patient sheep, with her great, soft,

dark eyes and fair white face like a lily, we began to think we'd heard

of angels from heaven, but never seen one before.

Just as she came opposite Jim, who was trying to shear sheep and sheep

with the 'ringer' of the shed, who was next on our right, the wether he

was holding kicked, and knocking the shears out of his hand, sent them

point down against his wrist. One of the points went right in, and

though it didn't cut the sinews, as luck would have it, the point stuck

out at the other side; out spurted the blood, and Jim was just going to

let out when he looked up and saw Miss Falkland looking at him, with her

beautiful eyes so full of pity and surprise that he could have had his

hand chopped off, so he told me afterwards, rather than vex her for a

moment. So he shut up his mouth and ground his teeth together, for it

was no joke in the way of pain, and the blood began to run like a blind

creek after a thunderstorm.

'Oh! poor fellow. What a dreadful cut! Look, papa!' she cried out.

'Hadn't something better be bound round it? How it bleeds! Does it pain

much?'

'Not a bit, miss!' said Jim, standing up like a schoolboy going to say

his lesson. 'That is, it doesn't matter if it don't stop my shearing.'

'Tar!' sings out my next-door neighbour. 'Here, boy; tar wanted for No.

36. That'll put it all right, Jim; it's only a scratch.'

'You mind your shearing, my man,' said Mr. Falkland quietly. 'I don't

know whether Mr. M'Intyre will quite approve of that last sheep of

yours. This is rather a serious wound. The best thing is to bind it up

at once.'

Before any one could say another word Miss Falkland had whipped out her

soft fine cambric handkerchief and torn it in two.

'Hold up your hand,' she said. 'Now, papa, lend me yours.' With the

last she cleared the wound of the flowing blood, and then neatly and

skilfully bound up the wrist firmly with the strips of cambric. This she

further protected by her father's handkerchief, which she helped herself

to and finally stopped the blood with.

Jim kept looking at her small white hands all the time she was doing

it. Neither of us had ever seen such before--the dainty skin, the pink

nails, the glittering rings.

'There,' she said, 'I don't think you ought to shear any more to-day;

it might bring on inflammation. I'll send to know how it gets on

to-morrow.'

'No, miss; my grateful thanks, miss,' said Jim, opening his eyes and

looking as if he'd like to drop down on his knees and pray to her. 'I

shall never forget your goodness, Miss Falkland, if I live till I'm a

hundred.' Then Jim bent his head a bit--I don't suppose he ever made

a bow in his life before--and then drew himself up as straight as a

soldier, and Miss Falkland made a kind of bow and smile to us all and

passed out.

Jim did shear all the same that afternoon, though the tally wasn't any

great things. 'I can't go and lie down in a bunk in the men's hut,' he

said; 'I must chance it,' and he did. Next day it was worse and very

painful, but Jim stuck to the shears, though he used to turn white with

the pain at times, and I thought he'd faint. However, it gradually got

better, and, except a scar, Jim's hand was as good as ever.

Jim sent back Mr. Falkland's handkerchief after getting the cook to wash

it and iron it out with a bit of a broken axletree; but the strips of

white handkerchief--one had C. F. in the corner--he put away in his

swag, and made some foolish excuse when I laughed at him about it.

She sent down a boy from the house next day to ask how Jim's hand was,

and the day after that, but she never came to the shed any more. So we

didn't see her again.

So it was this young lady that we saw coming tearing down the back road,

as they called it, that led over the Pretty Plain. A good way behind we

saw Mr. Falkland, but he had as much chance of coming up with her as a

cattle dog of catching a 'brush flyer'.

The stable boy, Billy Donnellan, had told us (of course, like all those

sort of youngsters, he was fond of getting among the men and listening

to them talk) all about Miss Falkland's new mare.

She was a great beauty and thoroughbred. The stud groom had bought

her out of a travelling mob from New England when she was dog-poor and

hardly able to drag herself along. Everybody thought she was going to be

the best lady's horse in the district; but though she was as quiet as

a lamb at first she had begun to show a nasty temper lately, and to get

very touchy. 'I don't care about chestnuts myself,' says Master Billy,

smoking a short pipe as if he was thirty; 'they've a deal of temper, and

she's got too much white in her eye for my money. I'm afeard she'll do

some mischief afore we've done with her; and Miss Falkland's that game

as she won't have nothing done to her. I'd ride the tail off her but

what I'd bring her to, if I had my way.'

So this was the brute that had got away with Miss Falkland, the day

we were coming back from Bundah. Some horses, and a good many men and

women, are all pretty right as long as they're well kept under and

starved a bit at odd times. But give them an easy life and four feeds of

corn a day, and they're troublesome brutes, and mischievous too.

It seems this mare came of a strain that had turned out more devils and

killed more grooms and breakers than any other in the country. She was

a Troubadour, it seems; there never was a Troubadour yet that wouldn't

buck and bolt, and smash himself and his rider, if he got a fright, or

his temper was roused. Men and women, horses and dogs, are very much

alike. I know which can talk best. As to the rest, I don't know whether

there's so much for us to be proud of.

It seems that this cranky wretch of a mare had been sideling and

fidgeting when Mr. Falkland and his daughter started for their ride; but

had gone pretty fairly--Miss Falkland, like my sister Aileen, could ride

anything in reason--when suddenly a dead limb dropped off a tree close

to the side of the road.

I believe she made one wild plunge, and set to; she propped and reared,

but Miss Falkland sat her splendidly and got her head up. When she saw

she could do nothing that way, she stretched out her head and went off

as hard as she could lay legs to the ground.

She had one of those mouths that are not so bad when horses are going

easy, but get quite callous when they are over-eager and excited.

Anyhow, it was like trying to stop a mail-coach going down Mount

Victoria with the brake off.

So what we saw was the wretch of a mare coming along as if the devil was

after her, and heading straight across the plain at its narrowest part;

it wasn't more than half-a-mile wide there, in fact, it was more like a

flat than a plain. The people about Boree didn't see much open country,

so they made a lot out of what they had.

The mare, like some women when they get their monkey up, was clean out

of her senses, and I don't believe anything could have held her under a

hide rope with a turn round a stockyard post. This was what she wanted,

and if it had broken her infernal neck so much the better.

Miss Falkland was sitting straight and square, with her hands down,

leaning a bit back, and doing her level best to stop the brute. Her hat

was off and her hair had fallen down and hung down her back--plenty of

it there was, too. The mare's neck was stretched straight out; her mouth

was like a deal board, I expect, by that time.

We didn't sit staring at her all the time, you bet. We could see the boy

ever so far off. We gathered up our reins and went after her, not in a

hurry, but just collecting ourselves a bit to see what would be the best

way to wheel the brute and stop her.

Jim's horse was far and away the fastest, and he let out to head the

mare off from a creek that was just in front and at the end of the

plain.

'By George!' said one of the men--a young fellow who lived near the

place--'the mare's turning off her course, and she's heading straight

for the Trooper's Downfall, where the policeman was killed. If she goes

over that, they'll be smashed up like a matchbox, horse and rider.'

'What's that?' I said, closing up alongside of him. We were all doing

our best, and were just in the line to back up Jim, who looked as if he

was overhauling the mare fast.

'Why, it's a bluff a hundred feet deep--a straight drop--and rocks at

the bottom. She's making as straight as a bee-line for it now, blast

her!'

'And Jim don't know it,' I said; 'he's closing up to her, but he doesn't

calculate to do it for a quarter of a mile more; he's letting her take

it out of herself.'

'He'll never catch her in time,' said the young chap. 'My God! it's an

awful thing, isn't it? and a fine young lady like her--so kind to us

chaps as she was.'

'I'll see if I can make Jim hear,' I said, for though I looked cool

I was as nearly mad as I could be to think of such a girl being lost

before our eyes. 'No, I can't do that, but I'll TELEGRAPH.'

Chapter 10

Now Jim and I had had many a long talk together about what we should do

in case we wanted to signal to each other very pressing. We thought the

time might come some day when we might be near enough to sign, but not

to speak. So we hit upon one or two things a little out of the common.

The first idea was, in case of one wanting to give the other the office

that he was to look out his very brightest for danger, and not to trust

to what appeared to be the state of affairs, the sign was to hold up

your hat or cap straight over your head. If the danger threatened on the

left, to shift to that side. If it was very pressing and on the jump, as

it were, quite unexpected, and as bad as bad could be, the signalman was

to get up on the saddle with his knees and turn half round.

We could do this easy enough and a lot of circus tricks besides. How

had we learned them? Why, in the long days we had spent in the saddle

tailing the milkers and searching after lost horses for many a night.

As luck would have it Jim looked round to see how we were getting on,

and up went my cap. I could see him turn his head and keep watching

me when I put on the whole box and dice of the telegraph business. He

'dropped', I could see. He took up the brown horse, and made such a rush

to collar the mare that showed he intended to see for himself what the

danger was. The cross-grained jade! She was a well-bred wretch, and be

hanged to her! Went as if she wanted to win the Derby and gave Jim all

he knew to challenge her. We could see a line of timber just ahead of

her, and that Jim was riding for his life.

'By----! they'll both be over it,' said the young shearer. 'They can't

stop themselves at that pace, and they must be close up now.'

'He's neck and neck,' I said. 'Stick to her, Jim, old man!'

We were all close together now. Several of the men knew the place, and

the word had been passed round.

No one spoke for a few seconds. We saw the two horses rush up at top

speed to the very edge of the timber.

'By Jove! they're over. No! he's reaching for her rein. It's no use.

Now--now! She's saved! Oh, my God! they're both right. By the Lord, well

done! Hurrah! One cheer more for Jim Marston!'

. . . . .

It was all right. We saw Jim suddenly reach over as the horses were

going stride and stride; saw him lift Miss Falkland from her saddle as

if she had been a child and place her before him; saw the brown horse

prop, and swing round on his haunches in a way that showed he had

not been called the crack 'cutting-out' horse on a big cattle run for

nothing. We saw Jim jump to the ground and lift the young lady down. We

saw only one horse.

Three minutes after Mr. Falkland overtook us, and we rode up together.

His face was white, and his dry lips couldn't find words at first. But

he managed to say to Jim, when we got up--

'You have saved my child's life, James Marston, and if I forget the

service may God in that hour forget me. You are a noble fellow. You must

allow me to show my gratitude in some way.'

'You needn't thank me so out and out as all that, Mr. Falkland,' said

Jim, standing up very straight and looking at the father first, and then

at Miss Falkland, who was pale and trembling, not altogether from fear,

but excitement, and trying to choke back the sobs that would come out

now and then. 'I'd risk life and limb any day before Miss Falkland's

finger should be scratched, let alone see her killed before my eyes. I

wonder if there's anything left of the mare, poor thing; not that she

don't deserve it all, and more.'

Here we all walked forward to the deep creek bank. A yard or two farther

and the brown horse and his burden must have gone over the terrible

drop, as straight as a plumb-line, on to the awful rocks below. We could

see where the brown had torn up the turf as he struck all four hoofs

deep into it at once. Indeed, he had been newly shod, a freak of Jim's

about a bet with a travelling blacksmith. Then the other tracks, the

long score on the brink--over the brink--where the frightened, maddened

animal had made an attempt to alter her speed, all in vain, and had

plunged over the bank and the hundred feet of fall.

We peered over, and saw a bright-coloured mass among the rocks

below--very still. Just at the time one of the ration-carriers came by

with a spring cart. Mr. Falkland lifted his daughter in and took the

reins, leaving his horse to be ridden home by the ration-carrier. As for

us we rode back to the shearers' hut, not quite so fast as we came, with

Jim in the middle. He did not seem inclined to talk much.

'It's lucky I turned round when I did, Dick,' he said at last, 'and saw

you making the “danger-look-out-sharp” signal. I couldn't think what the

dickens it was. I was so cocksure of catching the mare in half-a-mile

farther that I couldn't help wondering what it was all about. Anyhow,

I knew we agreed it was never to be worked for nothing, so thought the

best thing I could do was to call in the mare, and see if I could

find out anything then. When I got alongside, I could see that Miss

Falkland's face was that white that something must be up. It weren't the

mare she was afraid of. She was coming back to her. It took something to

frighten her, I knew. So it must be something I did not know, or didn't

see.

'“What is it, Miss Falkland?” I said.

'“Oh!” she cried out, “don't you know? Another fifty yards and we'll be

over the downfall where the trooper was killed. Oh, my poor father!”

'“Don't be afraid,” I said. “We'll not go over if I can help it.”

'So I reached over and got hold of the reins. I pulled and jerked.

She said her hands were cramped, and no wonder. Pulling double for a

four-mile heat is no joke, even if a man's in training. Fancy a woman,

a young girl, having to sit still and drag at a runaway horse all the

time. I couldn't stop the brute; she was boring like a wild bull. So

just as we came pretty close I lifted Miss Falkland off the saddle and

yelled at old Brownie as if I had been on a cattle camp, swinging round

to the near side at the same time. Round he came like one o'clock. I

could see the mare make one prop to stop herself, and then go flying

right through the air, till I heard a beastly “thud” at the bottom.

'Miss Falkland didn't faint, though she turned white and then red, and

trembled like a leaf when I lifted her down, and looked up at me with a

sweet smile, and said--

'“Jim, you have paid me for binding up your wrist, haven't you? You have

saved me from a horrible death, and I shall think of you as a brave and

noble fellow all the days of my life.”

'What could I say?' said Jim. 'I stared at her like a fool. “I'd have

gone over the bank with you, Miss Falkland,” I said, “if I could not

have saved you.”

'“Well, I'm afraid some of my admirers would have stopped short of that,

James,” she said. She did indeed. And then Mr. Falkland and all of you

came up.'

'I say, Jim,' said one of the young fellows, 'your fortune's made. Mr.

Falkland 'll stand a farm, you may be sure, for this little fakement.'

'And I say, Jack,' says old Jim, very quiet like, 'I've told you all the

yarn, and if there's any chaff about it after this the cove will have to

see whether he's best man or me; so don't make any mistake now.'

There was no more chaff. They weren't afraid. There were two or three

of them pretty smart with their hands, and not likely to take much from

anybody. But Jim was a heavy weight and could hit like a horse kicking;

so they thought it wasn't good enough, and left him alone.

Next day Mr. Falkland came down and wanted to give Jim a cheque for a

hundred; but he wouldn't hear of so much as a note. Then he said he'd

give him a billet on the run--make him under overseer; after a bit buy

a farm for him and stock it. No! Jim wouldn't touch nothing or take a

billet on the place. He wouldn't leave his family, he said. And as for

taking money or anything else for saving Miss Falkland's life, it was

ridiculous to think of it. There wasn't a man of the lot in the shed,

down to the tarboy, that wouldn't have done the same, or tried to. All

that was in it was that his horse was the fastest.

'It's not a bad thing for a poor man to have a fast horse now and then,

is it, Mr. Falkland?' he said, looking up and smiling, just like a boy.

He was very shy, was poor Jim.

'I don't grudge a poor man a good horse or anything else he likes to

have or enjoy. You know that, all of you. It's the fear I have of the

effect of the dishonest way that horses of value are come by, and the

net of roguery that often entangles fine young fellows like you and your

brother; that's what I fear,' said Mr. Falkland, looking at the pair of

us so kind and pitiful like.

I looked him in the face, though I felt I could not say he was wrong.

I felt, too, just then, as if I could have given all the world to be

afraid of no man's opinion.

What a thing it is to be perfectly honest and straight--to be able to

look the whole world in the face!

But if more gentlemen were like Mr. Falkland I do really believe no one

would rob them for very shame's sake. When shearing was over we were all

paid up--shearers, washers, knock-about men, cooks, and extra shepherds.

Every soul about the place except Mr. M'Intyre and Mr. Falkland seemed

to have got a cheque and a walking-ticket at the same time. Away they

went, like a lot of boys out of school; and half of 'em didn't show as

much sense either. As for me and Jim we had no particular wish to go

home before Christmas. So as there's always contracts to be let about

a big run like Banda we took a contract for some bush work, and went at

it. Mr. M'Intyre looked quite surprised. But Mr. Falkland praised us up,

and was proud we were going to turn over a new leaf.

Nobody could say at that time we didn't work. Fencing, dam-making,

horse-breaking, stock-riding, from making hay to building a shed, all

bushwork came easy enough to us, Jim in particular; he took a pleasure

in it, and was never happier than when he'd had a real tearing day's

work and was settling himself after his tea to a good steady smoke. A

great smoker he'd come to be. He never was much for drinking except

now and again, and then he could knock it off as easy as any man I ever

seen. Poor old Jim! He was born good and intended to be so, like mother.

Like her, his luck was dead out in being mixed up with a lot like ours.

One day we were out at the back making some lambing yards. We were about

twenty miles from the head station and had about finished the job. We

were going in the next day. We had been camping in an old shepherd's hut

and had been pretty jolly all by ourselves. There was first-rate feed

for our horses, as the grass was being saved for the lambing season. Jim

was in fine spirits, and as we had plenty of good rations and first-rate

tobacco we made ourselves pretty comfortable.

'What a jolly thing it is to have nothing on your mind!' Jim used to

say. 'I hadn't once, and what a fine time it was! Now I'm always waking

up with a start and expecting to see a policeman or that infernal

half-caste. He's never far off when there's villainy on. Some fine day

he'll sell us all, I really do believe.'

'If he don't somebody else will; but why do you pitch upon him? You

don't like him somehow; I don't see that he's worse than any other.

Besides, we haven't done anything much to have a reward put on us.'

'No! that's to come,' answered Jim, very dismally for him. 'I don't see

what else is to come of it. Hist! isn't that a horse's step coming this

way? Yes, and a man on him, too.'

It was a bright night, though only the stars were out; but the weather

was that clear that you could see ever so well and hear ever so far

also. Jim had a blackfellow's hearing; his eyes were like a hawk's; he

could see in about any light, and read tracks like a printed book.

I could hear nothing at first; then I heard a slight noise a good way

off, and a stick breaking every now and then.

'Talk of the devil!' growled Jim, 'and here he comes. I believe that's

Master Warrigal, infernal scoundrel that he is. Of course he's got a

message from our respectable old dad or Starlight, asking us to put our

heads in a noose for them again.'

'How do you know?'

'I know it's that ambling horse he used to ride,' says Jim. 'I can make

out his sideling kind of way of using his legs. All amblers do that.'

'You're right,' I said, after listening for a minute. 'I can hear the

regular pace, different from a horse's walk.'

'How does he know we're here, I wonder?' says Jim.

'Some of the telegraphs piped us, I suppose,' I answered. 'I begin to

wish they forgot us altogether.'

'No such luck,' says Jim. 'Let's keep dark and see what this black snake

of a Warrigal will be up to. I don't expect he'll ride straight up to

the door.'

He was right. The horse hoofs stopped just inside a thick bit of scrub,

just outside the open ground on which the hut stood. After a few seconds

we heard the cry of the mopoke. It's not a cheerful sound at the dead of

night, and now, for some reason or other, it affected Jim and me in

much the same manner. I remembered the last time I had heard the bird

at home, just before we started over for Terrible Hollow, and it seemed

unlucky. Perhaps we were both a little nervous; we hadn't drunk anything

but tea for weeks. We drank it awfully black and strong, and a great lot

of it.

Anyhow, as we heard the quick light tread of the horse pacing in his

two-feet-on-one-side way over the sandy, thin-grassed soil, every moment

coming nearer and nearer, and this queer dismal-voiced bird hooting its

hoarse deep notes out of the dark tree that swished and sighed-like

in front of the sandhill, a queer feeling came over both of us that

something unlucky was on the boards for us. We felt quite relieved when

the horse's footsteps stopped. After a minute or so we could see a dark

form creeping towards the hut.

Chapter 11

Warrigal left his horse at the edge of the timber, for fear he might

want him in a hurry, I suppose. He was pretty 'fly', and never threw

away a chance as long as he was sober. He could drink a bit, like the

rest of us, now and then--not often--but when he did it made a regular

devil of him--that is, it brought the devil out that lives low down in

most people's hearts. He was a worse one than usual, Jim said. He saw

him once in one of his break-outs, and heard him boast of something he'd

done. Jim never liked him afterwards. For the matter of that he hated

Jim and me too. The only living things he cared about were Starlight and

the three-cornered weed he rode, that had been a 'brumbee', and wouldn't

let any one touch him, much less ride him, but himself. How he used

to snort if a stranger came near him! He could kick the eye out of a

mosquito, and bite too, if he got the chance.

As for Warrigal, Starlight used to knock him down like a log if he

didn't please him, but he never offered to turn upon him. He seemed

to like it, and looked regular put out once when Starlight hurt his

knuckles against his hard skull.

Us he didn't like, as I said before--why, I don't know--nor we him.

Likes and dislikes are curious things. People hardly know the rights of

them. But if you take a regular strong down upon a man or woman when you

first see 'em it's ten to one that you'll find some day as you've good

reason for it. We couldn't say what grounds we had for hating the sight

of Warrigal neither, for he was as good a tracker as ever followed man

or beasts. He could read all the signs of the bush like a printed book.

He could ride any horse in the world, and find his way, day or night, to

any place he'd ever once been to in his life.

Sometimes we should have been hard pushed when we were making across

country at night only for him. Hour after hour he'd ride ahead through

scrub or forest, up hill or down dale, with that brute of a horse of

his--he called him 'Bilbah'--ambling away, till our horses, except

Rainbow, used to shake the lives out of us jogging. I believe he did it

on purpose.

He was a fine shot, and could catch fish and game in all sorts of ways

that came in handy when we had to keep dark. He had pluck enough,

and could fight a pretty sharp battle with his fists if he wasn't

overweighted. There were white men that didn't at all find him a good

thing if they went to bully him. He tried it on with Jim once, but he

knocked the seven senses out of him inside of three rounds, and that

satisfied him. He pretended to make up, but I was always expecting him

to play us some dog's trick yet. Anyway, so far he was all right, and

as long as Starlight and us were mixed up together, he couldn't hurt one

without the other. He came gliding up to the old hut in the dull light

by bits of moves, just as if he'd been a bush that had changed its

place. We pretended to be asleep near the fire.

He peeped in through a chink. He could see us by the firelight, and

didn't suppose we were watching him.

'Hullo, Warrigal!' sung out Jim suddenly, 'what's up now? Some devil's

work, I suppose, or you wouldn't be in it. Why don't you knock at a

gentleman's door when you come a visiting?'

'Wasn't sure it was you,' he answered, showing his teeth; 'it don't do

to get sold. Might been troopers, for all I know.'

'Pity we wasn't,' said Jim; 'I'd have the hobbles on you by this time,

and you'd have got “fitted” to rights. I wish I'd gone into the police

sometimes. It isn't a bad game for a chap that can ride and track, and

likes a bit of rough-and-tumble now and then.'

'If I'd been a police tracker I'd have had as good a chance of nailing

you, Jim Marston,' spoke up Warrigal. 'Perhaps I will some day. Mr.

Garton wanted me bad once, and said they'd never go agin me for old

times. But that says nothin'. Starlight's out at the back and the old

man, too. They want you to go to them--sharp.'

'What for?'

'Dunno. I was to tell you, and show the camp; and now gimme some grub,

for I've had nothing since sunrise but the leg of a 'possum.'

'All right,' said Jim, putting the billy on; 'here's some damper and

mutton to go on with while the tea warms.'

'Wait till I hobble out Bilbah; he's as hungry as I am, and thirsty too,

my word.'

'Take some out of the barrel; we shan't want it to-morrow,' said Jim.

Hungry as Warrigal was--and when he began to eat I thought he never

would stop--he went and looked after his horse first, and got him a

couple of buckets of water out of the cask they used to send us out

every week. There was no surface water near the hut. Then he hobbled him

out of a bit of old sheep-yard, and came in.

The more I know of men the more I see what curious lumps of good and

bad they're made up of. People that won't stick at anything in some ways

will be that soft and good-feeling in others--ten times more so than

your regular good people. Any one that thinks all mankind's divided

into good, bad, and middlin', and that they can draft 'em like a lot of

cattle--some to one yard, some to another--don't know much. There's a

mob in most towns though, I think, that wants boilin' down bad. Some

day they'll do it, maybe; they'll have to when all the good country's

stocked up. After Warrigal had his supper he went out again to see his

horse, and then coiled himself up before the fire and wouldn't hardly

say another word.

'How far was it to where Starlight was?'

'Long way. Took me all day to come.'

'Had he been there long?'

'Yes; had a camp there.'

'Anybody else with him?'

'Three more men from this side.'

'Did the old man say we were to come at once?'

'Yes, or leave it alone--which you liked.'

Then he shut his eyes, and his mouth too, and was soon as fast asleep as

if he never intended to wake under a week.

'What shall we do, Jim?' I said; 'go or not?'

'If you leave it to me,' says Jim, 'I say, don't go. It's only some

other cross cattle or horse racket. We're bound to be nobbled some day.

Why not cut it now, and stick to the square thing? We couldn't do better

than we're doing now. It's rather slow, but we'll have a good cheque by

Christmas.'

'I'm half a mind to tell Warrigal to go back and say we're not on,' I

said. 'Lots of other chaps would join without making any bones about

it.'

'Hoo--hoo--hoo--hoo,' sounded once more the night-bird from the black

tree outside.

'D----the bird! I believe he's the devil in the shape of a mopoke! And

yet I don't like Starlight to think we're afraid. He and the old man

might be in a fix and want help. Suppose we toss up?'

'All right,' says Jim, speaking rather slowly.

You couldn't tell from his face or voice how he felt about it; but I

believe now--more than that, he let on once to me--that he was awfully

cut up about my changing, and thought we were just in for a spell of

straightforward work, and would stash the other thing for good and all.

We put the fire together. It burnt up bright for a bit. I pulled out a

shilling.

'If it's head we go, Jim; if it's woman, we stay here.'

I sent up the coin; we both bent over near the fire to look at it.

The head was uppermost.

'Hoo--hoo--hoo--hoo,' came the night-bird's harsh croak.

There was a heavyish stake on that throw, if we'd only known. Only

ruin--only death. Four men's lives lost, and three women made miserable

for life.

Jim and I looked at one another. He smiled and opened the door.

'It's all the fault of that cursed owl, I believe,' he said; 'I'll have

his life if he waits till it's daylight. We must be off early and get

up our horses. I know what a long day for Warrigal and that ambling

three-cornered devil of his means--seventy or eighty miles, if it's a

yard.'

We slept sound enough till daybreak, and COULD SLEEP then, whatever was

on the card. As for Jim, he slept like a baby always once he turned in.

When I woke I got up at once. It was half dark; there was a little light

in the east. But Warrigal had been out before me, and was leading his

horse up to the hut with the hobbles in his hand.

Our horses were not far off; one of them had a bell on. Jim had his old

brown, and I had a chestnut that I thought nearly as good. We weren't

likely to have anything to ride that wasn't middlin' fast and plucky.

Them that overhauled us would have to ride for it. We saddled up and

took our blankets and what few things we couldn't do without. The rest

stopped in the hut for any one that came after us. We left our wages,

too, and never asked for 'em from that day to this. A trifle like that

didn't matter after what we were going in for. More's the pity.

As we moved off my horse propped once or twice, and Warrigal looked at

us in a queer side sort of way and showed his teeth a bit--smile nor

laugh it wasn't, only a way he had when he thought he knew more than we

did.

'My word! your horse's been where the feed's good. We're goin' a good

way to-day. I wonder if they'll be as flash as they are now.'

'They'll carry us wherever that three-cornered mule of yours will

shuffle to to-night,' said Jim. 'Never you mind about them. You ride

straight, and don't get up to any monkey tricks, or, by George, I'll

straighten you, so as you'll know better next time.'

'You know a lot, Jim Marston,' said the half-caste, looking at him with

his long dark sleepy eyes which I always thought were like a half-roused

snake's. 'Never mind, you'll know more one of these days. We'd better

push on.'

He went off at a hand-gallop, and then pulled back into a long

darting kind of canter, which Bilbah thought was quite the thing for a

journey--anyhow, he never seemed to think of stopping it--went on mile

after mile as if he was not going to pull up this side of sundown. A

wiry brute, always in condition, was this said Bilbah, and just at this

time as hard as nails. Our horses had been doing nothing lately, and

being on good young feed had, of course, got fat, and were rather soft.

After four or five miles they began to blow. We couldn't well pull up;

the ground was hard in places and bad for tracking. If we went on at the

pace we should cook our horses. As soon as we got into a bit of open I

raced up to him.

'Now, look here, Warrigal,' I said, 'you know why you're doing this, and

so do I. Our horses are not up to galloping fifty or sixty miles on end

just off a spell and with no work for months. If you don't pull up and

go our pace I'll knock you off your horse.'

'Oh! you're riled!' he said, looking as impudent as he dared, but

slackening all the same. 'Pulled up before if I knowed your horses were

getting baked. Thought they were up to anything, same as you and Jim.'

'So they are. You'll find that one of these days. If there's work ahead

you ought to have sense enough not to knock smoke out of fresh horses

before we begin.'

'All right. Plenty of work to do, my word. And Starlight said, “Tell 'em

to be here to-day if they can.” I know he's afraid of some one follerin'

up our tracks, as it is.'

'That's all right, Warrigal; but you ride steady all the same, and don't

be tearing away through thick timber, like a mallee scrubber that's

got into the open and sees the devil behind him until he can get cover

again. We shall be there to-night if it's not a hundred miles, and

that's time enough.'

We did drop in for a long day, and no mistake. We only pulled up for a

short halt in the middle, and Warrigal's cast-iron pony was off again,

as if he was bound right away for the other side of the continent.

However, though we were not going slow either, but kept up a reasonable

fast pace, it must have been past midnight when we rode into Starlight's

camp; very glad Jim and I were to see the fire--not a big one either.

We had been taking it pretty easy, you see, for a month or two, and

were not quite so ready for an eighty-mile ride as if we had been in

something like training. The horses had had enough of it, too, though

neither of them would give in, not if we'd ridden 'em twenty mile

farther. As for Warrigal's Bilbah he was near as fresh as when he

started, and kept tossin' his head an' amblin' and pacin' away as if he

was walkin' for a wager round a ring in a show-yard.

As we rode up we could see a gunyah made out of boughs, and a longish

wing of dogleg fence, made light but well put together. As soon as we

got near enough a dog ran out and looked as if he was going to worry us;

didn't bark either, but turned round and waited for us to get off.

'It's old Crib,' said Jim, with a big laugh; 'blest if it ain't.

Father's somewhere handy. They're going to take up a back block and do

the thing regular: Marston, Starlight, and Company--that's the fakement.

They want us out to make dams or put up a woolshed or something. I don't

see why they shouldn't, as well as Crossman and Fakesley. It's six of

one and half-a-dozen of the other, as far as being on the square goes.

Depend upon it, dad's turned over a new leaf.'

'Do you fellows want anything to eat?' said a voice that I knew to be

Starlight's. 'If you do there's tea near the fire, and some grub in

that flour bag. Help yourselves and hobble out your horses. We'll settle

matters a bit in the morning. Your respected parent's abed in his

own camp, and it's just as well not to wake him, unless you want his

blessing ere you sleep.'

We went with Starlight to his gunyah. A path led through a clump of

pines, so thick that a man might ride round it and never dream there

was anything but more pines inside. A clear place had been made in the

sandhill, and a snug crib enough rigged with saplings and a few sheets

of bark. It was neat and tidy, like everything he had to do with. 'I was

at sea when I was young,' he once said to Jim, when he was a bit 'on',

'and a man learns to be neat there.' There was a big chimney outside,

and a lot of leaves and rushes out of a swamp which he had made Warrigal

gather.

'Put your blankets down there, boys, and turn in. You'll see how the

land lies in the morning.' We didn't want asking twice, Jim's eyes were

nigh shut as it was. The sun was up when we woke.

Outside the first thing we saw was father and Starlight talking. Both of

these seemed a bit cranky. 'It's a d----shame,' we heard Starlight

say, as he turned and walked off. 'We could have done it well enough by

ourselves.'

'I know what I'm about,' says father, 'it's all or none. What's the use

of crying after being in it up to our neck?'

'Some day you'll think different,' says Starlight, looking back at him.

I often remembered it afterwards.

'Well, lads,' says father, looking straight at us, 'I wasn't sure as

you'd come. Starlight has been barneying with me about sending for you.

But we've got a big thing on now, and I thought you'd like to be in it.'

'We have come,' says I, pretty short. 'Now we're here what's the play

called, and when does the curtain rise? We're on.' I was riled, vexed

at Starlight talking as if we were children, and thought I'd show as we

were men, like a young fool as I was.

'All right,' says father, and he sat down on a log, and began to tell us

how there was any quantity of cattle running at the back where they were

camped--a good lot strayed and mixed up, from the last dry season, and

had never been mustered for years. The stockmen hardly ever came out

till the autumn musters. One of the chaps that was in it knew all this

side and had told them. They were going to muster for a month or so, and

drive the mob right through to Adelaide. Store cattle were dear then,

and we could get them off easy there and come back by sea. No one was to

know we were not regular overlanders; and when we'd got the notes in our

pockets it would be a hard matter to trace the cattle or prove that we

were the men that sold 'em.

'How many head do you expect to get?' says Jim.

'A thousand or twelve hundred; half of 'em fat, and two-thirds of them

young cattle.'

'By George! that's something like a haul; but you can't muster such a

lot as that without a yard.'

'I know that,' says father. 'We're putting up a yard on a little plain

about a mile from here. When they find it, it'll be an old nest, and the

birds flown.'

'Well, if that ain't the cheekiest thing I ever heard tell of,' says I

laughingly. 'To put up a yard at the back of a man's run, and muster

his cattle for him! I never heard the like before, nor any one else. But

suppose the cove or his men come across it?'

''Tain't no ways likely,' says father. 'They're the sleepiest lot of

chaps in this frontage I ever saw. It's hardly worth while “touching”

them. There's no fun in it. It's like shooting pheasants when they

ain't preserved. There's no risk, and when there's no risk there's no

pleasure. Anyway that's my notion.'

'Talking about risks, why didn't you work that Marquis of Lorne racket

better? We saw in the papers that the troopers hunted you so close you

had to kill him in the ranges.'

Father looked over at us and then began to laugh--not long, and he broke

off short. Laughing wasn't much in his line.

'Killed him, did we? And a horse worth nigh on to two thousand pounds.

You ought to have known your old father better than that. We did kill

A chestnut horse, one we picked out a purpose; white legs, white knee,

short under lip, everything quite regular. We even fed him for a week on

prairie grass, just like the Marquis had been eating. Bless you, we knew

how to work all that. We deceived Windhall his own self, and he thinks

he's pretty smart. No! the Marquis is all safe--you know where.'

I opened my eyes and stared at father.

'You've some call to crow if you can work things like that. How you ever

got him away beats me; but not more than how you managed to keep him hid

with a ring of troopers all round you from every side of the district.'

'We had friends,' father said. 'Me and Warrigal done all the travelling

by night. No one but him could have gone afoot, I believe, much less led

a blood horse through the beastly scrub and ranges he showed us. But the

devil himself could not beat him and that little brute Bilbah in rough

country.'

'I believe you,' I said, thinking of our ride yesterday. 'It's quite

bad enough to follow him on level ground. But don't you think our tracks

will be easy to follow with a thousand head of cattle before us? Any

fool could do that.'

'It ain't that as I'm looking at,' said father; 'of course an old woman

could do it, and knit stockings all the time; but our dart is to be off

and have a month's start before anybody knows they are off the run. They

won't think of mustering before fat cattle takes a bit of a turn. That

won't be for a couple of months yet. Then they may catch us if they

can.'

We had a long talk with Starlight, and what he said came to much the

same. One stockman they had 'squared', and he was to stand in. They had

got two or three flash chaps to help muster and drive, who were to swear

they thought we were dealers, and had bought cattle all right. One or

two more were to meet us farther on. If we could get the cattle together

and clear off before anything was suspected the rest was easy. The yard

was nearly up, and Jim and I wired in and soon finished it. It didn't

want very grand work putting into it as long as it would last our time.

So we put it up roughly, but pretty strong, with pine saplings.

The drawing in was the worst, for we had to 'hump' the most of them

ourselves. Jim couldn't help bursting out laughing from time to time.

'It does seem such a jolly cheeky thing,' he said. 'Driving off a mob of

cattle on the quiet I've known happen once or twice; but I'm dashed if

ever I heard tell of putting up duffing improvements of a superior class

on a cove's run and clearing off with a thousand drafted cattle, all

quiet and regular, and him pottering about his home-station and never

“dropping” to it no more than if he was in Sydney.'

'People ought to look after their stock closer than they do,' I said.

'It is their fault almost as much as ours. But they are too lazy to look

after their own work, and too miserable to pay a good man to do it for

them. They just get a half-and-half sort of fellow that'll take low

wages and make it up with duffing, and of course he's not likely to look

very sharp after the back country.'

'You're not far away,' says Jim; 'but don't you think they'd have to

look precious sharp and get up very early in the morning to be level

with chaps like father and Starlight, let alone Warrigal, who's as good

by night as day? Then there's you and me. Don't try and make us out

better than we are, Dick; we're all d----scoundrels, that's the truth

of it, and honest men haven't a chance with us, except in the long

run--except in the long run. That's where they'll have us, Dick

Marston.'

'That's quite a long speech for you, Jim,' I said; 'but it don't matter

much that I know of whose fault it is that we're in this duffing racket.

It seems to be our fate, as the chap says in the book. We'll have a

jolly spree in Adelaide if this journey comes out right. And now let's

finish this evening off. To-morrow they're going to yard the first mob.'

After that we didn't talk much except about the work. Starlight and

Warrigal were out every day and all day. The three new hands were some

chaps who formed part of a gang that did most of the horse-stealing in

that neighbourhood, though they never showed up. The way they managed it

was this. They picked up any good-looking nag or second-class racehorse

that they fell across, and took them to a certain place. There they met

another lot of fellows, who took the horses from them and cleared out to

another colony; at the same time they left the horses they had brought.

So each lot travelled different ways, and were sold in places where they

were quite strange and no one was likely to claim them.

After a man had had a year or two at this kind of work, he was good, or

rather bad, for anything. These young chaps, like us, had done pretty

well at these games, and one of them, falling in with Starlight, had

proposed to him to put up a couple of hundred head of cattle on Outer

Back Momberah, as the run was called; then father and he had seen that

a thousand were as easy to get as a hundred. Of course there was a risky

feeling, but it wasn't such bad fun while it lasted. We were out all day

running in the cattle. The horses were in good wind and condition now;

we had plenty of rations--flour, tea, and sugar. There was no cart,

but some good packhorses, just the same as if we were a regular station

party on our own run. Father had worked all that before we came. We had

the best of fresh beef and veal too--you may be sure of that--there was

no stint in that line; and at night we were always sure of a yarn from

Starlight--that is, if he was in a good humour. Sometimes he wasn't, and

then nobody dared speak to him, not even father.

He was an astonishing man, certainly. Jim and I used to wonder, by

the hour, what he'd been in the old country. He'd been all over the

world--in the Islands and New Zealand; in America, and among Malays and

other strange people that we'd hardly ever heard of. Such stories as

he'd tell us, too, about slaves and wild chiefs that he'd lived with and

gone out to fight with against their enemy. 'People think a great deal

of a dead man now and then in this innocent country,' he said once

when the grog was uppermost; 'why, I've seen fifty men killed before

breakfast, and in cold blood, too, chopped up alive, or next thing to

it; and a drove of slaves--men, women, and children--as big nearly as

our mob, handed over to a slave-dealer, and driven off in chains just

as you'd start a lot of station cattle. They didn't like it, going off

their run either, poor devils. The women would try and run back after

their pickaninnies when they dropped, just like that heifer when

Warrigal knocked her calf on the head to-day.' What a man he was! This

was something like life, Jim and I thought. When we'd sold the cattle,

if we got 'em down to Adelaide all right, we'd take a voyage to some

foreign country, perhaps, and see sights too. What a paltry thing

working for a pound a week seemed when a rise like this was to be made!

Well, the long and short of it is that we mustered the cattle quite

comfortably, nobody coming anext or anigh us any more than if we'd

taken the thing by contract. You wouldn't have thought there was anybody

nearer than Bathurst. Everything seemed to be in our favour. So it was,

just at the start. We drafted out all the worst and weediest of the

cattle, besides all the old cows, and when we counted the mob out we

had nearly eleven hundred first-rate store cattle; lots of fine young

bullocks and heifers, more than half fat--altogether a prime well-bred

mob that no squatter or dealer could fault in any way if the price was

right. We could afford to sell them for a shade under market price for

cash. Ready money, of course, we were bound to have.

Just as we were starting there was a fine roan bull came running up with

a small mob.

'Cut him out, and beat him back,' says father; 'we don't want to be

bothered with the likes of him.'

'Why, I'm dashed if that ain't Hood's imported bull,' says Billy the

Boy, a Monaro native that we had with us. 'I know him well. How's he

come to get back? Why, the cove gave two hundred and fifty notes for him

afore he left England, I've heard 'em say.'

'Bring him along,' said Starlight, who came up just then. 'In for a

penny, in for a pound. They'll never think of looking for him on the

Coorong, and we'll be there before they miss any cattle worth talking

about.'

So we took 'Fifteenth Duke of Cambridge' along with us; a red roan he

was, with a little white about the flank. He wasn't more than four year

old. He'd been brought out from England as a yearling. How he'd worked

his way out to this back part of the run, where a bull of his quality

ain't often seen, nobody could say. But he was a lively active beast,

and he'd got into fine hard fettle with living on saltbush, dry grass,

and scrub for the last few months, so he could travel as well as the

others. I took particular notice of him, from his little waxy horns to

his straight locks and long square quarters. And so I'd need to--but

that came after. He had only a little bit of a private brand on the

shoulder. That was easily faked, and would come out quite different.

Chapter 12

We didn't go straight ahead along any main track to the Lower Murray and

Adelaide exactly. That would have been a little too open and barefaced.

No; we divided the mob into three, and settled where to meet in about a

fortnight. Three men to each mob. Father and Warrigal took one lot; they

had the dog, old Crib, to help them. He was worth about two men and a

boy. Starlight, Jim, and I had another; and the three stranger chaps

another. We'd had a couple of knockabouts to help with the cooking and

stockyard work. They were paid by the job. They were to stay at the

camp for a week, to burn the gunyahs, knock down the yard, and blind the

track as much as they could.

Some of the cattle we'd left behind they drove back and forward across

the track every day for a week. If rain came they were to drop it, and

make their way into the frontage by another road. If they heard about

the job being blown or the police set on our track, they were to wire to

one of the border townships we had to pass. Weren't we afraid of their

selling us? No, not much; they were well paid, and had often given

father and Starlight information before, though they took care never

to show out in the cattle or horse-stealing way themselves. As long

as chaps in our line have money to spend, they can always get good

information and other things, too. It is when the money runs short that

the danger comes in. I don't know whether cattle-duffing was ever done

in New South Wales before on such a large scale, or whether it will ever

be done again. Perhaps not. These wire fences stop a deal of cross-work;

but it was done then, you take my word for it--a man's word as hasn't

that long to live that it's worth while to lie--and it all came out

right; that is as far as our getting safe over, selling the cattle, and

having the money in our pockets.

We kept on working by all sorts of outside tracks on the main line of

road--a good deal by night, too--for the first two or three hundred

miles. After we crossed the Adelaide border we followed the Darling down

to the Murray. We thought we were all right, and got bolder. Starlight

had changed his clothes, and was dressed like a swell--away on a

roughish trip, but still like a swell.

'They were his cattle; he had brought them from one of his stations on

the Narran. He was going to take up country in the Northern Territory.

He expected a friend out from England with a lot more capital.'

Jim and I used to hear him talking like this to some of the squatters

whose runs we passed through, as grave as you please. They used to ask

him to stay all night, but he always said 'he didn't like to leave

his men. He made it a practice on the road.' When we got within a

fortnight's drive of Adelaide, he rode in and lived at one of the best

hotels. He gave out that he expected a lot of cattle to arrive, and

got a friend that he'd met in the billiard-room (and couldn't he play

surprisin'?) to introduce him to one of the leading stock agents there.

So he had it all cut and dry, when one day Warrigal and I rode in, and

the boy handed him a letter, touching his hat respectfully, as he had

been learned to do, before a lot of young squatters and other swells

that he was going out to a picnic with.

'My confounded cattle come at last,' he says. 'Excuse me for mentioning

business. I began to hope they'd never come; 'pon my soul I did. The

time passes so deuced pleasantly here. Well, they'll all be at the yards

to-morrow. You fellows had all better come and see them sold. There'll

be a little lunch, and perhaps some fizz. You go to the stock agents,

Runnimall and Co.; here's their address, Jack,' he says to me, looking

me straight in the eyes. 'They'll send a man to pilot you to the yards;

and now off with you, and don't let me see your face till to-morrow.'

How he carried it off! He cantered away with the rest of the party, as

if he hadn't a thought in the world except about pleasure and honest

business. Nobody couldn't have told that he wasn't just like them other

young gentlemen with only their stock and station to think about, and

a little fun at the races now and then. And what a risk he was running

every minute of his life, he and all the rest of us. I wasn't sorry to

be out of the town again. There were lots of police, too. Suppose one

of them was to say, 'Richard Marston, I arrest you for----' It hardly

mattered what. I felt as if I should have tumbled down with sheer fright

and cowardliness. It's a queer thing you feel like that off and on.

Other times a man has as much pluck in him as if his life was worth

fighting for--which it isn't.

The agent knew all about us (or thought he did), and sent a chap to show

Mr. Carisforth's cattle (Charles Carisforth, Esq., of Sturton, Yorkshire

and Banda, Waroona, and Ebor Downs, New South Wales; that was the name

he went by) the way to the yards. We were to draft them all next morning

into separate pens--cows and bullocks, steers and heifers, and so on.

He expected to sell them all to a lot of farmers and small settlers that

had taken up a new district lately and were very short of stock.

'You couldn't have come into a better market, young fellow,' says the

agent's man to me. 'Our boss he's advertised 'em that well as there'll

be smart bidding between the farmers and some of the squatters. Good

store cattle's been scarce, and these is in such rattling condition.

That's what'll sell 'em. Your master seems a regular free-handed sort

of chap. He's the jolliest squatter there's been in town these years,

I hear folk say. Puts 'em in mind of Hawdon and Evelyn Sturt in the old

overlander days.'

Next day we were at the yards early, you bet. We wanted to have time to

draft them into pens of twenty to fifty each, so that the farmers and

small settlers might have a chance to buy. Besides, it was the last

day of our work. Driving all day and watching half the night is pretty

stiffish work, good weather and bad, when you've got to keep it up for

months at a time, and we'd been three months and a week on the road.

The other chaps were wild for a spree. Jim and I had made up our minds

to be careful; still, we had a lot to see in a big town like Adelaide;

for we'd never been to Sydney even in our lives, and we'd never seen the

sea. That was something to look at for the first time, wasn't it?

Well, we got the cattle drafted to rights, every sort and size and age

by itself, as near as could be. That's the way to draft stock, whether

they're cattle, sheep, or horses; then every man can buy what he likes

best, and isn't obliged to lump up one sort with another. We had time

to have a bit of dinner. None of us had touched a mouthful since before

daylight. Then we began to see the buyers come.

There'd been a big tent rigged, as big as a small woolshed, too. It came

out in a cart, and then another cart came with a couple of waiters, and

they laid out a long table of boards on trestles with a real first-class

feed on it, such as we'd never seen in our lives before. Fowls and

turkeys and tongues and rounds of beef, beer and wine in bottles with

gilt labels on. Such a set-out it was. Father began to growl a bit.

'If he's going to feed the whole country this way, he'll spend half the

stuff before we get it, let alone drawing a down on the whole thing.'

But Jim and me could see how Starlight had been working the thing to

rights while he was swelling it in the town among the big bugs. We told

him the cattle would fetch that much more money on account of the lunch

and the blowing the auctioneer was able to do. These would pay for the

feed and the rest of the fal-lals ten times over. 'When he gets in with

men like his old pals he loses his head, I believe,' father says, 'and

fancies he's what he used to be. He'll get “fitted” quite simple some

day if he doesn't keep a better look-out.'

That might be, but it wasn't to come about this time. Starlight came

riding out by and by, dressed up like a real gentleman, and lookin' so

different that Jim and I hardly dared speak to him--on a splendid horse

too (not Rainbow, he'd been left behind; he was always left within a

hundred miles of The Hollow, and he could do it in one day if he was

wanted to), and a lot of fine dressed chaps with him--young squatters

and officers, and what not. I shouldn't have been surprised if he'd

had the Governor out with him. They told us afterwards he did dine at

Government House reg'lar, and was made quite free and welcome there.

Well, he jumps down and shakes hands with us before them all. 'Well,

Jack! Well, Bill!' and so on, calls us his good faithful fellows, and

how well we'd brought the cattle over; nods to father, who didn't seem

able to take it all in; says he'll back us against any stockmen in

Australia; has up Warrigal and shows him off to the company. 'Most

intelligent lad.' Warrigal grinned and showed his white teeth. It was as

good as a play.

Then everybody goes to lunch--swells and selectors, Germans and Paddies,

natives and immigrants, a good many of them, too, and there was

eating and drinking and speechifying till all was blue. By and by the

auctioneer looks at his watch. He'd had a pretty good tuck-in himself,

and they must get to business.

Father opened his eyes at the price the first pen brought, all prime

young bullocks, half fat most of them. Then they all went off like

wildfire; the big men and the little men bidding, quite jealous,

sometimes one getting the lot, sometimes another. One chap made a remark

about there being such a lot of different brands; but Starlight said

they'd come from a sort of depot station of his, and were the odds and

ends of all the mobs of store cattle that he'd purchased the last four

years. That satisfied 'em, particularly as he said it in a careless,

fierce way which he could put on, as if it was like a man's----impudence

to ask him anything. It made the people laugh; I could see that.

By and by we comes to the imported bull. He was in a pen by himself,

looking first-rate. His brand had been faked, and the hair had grown

pretty well. It would have took a sharp hand to know him again.

'Well, gentlemen,' says the auctioneer, 'here is the imported bull “Duke

of Brunswick”. It ain't often an animal of his quality comes in with a

mob of store cattle; but I am informed by Mr. Carisforth that he left

orders for the whole of the cattle to be cleared off the run, and this

valuable animal was brought away in mistake. He was to return by sea;

but as he happens to be here to-day, why, sooner than disappoint any

intending buyer, Mr. Carisforth has given me instructions to put him up,

and if he realises anything near his value he will be sold.'

'Yes!' drawls Starlight, as if a dozen imported bulls, more or less,

made no odds to him, 'put him up, by all means, Mr. Runnimall. Expectin'

rather large shipment of Bates's “Duchess” tribe next month. Rather

prefer them on the whole. The “Duke” here is full of Booth blood, so

he may just as well go with the others. I shall never get what he cost,

though; I know that. He's been a most expensive animal to me.'

Many a true word spoken in jest. He had good call to know him, as well

as the rest of us, for a most expensive animal, before all was said and

done. What he cost us all round it would be hard indeed to cipher up.

Anyhow, there was a great laugh at Starlight's easy way of taking

it. First one and then another of the squatters that was going in for

breeding began to bid, thinking he'd go cheap, until they got warm, and

the bull went up to a price that we never dreamed he'd fetch. Everything

seemed to turn out lucky that day. One would have thought they'd never

seen an imported bull before. The young squatters got running one

another, as I said before, and he went up to 270 Pounds! Then the

auctioneer squared off the accounts as sharp as he could; an' it took

him all his time, what with the German and the small farmers, who took

their time about it, paying in greasy notes and silver and copper,

out of canvas bags, and the squatters, who were too busy chaffing and

talking among themselves to pay at all. It was dark before everything

was settled up, and all the lots of cattle delivered. Starlight told the

auctioneer he'd see him at his office, in a deuced high and mighty kind

of way, and rode off with his new friend.

All of us went back to our camp. Our work was over, but we had to settle

up among ourselves and divide shares. I could hardly believe my eyes

when I saw the cattle all sold and gone, and nothing left at the camp

but the horses and the swags.

When we got there that night it was late enough. After tea father and I

and Jim had a long yarn, settling over what we should do and wondering

whether we were going to get clean away with our share of the money

after all.

'By George!' says Jim, 'it's a big touch, and no mistake. To think of

our getting over all right, and selling out so easy, just as if they was

our own cattle. Won't there be a jolly row when it's all out, and the

Momberah people miss their cattle?' (more than half 'em was theirs).

'And when they muster they can't be off seein' they're some hundreds

short.'

'That's what's botherin' me,' says father. 'I wish Starlight hadn't been

so thundering flash with it all. It'll draw more notice on us, and every

one 'll be gassin' about this big sale, and all that, till people's set

on to ask where the cattle come from, and what not.'

'I don't see as it makes any difference,' I said. 'Somebody was bound

to buy 'em, and we'd have had to give the brands and receipts just the

same. Only if we'd sold to any one that thought there was a cross look

about it, we'd have had to take half money, that's all. They've fetched

a rattling price, through Starlight's working the oracle with those

swells, and no mistake.'

'Yes, but that ain't all of it,' says the old man, filling his pipe.

'We've got to look at what comes after. I never liked that imported

bull being took. They'll rake all the colonies to get hold of him again,

partic'ler as he sold for near three hundred pound.'

'We must take our share of the risk along with the money,' said Jim.

'We shall have our whack of that according to what they fetched to-day.

It'll be a short life and a merry one, though, dad, if we go on big

licks like this. What'll we tackle next--a bank or Government House?'

'Nothing at all for a good spell, if you've any sense,' growled father.

'It'll give us all we know to keep dark when this thing gets into the

papers, and the police in three colonies are all in full cry like a pack

of beagles. The thing is, what'll be our best dart now?'

'I'll go back overland,' says he. 'Starlight's going to take Warrigal

with him, and they'll be off to the islands for a turn. If he knows

what's best for him, he'll never come back. These other chaps say

they'll separate and sell their horses when they get over to the Murray

low down, and work their way up by degrees. Which way are you boys

going?'

'Jim and I to Melbourne by next steamer,' I said. 'May as well see a bit

of life now we're in it. We'll come back overland when we're tired of

strange faces.'

'All right,' says father, 'they won't know where I'm lyin' by for a bit,

I'll go bail, and the sooner you clear out of Adelaide the better.

News like ours don't take long to travel, and you might be nabbed very

simple. One of ye write a line to your mother and tell her where you're

off to, or she'll be frettin' herself and the gal too--frettin' over

what can't be helped. But I suppose it's the natur' o' some women.'

We done our settling-up next day. All the sale money was paid over

to Starlight. He cashed the cheques and drew the lot in notes and

gold--such a bundle of 'em there was. He brought them out to us at the

camp, and then we 'whacked' the lot. There were eight of us that had to

share and share alike. How much do you think we had to divide? Why, not

a penny under four thousand pounds. It had to be divided among the eight

of us. That came to five hundred a man. A lot of money to carry about,

that was the worst of it.

Next day there was a regular split and squander. We didn't wait long

after daylight, you bet. Father was off and well on his way before the

stars were out of the sky. He took Warrigal's horse, Bilbah, back

with him; he and Starlight was going off to the islands together, and

couldn't take horses with them. But he was real sorry to part with the

cross-grained varmint; I thought he was going to blubber when he saw

father leading him off. Bilbah wouldn't go neither at first; pulled

back, and snorted and went on as if he'd never seen only one man afore

in his life. Father got vexed at last and makes a sign to old Crib; he

fetches him such a 'heeler' as gave him something else to think of for a

few miles. He didn't hang back much after that.

The three other chaps went their own road. They kept very dark all

through. I know their names well enough, but there's no use in bringing

them up now.

Jim and I cuts off into the town, thinking we was due for a little fun.

We'd never been in a big town before, and it was something new to

us. Adelaide ain't as grand quite as Melbourne or Sydney, but there's

something quiet and homelike about it to my thinking--great wide

streets, planted with trees; lots of steady-going German farmers, with

their vineyards and orchards and droll little waggons. The women work

as hard as the men, harder perhaps, and get brown and scorched up in no

time--not that they've got much good looks to lose; leastways none we

ever saw.

We could always tell the German farmers' places along the road from one

of our people by looking outside the door. If it was an Englishman or an

Australian, you'd see where they'd throwed out the teapot leavings; if

it was a German, you wouldn't see nothing. They drink their own sour

wine, if their vines are old enough to make any, or else hop beer; but

they won't lay out their money in the tea chest or sugar bag; no fear,

or the grog either, and not far wrong. Then the sea! I can see poor old

Jim's face now the day we went down to the port and he seen it for the

first time.

'So we've got to the big waterhole at last,' he said. 'Don't it make

a man feel queer and small to think of its going away right from here

where we stand to the other side of the world? It's a long way across.'

'Jim,' says I, 'and to think we've lived all our lives up to this time

and never set eyes on it before. Don't it seem as if one was shut up in

the bush, or tied to a gum tree, so as one can never have a chance to

see anything? I wonder we stayed in it so long.'

'It's not a bad place, though it is rather slow and wired in sometimes,'

says Jim. 'We might be sorry we ever left it yet. When does the steamer

go to Melbourne?'

'The day after to-morrow.'

'I'll be glad to be clear off; won't you?'

We went to the theatre that night, and amused ourselves pretty well next

day and till the time came for our boat to start for Melbourne. We had

altered ourselves a bit, had our hair cut and our beards trimmed by

the hairdresser. We bought fresh clothes, and what with this, and the

feeling of being in a new place and having more money in our pockets

than we'd ever dreamed about before, we looked so transmogrified when

we saw ourselves in the glass that we hardly knew ourselves. We had

to change our names, too, for the first time in our lives; and it went

harder against the grain than you'd think, for all we were a couple of

cattle-duffers, with a warrant apiece sure to be after us before the

year was out.

'It sounds ugly,' says Jim, after we had given our names as John Simmons

and Henry Smith at the hotel where we put up at till the steamer

was ready to start. 'I never thought that Jim Marston was to come

to this--to be afraid to tell a fat, greasy-looking fellow like that

innkeeper what his real name was. Seems such a pitiful mean lie, don't

it, Dick?'

'It isn't so bad as being called No. 14, No. 221, as they sing out for

the fellows in Berrima Gaol. How would you like that, Jim?'

'I'd blow my brains out first,' cried out Jim, 'or let some other fellow

do it for me. It wouldn't matter which.'

It was very pleasant, those two or three days in Adelaide, if they'd

only lasted. We used to stroll about the lighted streets till all hours,

watching the people and the shops and everything that makes a large city

different from the country. The different sorts of people, the carts

and carriages, buggies and drays, pony-carriages and spring-carts, all

jumbled up together; even the fruit and flowers and oysters and fish

under the gas-lights seemed strange and wonderful to us. We felt as if

we would have given all the world to have got mother and Aileen down to

see it all. Then Jim gave a groan.

'Only to think,' says he, 'that we might have had all this fun some day,

and bought and paid for it honest. Now it isn't paid for. It's out of

some other man's pocket. There's a curse on it; it will have to be paid

in blood or prison time before all's done. I could shoot myself for

being such a cursed fool.'

'Too late to think of that,' I said; 'we'll have some fun in Melbourne

for a bit, anyhow. For what comes after we must “chance it”, as we've

done before, more than once or twice, either.'

. . . . .

Next day our steamer was to sail. We got Starlight to come down with us

and show us how to take our passage. We'd never done it before, and felt

awkward at it. He'd made up his mind to go to New Zealand, and after

that to Honolulu, perhaps to America.

'I'm not sure that I'll ever come back, boys,' he said, 'and if I were

you I don't think I would either. If you get over to San Francisco you'd

find the Pacific Slope a very pleasant country to live in. The people

and the place would suit you all to pieces. At any rate I'd stay away

for a few years and wait till all this blows over.'

I wasn't sorry when the steamer cleared the port, and got out of sight

of land. There we were--where we'd never been before--in blue water.

There was a stiff breeze, and in half-an-hour we shouldn't have turned

our heads if we'd seen Hood and the rest of 'em come riding after us on

seahorses, with warrants as big as the mainsail. Jim made sure he was

going to die straight off, and the pair of us wished we'd never seen

Outer Back Momberah, nor Hood's cattle, nor Starlight, nor Warrigal. We

almost made up our minds to keep straight and square to the last day of

our lives. However, the wind died down a bit next day, and we both felt

a lot better--better in body and worse in mind--as often happens. Before

we got to Melbourne we could eat and drink, smoke and gamble, and were

quite ourselves again. We'd laid it out to have a reg'lar good month of

it in town, takin' it easy, and stopping nice and quiet at a good hotel,

havin' some reasonable pleasure. Why shouldn't we see a little life?

We'd got the cash, and we'd earned that pretty hard. It's the hardest

earned money of all, that's got on the cross, if fellows only knew, but

they never do till it's too late.

When we got tired of doing nothing, and being in a strange place, we'd

get across the border, above Albury somewhere, and work on the mountain

runs till shearing came round again; and we could earn a fairish bit of

money. Then we'd go home for Christmas after it was all over, and see

mother and Aileen again. How glad and frightened they'd be to see us. It

wouldn't be safe altogether, but go we would.

Chapter 13

We got to Melbourne all right, and though it's a different sort of a

place from Sydney, it's a jolly enough town for a couple of young chaps

with money in their pockets. Most towns are, for the matter of that. We

took it easy, and didn't go on the spree or do anything foolish. No, we

weren't altogether so green as that. We looked out for a quiet place to

lodge, near the sea--St. Kilda they call it, in front of the beach--and

we went about and saw all the sights, and for a time managed to keep

down the thought that perhaps sooner or later we'd be caught, and have

to stand our trial for this last affair of ours, and maybe one or two

others. It wasn't a nice thing to think of; and now and then it used

to make both of us take an extra drop of grog by way of driving the

thoughts of it out of our heads. That's the worst of not being straight

and square. A man's almost driven to drink when he can't keep from

thinking of all sorts of miserable things day and night. We used to go

to the horse-yards now and then, and the cattle-yards too. It was like

old times to see the fat cattle and sheep penned up at Flemington, and

the butchers riding out on their spicy nags or driving trotters. But

their cattle-yards was twice as good as ours, and me and Jim used often

to wonder why the Sydney people hadn't managed to have something like

them all these years, instead of the miserable cockatoo things at

Homebush that we'd often heard the drovers and squatters grumble about.

However, one day, as we was sitting on the rails, talking away quite

comfortable, we heard one butcher say to another, 'My word, this is a

smart bit of cattle-duffing--a thousand head too!' 'What's that?' says

the other man. 'Why, haven't you heard of it?' says the first one, and

he pulls a paper out of his pocket, with this in big letters: 'Great

Cattle Robbery.--A thousand head of Mr. Hood's cattle were driven off

and sold in Adelaide. Warrants are out for the suspected parties, who

are supposed to have left the colony.' Here was a bit of news! We felt

as if we could hardly help falling off the rails; but we didn't show

it, of course, and sat there for half-an-hour, talking to the buyers and

sellers and cracking jokes like the others. But we got away home as soon

as we could, and then we began to settle what we should do.

Warrants were out, of course, for Starlight, and us too. He was known,

and so were we. Our descriptions were sure to be ready to send out all

over the country. Warrigal they mightn't have noticed. It was common

enough to have a black boy or a half-caste with a lot of travelling

cattle. Father had not shown up much. He had an old pea-jacket on, and

they mightn't have dropped down to him or the three other chaps that

were in it with us; they were just like any other road hands. But about

there being warrants out, with descriptions, in all the colonies, for a

man to be identified, but generally known as Starlight, and for Richard

and James Marston, we were as certain as that we were in St. Kilda, in

a nice quiet little inn, overlooking the beach; and what a murder it was

to have to leave it at all.

Leave the place we had to do at once. It wouldn't do to be strollin'

about Melbourne with the chance of every policeman we met taking a

look at us to see if we tallied with a full description they had at

the office: 'Richard and James Marston are twenty-five and twenty-two,

respectively; both tall and strongly built; having the appearance of

bushmen. Richard Marston has a scar on left temple. James Marston

has lost a front tooth,' and so on. When we came to think of it, they

couldn't be off knowing us, if they took it into their heads to bail us

up any day. They had our height and make. We couldn't help looking like

bushmen--like men that had been in the open air all their lives, and

that had a look as if saddle and bridle rein were more in our way than

the spade and plough-handle. We couldn't wash the tan off our skins;

faces, necks, arms, all showed pretty well that we'd come from where the

sun was hot, and that we'd had our share of it. They had my scar, got in

a row, and Jim's front tooth, knocked out by a fall from a horse when he

was a boy; there was nothing for it but to cut and run.

'It was time for us to go, my boys,' as the song the Yankee sailor sung

us one night runs, and then, which way to go? Every ship was watched

that close a strange rat couldn't get a passage, and, besides, we had

that feeling we didn't like to clear away altogether out of the old

country; there was mother and Aileen still in it, and every man, woman,

and child that we'd known ever since we were born. A chap feels that,

even if he ain't much good other ways. We couldn't stand the thought of

clearin' out for America, as Starlight advised us. It was like death

to us, so we thought we'd chance it somewhere in Australia for a bit

longer.

Now where we put up a good many drovers from Gippsland used to stay,

as they brought in cattle from there. The cattle had to be brought over

Swanston Street Bridge and right through the town after twelve o'clock

at night. We'd once or twice, when we'd been out late, stopped to look

at them, and watched the big heavy bullocks and fat cows staring and

starting and slipping all among the lamps and pavements, with the street

all so strange and quiet, and laughed at the notion of some of the

shopkeepers waking up and seeing a couple of hundred wild cattle, with

three or four men behind 'em, shouldering and horning one another, then

rushing past their doors at a hard trot, or breaking into a gallop for a

bit.

Some of these chaps, seeing we was cattle-men and knew most things in

that line, used to open out about where they'd come from, and what a

grand place Gippsland was--splendid grass country, rivers that run all

the year round, great fattening country; and snowy mountains at the

back, keeping everything cool in the summer. Some of the mountain

country, like Omeo, that they talked a lot of, seemed about one of the

most out-of-the-way places in the world. More than that, you could get

back to old New South Wales by way of the Snowy River, and then on to

Monaro. After that we knew where we were.

Going away was easy enough, in a manner of speaking; but we'd been

a month in Melbourne, and when you mind that we were not bad-looking

chaps, fairishly dressed, and with our pockets full of money, it was

only what might be looked for if we had made another friend or two

besides Mrs. Morrison, the landlady of our inn, and Gippsland drovers.

When we had time to turn round a bit in Melbourne of course we began to

make a few friends. Wherever a man goes, unless he keeps himself that

close that he won't talk to any one or let any one talk to him, he's

sure to find some one he likes to be with better than another. If he's

old and done with most of his fancies, except smokin' and drinkin' it's

a man. If he's young and got his life before him it's a woman. So Jim

and I hadn't been a week in Melbourne before we fell across a couple

of--well, friends--that we were hard set to leave. It was a way of mine

to walk down to the beach every evening and have a look at the boats

in the bay and the fishermen, if there were any--anything that might be

going on. Sometimes a big steamer would be coming in, churning the water

under her paddles and tearing up the bay like a hundred bunyips. The

first screw-boat Jim and I saw we couldn't make out for the life of us

what she moved by. We thought all steamers had paddles. Then the sailing

boats, flying before the breeze like seagulls, and the waves, if it

was a rough day, rolling and beating and thundering on the beach. I

generally stayed till the stars came out before I went back to the

hotel. Everything was so strange and new to a man who'd seen so

little else except green trees that I was never tired of watching, and

wondering, and thinking what a little bit of a shabby world chaps like

us lived in that never seen anything but a slab hut, maybe, all the year

round, and a bush public on high days and holidays.

Sometimes I used to feel as if we hadn't done such a bad stroke in

cutting loose from all this. But then the horrible feeling would come

back of never being safe, even for a day, of being dragged off and put

in the dock, and maybe shut up for years and years. Sometimes I used

to throw myself down upon the sand and curse the day when I ever did

anything that I had any call to be ashamed of and put myself in the

power of everything bad and evil in all my life through.

Well, one day I was strolling along, thinking about these things, and

wondering whether there was any other country where a man could go and

feel himself safe from being hounded down for the rest of his life,

when I saw a woman walking on the beach ahead of me. I came up with her

before long, and as I passed her she turned her head and I saw she

was one of two girls that we had seen in the landlady's parlour one

afternoon. The landlady was a good, decent Scotch woman, and had taken

a fancy to both of us (particularly to Jim--as usual). She thought--she

was that simple--that we were up-country squatters from some far-back

place, or overseers. Something in the sheep or cattle line everybody

could see that we were. There was no hiding that. But we didn't talk

about ourselves overmuch, for very good reasons. The less people say the

more others will wonder and guess about you. So we began to be looked

upon as bosses of some sort, and to be treated with a lot of respect

that we hadn't been used to much before. So we began to talk a

bit--natural enough--this girl and I. She was a good-looking girl, with

a wonderful fresh clear skin, full of life and spirits, and pretty well

taught. She and her sister had not been a long time in the country;

their father was dead, and they had to live by keeping a very small shop

and by dressmaking. They were some kind of cousins of the landlady and

the same name, so they used to come and see her of evenings and Sundays.

Her name was Kate Morrison and her sister's was Jeanie. This and a lot

more she told me before we got back to the hotel, where she said she was

going to stay that night and keep Mrs. Morrison company.

After this we began to be a deal better acquainted. It all came easy

enough. The landlady thought she was doing the girls a good turn by

putting them in the way of a couple of hard-working well-to-do fellows

like us; and as Jim and the younger one, Jeanie, seemed to take a fancy

to each other, Mrs. Morrison used to make up boating parties, and we

soon got to know each other well enough to be joked about falling in

love and all the rest of it.

After a bit we got quite into the way of calling for Kate and Jeanie

after their day's work was done, and taking them out for a walk. I don't

know that I cared so much for Kate in those days anyhow, but by degrees

we got to think that we were what people call in love with each other.

It went deeper with her than me, I think. It mostly does with women. I

never really cared for any woman in the world except Gracey Storefield,

but she was far away, and I didn't see much likelihood of my being able

to live in that part of the world, much less to settle down and marry

there. So, though we'd broken a six-pence together and I had my half,

I looked upon her as ever so much beyond me and out of my reach, and

didn't see any harm in amusing myself with any woman that I might happen

to fall across.

So, partly from idleness, partly from liking, and partly seeing that the

girl had made up her mind to throw in her lot with me for good and all,

I just took it as it came; but it meant a deal more than that, if I

could have foreseen the end.

I hadn't seen a great many women, and had made up my mind that, except

a few bad ones, they was mostly of one sort--good to lead, not hard to

drive, and, above all, easy to see through and understand.

I often wonder what there was about this Kate Morrison to make her so

different from other women; but she was born unlike them, I expect.

Anyway, I never met another woman like her. She wasn't out-and-out

handsome, but there was something very taking about her. Her figure

was pretty near as good as a woman's could be; her step was light and

active; her feet and hands were small, and she took a pride in showing

them. I never thought she had any temper different from other women;

but if I'd noticed her eyes, surely I'd have seen it there. There was

something very strange and out of the way about them. They hardly seemed

so bright when you looked at them first; but by degrees, if she got

roused and set up about anything, they'd begin to burn with a steady

sort of glitter that got fiercer and brighter till you'd think they'd

burn everything they looked at. The light in them didn't go out again

in a hurry, either. It seemed as if those wonderful eyes would keep on

shining, whether their owner wished it or not.

I didn't find out all about her nature at once--trust a woman for that.

Vain and fond of pleasure I could see she was; and from having been

always poor, in a worrying, miserable, ill-contented way, she had got

to be hungry for money and jewels and fine clothes; just like a person

that's been starved and shivering with cold longs for a fire and a full

meal and a warm bed. Some people like these things when they can get

them; but others never seem to think about anything else, and would sell

their souls or do anything in the whole world to get what their hearts

are set on. When men are like this they're dangerous, but they hardly

hurt anybody, only themselves. When women are born with hearts of this

sort it's a bad look-out for everybody they come near. Kate Morrison

could see that I had money. She thought I was rich, and she made up her

mind to attract me, and go shares in my property, whatever it might

be. She won over her younger sister, Jeanie, to her plans, and our

acquaintance was part of a regular put-up scheme. Jeanie was a soft,

good-tempered, good-hearted girl, with beautiful fair hair, blue eyes,

and the prettiest mouth in the world. She was as good as she was pretty,

and would have worked away without grumbling in that dismal little shop

from that day to this, if she'd been let alone. She was only just turned

seventeen. She soon got to like Jim a deal too well for her own good,

and used to listen to his talk about the country across the border, and

such simple yarns as he could tell her, poor old Jim! until she said

she'd go and live with him under a salt-bush if he'd come back and marry

her after Christmas. And of course he did promise. He didn't see any

harm in that. He intended to come back if he could, and so did I for

that matter. Well, the long and short of it was that we were both

regularly engaged and had made all kinds of plans to be married at

Christmas and go over to Tasmania or New Zealand, when this terrible

blow fell upon us like a shell. I did see one explode at a review in

Melbourne--and, my word! what a scatteration it made.

Well, we had to let Kate and Jeanie know the best way we could that our

business required us to leave Melbourne at once, and that we shouldn't

be back till after Christmas, if then.

It was terrible hard work to make out any kind of a story that would

do. Kate questioned and cross-questioned me about the particular kind

of business that called us away like a lawyer (I've seen plenty of that

since) until at last I was obliged to get a bit cross and refuse to

answer any more questions.

Jeanie took it easier, and was that down-hearted and miserable at

parting with Jim that she hadn't the heart to ask any questions of any

one, and Jim looked about as dismal as she did. They sat with their

hands in each other's till it was nearly twelve o'clock, when the

old mother came and carried the girls off to bed. We had to start at

daylight next morning; but we made up our minds to leave them a hundred

pounds apiece to keep for us until we came back, and promised if we were

alive to be at St. Kilda next January, which they had to be contented

with.

Jeanie did not want to take the money; but Jim said he'd very likely

lose it, and so persuaded her.

We were miserable and low-spirited enough ourselves at the idea of going

away all in a hurry. We had come to like Melbourne, and had bit by

bit cheated ourselves into thinking that we might live comfortably and

settle down in Victoria, out of reach of our enemies, and perhaps live

and die unsuspected.

From this dream we were roused up by the confounded advertisement.

Detectives and constables would be seen to be pretty thick in all the

colonies, and we could not reasonably expect not to be taken some time

or other, most likely before another week.

We thought it over and over again, in every way. The more we thought

over it the more dangerous it seemed to stop in Melbourne. There was

only one thing for it, that was to go straight out of the country. The

Gippsland men were the only bushmen we knew at all well, and perhaps

that door might shut soon.

So we paid our bill. They thought us a pair of quiet, respectable chaps

at that hotel, and never would believe otherwise. People may say what

they like, but it's a great thing to have some friends that can say of

you--

'Well, I never knew no harm of him; a better tempered chap couldn't be;

and all the time we knowed him he was that particular about his bills

and money matters that a banker couldn't have been more regular. He may

have had his faults, but we never seen 'em. I believe a deal that was

said of him wasn't true, and nothing won't ever make me believe it.'

These kind of people will stand up for you all the days of your life,

and stick to you till the very last moment, no matter what you turn out

to be. Well, there's something pleasant in it; and it makes you think

human nature ain't quite such a low and paltry thing as some people

tries to make out. Anyhow, when we went away our good little landlady

and her sister was that sorry to lose us, as you'd have thought they was

our blood relations. As for Jim, every one in the house was fit to cry

when he went off, from the dogs and cats upwards. Jim never was in no

house where everybody didn't seem to take naturally to him. Poor old

Jim!

We bought a couple of horses, and rode away down to Sale with these

chaps that had sold their cattle in Melbourne and was going home. It

rained all the way, and it was the worst road by chalks we'd ever seen

in our lives; but the soil was wonderful, and the grass was something to

talk about; we'd hardly ever seen anything like it. A few thousand acres

there would keep more stock than half the country we'd been used to.

We didn't stay more than a day or so in Sale. Every morning at breakfast

some one was sure to turn up the paper and begin jabbering about the

same old infernal business, Hood's cattle, and what a lot were taken,

and whether they'll catch Starlight and the other men, and so on.

We heard of a job at Omeo while we were in Sale, which we thought would

just about suit us. All the cattle on a run there were to be mustered

and delivered to a firm of stock agents that had bought them; they

wanted people to do it by contract at so much a head. Anybody who took

it must have money enough to buy stock horses. The price per head was

pretty fair, what would pay well, and we made up our minds to go in for

it.

So we made a bargain; bought two more horses each, and started away

for Omeo. It was near 200 miles from where we were. We got up there all

right, and found a great rich country with a big lake, I don't know

how many feet above the sea. The cattle were as wild as hares, but the

country was pretty good to ride over. We were able to keep our horses in

good condition in the paddocks, and when we had mustered the whole lot

we found we had a handsome cheque to get.

It was a little bit strange buckling to after the easy life we'd led for

the last few months; but after a day or two we found ourselves as good

men as ever, and could spin over the limestone boulders and through

the thick mountain timber as well as ever we did. A man soon gets right

again in the fresh air of the bush; and as it used to snow there every

now and then the air was pretty fresh, you bet, particularly in the

mornings and evenings.

After we'd settled up we made up our minds to get as far as Monaro,

and wait there for a month or two. After that we might go in for the

shearing till Christmas, and then whatever happened we would both make a

strike back for home, and have one happy week, at any rate, with mother

and Aileen.

We tried as well as we could to keep away from the large towns and the

regular mail coach road. We worked on runs where the snow came down

every now and then in such a way as to make us think that we might be

snowed up alive some fine morning. It was very slow and tedious work,

but the newspapers seldom came there, and we were not worried day

after day with telegrams about our Adelaide stroke, and descriptions

of Starlight's own look and way of speaking. We got into the old way of

working hard all day and sleeping well at night. We could eat and drink

well; the corned beef and the damper were good, and Jim, like when we

were at the back of Boree when Warrigal came, wished that we could

stick to this kind of thing always, and never have any fret or crooked

dealings again as long as we lived.

But it couldn't be done. We had to leave and go shearing when the spring

came on. We did go, and went from one big station to the other when the

spring was regularly on and shearers were scarce. By and by the weather

gets warmer, and we had cut our last shed before the first week in

December.

Then we couldn't stand it any longer.

'I don't care,' says Jim, 'if there's a policeman standing at every

corner of the street, I must make a start for home. They may catch us,

but our chance is a pretty good one; and I'd just as soon be lagged

outright as have to hide and keep dark and moulder away life in some of

these God-forsaken spots.'

So we made up to start for home and chance it. We worked our way by

degrees up the Snowy River, by Buchan and Galantapee, and gradually made

towards Balooka and Buckley's Crossing. On the way we crossed some of

the roughest country we had ever seen or ridden over.

'My word, Dick,' said Jim one day, as we were walking along and leading

our horses, 'we could find a place here if we were hard pushed near as

good for hiding in as the Hollow. Look at that bit of tableland that

runs up towards Black Mountain, any man that could find a track up to it

might live there for a year and all the police of the country be after

him.'

'What would he get to eat if he was there?'

'That long chap we stayed with at Wargulmerang told us that there were

wild cattle on all those tablelands. Often they get snowed up in winter

and die, making a circle in the snow. Then fish in all the creeks,

besides the old Snowy, and there are places on the south side of him

that people didn't see once in five years. I believe I shall make a

camp for myself on the way, and live in it till they've forgot all about

these cursed cattle. Rot their hides, I wish we'd never have set eyes on

one of them.'

'So do I; but like many things in the world it's too late--too late,

Jim!'

Chapter 14

One blazing hot day in the Christmas week Jim and I rode up the 'gap'

that led from the Southern road towards Rocky Creek and the little flat

near the water where our hut stood. The horses were tired, for we'd

ridden a long way, and not very slow either, to get to the old place.

How small and queer the old homestead looked, and everything about it

after all we had seen. The trees in the garden were in full leaf, and

we could see that it was not let go to waste. Mother was sitting in the

verandah sewing, pretty near the same as we went away, and a girl was

walking slowly up from the creek carrying a bucket of water. It was

Aileen. We knew her at once. She was always as straight as a rush, and

held her head high, as she used to do; but she walked very slow, and

looked as if she was dull and weary of everything. All of a sudden Jim

jumped off, dropped his horse's bridle on the ground, and started to

run towards her. She didn't see him till he was pretty close; then she

looked up astonished-like, and put her bucket down. She gave a sudden

cry and rushed over to him; the next minute she was in his arms, sobbing

as if her heart would break.

I came along quiet. I knew she'd be glad to see me--but, bless you, she

and mother cared more for Jim's little finger than for my whole

body. Some people have a way of gettin' the biggest share of nearly

everybody's liking that comes next or anigh 'em. I don't know how it's

done, or what works it. But so it is; and Jim could always count on

every man, woman, and child, wherever he lived, wearing his colours and

backing him right out, through thick and thin.

When I came up Aileen was saying--

'Oh, Jim, my dear old Jim! now I'll die happy; mother and I were only

talking of you to-day, and wondering whether we should see you at

Christmas--and now you have come. Oh, Dick! and you too. But we shall be

frightened every time we hear a horse's tread or dog's bark.'

'Well, we're here now, Aileen, and that's something. I had a great

notion of clearing out for San Francisco and turning Yankee. What would

you have done then?'

We walked up to the house, leading our horses, Jim and Aileen hand in

hand. Mother looked up and gave a scream; she nearly fell down; when we

got in her face was as white as a sheet.

'Mother of Mercy! I vowed to you for this,' she said; 'sure she hears

our prayers. I wanted to see ye both before I died, and I didn't think

you'd come. I was afraid ye'd be dreadin' the police, and maybe stay

away for good and all. The Lord be thanked for all His mercies!'

We went in and enjoyed our tea. We had had nothing to eat that day since

breakfast; but better than all was Aileen's pleasant, clever tongue,

though she said it was getting stiff for want of exercise. She wanted

to know all about our travels, and was never tired of listening to Jim's

stories of the wonders we had seen in the great cities and the strange

places we had been to.

'Oh! how happy you must have been!' she would say, 'while we have been

pining and wearying here, all through last spring and summer, and then

winter again--cold and miserable it was last year; and now Christmas has

come again. Don't go away again for a good while, or mother and I'll die

straight out.'

Well, what could we say? Tell her we'd never go away at all if we could

help it--only she must be a good girl and make the best of things, for

mother's sake? When had she seen father last?

'Oh! he was away a good while once; that time you and Jim were at Mr.

Falkland's back country. You must have had a long job then; no wonder

you've got such good clothes and look so smartened up like. He comes

every now and then, just like he used. We never know what's become of

him.'

'When was he here last?'

'Oh! about a month ago. He said he might be here about Christmas; but

he wasn't sure. And so you saved Miss Falkland from being killed off her

horse, Jim? Tell me all about it, like a good boy, and what sort of a

looking young lady is she?'

'All right,' said Jim. 'I'll unload the story bag before we get through;

there's a lot in there yet; but I want to look at you and hear you talk

just now. How's George Storefield?'

'Oh! he's just the same good, kind, steady-going fellow he always was,'

says she. 'I don't know what we should do without him when you're away.

He comes and helps with the cows now and then. Two of the horses got

into Bargo pound, and he went and released them for us. Then a storm

blew off best part of the roof of the barn, and the bit of wheat would

have been spoiled only for him. He's the best friend we have.'

'You'd better make sure of him for good and all,' I said. 'I suppose

he's pretty well-to-do now with that new farm he bought the other day.'

'Oh! you saw that,' she said. 'Yes; he bought out the Cumberers. They

never did any good with Honeysuckle Flat, though the land was so good.

He's going to lay it all down in lucerne, he says.'

'And then he'll smarten up the cottage, and sister Aileen 'll go over,

and live in it,' says Jim; 'and a better thing she couldn't do.'

'I don't know,' she said. 'Poor George, I wish I was fonder of him.

There never was a better man, I believe; but I cannot leave mother yet,

so it's no use talking.' Then she got up and went in.

'That's the way of the world,' says Jim. 'George worships the ground she

treads on, and she can't make herself care two straws about him. Perhaps

she will in time. She'll have the best home and the best chap in the

whole district if she does.'

'There's a deal of “if” in this world,' I said; 'and “if” we're “copped”

on account of that last job, I'd like to think she and mother had some

one to look after them, good weather and bad.'

'We might have done that, and not killed ourselves with work either,'

said Jim, rather sulkily for him; and he lit his pipe and walked off

into the bush without saying another word.

I thought, too, how we might have been ten times, twenty times, as happy

if we'd only kept on steady ding-dong work, like George Storefield,

having patience and seeing ourselves get better off--even a little--year

by year. What had he come to? And what lay before us? And though we were

that fond of poor mother and Aileen that we would have done anything in

the world for them--that is, we would have given our lives for them any

day--yet we had left them--father, Jim, and I--to lead this miserable,

lonesome life, looked down upon by a lot of people not half good enough

to tie their shoes, and obliged to a neighbour for help in every little

distress.

Jim and I thought we'd chance a few days at home, no matter what risk we

ran; but still we knew that if warrants were out the old home would be

well watched, and that it was the first place the police would come to.

So we made up our minds not to sleep at home, but to go away every night

to an old deserted shepherd's hut, a couple of miles up the gully, that

we used to play in when we were boys. It had been strongly built at

first; time was not much matter then, and there were no wages to speak

of, so that it was a good shelter. The weather was that hot, too, it was

just as pleasant sleeping under a tree as anywhere else. So we didn't

show at home more than one at a time, and took care to be ready for a

bolt at any time, day or night, when the police might show themselves.

Our place was middling clear all round now, and it was hard for any one

on horseback to get near it without warning; and if we could once reach

the gully we knew we could run faster than any man could ride.

One night, latish, just as we were walking off to our hut there was a

scratching at the door; when we opened it there was old Crib! He ran up

to both of us and smelt round our legs for a minute to satisfy himself;

then jumped up once to each of us as if he thought he ought to do the

civil thing, wagged his stump of a tail, and laid himself down. He

was tired, and had come a long way. We could see that, and that he was

footsore too. We knew that father wasn't so very far off, and would soon

be in. If there'd been anybody strange there Crib would have run back

fast enough; then father'd have dropped there was something up and not

shown. No fear of the dog not knowing who was right and who wasn't. He

could tell every sort of a man a mile off, I believe. He knew the very

walk of the police troopers' horses, and would growl, father said, if he

heard their hoofs rattle on the stones of the road.

About a quarter of an hour after father walks in, quiet as usual.

Nothing never made no difference to him, except he thought it was

worth while. He was middlin' glad to see us, and behaved kind enough

to mother, so the poor soul looked quite happy for her. It was little

enough of that she had for her share. By and by father walks outside

with us, and we had a long private talk.

It was a brightish kind of starlight night. As we walked down to the

creek I thought how often Jim and I had come out on just such a night

'possum hunting, and came home so tired that we were hardly able to pull

our boots off. Then we had nothing to think about when we woke in the

morning but to get in the cows; and didn't we enjoy the fresh butter

and the damper and bacon and eggs at breakfast time! It seems to me

the older people get the more miserable they get in this world. If they

don't make misery for themselves other people do it for 'em; or

just when everything's going straight, and they're doing their duty

first-rate and all that, some accident happens 'em just as if they was

the worst people in the world. I can't make it out at all.

'Well, boys,' says dad, 'you've been lucky so far; suppose you had a

pretty good spree in Melbourne? You seen the game was up by the papers,

didn't you? But why didn't you stay where you were?'

'Why, of course, that brought us away,' says Jim; 'we didn't want to

be fetched back in irons, and thought there was more show for it in the

bush here.'

'But even if they'd grabbed Starlight,' says the old man, 'you'd no call

to be afeard. Not much chance of his peaching, if it had been a hanging

matter.'

'You don't mean to say there ain't warrants against us and the rest of

the lot?' I said.

'There's never a warrant out agin any one but Starlight,' said the old

man. 'I've had the papers read to me regular, and I rode over to Bargo

and saw the reward of 200 Pounds (a chap alongside of me read it) as is

offered for a man generally known as Starlight, supposed to have left

the country; but not a word about you two and me, or the boy, or them

other coves.'

'So we might as well have stayed where we were, Jim.' Jim gave a kind

of groan. 'Still, when you look at it, isn't it queer,' I went on, 'that

they should only spot Starlight and leave us out? It looks as if they

was keepin' dark for fear of frightening us out of the country, but

watching all the same.'

'It's this way I worked it,' says father, rubbing his tobacco in his

hands the old way, and bringing out his pipe: 'they couldn't be off

marking down Starlight along of his carryin' on so. Of course he drawed

notice to himself all roads. But the rest of us only come in with

the mob, and soon as they was sold stashed the camp and cleared out

different ways. Them three fellers is in Queensland long ago, and nobody

was to know them from any other road hands. I was back with the old mare

and Bilbah in mighty short time. I rode 'em night and day, turn about,

and they can both travel. You kept pretty quiet, as luck had it, and was

off to Melbourne quick. I don't really believe they dropped to any of

us, bar Starlight; and if they don't nab him we might get shut of it

altogether. I've known worse things as never turned up in this world,

and never will now.' Here the old man showed his teeth as if he were

going to laugh, but thought better of it.

'Anyhow, we'd made it up to come home at Christmas,' says Jim; 'but it's

all one. It would have saved us a deal of trouble in our minds all the

same if we'd known there was no warrants out after us two. I wonder if

they'll nail Starlight.'

'They can't be well off it,' says father. 'He's gone off his head, and

stopped in some swell town in New Zealand--Canterbury, I think it's

called--livin' tiptop among a lot of young English swells, instead of

makin' off for the Islands, as he laid out to do.'

'How do you know he's there?' I said.

'I know, and that's enough,' snarls father. 'I hear a lot in many ways

about things and people that no one guesses on, and I know this--that

he's pretty well marked down by old Stillbrook the detective as went

down there a month ago.'

'But didn't you warn him?'

'Yes, of course, as soon as I heard tell; but it's too late, I'm

thinking. He has the devil's luck as well as his own, but I always used

to tell him it would fail him yet.'

'I believe you're the smartest man of the crowd, dad,' says Jim, laying

his hand on father's shoulder. He could pretty nigh get round the old

chap once in a way, could Jim, surly as he was. 'What do you think we'd

better do? What's our best dart?'

Father shook off his hand, but not roughly, and his voice wasn't so hard

when he said--

'Why, stop at home quiet, of course, and sleep in your beds at night.

Don't go planting in the gully, or some one 'll think you're wanted, and

let on to the police. Ride about the country till I give you the

office. Never fear but I'll have word quick enough. Go about and see the

neighbours round just as usual.'

Jim and I was quite stunned by this bit of news; no doubt we was pretty

sorry as ever we left Melbourne, but there was nothing for it now but to

follow it out. After all, we were at home, and it was pleasant to think

we wouldn't be hunted for a bit and might ride about the old place and

enjoy ourselves a bit. Aileen was as happy as the day was long, and poor

mother used to lay her head on Jim's neck and cry for joy to have him

with her. Even father used to sit in the front, under the quinces, and

smoke his pipe, with old Crib at his feet, most as if he thought he was

happy. I wonder if he ever looked back to the days when he was a farmin'

boy and hadn't took to poaching? He must have been a smart, handy kind

of lad, and what a different look his face must have had then!

We had our own horses in pretty good trim, so we foraged up Aileen's

mare, and made it up to ride over to George Storefield's, and gave him a

look-up. He'd been away when we came, and now we heard he was home.

'George has been doing well all this time, of course,' I said. 'I expect

he'll turn squatter some day and be made a magistrate.'

'Like enough,' says Jim. 'More than one we could pick began lower down

than him, and sits on the Bench and gives coves like us a turn when

we're brought up before 'em. Fancy old George sayin', “Is anything

known, constable, of this prisoner's anterseedents?” as I heard old

Higgler say one day at Bargo.'

'Why do you make fun of these things, Jim, dear?' says Aileen, looking

so solemn and mournful like. 'Oughtn't a steady worker to rise in

life, and isn't it sad to see cleverer men and better workers--if they

liked--kept down by their own fault?'

'Why wasn't your roan mare born black or chestnut?' says Jim, laughing,

and pretending to touch her up. 'Come along, and let's see if she can

trot as well as she used to do?'

'Poor Lowan,' says she, patting the mare's smooth neck (she was a

wonderful neat, well-bred, dark roan, with black points--one of dad's,

perhaps, that he'd brought her home one time he was in special good

humour about something. Where she was bred or how, nobody ever knew);

'she was born pretty and good. How little trouble her life gives her.

It's a pity we can't all say as much, or have as little on our minds.'

'Whose fault's that?' says Jim. 'The dingo must live as well as the

collie or the sheep either. One's been made just the same as the other.

I've often watched a dingo turn round twice, and then pitch himself

down in the long grass like as if he was dead. He's not a bad sort, old

dingo, and has a good time of it as long as it lasts.'

'Yes, till he's trapped or shot or poisoned some day, which he always

is,' said Aileen bitterly. 'I wonder any man should be content with a

wicked life and a shameful death.' And she struck Lowan with a

switch, and spun down the slope of the hill between the trees like a

forester-doe with the hunter-hound behind her.

When we came up with her she was all right again, and tried to smile.

Whatever put her out for the time she always worked things by kindness,

and would lead us straight if she could. Driven, she knew we couldn't

be; and I believe she did us about ten times as much good that way as if

she had scolded and raged, or even sneered at us.

When we rode up to Mr. Storefield's farm we were quite agreeable and

pleasant again, Jim makin' believe his horse could walk fastest, and

saying that her mare's pace was only a double shuffle of an amble like

Bilbah's, and she declaring that the mare's was a true walk--and so

it was. The mare could do pretty well everything but talk, and all her

paces were first-class.

Old Mrs. Storefield was pottering about in the garden with a big

sun-bonnet on. She was a great woman for flowers.

'Come along in, Aileen, my dear,' she said. 'Gracey's in the dairy;

she'll be out directly. George only came home yesterday. Who be these

you've got with ye? Why, Dick!' she says, lookin' again with her sharp,

old, gray eyes, 'it's you, boy, is it? Well, you've changed a deal too;

and Jim too. Is he as full of mischief as ever? Well, God bless you,

boys, I wish you well! I wish you well. Come in out of the sun, Aileen;

and one of you take the horses up to the stable. You'll find George

there somewhere.'

Aileen had jumped down by this time, and had thrown her rein to Jim, so

we rode up to the stable, and a very good one it was, not long put up,

that we could see. How the place had changed, and how different it was

from ours! We remembered the time when their hut wasn't a patch on ours,

when old Isaac Storefield, that had been gardener at Mulgoa to some of

the big gentlemen in the old days, had saved a bit of money and taken

up a farm; but bit by bit their place had been getting better and bigger

every year, while ours had stood still and now was going back.

Chapter 15

George Storefield's place, for the old man was dead and all the place

belonged to him and Gracey, quite stunned Jim and me. We'd been away

more than a year, and he'd pulled down the old fences and put up

new ones--first-rate work it was too; he was always a dead hand at

splitting. Then there was a big hay-shed, chock-full of good sweet hay

and wheat sheaves, and, last of all, the new stable, with six stalls

and a loft above, and racks, all built of ironbark slabs, as solid and

reg'lar as a church, Jim said.

They'd a good six-roomed cottage and a new garden fence ever so long.

There were more fruit trees in the garden and a lot of good draught

horses standing about, that looked well, but as if they'd come off a

journey.

The stable door opens, and out comes old George as hearty as ever, but

looking full of business.

'Glad to see you, boys,' he says; 'what a time you've been away! Been

away myself these three months with a lot of teams carrying. I've taken

greatly to the business lately. I'm just settling up with my drivers,

but put the horses in, there's chaff and corn in the mangers, and I'll

be down in a few minutes. It's well on to dinner-time, I see.'

We took the bridles off and tied up the horses--there was any amount of

feed for them--and strolled down to the cottage again.

'Wonder whether Gracey's as nice as she used to be,' says Jim. 'Next to

Aileen I used to think she wasn't to be beat. When I was a little chap

I believed you and she must be married for certain. And old George and

Aileen. I never laid out any one for myself, I remember.'

'The first two don't look like coming off,' I said. 'You're the

likeliest man to marry and settle if Jeanie sticks to you.'

'She'd better go down to the pier and drown herself comfortably,' said

Jim. 'If she knew what was before us all, perhaps she would. Poor little

Jeanie! We'd no right to drag other people into our troubles. I believe

we're getting worse and worse. The sooner we're shot or locked up the

better.'

'You won't think so when it comes, old man,' I said. 'Don't bother your

head--it ain't the best part of you--about things that can't be helped.

We're not the only horses that can't be kept on the course--with a good

turn of speed too.'

'“They want shooting like the dingoes,” as Aileen said. They're never no

good, except to ruin those that back 'em and disgrace their owners and

the stable they come out of. That's our sort, all to pieces. Well, we'd

better come in. Gracey 'll think we're afraid to face her.'

When we went away last Grace Storefield was a little over seventeen,

so now she was nineteen all out, and a fine girl she'd grown. Though I

never used to think her a beauty, now I almost began to think she must

be. She wasn't tall, and Aileen looked slight alongside of her; but she

was wonderful fair and fresh coloured for an Australian girl, with a

lot of soft brown hair and a pair of clear blue eyes that always looked

kindly and honestly into everybody's face. Every look of her seemed to

wish to do you good and make you think that nothing that wasn't square

and right and honest and true could live in the same place with her.

She held out both hands to me and said--

'Well, Dick, so you're back again. You must have been to the end of the

world, and Jim, too. I'm very glad to see you both.'

She looked into my face with that pleased look that put me in mind of

her when she was a little child and used to come toddling up to me,

staring and smiling all over her face the moment she saw me. Now she was

a grown woman, and a sweet-looking one too. I couldn't lift her up and

kiss her as I used to do, but I felt as if I should like to do it all

the same. She was the only creature in the whole world, I think, that

liked me better than Jim. I'd been trying to drive all thoughts of her

out of my heart, seeing the tangle I'd got into in more ways than one;

but now the old feeling which had been a part of me ever since I'd grown

up came rushing back stronger than ever. I was surprised at myself, and

looked queer I daresay.

Then Aileen laughed, and Jim comes to the rescue and says--

'Dick doesn't remember you, Gracey. You've grown such a swell, too. You

can't be the little girl we used to carry on our backs.'

'Dick remembers very well,' she says, and her very voice was ever so

much fuller and softer, 'don't you, Dick?' and she looked into my face

as innocent as a child. 'I don't think he could pull me out of the water

and carry me up to the cottage now.'

'You tumble in and we'll try,' says Jim; 'first man to keep you for

good--eh, Gracey? It's fine hot weather, and Aileen shall see fair

play.'

'You're just as saucy as ever, Jim,' says she, blushing and smiling. 'I

see George coming, so I must go and fetch in dinner. Aileen's going to

help me instead of mother. You must tell us all about your travels when

we sit down.'

When George came in he began to talk to make up for lost time, and told

us where he had been--a long way out in some new back country, just

taken up with sheep. He had got a first-rate paying price for his

carriage out, and had brought back and delivered a full load of wool.

'I intend to do it every year for a bit,' he said. 'I can breed and feed

a good stamp of draught horse here. I pay drivers for three waggons and

drive the fourth myself. It pays first-rate so far, and we had very fair

feed all the way there and back.'

'Suppose you get a dry season,' I said, 'how will that be?'

'We shall have to carry forage, of course; but then carriage will be

higher, and it will come to the same thing. I don't like being so long

away from home; but it pays first-rate, and I think I see a way to its

paying better still.'

'So you've ridden over to show them the way, Aileen,' he said, as the

girls came in; 'very good of you it was. I was afraid you'd forgotten

the way.'

'I never forget the way to a friend's place, George,' she said, 'and

you've been our best friend while these naughty boys have left mother

and me so long by ourselves. But you've been away yourself.'

'Only four months,' he said; 'and after a few more trips I shan't want

to go away any more.'

'That will be a good day for all of us,' she said. 'You know, Gracey, we

can't do without George, can we? I felt quite deserted, I can tell you.'

'He wouldn't have gone away at all if you'd held up your little finger,

you know that, you hard-hearted girl,' said Grace, trying to frown.

'It's all your fault.'

'Oh! I couldn't interfere with Mr. Storefield's business,' said Aileen,

looking very grave. 'What kind of a country was it you were out in?'

'Not a bad place for sheep and cattle and blacks,' said poor George,

looking rather glum; 'and not a bad country to make money or do anything

but live in, but that hot and dry and full of flies and mosquitoes that

I'd sooner live on a pound a week down here than take a good station as

a present there. That is, if I was contented,' he went on to say, with a

sort of a groan.

There never was a greater mistake in the world, I believe, than for a

man to let a woman know how much he cares for her. It's right enough if

she's made up her mind to take him, no odds what happens. But if there's

any half-and-half feeling in her mind about him, and she's uncertain and

doubtful whether she likes him well enough, all this down-on-your-knees

business works against you, more than your worst enemy could do. I

didn't know so much about it then. I've found it out since, worse luck.

And I really believe if George had had the savey to crack himself up a

little, and say he'd met a nice girl or two in the back country and hid

his hand, Aileen would have made it up with him that very Christmas, and

been a happy woman all her life.

When old Mrs. Storefield came in she put us through our facings pretty

brisk--where we'd been, what we'd done? What took us to Melbourne,--how

we liked it? What kind of people they were? and so on. We had to tell

her a good lot, part of it truth, of course, but pretty mixed. It made

rather a good yarn, and I could see Grace was listening with her heart

as well as her ears. Jim said generally we met some very nice people in

Melbourne named Jackson, and they were very kind to us.

'Were there any daughters in the family, Jim?' asked Grace.

'Oh! yes, three.'

'Were they good-looking?'

'No, rather homely, particularly the youngest.'

'What did they do?'

'Oh! their mother kept a boarding-house. We stayed there.'

I don't think I ever knew Jim do so much lying before; but after he'd

begun he had to stick to it. He told me afterwards he nearly broke down

about the three daughters; but was rather proud of making the youngest

the ugliest.

'I can see Gracey's as fond of you as ever she was, Dick,' says he;

'that's why she made me tell all those crammers. It's an awful pity we

can't all square it, and get spliced this Christmas. Aileen would take

George if she wasn't a fool, as most women are. I'd like to bring Jeanie

up here, and join George in the carrying business. It's going to be a

big thing, I can see. You might marry Gracey, and look after both places

while we were away.'

'And how about Kate?'

'The devil take her! and then he'd have a bargain. I wish you'd never

dropped across her, and that she wasn't Jeanie's sister,' blurts out

Jim. 'She'll bring bad luck among us before she's done, I feel, as sure

as we're standing here.'

'It's all a toss up--like our lives; married or lagged, bushwork or

roadwork (in irons), free or bond. We can't tell how it will be with us

this day year.'

'I've half a mind to shoot myself,' says Jim, 'and end it all. I would,

too, only for mother and Aileen. What's the use of life that isn't life,

but fear and misery, from one day's end to another, and we only just

grown up? It's d----d hard that a chap's brains don't grow along with

his legs and arms.'

We didn't ride home till quite the evening. Grace would have us stay

for tea; it was a pretty hot day, so there was no use riding in the sun.

George saddled his horse, and he and Grace rode part of the way home

with us. He'd got regular sunburnt like us, and, as he could ride a bit,

like most natives, he looked better outside of a horse than on his own

legs, being rather thick-set and shortish; but his heart was in the

right place, like his sister's, and his head was screwed on right, too.

I think more of old George now than I ever did before, and wish I'd had

the sense to value his independent straight-ahead nature, and the track

it led him, as he deserved.

Jim and I rode in front, with Gracey between us. She had on a neat habit

and a better hat and gloves than Aileen, but nothing could ever give her

the seat and hand and light, easy, graceful way with her in the saddle

that our girl had. All the same she could ride and drive too, and as we

rode side by side in the twilight, talking about the places I'd been to,

and she wanting to know everything (Jim drew off a bit when the road got

narrow), I felt what a fool I'd been to let things slide, and would have

given my right hand to have been able to put them as they were three

short years before.

At last we got to the Gap; it was the shortest halt from their home.

George shook hands with Aileen, and turned back.

'We'll come and see you next----' he said.

'Christmas Eve!' said Aileen.

'Christmas Eve let it be,' says George.

'All right,' I said, holding Grace's hand for a bit. And so we

parted--for how long, do you think?

Chapter 16

When we got home it was pretty late, and the air was beginning to cool

after the hot day. There was a low moon, and everything showed out

clear, so that you could see the smallest branches of the trees on Nulla

Mountain, where it stood like a dark cloud-bank against the western sky.

There wasn't the smallest breeze. The air was that still and quiet you

could have heard anything stir in the grass, or almost a 'possum digging

his claws into the smooth bark of the white gum trees. The curlews set

up a cry from time to time; but they didn't sound so queer and shrill as

they mostly do at night. I don't know how it was, but everything seemed

quiet and pleasant and homelike, as if a chap might live a hundred

years, if it was all like this, and keep growing better and happier

every day. I remember all this so particular because it was the only

time I'd felt like it for years, and I never had the same feeling

afterwards--nor likely to.

'Oh! what a happy day I've had,' Aileen said, on a sudden. Jim and I and

her had been riding a long spell without speaking. 'I don't know when

I've enjoyed myself so much; I've got quite out of the way of being

happy lately, and hardly know the taste of it. How lovely it would be

if you and Jim could always stay at home like this, and we could do our

work happy and comfortable together, without separating, and all this

deadly fear of something terrible happening, that's never out of my

mind. Oh! Dick, won't you promise me to stop quiet and work steady at

home, if you--if you and Jim haven't anything brought against you?'

She bent forward and looked into my face as she said this. I could see

her eyes shine, and every word she said seemed to come straight from her

heart. How sad and pitiful she looked, and we felt for a moment just as

we did when we were boys, and she used to come and persuade us to go on

with our work and not grieve mother, and run the risk of a licking from

father when he came home.

Her mare, Lowan, was close alongside of my horse, stepping along at her

fast tearing walk, throwing up her head and snorting every now and then,

but Aileen sat in her saddle better than some people can sit in a chair;

she held the rein and whip together and kept her hand on mine till I

spoke.

'We'll do all we can, Aileen dear, for you and poor mother, won't we,

Jim?' I felt soft and down-hearted then, if ever I did. 'But it's too

late--too late! You'll see us now and then; but we can't stop at home

quiet, nor work about here all the time as we used to do. That day's

gone. Jim knows it as well as me. There's no help for it now. We'll have

to do like the rest--enjoy ourselves a bit while we can, and stand up to

our fight when the trouble comes.'

She took her hand away, and rode on with her rein loose and her head

down. I could see the tears falling down her face, but after a bit she

put herself to rights, and we rode quietly up to the door. Mother was

working away in her chair, and father walking up and down before the

door smoking.

When we were letting go the horses, father comes up and says--

'I've got a bit of news for you, boys; Starlight's been took, and the

darkie with him.'

'Where?' I said. Somehow I felt struck all of a heap by hearing this.

I'd got out of the way of thinking they'd drop on him. As for Jim,

he heard it straight enough, but he went on whistling and patting the

mare's neck, teasing her like, because she was so uneasy to get her

head-stall off and run after the others.

'Why, in New Zealand, to be sure. The blamed fool stuck there all this

time, just because he found himself comfortably situated among people as

he liked. I wonder how he'll fancy Berrima after it all? Sarves him well

right.'

'But how did you come to hear about it?' We knew father couldn't read

nor write.

'I have a chap as is paid to read the papers reg'lar, and to put me

on when there's anything in 'em as I want to know. He's bin over here

to-day and give me the office. Here's the paper he left.'

Father pulls out a crumpled-up dirty-lookin' bit of newspaper. It

wasn't much to look at; but there was enough to keep us in readin', and

thinkin', too, for a good while, as soon as we made it out. In pretty

big letters, too.

IMPORTANT CAPTURE BY DETECTIVE STILLBROOK,

OF THE NEW SOUTH WALES POLICE.

That was atop of the page, then comes this:--

Our readers may remember the description given in this journal, some

months since, of a cattle robbery on the largest scale, when upwards of

a thousand head were stolen from one of Mr. Hood's stations, driven to

Adelaide, and then sold, by a party of men whose names have not as yet

transpired. It is satisfactory to find that the leader of the gang, who

is well known to the police by the assumed name of 'Starlight', with a

half-caste lad recognised as an accomplice, has been arrested by this

active officer. It appears that, from information received, Detective

Stillbrook went to New Zealand, and, after several months' patient

search, took his passage in the boat which left that colony, in order

to meet the mail steamer, outward bound, for San Francisco. As the

passengers were landing he arrested a gentlemanlike and well-dressed

personage, who, with his servant, was about to proceed to Menzies's

Hotel. Considerable surprise was manifested by the other passengers,

with whom the prisoner had become universally popular. He indignantly

denied all knowledge of the charge; but we have reason to believe that

there will be no difficulty as to identification. A large sum of money

in gold and notes was found upon him. Other arrests are likely to

follow.

This looked bad; for a bit we didn't know what to think. While Jim and

I was makin' it all out, with the help of a bit of candle we smuggled

out--we dursn't take it inside--father was smokin' his pipe--in the old

fashion--and saying nothing. When we'd done he put up his pipe in his

pouch and begins to talk.

'It's come just as I said, and knowed it would, through Starlight's

cussed flashness and carryin's on in fine company. If he'd cleared out

and made for the Islands as I warned him to do, and he settled to, or as

good, afore he left us that day at the camp, he'd been safe in some o'

them 'Merikin places he was always gassin' about, and all this wouldn't

'a happened.'

'He couldn't help that,' says Jim; 'he thought they'd never know him

from any other swell in Canterbury or wherever he was. He's been took in

like many another man. What I look at is this: he won't squeak. How are

they to find out that we had any hand in it?'

'That's what I'm dubersome about,' says father, lightin' his pipe again.

'Nobody down there got much of a look at me, and I let my beard grow on

the road and shaved clean soon's I got back, same as I always do. Now

the thing is, does any one know that you boys was in the fakement?'

'Nobody's likely to know but him and Warrigal. The knockabouts and those

other three chaps won't come it on us for their own sakes. We may as

well stop here till Christmas is over and then make down to the Barwon,

or somewhere thereabouts. We could take a long job at droving till the

derry's off a bit.'

'If you'll be said by me,' the old man growls out, 'you'll make tracks

for the Hollow afore daylight and keep dark till we hear how the play

goes. I know Starlight's as close as a spring-lock; but that chap

Warrigal don't cotton to either of you, and he's likely to give you away

if he's pinched himself--that's my notion of him.'

'Starlight 'll keep him from doing that,' Jim says; 'the boy 'll do

nothing his master don't agree to, and he'd break his neck if he found

him out in any dog's trick like that.'

'Starlight and he ain't in the same cell, you take your oath. I don't

trust no man except him. I'll be off now, and if you'll take a fool's

advice, though he is your father, you'll go too; we can be there by

daylight.'

Jim and I looked at each other.

'We promised to stay Chris'mas with mother and Aileen,' says he, 'and if

all the devils in hell tried to stop us, I wouldn't break my word. But

we'll come to the Hollow on Boxing Day, won't we, Dick?'

'All right! It's only two or three days. The day after to-morrow's

Chris'mas Eve. We'll chance that, as it's gone so far.'

'Take your own way,' growls father. 'Fetch me my saddle. The old mare's

close by the yard.'

Jim fetches the saddle and bridle, and Crib comes after him, out of the

verandah, where he had been lying. Bless you! he knew something was up.

Just like a Christian he was, and nothing never happened that dad was in

as he wasn't down to.

'May as well stop till morning, dad,' says Jim, as we walked up to the

yard.

'Not another minute,' says the old man, and he whips the bridle out of

Jim's hand and walks over to the old mare. She lifts up her head from

the dry grass and stands as steady as a rock.

'Good-bye,' he says, and he shook hands with both of us; 'if I don't see

you again I'll send you word if I hear anything fresh.'

In another minute we heard the old mare's hoofs proceeding away among

the rocks up the gully, and gradually getting fainter in the distance.

Then we went in. Mother and Aileen had been in bed an hour ago, and all

the better for them. Next morning we told mother and Aileen that father

had gone. They didn't say much. They were used to his ways. They never

expected him till they saw him, and had got out of the fashion of asking

why he did this or that. He had reasons of his own, which he never told

them, for going or coming, and they'd left off troubling their heads

about it. Mother was always in dread while he was there, and they were

far easier in their minds when he was away off the place.

As for us, we had made up our minds to enjoy ourselves while we could,

and we had come to his way of thinking, that most likely nothing was

known of our being in the cattle affair that Starlight and the boy had

been arrested for. We knew nothing would drag it out of Starlight about

his pals in this or any other job. Now they'd got him, it would content

them for a bit, and maybe take off their attention from us and the

others that were in it.

There were two days to Christmas. Next day George and his sister would

be over, and we all looked forward to that for a good reminder of old

times. We were going to have a merry Christmas at home for once in a

way. After that we would clear out and get away to some of the far out

stations, where chaps like ourselves always made to when they wanted to

keep dark. We might have the luck of other men that we had known of,

and never be traced till the whole thing had died out and been

half-forgotten. Though we didn't say much to each other we had pretty

well made up our minds to go straight from this out. We might take up a

bit of back country, and put stock on it with some of the money we had

left. Lots of men had begun that way that had things against them as bad

as us, and had kept steady, and worked through in course of time. Why

shouldn't we as well as others? We wanted to see what the papers said of

us, so we rode over to a little post town we knew of and got a copy of

the 'Evening Times'. There it all was in full:--

CATTLE-LIFTING EXTRAORDINARY.

We have heard from time to time of cattle being stolen in lots of

reasonable size, say from ten to one hundred, or even as high as two

hundred head at the outside. But we never expected to have to record the

erecting of a substantial stockyard and the carrying off and disposing

of a whole herd, estimated at a thousand or eleven hundred head, chiefly

the property of one proprietor. Yet this has been done in New South

Wales, and done, we regret to say, cleverly and successfully. It has

just transpired, beyond all possibility of mistake, that Mr. Hood's

Outer Back Momberah run has suffered to that extent in the past winter.

The stolen herd was driven to Adelaide, and there sold openly. The

money was received by the robbers, who were permitted to decamp at their

leisure.

When we mention the name of the notorious 'Starlight', no one will be

surprised that the deed was planned, carried out, and executed with

consummate address and completeness. It seems matter of regret that we

cannot persuade this illustrious depredator to take the command of our

police force, that body of life-assurers and property-protectors which

has proved so singularly ineffective as a preventive service in the

present case. On the well-known proverbial principle we might hope for

the best results under Mr. Starlight's intelligent supervision. We must

not withhold our approval as to one item of success which the force has

scored. Starlight himself and a half-caste henchman have been cleverly

captured by Detective Stillbrook, just as the former, who has been

ruffling it among the 'aristocratic' settlers of Christchurch, was about

to sail for Honolulu. The names of his other accomplices, six in number,

it is said, have not as yet transpired.

This last part gave us confidence, but all the same we kept everything

ready for a bolt in case of need. We got up our horses every evening and

kept them in the yard all night. The feed was good by the creek now--a

little dried up but plenty of bite, and better for horses that had been

ridden far and fast than if it was green. We had enough of last year's

hay to give them a feed at night, and that was all they wanted. They

were two pretty good ones and not slow either. We took care of that when

we bought them. Nobody ever saw us on bad ones since we were boys, and

we had broken them in to stand and be caught day or night, and to let us

jump on and off at a moment's notice.

All that day, being awful hot and close, we stayed in the house and

yarned away with mother and Aileen till they thought--poor souls--that

we had turned over a new leaf and were going to stay at home and be good

boys for the future. When a man sees how little it takes to make women

happy--them that's good and never thinks of anything but doing their

best for everybody belonging to 'em--it's wonderful how men ever make

up their minds to go wrong and bring all that loves them to shame and

grief. When they've got nobody but themselves to think of it don't so

much matter as I know of; but to keep on breaking the hearts of those

as never did you anything but good, and wouldn't if they lived for a

hundred years, is cowardly and unmanly any way you look at it. And yet

we'd done very little else ourselves these years and years.

We all sat up till nigh on to midnight with our hands in one

another's--Jim down at mother's feet; Aileen and I close beside them on

the old seat in the verandah that father made such a time ago. At last

mother gets up, and they both started for bed. Aileen seemed as if she

couldn't tear herself away. Twice she came back, then she kissed us

both, and the tears came into her eyes. 'I feel too happy,' she said;

'I never thought I should feel like this again. God bless you both,

and keep us all from harm.' 'Amen,' said mother from the next room. We

turned out early, and had a bathe in the creek before we went up to the

yard to let out the horses. There wasn't a cloud in the sky; it was safe

to be a roasting hot day, but it was cool then. The little waterhole

where we learned to swim when we were boys was deep on one side and had

a rocky ledge to jump off. The birds just began to give out a note or

two; the sun was rising clear and bright, and we could see the dark top

of Nulla Mountain getting a sort of rose colour against the sky.

'George and Gracey 'll be over soon after breakfast,' I said; 'we must

have everything look ship-shape as well as we can before they turn up.'

'The horses may as well go down to the flat,' Jim says; 'we can catch

them easy enough in time to ride back part of the way with them. I'll

run up Lowan, and give her a bit of hay in the calf-pen.'

We went over to the yard, and Jim let down the rails and walked in. I

stopped outside. Jim had his horse by the mane, and was patting his neck

as mine came out, when three police troopers rose up from behind the

bushes, and covering us with their rifles called out, 'Stand, in the

Queen's name!'

Jim made one spring on to his horse's back, drove his heels into his

flank, and was out through the gate and half-way down the hill before

you could wink.

Just as Jim cleared the gate a tall man rose up close behind me and took

a cool pot at him with a revolver. I saw Jim's hat fly off, and another

bullet grazed his horse's hip. I saw the hair fly, and the horse make

a plunge that would have unseated most men with no saddle between their

legs. But Jim sat close and steady and only threw up his arm and gave a

shout as the old horse tore down the hill a few miles an hour faster.

'D--n those cartridges,' said the tall trooper; 'they always put too

much powder in them for close shooting. Now, Dick Marston!' he went on,

putting his revolver to my head, 'I'd rather not blow your brains out

before your people, but if you don't put up your hands by----I'll shoot

you where you stand.' I had been staring after Jim all the time; I

believe I had never thought of myself till he was safe away.

'Get your horses, you d----d fools,' he shouts out to the men, 'and see

if you can follow up that madman. He's most likely knocked off against a

tree by this time.'

There was nothing else for it but to do it and be handcuffed. As the

steel locks snapped I saw mother standing below wringing her hands, and

Aileen trying to get her into the house.

'Better come down and get your coat on, Dick,' said the senior

constable. 'We want to search the place, too. By Jove! we shall get

pepper from Sir Ferdinand when we go in. I thought we had you both as

safe as chickens in a coop. Who would have thought of Jim givin' us the

slip, on a barebacked horse, without so much as a halter? I'm devilish

sorry for your family; but if nothing less than a thousand head of

cattle will satisfy people, they must expect trouble to come of it.'

'What are you talking about?' I said. 'You've got the wrong story and

the wrong men.'

'All right; we'll see about that. I don't know whether you want any

breakfast, but I should like a cup of tea. It's deuced slow work

watching all night, though it isn't cold. We've got to be in Bargo

barracks to-night, so there's no time to lose.'

It was all over now--the worst HAD come. What fools we had been not to

take the old man's advice, and clear out when he did. He was safe in the

Hollow, and would chuckle to himself--and be sorry, too--when he heard

of my being taken, and perhaps Jim. The odds were he might be smashed

against a tree, perhaps killed, at the pace he was going on a horse he

could not guide.

They searched the house, but the money they didn't get. Jim and I had

taken care of that, in case of accidents. Mother sat rocking herself

backwards and forwards, every now and then crying out in a pitiful way,

like the women in her country do, I've heard tell, when some one of

their people is dead; 'keening', I think they call it. Well, Jim and I

were as good as dead. If the troopers had shot the pair of us there and

then, same as bushmen told us the black police did their prisoners when

they gave 'em any trouble, it would have been better for everybody.

However, people don't die all at once when they go to the bad, and take

to stealing or drinking, or any of the devil's favourite traps. Pity

they don't, and have done with it once and for all.

I know I thought so when I was forced to stand there with my hands

chained together for the first time in my life (though I'd worked for

it, I know that); and to see Aileen walking about laying the cloth for

breakfast like a dead woman, and know what was in her mind.

The troopers were civil enough, and Goring, the senior constable, tried

to comfort them as much as he could. He knew it was no fault of theirs;

and though he said he meant to have Jim if mortal men and horses could

do it he thought he had a fair chance of getting away. 'He's sure to be

caught in the long run, though,' he went on to say. 'There's a warrant

out for him, and a description in every “Police Gazette” in the

colonies. My advice to him would be to come back and give himself

up. It's not a hanging matter, and as it's the first time you've been

fitted, Dick, the judge, as like as not, will let you off with a light

sentence.'

So they talked away until they had finished their breakfast. I couldn't

touch a mouthful for the life of me, and as soon as it was all over

they ran up my horse and put the saddle on. But I wasn't to ride him. No

fear! Goring put me on an old screw of a troop horse, with one leg like

a gate-post. I was helped up and my legs tied under his belly. Then one

of the men took the bridle and led me away. Goring rode in front and the

other men behind.

As we rose the hill above the place I looked back and saw mother drop

down on the ground in a kind of fit, while Aileen bent over her and

seemed to be loosening her dress. Just at that moment George Storefield

and his sister rode up to the door. George jumped off and rushed over to

Aileen and mother. I knew Gracey had seen me, for she sat on her horse

as if she had been turned to stone, and let her reins drop on his neck.

Strange things have happened to me since, but I shall never forget that

to the last day of my miserable life.

Chapter 17

I wasn't in the humour for talking, but sometimes anything's better than

one's own thoughts. Goring threw in a word from time to time. He'd only

lately come into our district, and was sure to be promoted, everybody

said. Like Starlight himself, he'd seen better days at home in England;

but when he got pinched he'd taken the right turn and not the wrong one,

which makes all the difference. He was earning his bread honest, anyway,

and he was a chap as liked the fun and dash of a mounted policeman's

life. As for the risk--and there is some danger, more than people

thinks, now and then--he liked that the best of it. He was put out at

losing Jim; but he believed he couldn't escape, and told me so in a

friendly way. 'He's inside a circle and he can't get away, you mark

my words,' he said, two or three times. 'We have every police-station

warned by wire, within a hundred miles of here, three days ago. There's

not a man in the colony sharper looked after than Master Jim is this

minute.'

'Then you only heard about us three days ago?' I said.

'That's as it may be,' he answered, biting his lip. 'Anyhow, there isn't

a shepherd's hut within miles that he can get to without our knowing

it. The country's rough, but there's word gone for a black tracker to go

down. You'll see him in Bargo before the week's out.'

I had a good guess where Jim would make for, and he knew enough to hide

his tracks for the last few miles if there was a whole tribe of trackers

after him.

That night we rode into Bargo. A long day too we'd had--we were all

tired enough when we got in. I was locked up, of course, and as soon as

we were in the cell Goring said, 'Listen to me,' and put on his official

face--devilish stern and hard-looking he was then, in spite of all the

talking and nonsense we'd had coming along.

'Richard Marston, I charge you with unlawfully taking, stealing, and

carrying away, in company with others, one thousand head of mixed

cattle, more or less the property of one Walter Hood, of Outer Back,

Momberah, in or about the month of June last.'

'All right; why don't you make it a few more while you're about it?'

'That'll do,' he said, nodding his head, 'you decline to say anything.

Well, I can't exactly wish you a merry Christmas--fancy this being

Christmas Eve, by Jove!--but you'll be cool enough this deuced hot

weather till the sessions in February, which is more than some of us

can say. Good-night.' He went out and locked the door. I sat down on

my blanket on the floor and hid my head in my hands. I wonder it didn't

burst with what I felt then. Strange that I shouldn't have felt half as

bad when the judge, the other day, sentenced me to be a dead man in a

couple of months. But I was young then.

. . . . .

Christmas Day! Christmas Day! So this is how I was to spend it after

all, I thought, as I woke up at dawn, and saw the gray light just

beginning to get through the bars of the window of the cell.

Here was I locked up, caged, ironed, disgraced, a felon and an outcast

for the rest of my life. Jim, flying for his life, hiding from every

honest man, every policeman in the country looking after him, and

authorised to catch him or shoot him down like a sheep-killing dog.

Father living in the Hollow, like a blackfellow in a cave, afraid to

spend the blessed Christmas with his wife and daughter, like the poorest

man in the land could do if he was only honest. Mother half dead with

grief, and Aileen ashamed to speak to the man that loved and respected

her from her childhood. Gracey Storefield not daring to think of me or

say my name, after seeing me carried off a prisoner before her eyes.

Here was a load of misery and disgrace heaped up together, to be borne

by the whole family, now and for the time to come--by the innocent

as well as the guilty. And for what? Because we had been too idle and

careless to work regularly and save our money, though well able to do

it, like honest men. Because, little by little, we had let bad dishonest

ways and flash manners grow upon us, all running up an account that had

to be paid some day.

And now the day of reckoning had come--sharp and sudden with a

vengeance! Well, what call had we to look for anything else? We had been

working for it; now we had got it, and had to bear it. Not for want of

warning, neither. What had mother and Aileen been saying ever since we

could remember? Warning upon warning. Now the end had come just as they

said. Of course I knew in a general way that I couldn't be punished

or be done anything to right off. I knew law enough for that. The

next thing would be that I should have to be brought up before the

magistrates and committed for trial as soon as they could get any

evidence.

After breakfast, flour and water or hominy, I forget which, the warder

told me that there wasn't much chance of my being brought up before

Christmas was over. The police magistrate was away on a month's leave,

and the other magistrates would not be likely to attend before the end

of the week, anyway. So I must make myself comfortable where I was.

Comfortable!

'Had they caught Jim?'

'Well, not that he'd heard of; but Goring said it was impossible for him

to get away. At twelve he'd bring me some dinner.'

I was pretty certain they wouldn't catch Jim, in spite of Goring being

so cocksure about it. If he wasn't knocked off the first mile or so,

he'd find ways of stopping or steadying his horse, and facing him up to

where we had gone to join father at the tableland of the Nulla Mountain.

Once he got near there he could let go his horse. They'd be following

his track, while he made the best of his way on foot to the path that

led to the Hollow. If he had five miles start of them there, as was most

likely, all the blacks in the country would never track where he got to.

He and father could live there for a month or so, and take it easy until

they could slip out and do a bit of father's old trade. That was about

what I expected Jim to do, and as it turned out I was as nearly right

as could be. They ran his track for ten miles. Then they followed his

horse-tracks till late the second day, and found that the horse had

slued round and was making for home again with nobody on him. Jim was

nowhere to be seen, and they'd lost all that time, never expecting that

he was going to dismount and leave the horse to go his own way.

They searched Nulla Mountain from top to bottom; but some of the

smartest men of the old Mounted Police and the best of the stockmen

in the old days--men not easy to beat--had tried the same country many

years before, and never found the path to the Hollow. So it wasn't

likely any one else would. They had to come back and own that they were

beat, which put Goring in a rage and made the inspector, Sir Ferdinand

Morringer, blow them all up for a lot of duffers and old women.

Altogether they had a bad time of it, not that it made any difference to

me.

After the holidays a magistrate was fished up somehow, and I was brought

before him and the apprehending constable's evidence taken. Then I was

remanded to the Bench at Nomah, where Mr. Hood and some of the other

witnesses were to appear. So away we started for another journey. Goring

and a trooper went with me, and all sorts of care was taken that I

didn't give them the slip on the road. Goring used to put one of my

handcuffs on his own wrist at night, so there wasn't much chance of

moving without waking him. I had an old horse to ride that couldn't go

much faster than I could run, for fear of accident. It was even betting

that he'd fall and kill me on the road. If I'd had a laugh in me, I

should have had a joke against the Police Department for not keeping

safer horses for their prisoners to ride. They keep them till they

haven't a leg to stand upon, and long after they can't go a hundred

yards without trying to walk on their heads they're thought good enough

to carry packs and prisoners.

'Some day,' Goring said, 'one of those old screws will be the death of

a prisoner before he's committed for trial, and then there'll be a row

over it, I suppose.'

We hadn't a bad journey of it on the whole. The troopers were civil

enough, and gave me a glass of grog now and then when they had one

themselves. They'd done their duty in catching me, and that was all they

thought about. What came afterwards wasn't their look-out. I've no call

to have any bad feeling against the police, and I don't think most men

of my sort have. They've got their work to do, like other people, and as

long as they do what they're paid for, and don't go out of their way

to harass men for spite, we don't bear them any malice. If one's hit

in fair fight it's the fortune of war. What our side don't like is men

going in for police duty that's not in their line. That's interfering,

according to our notions, and if they fall into a trap or are met

with when they don't expect it they get it pretty hot. They've only

themselves to thank for it.

Goring, I could see by his ways, had been a swell, something like

Starlight. A good many young fellows that don't drop into fortunes when

they come out here take to the police in Australia, and very good men

they make. They like the half-soldiering kind of life, and if they

stick steady at their work, and show pluck and gumption, they mostly

get promoted. Goring was a real smart, dashing chap, a good rider for an

Englishman; that is, he could set most horses, and hold his own with us

natives anywhere but through scrub and mountain country. No man can ride

there, I don't care who he is, the same as we can, unless he's been at

it all his life. There we have the pull--not that it is so much after

all. But give a native a good horse and thick country, and he'll lose

any man living that's tackled the work after he's grown up.

By and by we got to Nomah, a regular hot hole of a place, with a log

lock-up. I was stuck in, of course, and had leg-irons put on for fear I

should get out, as another fellow had done a few weeks back. Starlight

and Warrigal hadn't reached yet; they had farther to come. The trial

couldn't come till the Quarter Sessions. January, and February too,

passed over, and all this time I was mewed up in a bit of a place enough

to stifle a man in the burning weather we had.

I heard afterwards that they wanted to bring some of the cattle over, so

as Mr. Hood could swear to 'em being his property. But he said he could

only swear to its being his brand; that he most likely had never set

eyes on them in his life, and couldn't swear on his own knowledge that

they hadn't been sold, like lots of others, by his manager. So

this looked like a hitch, as juries won't bring a man in guilty of

cattle-stealing unless there's clear swearing that the animals he sold

were the property of the prosecutor, and known by him to be such.

Mr. Hood had to go all the way to Adelaide himself, and they told me we

might likely have got out of it all, only for the imported bull. When

he saw him he said he could swear to him point blank, brand or no brand.

He'd no brand on him, of course, when he left England; but Hood happened

to be in Sydney when he came out, and at the station when he came up. He

was stabled for the first six months, so he used to go and look him over

every day, and tell visitors what a pot of money he'd cost, till he

knew every hair in his tail, as the saying is. As soon as he seen him

in Adelaide he said he could swear to him as positive as he could to

his favourite riding horse. So he was brought over in a steamer from

Adelaide, and then drove all the way up to Nomah. I wished he'd broken

his neck before we ever saw him.

Next thing I saw was Starlight being brought in, handcuffed, between

two troopers, and looking as if he'd ridden a long way. He was just as

easy-going and devil-may-care as ever. He said to one of the troopers--

'Here we are at last, and I'm deuced glad of it. It's perfectly

monstrous you fellows haven't better horses. You ought to make me

remount agent, and I'd show you the sort of horses that ought to be

bought for police service. Let me have a glass of beer, that's a good

fellow, before I'm locked up. I suppose there's no tap worth speaking of

inside.'

The constable laughed, and had one brought to him.

'It will be some time before you get another, captain. Here's a long one

for you; make the most of it.'

Where, in the devil's name, is that Warrigal? I thought to myself. Has

he given them the slip? He had, as it turned out. He had slipped the

handcuffs over his slight wrists and small hands, bided his time, and

then dashed into a scrub. There he was at home. They rode and rode, but

Warrigal was gone like a rock wallaby. It was a good while before he was

as near the gaol again.

All this time I'd been wondering how it was they came to drop on our

names so pat, and to find out that Jim and I had a share in the Momberah

cattle racket. All they could have known was that we left the back of

Boree at a certain day; and that was nothing, seeing that for all they

knew we might have gone away to new country or anywhere. The more I

looked at it the more I felt sure that some one had given to the

police information about us--somebody who was in it and knew all about

everything. It wasn't Starlight. We could have depended our life on him.

It might have been one of the other chaps, but I couldn't think of any

one, except Warrigal. He would do anything in the world to spite me

and Jim, I knew; but then he couldn't hurt us without drawing the net

tighter round Starlight. Sooner than hurt a hair of his head he'd have

put his hand into the fire and kept it there. I knew that from things

I'd seen him do.

Starlight and I hadn't much chance of a talk, but we managed to get news

from each other, a bit at a time; that can always be managed. We were to

be defended, and a lawyer fetched all the way from Sydney to fight our

case for us. The money was there. Father managed the other part of it

through people he had that did every kind of work for him; so when the

judge came up we should have a show for it.

The weary long summer days--every one of them about twenty hours

long--came to an end somehow or other. It was so hot and close and I

was that miserable I had two minds to knock my brains out and finish

the whole thing. I couldn't settle to read, as I did afterwards. I was

always wishing and wondering when I'd hear some news from home, and none

ever came. Nomah was a bit of a place where hardly anybody did anything

but idle and drink, and spend money when they had it. When they had none

they went away. There wasn't even a place to take exercise in, and the

leg-irons I wore night and day began to eat into my flesh. I wasn't used

to them in those days. I could feel them in my heart, too. Last of all I

got ill, and for a while was so weak and low they thought I was going to

get out of the trial altogether.

At last we heard that the judge and all his lot were on the road, and

would be up in a few days. We were almost as glad when the news came

as if we were sure of being let off. One day they did come, and all the

little town was turned upside down. The judge stopped at one hotel (they

told us); the lawyers at another. Then the witnesses in ours and other

cases came in from all parts, and made a great difference, especially

to the publicans. The jurors were summoned, and had to come, unless they

had a fancy for being fined. Most of this I heard from the constables;

they seemed to think it was the only thing that made any difference

in their lives. Last of all I heard that Mr. Hood had come, and the

imported bull, and some other witnesses.

There were some small cases first, and then we were brought out,

Starlight and I, and put in the dock. The court was crammed and crowded;

every soul within a hundred miles seemed to have come in; there never

were so many people in the little courthouse before. Starlight was

quietly dressed, and looked as if he was there by mistake. Anybody would

have thought so, the way he lounged and stared about, as if he thought

there was something very curious and hard to understand about the whole

thing. I was so weak and ill that I couldn't stand up, and after a while

the judge told me to sit down, and Starlight too. Starlight made a most

polite bow, and thanked his Honour, as he called him. Then the jury

were called up, and our lawyer began his work. He stood alongside of

Starlight, and whispered something to him, after which Starlight stood

up, and about every second man called out 'Challenge'; then that juror

had to go down. It took a good while to get our jury all together. Our

lawyer seemed very particular about the sort of jury he was satisfied

with; and when they did manage to get twelve at last they were not the

best-looking men in the court by a very long way.

The trial had to go on, and then the Crown Prosecutor made a speech, in

which he talked about the dishonesty which was creeping unchecked over

the land, and the atrocious villainy of criminals who took a thousand

head of cattle in one lot, and made out the country was sure to go to

destruction if we were not convicted. He said that unfortunately they

were not in a position to bring many of the cattle back that had been

taken to another colony; but one remarkable animal was as good for

purposes of evidence as a hundred. Such an animal he would produce,

and he would not trespass on the patience of jurors and gentlemen in

attendance any longer, but call his first witness.

John Dawson, sworn: Was head stockman and cattle manager at Momberah;

knew the back country, and in a general way the cattle running there;

was not out much in the winter; the ground was boggy, and the cattle

were hardly ever mustered till spring; when he did go, with some other

stock-riders, he saw at once that a large number of the Momberah cattle,

branded HOD and other brands, were missing; went to Adelaide a few

months after; saw a large number of cattle of the HOD brand, which he

was told had been sold by the prisoner now before the court, and known

as Starlight, and others, to certain farmers; he could swear that the

cattle he saw bore Mr. Hood's brand; could not swear that he recognised

them as having been at Momberah in his charge; believed so, but could

not swear it; he had seen a short-horn bull outside of the court this

morning; he last saw the said bull at the station of Messrs. Fordham

Brothers, near Adelaide; they made a communication to him concerning the

bull; he would and could swear to the identity of the animal with the

Fifteenth Duke of Cambridge, an imported short-horn bull, the property

of Mr. Hood; had seen him before that at Momberah; knew that Mr. Hood

had bought said bull in Sydney, and was at Momberah when he was sent up;

could not possibly be mistaken; when he saw the bull at Momberah, nine

months since, he had a small brand like H on the shoulder; Mr. Hood put

it on in witness's presence; it was a horse-brand, now it resembled J-E;

the brand had been 'faked' or cleverly altered; witness could see the

original brand quite plain underneath; as far as he knew Mr. Hood never

sold or gave any one authority to take the animal; he had missed him

some months since, and always believed he had strayed; knew the bull to

be a valuable animal, worth several hundred pounds.

We had one bit of luck in having to be tried in an out-of-the-way place

like Nomah. It was a regular outside bush township, and though the

distance oughtn't to have much to say to people's honesty, you'll mostly

find that these far-out back-of-beyond places have got men and women to

match 'em.

Except the squatters and overseers, the other people's mostly a shady

lot. Some's run away from places that were too hot to hold 'em.

The women ain't the men's wives that they live with, but somebody

else's--who's well rid of 'em too if all was known. There's most likely

a bit of horse and cattle stealing done on the quiet, and the publicans

and storekeepers know who are their best customers, the square people

or the cross ones. It ain't so easy to get a regular up-and-down

straight-ahead jury in a place of this sort. So Starlight and I knew

that our chance was a lot better than if we'd been tried at Bargo or

Dutton Forest, or any steady-going places of that sort.

If we'd made up our minds from the first that we were to get into it

it wouldn't have been so bad; we'd have known we had to bear it. Now we

might get out of it, and what a thing it would be to feel free again,

and walk about in the sun without any one having the right to stop you.

Almost, that is--there were other things against us; but there wasn't

so much of a chance of their turning up. This was the great stake. If we

won we were as good as made. I felt ready to swear I'd go home and never

touch a shilling that didn't come honest again. If we lost it seemed

as if everything was so much the worse, and blacker than it looked at

first, just for this bit of hope and comfort.

After the bull had been sworn to by Mr. Hood and another witness, they

brought up some more evidence, as they called it, about the other cattle

we had sold in Adelaide. They had fetched some of the farmers up that

had been at the sale. They swore straight enough to having bought cattle

with certain brands from Starlight. They didn't know, of course, at the

time whose they were, but they could describe the brands fast enough.

There was one fellow that couldn't read nor write, but he remembered all

the brands, about a dozen, in the pen of steers he bought, and described

them one by one. One brand, he said, was like a long-handled shovel. It

turned out to be--D. [*] TD--Tom Dawson's, of Mungeree. About a hundred of

his were in the mob. They had drawn back for Mungeree, as was nearly all

frontage and cold in the winter. He was the worst witness for us of the

lot, very near. He'd noticed everything and forgot nothing.

* In the original text, the horizontal bar is represented by

a capital “I” rotated 90 degrees, and a bit lower than

centre--but from the description, '--D' may be better, where

the '--' represents the upright of the T in TD.--A. L.,

1997.--

'Do you recognise either of the prisoners in the dock?' he was asked.

'Yes; both of 'em,' says he. I wish I could have got at him. 'I see the

swell chap first--him as made out he was the owner, and gammoned all

the Adelaide gentlemen so neat. There was a half-caste chap with him as

followed him about everywhere; then there was another man as didn't talk

much, but seemed, by letting down sliprails and what not, to be in it.

I heard this Starlight, as he calls hisself now, say to him, “You

have everything ready to break camp by ten o'clock, and I'll be there

to-morrow and square up.” I thought he meant to pay their wages. I never

dropped but what they was his men--his hired servants--as he was going

to pay off or send back.'

'Will you swear,' our lawyer says, 'that the younger prisoner is the man

you saw at Adelaide with the cattle?'

'Yes; I'll swear. I looked at him pretty sharp, and nothing ain't likely

to make me forget him. He's the man, and that I'll swear to.'

'Were there not other people there with the cattle?'

'Yes; there was an oldish, very quiet, but determined-like man--he had a

stunnin' dorg with him--and a young man something like this gentleman--I

mean the prisoner. I didn't see the other young man nor the half-caste

in court.'

'That's all very well,' says our lawyer, very fierce; 'but will you

swear, sir, that the prisoner Marston took any charge or ownership of

the cattle?'

'No, I can't,' says the chap. 'I see him a drafting 'em in the morning,

and he seemed to know all the brands, and so on; but he done no more

than I've seen hired servants do over and over again.'

The other witnesses had done, when some one called out, 'Herbert

Falkland,' and Mr. Falkland steps into the court. He walks in quiet and

a little proud; he couldn't help feeling it, but he didn't show it in

his ways and talk, as little as any man I ever saw.

He's asked by the Crown Prosecutor if he's seen the bull outside of the

court this day.

'Yes; he has seen him.'

'Has he ever seen him before?'

'Never, to his knowledge.'

'He doesn't, then, know the name of his former owner?'

'Has heard generally that he belonged to Mr. Hood, of Momberah; but does

not know it of his own knowledge.'

'Has he ever seen, or does he know either of the prisoners?'

'Knows the younger prisoner, who has been in the habit of working for

him in various ways.'

'When was prisoner Marston working for him last?'

'He, with his brother James, who rendered his family a service he

shall never forget, was working for him, after last shearing, for some

months.'

'Where were they working?'

'At an out-station at the back of the run.'

'When did they leave?'

'About April or May last.'

'Was it known to you in what direction they proceeded after leaving your

service?'

'I have no personal knowledge; I should think it improper to quote

hearsay.'

'Had they been settled up with for their former work?'

'No, there was a balance due to them.'

'To what amount?'

'About twenty pounds each was owing.'

'Did you not think it curious that ordinary labourers should leave so

large a sum in your hands?'

'It struck me as unusual, but I did not attach much weight to the

circumstance. I thought they would come back and ask for it before the

next shearing. I am heartily sorry that they did not do so, and regret

still more deeply that two young men worthy of a better fate should have

been arraigned on such a charge.'

'One moment, Mr. Falkland,' says our counsel, as they call them, and

a first-rate counsellor ours was. If we'd been as innocent as two

schoolgirls he couldn't have done more for us. 'Did the prisoner Marston

work well and conduct himself properly while in your employ?'

'No man better,' says Mr. Falkland, looking over to me with that pitying

kind of look in his eyes as made me feel what a fool and rogue I'd been

ten times worse than anything else. 'No man better; he and his brother

were in many respects, according to my overseer's report, the most

hard-working and best-conducted labourers in the establishment.'

Chapter 18

Mr. Runnimall, the auctioneer, swore that the older prisoner placed

certain cattle in his hands, to arrive, for sale in the usual way,

stating that his name was Mr. Charles Carisforth, and that he had

several stations in other colonies. Had no reason for doubting him.

Prisoner was then very well dressed, was gentlemanly in his manners, and

came to his office with a young gentleman of property whom he knew well.

The cattle were sold in the usual way for rather high prices, as the

market was good. The proceeds in cash were paid over to the prisoner,

whom he now knew by the name of Starlight. He accounted for there being

an unusual number of brands by saying publicly at the sale that

the station had been used as a depot for other runs of his, and the

remainder lots of store cattle kept there.

He had seen a short-horn bull outside of the court this day branded

'J-E' on the shoulder. He identified him as one of the cattle placed in

his hands for sale by the prisoner Starlight. He sold and delivered him

according to instructions. He subsequently handed over the proceeds to

the said prisoner. He included the purchase money in a cheque given for

the bull and other cattle sold on that day. He could swear positively to

the bull; he was a remarkable animal. He had not the slightest doubt as

to his identity.

'Had he seen the prisoner Marston when the cattle were sold now alleged

to belong to Mr. Hood?'

'Yes; he was confident that prisoner was there with some other men whom

he (witness) did not particularly remark. He helped to draft the cattle,

and to put them in pens on the morning of the sale.'

'Was he prepared to swear that prisoner Marston was not a hired servant

of prisoner Starlight?'

'No; he could not swear. He had no way of knowing what the relations

were between the two. They were both in the robbery; he could see that.'

'How could you see that?' said our lawyer. 'Have you never seen a paid

stockman do all that you saw prisoner Marston do?'

'Well, I have; but somehow I fancy this man was different.'

'We have nothing to do with your fancies, sir,' says our man, mighty

hot, as he turns upon him; 'you are here to give evidence as to facts,

not as to what you fancy. Have you any other grounds for connecting

prisoner Marston with the robbery in question?'

'No, he had not.'

'You can go down, sir, and I only wish you may live to experience some

of the feelings which fill the breasts of persons who are unjustly

convicted.'

. . . . .

This about ended the trial. There was quite enough proved for a moderate

dose of transportation. A quiet, oldish-looking man got up now and came

forward to the witness-box. I didn't know who he was; but Starlight

nodded to him quite pleasant. He had a short, close-trimmed beard, and

was one of those nothing-particular-looking old chaps. I'm blessed if

I could have told what he was. He might have been a merchant, or a

squatter, or a head clerk, or a wine merchant, or a broker, or lived in

the town, or lived in the country; any of half-a-dozen trades would suit

him. The only thing that was out of the common was his eyes. They had a

sort of curious way of looking at you, as if he wondered whether you was

speaking true, and yet seein' nothing and tellin' nothing. He regular

took in Starlight (he told me afterwards) by always talking about the

China Seas; he'd been there, it seems; he'd been everywhere; he'd last

come from America; he didn't say he'd gone there to collar a clerk that

had run off with two or three thousand pounds, and to be ready to meet

him as he stepped ashore.

Anyhow he'd watched Starlight in Canterbury when he was riding and

flashing about, and had put such a lot of things together that he took a

passage in the same boat with him to Melbourne. Why didn't he arrest him

in New Zealand? Because he wasn't sure of his man. It was from something

Starlight let out on board ship. He told me himself afterwards that

he made sure of his being the man he wanted; so he steps into the

witness-box, very quiet and respectable-looking, with his white

waistcoat and silk coat--it was hot enough to fry beefsteaks on the roof

of the courthouse that day--and looks about him. The Crown Prosecutor

begins with him as civil as you please.

'My name is Stephen Stillbrook. I am a sergeant of detective police

in the service of the Government of New South Wales. From information

received, I proceeded to Canterbury, in New Zealand, about the month

of September last. I saw there the older prisoner, who was living at a

first-class hotel in Christchurch. He was moving in good society, and

was apparently possessed of ample means. He frequently gave expensive

entertainments, which were attended by the leading inhabitants and high

officials of the place. I myself obtained an introduction to him, and

partook of his hospitality on several occasions. I attempted to draw him

out in conversation about New South Wales; but he was cautious, and

gave me to understand that he had been engaged in large squatting

transactions in another colony. From his general bearing and from the

character of his associates, I came to the belief that he was not the

individual named in the warrant, and determined to return to Sydney.

I was informed that he had taken his passage to Melbourne in a mail

steamer. From something which I one day heard his half-caste servant

say, who, being intoxicated, was speaking carelessly, I determined to

accompany them to Melbourne. My suspicions were confirmed on the voyage.

As we went ashore at the pier at Sandridge I accosted him. I said, “I

arrest you on suspicion of having stolen a herd of cattle, the property

of Walter Hood, of Momberah.” Prisoner was very cool and polite, just as

any other gentleman would be, and asked me if I did not think I'd made

a most ridiculous mistake. The other passengers began to laugh, as if

it was the best joke in the world. Starlight never moved a muscle. I've

seen a good many cool hands in my time, but I never met any one like

him. I had given notice to one of the Melbourne police as he came

aboard, and he arrested the half-caste, known as Warrigal. I produced a

warrant, the one now before the court, which is signed by a magistrate

of the territory of New South Wales.'

The witnessing part was all over. It took the best part of the day,

and there we were all the time standing up in the dock, with the court

crammed with people staring at us. I don't say that it felt as bad as it

might have done nigh home. Most of the Nomah people looked upon fellows

stealing cattle or horses, in small lots or big, just like most people

look at boys stealing fruit out of an orchard, or as they used to talk

of smugglers on the English coast, as I've heard father tell of. Any man

might take a turn at that sort of thing, now and then, and not be such a

bad chap after all. It was the duty of the police to catch him. If they

caught him, well and good, it was so much the worse for him; if they

didn't, that was their look-out. It wasn't anybody else's business

anyhow. And a man that wasn't caught, or that got turned up at his

trial, was about as good as the general run of people; and there was no

reason for any one to look shy at him.

After the witnesses had said all they knew our lawyer got up and made a

stunning speech. He made us out such first-rate chaps that it looked as

if we ought to get off flying. He blew up the squatters in a general way

for taking all the country, and not giving the poor man a chance--for

neglecting their immense herds of cattle and suffering them to roam

all over the country, putting temptation in the way of poor people, and

causing confusion and recklessness of all kinds. Some of these cattle

are never seen from the time they are branded till they are mustered,

every two or three years apparently. They stray away hundreds of

miles--probably a thousand--who is to know? Possibly they are sold. It

was admitted by the prosecutor that he had sold 10,000 head of cattle

during the last six years, and none had been rebranded to his knowledge.

What means had he of knowing whether these cattle that so much was said

about had not been legally sold before? It was a most monstrous thing

that men like his clients--men who were an honour to the land they lived

in--should be dragged up to the very centre of the continent upon

a paltry charge like this--a charge which rested upon the flimsiest

evidence it had ever been his good fortune to demolish.

With regard to the so-called imported bull the case against his clients

was apparently stronger, but he placed no reliance upon the statements

of the witnesses, who averred that they knew him so thoroughly that they

could not be deceived in him. He distrusted their evidence and believed

the jury would distrust it too. The brand was as different as possible

from the brand seen to have been on the beast originally. One short-horn

was very like another. He would not undertake to swear positively in

any such case, and he implored the jury, as men of the world, as men

of experience in all transactions relating to stock (here some of the

people in the court grinned) to dismiss from their minds everything

of the nature of prejudice, and looking solely at the miserable,

incomplete, unsatisfactory nature of the evidence, to acquit the

prisoners.

It sounded all very pleasant after everything before had been so rough

on our feelings, and the jury looked as if they'd more than half made up

their minds to let us off.

Then the judge put on his glasses and began to go all over the evidence,

very grave and steady like, and read bits out of the notes which he'd

taken very careful all the time. Judges don't have such an easy time of

it as some people thinks they have. I've often wondered as they take so

much trouble, and works away so patient trying to find out the rights

and wrongs of things for people that they never saw before, and won't

see again. However, they try to do their best, all as I've ever seen,

and they generally get somewhere near the right and justice of things.

So the judge began and read--went over the evidence bit by bit, and laid

it all out before the jury, so as they couldn't but see it where it told

against us, and, again, where it was a bit in our favour.

As for the main body of the cattle, he made out that there was strong

grounds for thinking as we'd taken and sold them at Adelaide, and had

the money too. The making of a stockyard at the back of Momberah was not

the thing honest men would do. But neither of us prisoners had been seen

there. There was no identification of the actual cattle, branded 'HOD',

alleged to have been stolen, nor could Mr. Hood swear positively that

they were his cattle, had never been sold, and were a portion of his

herd. It was in the nature of these cases that identification of live

stock, roaming over the immense solitudes of the interior, should be

difficult, occasionally impossible. Yet he trusted that the jury

would give full weight to all the circumstances which went to show a

continuous possession of the animals alleged to be stolen. The persons

of both prisoners had been positively sworn to by several witnesses as

having been seen at the sale of the cattle referred to. They were both

remarkable-looking men, and such as if once seen would be retained in

the memory of the beholder.

But the most important piece of evidence (here the judge stopped

and took a pinch of snuff) was that afforded by the short-horn bull,

Fifteenth Duke of Cambridge--he had been informed that was his name.

That animal, in the first place, was sworn to most positively by Mr.

Hood, and claimed as his property. Other credible witnesses testified

also to his identity, and corroborated the evidence of Mr. Hood in all

respects; the ownership and identity of the animal are thus established

beyond all doubt.

Then there was the auctioneer, Mr. Runnimall, who swore that this animal

had been, with other cattle, placed in his hands for sale by the older

prisoner. The bull is accordingly sold publicly by him, and in the

prisoner's presence. He subsequently receives from the witness the

price, about 270 Pounds, for which the bull was sold. The younger

prisoner was there at the same time, and witnessed the sale of the bull

and other cattle, giving such assistance as would lead to the conclusion

that he was concerned in the transaction.

He did not wish to reflect upon this or any other jury, but he could

not help recalling the fact that a jury in that town once committed the

unpardonable fault, the crime, he had almost said, of refusing to find

a prisoner guilty against whom well confirmed evidence had been brought.

It had been his advice to the Minister for Justice, so glaring was

the miscarriage of justice to which he referred, that the whole of the

jurymen who had sat upon that trial should be struck off the roll. This

was accordingly done.

He, the judge, was perfectly convinced in his own mind that no

impropriety of this sort was likely to be committed by the intelligent,

respectable jury whom he saw before him; but it was his duty to warn

them that, in his opinion, they could not bring in any verdict but

'Guilty' if they respected their oaths. He should leave the case

confidently in their hands, again impressing upon them that they could

only find one verdict if they believed the evidence.

. . . . .

The jury all went out. Then another case was called on, and a fresh jury

sworn in for to try it. We sat in the dock. The judge told Starlight he

might sit down, and we waited till they came back. I really believe that

waiting is the worst part of the whole thing, the bitterest part of

the punishment. I've seen men when they were being tried for their

lives--haven't I done it, and gone through it myself?--waiting there an

hour--two hours, half through the night, not knowing whether they was to

be brought in guilty or not. What a hell they must have gone through

in that time--doubt and dread, hope and fear, wretchedness and despair,

over and over and over again. No wonder some of 'em can't stand it, but

keeps twitching and shifting and getting paler and turning faint when

the jury comes back, and they think they see one thing or the other

written in their faces. I've seen a strong man drop down like a dead

body when the judge opened his mouth to pass sentence on him. I've seen

'em faint, too, when the foreman of the jury said 'Not guilty.' One

chap, he was an innocent up-country fellow, in for his first bit of

duffing, like we was once, he covered his face with his hands when he

found he was let off, and cried like a child. All sorts and kinds of

different ways men takes it. I was in court once when the judge asked

a man who'd just been found guilty if he'd anything to say why he

shouldn't pass sentence of death upon him. He'd killed a woman, cut her

throat, and a regular right down cruel murder it was (only men 'll

kill women and one another, too, for some causes, as long as the world

lasts); and he just leaned over the dock rails, as if he'd been going to

get three months, and said, cool and quiet, 'No, your Honour; not as I

know of.' He'd made up his mind to it from the first, you see, and that

makes all the difference. He knew he hadn't the ghost of a chance to

get out of it, and when his time came he faced it. I remember seeing his

worst enemy come into the court, and sit and look at him then just to

see how he took it, but he didn't make the least sign. That man couldn't

have told whether he seen him or not.

Starlight and I wasn't likely to break down--not much--whatever the jury

did or the judge said. All the same, after an hour had passed, and we

still waiting there, it began to be a sickening kind of feeling. The day

had been all taken up with the evidence and the rest of the trial; all

long, dragging hours of a hot summer's day. The sun had been blazing

away all day on the iron roof of the courthouse and the red dust of the

streets, that lay inches deep for a mile all round the town. The flies

buzzed all over the courthouse, and round and round, while the lawyers

talked and wrangled with each other; and still the trial went on.

Witness after witness was called, and cross-examined and bullied, and

confused and contradicted till he was afraid to say what he knew or what

he didn't know. I began to think it must be some kind of performance

that would go on for ever and never stop, and the day and it never could

end.

At last the sun came shining level with the lower window, and we knew

it was getting late. After a while the twilight began to get dimmer

and grayer. There isn't much out there when the sun goes down. Then the

judge ordered the lamps to be lighted.

Just at that time the bailiff came forward.

'Your Honour, the jury has agreed.' I felt my teeth shut hard; but I

made no move or sign. I looked over at Starlight. He yawned. He did, as

I'm alive.

'I wish to heaven they'd make more haste,' he said quietly; 'his Honour

and we are both being done out of our dinners.'

I said nothing. I was looking at the foreman's face. I thought I knew

the word he was going to say, and that word was 'Guilty.' Sure enough I

didn't hear anything more for a bit. I don't mind owning that. Most men

feel that way the first time. There was a sound like rushing waters in

my ears, and the courthouse and the people all swam before my eyes.

The first I heard was Starlight's voice again, just as cool and

leisurely as ever. I never heard any difference in it, and I've known

him speak in a lot of different situations. If you shut your eyes you

couldn't tell from the tone of his voice whether he was fighting for his

life or asking you to hand him the salt. When he said the hardest and

fiercest thing--and he could be hard and fierce--he didn't raise his

voice; he only seemed to speak more distinct like. His eyes were worse

than his voice at such times. There weren't many men that liked to look

back at him, much less say anything.

Now he said, 'That means five years of Berrima, Dick, if not seven. It's

cooler than these infernal logs, that's one comfort.'

I said nothing. I couldn't joke. My throat was dry, and I felt hot and

cold by turns. I thought of the old hut by the creek, and could see

mother sitting rocking herself, and crying out loud, and Aileen with

a set dull look on her face as if she'd never speak or smile again. I

thought of the days, months, years that were to pass under lock and key,

with irons and shame and solitude all for company. I wondered if the

place where they shut up mad people was like a gaol, and why we were not

sent there instead.

I heard part of what the judge said, but not all--bits here and there.

The jury had brought in a most righteous verdict; just what he should

have expected from the effect of the evidence upon an intelligent,

well-principled Nomah jury. (We heard afterwards that they were six to

six, and then agreed to toss up how the verdict was to go.) 'The crime

of cattle and horse stealing had assumed gigantic proportions. Sheep, as

yet, appeared to be safe; but then there were not very many within a few

hundred miles of Nomah. It appeared to him that the prisoner known as

Starlight, though from old police records his real name appeared to

be----'

Here he drew himself up and faced the judge in defiance. Then like

lightning he seemed to change, and said--

'Your Honour, I submit that it can answer no good purpose to disclose my

alleged name. There are others--I do not speak for myself.'

The judge stopped a bit; then hesitated. Starlight bowed. 'I do

not--a--know whether there is any necessity to make public a name

which many years since was not better known than honoured. I say

the--a--prisoner known as Starlight has, from the evidence, taken

the principal part in this nefarious transaction. It is not the first

offence, as I observe from a paper I hold in my hand. The younger

prisoner, Marston, has very properly been found guilty of criminal

complicity with the same offence. It may be that he has been concerned

in other offences against the law, but of that we have no proof before

this court. He has not been previously convicted. I do not offer advice

to the elder criminal; his own heart and conscience, the promptings of

which I assume to be dulled, not obliterated, I feel convinced, have

said more to him in the way of warning, condemnation, and remorse than

could the most impressive rebuke, the most solemn exhortation from a

judicial bench. But to the younger man, to him whose vigorous frame

has but lately attained the full development of early manhood, I feel

compelled to appeal with all the weight which age and experience may

lend. I adjure him to accept the warning which the sentence I am about

to pass will convey to him, to endure his confinement with submission

and repentance, and to lead during his remaining years, which may be

long and comparatively peaceful, the free and necessarily happy life

of an honest man. The prisoner Starlight is sentenced to seven years'

imprisonment; the prisoner Richard Marston to five years' imprisonment;

both in Berrima Gaol.'

I heard the door of the dock unclose with a snap. We were taken out; I

hardly knew how. I walked like a man in his sleep. 'Five years, Berrima

Gaol! Berrima Gaol!' kept ringing in my ears.

The day was done, the stars were out, as we moved across from the

courthouse to the lock-up. The air was fresh and cool. The sun had gone

down; so had the sun of our lives, never to rise again.

Morning came. Why did it ever come again? I thought. What did we want

but night?--black as our hearts--dark as our fate--dismal as the death

which likely would come quick as a living tomb, and the sooner the

better. Mind you, I only felt this way the first time. All men do, I

suppose, that haven't been born in gaols and workhouses. Afterwards they

take a more everyday view of things.

'You're young and soft, Dick,' Starlight said to me as we were rumbling

along in the coach next day, with hand and leg-irons on, and a trooper

opposite to us. 'Why don't I feel like it? My good fellow, I have felt

it all before. But if you sear your flesh or your horse's with a red-hot

iron you'll find the flesh hard and callous ever after. My heart was

seared once--ay, twice--and deeply, too. I have no heart now, or if I

ever feel at all it's for a horse. I wonder how old Rainbow gets on.'

'You were sorry father let us come in the first time,' I said. 'How do

you account for that, if you've no heart?'

'Really! Well, listen, Richard. Did I? If you guillotine a man--cut off

his head, as they do in France, with an axe that falls like the

monkey of a pile-driver--the limbs quiver and stretch, and move almost

naturally for a good while afterwards. I've seen the performance

more than once. So I suppose the internal arrangements immediately

surrounding my heart must have performed some kind of instinctive motion

in your case and Jim's. By the way, where the deuce has Jim been all

this time? Clever James!'

'Better ask Evans here if the police knows. It is not for want of trying

if they don't.'

'By the Lord Harry, no!' said the trooper, a young man who saw no reason

not to be sociable. 'It's the most surprisin' thing out where he's got

to. They've been all round him, reg'lar cordon-like, and he must have

disappeared into the earth or gone up in a balloon to get away.'

Chapter 19

It took us a week's travelling or more to get to Berrima. Sometimes

we were all night in the coach as well as all day. There were other

passengers in the coach with us. Two or three bushmen, a station

overseer with his wife and daughter, a Chinaman, and a lunatic that had

come from Nomah, too. I think it's rough on the public to pack madmen

and convicts in irons in the same coach with them. But it saves the

Government a good deal of money, and the people don't seem to care. They

stand it, anyhow.

We would have made a bolt of it if we'd had a chance, but we never had,

night nor day, not half a one. The police were civil, but they never

left us, and slept by us at night. That is, one watched while the

other slept. We began to sleep soundly ourselves and to have a better

appetite. Going through the fresh air had something to do with it, I

daresay. And then there was no anxiety. We had played for a big stake

and lost. Now we had to pay and make the best of it. It was the tenth

day (there were no railways then to shorten the journey) when we drove

up to the big gate and looked at the high walls and dark, heavy lines of

Berrima Gaol, the largest, the most severe, the most dreaded of all the

prisons in New South Wales. It had leaked out the day before, somehow,

that the famous Starlight and the other prisoner in the great Momberah

cattle robbery were to be brought in this particular day. There was a

fair-sized crowd gathered as we were helped down from the coach. At the

side of the crowd was a small mob of blacks with their dogs, spears,

'possum rugs and all complete. They and their gins and pickaninnies

appeared to take great notice of the whole thing. One tallish gin,

darker than the others, and with her hair tucked under an old bonnet,

wrapped her 'possum cloak closely round her shoulders and pushed up

close to us. She looked hard at Starlight, who appeared not to see her.

As she drew back some one staggered against her; an angry scowl passed

over her face, so savage and bitter that I felt quite astonished. I

should have been astonished, I mean, if I had not been able, by that

very change, to know again the restless eyes and grim set mouth of

Warrigal.

It was only a look, and he was gone. The lock creaked, the great iron

door swung back, and we were swallowed up in a tomb--a stone vault where

men are none the less buried because they have separate cells. They

do not live, though they appear to be alive; they move, and sometimes

speak, and appear to hear words. Some have to be sent away and buried

outside. They have been dead a long time, but have not seemed to want

putting in the ground. That makes no change in them--not much, I mean.

If they sleep it's all right; if they don't sleep anything must be

happiness after the life they have escaped. 'Happy are the dead' is

written on all prison walls.

What I suffered in that first time no tongue can tell. I can't bear now

to think of it and put it down. The solitary part of it was enough to

drive any man mad that had been used to a free life. Day after day,

night after night, the same and the same and the same over again.

Then the dark cells. I got into them for a bit. I wasn't always as cool

as I might be--more times that mad with myself that I could have smashed

my own skull against the wall, let alone any one else's. There was one

of the warders I took a dislike to from the first, and he to me, I don't

doubt. I thought he was rough and surly. He thought I wanted to have my

own way, and he made it up to take it out of me, and run me every way

he could. We had a goodish spell of fighting over it, but he gave in at

last. Not but what I'd had a lot to bear, and took a deal of punishment

before he jacked up. I needn't have had it. It was all my own obstinacy

and a sort of dogged feeling that made me feel I couldn't give in. I

believe it done me good, though. I do really think I should have gone

mad else, thinking of the dreadful long months and years that lay before

me without a chance of getting out.

Sometimes I'd take a low fit and refuse my food, and very near give up

living altogether. The least bit more, and I'd have died outright. One

day there was a party of ladies and gentlemen came to be shown over the

gaol. There was a lot of us passing into the exercise yard. I happened

to look up for a minute, and saw one of the ladies looking steadily at

us, and oh! what a pitying look there was in her face. In a moment I saw

it was Miss Falkland, and, by the change that came into her face, that

she knew me again, altered as I was. I wondered how she could have known

me. I was a different-looking chap from when she had seen me last. With

a beastly yellow-gray suit of prison clothes, his face scraped smooth

every day, like a fresh-killed pig, and the look of a free man gone out

of his face for ever--how any woman, gentle or simple, ever can know a

man in gaol beats me. Whether or no, she knew me. I suppose she saw the

likeness to Jim, and she told him, true enough, she'd never forget him

nor what he'd done for her.

I just looked at her, and turned my head away. I felt as if I'd make a

fool of myself if I didn't. All the depth down that I'd fallen since I

was shearing there at Boree rushed into my mind at once. I nearly fell

down, I know. I was pretty weak and low then; I'd only just come out of

the doctor's hands.

I was passing along with the rest of the mob. I heard her voice quite

clear and firm, but soft and sweet, too. How sweet it sounded to me

then!

'I wish to speak a few words to the third prisoner in the line--the tall

one. Can I do so, Captain Wharton?'

'Oh! certainly, Miss Falkland,' said the old gentleman, who had brought

them all in to look at the wonderful neat garden, and the baths, and the

hospital, and the unnatural washed-up, swept-up barracks that make the

cleanest gaol feel worse than the roughest hut. He was the visiting

magistrate, and took a deal of interest in the place, and believed he

knew all the prisoners like a book. 'Oh! certainly, my dear young lady.

Is Richard Marston an acquaintance of yours?'

'He and his brother worked for my father at Boree,' she said, quite

stately. 'His brother saved my life.'

I was called back by the warder. Miss Falkland stepped out before them

all, and shook hands with me. Yes, SHE SHOOK HANDS WITH ME, and the

tears came into her eyes as she did so.

If anything could have given a man's heart a turn the right way that

would have done it. I felt again as if some one cared for me in the

world, as if I had a soul worth saving. And people may talk as they

like, but when a man has the notion that everybody has given him up as

a bad job, and has dropped troubling themselves about him, he gets worse

and worse, and meets the devil half-way.

She said--

'Richard Marston, I cannot tell how grieved I am to see you here. Both

papa and I were so sorry to hear all about those Momberah cattle.'

I stammered out something or other, I hardly knew what.

She looked at me again with her great beautiful eyes like a wondering

child.

'Is your brother here too?'

'No, Miss Falkland,' I said. 'They've never caught Jim yet, and, what's

more, I don't think they will. He jumped on a bare-backed horse without

saddle or bridle, and got clear.'

She looked as if she was going to smile, but she didn't. I saw her eyes

sparkle, though, and she said softly--

'Poor Jim! so he got away; I am glad of that. What a wonderful rider he

was! But I suppose he will be caught some day. Oh, I do so wish I could

say anything that would make you repent of what you have done, and try

and do better by and by. Papa says you have a long life before you most

likely, and might do so much with it yet. You will try, for my sake;

won't you now?'

'I'll do what I can, miss,' I said; 'and if I ever see Jim again I'll

tell him of your kindness.'

'Thank you, and good-bye,' she said, and she held out her hand again and

took mine. I walked away, but I couldn't help holding my head higher,

and feeling a different man, somehow.

I ain't much of a religious chap, wasn't then, and I am farther off it

now than ever, but I've heard a power of the Bible and all that read

in my time; and when the parson read out next Sunday about Jesus Christ

dying for men, and wanting to have their souls saved, I felt as if I

could have a show of understanding it better than I ever did before. If

I'd been a Catholic, like Aileen and mother, I should have settled what

the Virgin Mary was like when she was alive, and never said a prayer to

her without thinking of Miss Falkland.

While I was dying one week and getting over it another, and going

through all the misery every fellow has in his first year of gaol,

Starlight was just his old self all the time. He took it quite easy,

never gave any one trouble, and there wasn't a soul in the place that

wouldn't have done anything for him. The visiting magistrate thought his

a most interesting case, and believed in his heart that he had been the

means of turning him from the error of his ways--he and the chaplain

between them, anyhow. He even helped him to be allowed to be kept a

little separate from the other prisoners (lest they should contaminate

him!), and in lots of ways made his life a bit easier to him.

It was reported about that it was not the first time that he had been

in a gaol. That he'd 'done time', as they call it, in another colony.

He might or he might not. He never said. And he wasn't the man, with all

his soft ways, you'd like to ask about such a thing.

By the look of it you wouldn't think he cared about it a bit. He took it

very easy, read half his time, and had no sign about him that he wasn't

perfectly satisfied. He intended when he got out to lead a new life, the

chaplain said, and be the means of keeping other men right and straight.

One day we had a chance of a word together. He got the soft side of

the chaplain, who thought he wanted to convert me and take me out of my

sulky and obstinate state of mind. He took good care that we were not

overheard or watched, and then said rather loud, for fear of accidents--

'Well, Richard, how are you feeling? I am happy to say that I have been

led to think seriously of my former evil ways, and I have made up my

mind, besides, to use every effort in my power to clear out of this

infernal collection of tombstones when the moon gets dark again, about

the end of this month.'

'How have you taken to become religious?' I said. 'Are you quite sure

that what you say can be depended upon? And when did you get the good

news?'

'I have had many doubts in my mind for a long time,' he said, 'and have

watched and prayed long, and listened for the word that was to come;

and the end of it is that I have at length heard the news that makes

the soul rejoice, even for the heathen, the boy Warrigal, who will be

waiting outside these walls with fresh horses. I must now leave you,

my dear Richard,' he said; 'and I hope my words will have made an

impression on you. When I have more to communicate for your good I will

ask leave to return.'

After I heard this news I began to live again. Was there a chance of our

getting out of this terrible tomb into the free air and sunshine once

more? However it was to be managed I could not make out. I trusted

mostly to Starlight, who seemed to know everything, and to be quite easy

about the way it would all turn out.

All that I could get out of him afterwards was that on a certain night a

man would be waiting with two horses outside of the gaol wall; and that

if we had the luck to get out safe, and he thought we should, we would

be on their backs in three minutes, and all the police in New South

Wales wouldn't catch us once we got five minutes' start.

This was all very well if it came out right; but there was an awful lot

to be done before we were even near it. The more I began to think over

it the worse it looked; sometimes I quite lost heart, and believed we

should never have half a chance of carrying out our plan.

We knew from the other prisoners that men had tried from time to time

to get away. Three had been caught. One had been shot dead--he was

lucky--another had fallen off the wall and broke his leg. Two had got

clear off, and had never been heard of since.

We were all locked up in our cells every evening, and at five o'clock,

too. We didn't get out till six in the morning; a long, long time. Cold

enough in the bitter winter weather, that had then come in, and a long,

weary, wretched time to wait and watch for daylight.

Well, first of all, we had to get the cell door open. That was the

easiest part of the lot. There's always men in a big gaol that all kinds

of keys and locks are like large print to. They can make most locks fly

open like magic; what's more, they're willing to do it for anybody

else, or show them how. It keeps their hand in; they have a pleasure in

spiting those above them whenever they can do it.

The getting out of the cell was easy enough, but there was a lot of

danger after you had got out. A passage to cross, where the warder,

with his rifle, walked up and down every half-hour all night; then a big

courtyard; then another smaller door in the wall; then the outer

yard for those prisoners who are allowed to work at stone-cutting or

out-of-door trades.

After all this there was the great outer wall to climb up and drop down

from on the other side.

We managed to pick our night well. A French convict, who liked that

sort of thing, gave me the means of undoing the cell door. It was three

o'clock in the morning, when in winter most people are sleepy that

haven't much on their minds. The warder that came down the passage

wasn't likely to be asleep, but he might have made it up in his mind

that all was right, and not taken as much notice as usual. This was what

we trusted to. Besides, we had got a few five-pound notes smuggled in

to us; and though I wouldn't say that we were able to bribe any of the

gaolers, we didn't do ourselves any harm in one or two little ways by

throwing a few sovereigns about.

I did just as I was told by the Frenchman, and I opened the cell door as

easy as a wooden latch. I had to shut it again for fear the warder would

see it and begin to search and sound the alarm at once. Just as I'd done

this he came down the passage. I had only time to crouch down in the

shadow when he passed me. That was right; now he would not be back for

half-an-hour.

I crawled and scrambled, and crept along like a snake until little by

little I got to the gate through the last wall but one. The lock here

was not so easy as the cell door, and took me more time. While I stood

there I was in a regular tremble with fright, thinking some one might

come up, and all my chance would be gone. After a bit the lock gave way,

and I found myself in the outer yard. I went over to the wall and

crept along it till I came to one of the angles. There I was to meet

Starlight. He was not there, and he was to bring some spikes to climb

the wall with, and a rope, with two or three other things.

I waited and waited for half-an-hour, which seemed a month. What was

I to do if he didn't come? I could not climb the thirty-foot wall by

myself. One had to be cautious, too, for there were towers at short

distances along the wall; in every one of these a warder, armed with

a rifle, which he was sure to empty at any one that looked like

gaol-breaking. I began to think he had made a mistake in the night.

Then, that he had been discovered and caught the moment he tried to

get out of the cell. I was sure to be caught if he was prevented from

coming; and shutting up would be harder to bear than ever.

Then I heard a man's step coming up softly; I knew it was Starlight. I

knew his step, and thought I would always tell it from a thousand other

men's; it was so light and firm, so quick and free. Even in a prison it

was different from other men's; and I remembered everything he had ever

said about walking and running, both of which he was wonderfully good

at.

He was just as cool as ever. 'All right, Dick; take these spikes.' He

had half-a-dozen stout bits of iron; how ever he got them I know no more

than the dead, but there they were, and a light strong coil of rope as

well. I knew what the spikes were for, of course; to drive into the

wall between the stones and climb up by. With the rope we were to drop

ourselves over the wall the other side. It was thirty feet high--no fool

of a drop. More than one man had been picked up disabled at the bottom

of it. He had a short stout piece of iron that did to hammer the spikes

in; and that had to be done very soft and quiet, you may be sure.

It took a long time. I thought the night would be over and the daylight

come before it was all done; it was so slow. I could hear the tick-tack

of his iron every time he knocked one of the spikes in. Of course he

went higher every time. They were just far enough apart for a man to

get his foot on from one to another. As he went up he had one end of the

coil of the rope round his wrist. When he got to the top he was to draw

it up to fasten to the top spike, and lower himself down by it to the

ground on the other side. At last I felt him pull hard on the rope. I

held it, and put my foot on the first spike. I don't know that I should

have found it so very easy in the dark to get up by the spikes--it was

almost blackfellows' work, when they put their big toe into a notch

cut in the smooth stem of a gum tree that runs a hundred feet without

a branch, and climb up the outside of it--but Jim and I had often

practised this sort of climbing when we were boys, and were both pretty

good at it. As for Starlight, he had been to sea when he was young, and

could climb like a cat.

When I got to the top I could just see his head above the wall. The rope

was fastened well to the top spike, which was driven almost to the head

into the wall. Directly he saw me, he began to lower himself down the

rope, and was out of sight in a minute. I wasn't long after him, you may

be sure. In my hurry I let the rope slip through my hands so fast they

were sore for a week afterwards. But I didn't feel it then. I should

hardly have felt it if I had cut them in two, for as my feet touched

the ground in the darkness I heard the stamp of a horse's hoof and the

jingle of a bit--not much of a sound, but it went through my heart like

a knife, along with the thought that I was a free man once more; that

is, free in a manner of speaking. I knew we couldn't be taken then, bar

accidents, and I felt ready to ride through a regiment of soldiers.

As I stood up a man caught my hand and gave it a squeeze as if he'd have

crushed my fingers in. I knew it was Jim. Of course, I'd expected him to

be there, but wasn't sure if he'd be able to work it. We didn't speak,

but started to walk over to where two horses were standing, with a man

holding 'em. It was pretty dark, but I could see Rainbow's star--just in

his forehead it was--the only white he had about him. Of course it was

Warrigal that was holding them.

'We must double-bank my horse,' whispers Jim, 'for a mile or two,

till we're clear of the place; we didn't want to bring a lot of horses

about.'

He jumped up, and I mounted behind him. Starlight was on Rainbow in a

second. The half-caste disappeared, he was going to keep dark for a few

days and send us the news. Jim's horse went off as if he had only ten

stone on his back instead of pretty nigh five-and-twenty. And we were

free! Lord God! to think that men can be such fools as ever to do

anything of their own free will and guiding that puts their liberty in

danger when there's such a world outside of a gaol wall--such a heaven

on earth as long as a man's young and strong, and has all the feelings

of a free man, in a country like this. Would I do the first crooked

thing again if I had my life to live over again, and knew a hundredth

part of what I know now? Would I put my hand in the fire out of laziness

or greed? or sit still and let a snake sting me, knowing I should be

dead in twelve hours? Any man's fool enough to do one that'll do the

other. Men and women don't know this in time, that's the worst of it;

they won't believe half they're told by them that do know and wish 'em

well. They run on heedless and obstinate, too proud to take advice, till

they do as we did. The world's always been the same, I suppose, and will

to the end. Most of the books say so, anyway.

Chapter 20

What a different feel from prison air the fresh night breeze had as we

swept along a lonely outside track! The stars were out, though the sky

was cloudy now and then, and the big forest trees looked strange in

the broken light. It was so long since I'd seen any. I felt as if I was

going to a new world. None of us spoke for a bit. Jim pulled up at a

small hut by the roadside; it looked like a farm, but there was not much

show of crops or anything about the place. There was a tumble-down

old barn, with a strong door to it, and a padlock; it seemed the only

building that there was any care taken about. A man opened the door of

the hut and looked out.

'Look sharp,' says Jim. 'Is the horse all right and fit?'

'Fit enough to go for the Hawkesbury Guineas. I was up and fed him three

hours ago. He's----'

'Bring him out, and be hanged to you,' says Jim; 'we've no time for

chat.'

The man went straight to the barn, and after a minute or two brought out

a horse--the same I'd ridden from Gippsland, saddled and bridled, and

ready to jump out of his skin. Jim leaned forward and put something into

his hand, which pleased him, for he held my rein and stirrup, and then

said--

'Good luck and a long reign to you,' as we rode away.

All this time Starlight had sat on his horse in the shade of a tree a

good bit away. When we started he rode alongside of us. We were soon in

a pretty fair hand-gallop, and we kept it up. All our horses were good,

and we bowled along as if we were going to ride for a week without

stopping.

What a ride it was! It was a grand night, anyway I thought so. I blessed

the stars, I know. Mile after mile, and still the horses seemed to go

all the fresher the farther they went. I felt I could ride on that way

for ever. As the horses pulled and snorted and snatched at their bridles

I felt as happy as ever I did in my life. Mile after mile it was all the

same; we could hear Rainbow snorting from time to time and see his star

move as he tossed up his head. We had many a night ride after together,

but that was the best. We had laid it out to make for a place we knew

not so far from home. We dursn't go there straight, of course, but nigh

enough to make a dart to it whenever we had word that the coast was

clear.

We knew directly we were missed the whole countryside would be turned

out looking for us, and that every trooper within a hundred miles would

be hoping for promotion in case he was lucky enough to drop on either of

the Marstons or the notorious Starlight. His name had been pretty well

in every one's mouth before, and would be a little more before they were

done with him.

It was too far to ride to the Hollow in a day, but Jim had got a place

ready for us to keep dark in for a bit, in case we got clear off.

There's never any great trouble in us chaps finding a home for a week

or two, and somebody to help us on our way as long as we've the notes to

chuck about. All the worse in the long run. We rode hardish (some people

would have called it a hand-gallop) most of the way; up hill and down,

across the rocky creeks, through thick timber. More than one river we

had to swim. It was mountain water, and Starlight cursed and swore, and

said he would catch his death of cold. Then we all laughed; it was the

first time we'd done that since we were out. My heart was too full to

talk, much less laugh, with the thought of being out of that cursed

prison and on my own horse again, with the free bush breeze filling my

breast, and the free forest I'd lived in all my life once more around

me. I felt like a king, and as for what might come afterwards I had

no more thought than a schoolboy has of his next year's lessons at the

beginning of his holidays. It might come now. As I took the old horse by

the head and raced him down the mountain side, I felt I was living again

and might call myself a man once more.

The sun was just rising, the morning was misty and drizzling; the long

sour-grass, the branches of the scrubby trees, everything we touched and

saw was dripping with the night dew, as we rode up a 'gap' between

two stiffish hills. We had been riding all night from track to track,

sometimes steering by guesswork. Jim seemed to know the country in a

general way, and he told us father and he had been about there a good

deal lately, cattle-dealing and so on. For the last hour or so we had

been on a pretty fair beaten road, though there wasn't much traffic

on it. It was one of the old mail tracks once, but new coach lines had

knocked away all the traffic. Some of the old inns had been good big

houses, well kept and looked after then. Now lots of them were empty,

with broken windows and everything in ruins; others were just good

enough to let to people who would live in them, and make a living by

cultivating a bit and selling grog on the sly. Where we pulled up was

one of these places, and the people were just what you might expect.

First of all there was the man of the house, Jonathan Barnes, a tall,

slouching, flash-looking native; he'd been a little in the horse-racing

line, a little in the prize-fighting line--enough to have his nose

broken, and was fond of talking about 'pugs' as he'd known intimate--a

little in the farming and carrying line, a little in every line that

meant a good deal of gassing, drinking, and idling, and mighty little

hard work. He'd a decent, industrious little wife, about forty times too

good for him, and the girls, Bella and Maddie, worked well, or else he'd

have been walking about the country with a swag on his back. They kept

him and the house too, like many another man, and he took all the credit

of it, and ordered them about as if he'd been the best and straightest

man in the land. If he made a few pounds now and then he'd drop it on a

horse-race before he'd had it a week. They were glad enough to see us,

anyhow, and made us comfortable, after a fashion. Jim had brought fresh

clothes, and both of us had stopped on the road and rigged ourselves

out, so that we didn't look so queer as men just out of the jug mostly

do, with their close-shaved faces, cropped heads, and prison clothes.

Starlight had brought a false moustache with him, which he stuck on, so

that he looked as much like a swell as ever. Warrigal had handed him a

small parcel, which he brought with him, just as we started; and, with

a ring on his finger, some notes and gold in his pocket, he ate his

breakfast, and chatted away with the girls as if he'd only ridden out

for a day to have a look at the country.

Our horses were put in the stable and well looked to, you may be

sure. The man that straps a cross cove's horse don't go short of his

half-crown--two or three of them, maybe. We made a first-rate breakfast

of it; what with the cold and the wet and not being used to riding

lately, we were pretty hungry, and tired too. We intended to camp there

that day, and be off again as soon as it was dark.

Of course we ran a bit of a risk, but not as bad as we should by riding

in broad daylight. The hills on the south were wild and rangy enough,

but there were all sorts of people about on their business in the

daytime; and of course any of them would know with one look that three

men, all on well-bred horses, riding right across country and not

stopping to speak or make free with any one, were likely to be 'on the

cross'--all the more if the police were making particular inquiries

about them. We were all armed, too, now. Jim had seen to that. If we

were caught, we intended to have a flutter for it. We were not going

back to Berrima if we knew it.

So we turned in, and slept as if we were never going to wake again. We'd

had a glass of grog or two, nothing to hurt, though; and the food and

one thing and another made us sleep like tops. Jim was to keep a good

look-out, and we didn't take off our clothes. Our horses were kept

saddled, too, with the bridles on their heads, and only the bits out

of their mouths--we could have managed without the bits at a

pinch--everything ready to be out of the house in one minute, and in

saddle and off full-split the next. We were learned that trick pretty

well before things came to an end.

Besides that, Jonathan kept a good look-out, too, for strangers of the

wrong sort. It wasn't a bad place in that way. There was a long stony

track coming down to the house, and you could see a horseman or a

carriage of any kind nearly a mile off. Then, in the old times, the

timber had been cleared pretty nigh all round the place, so there was

no chance of any one sneaking up unknown to people. There couldn't have

been a better harbour for our sort, and many a jolly spree we had there

afterwards. Many a queer sight that old table in the little parlour saw

years after, and the notes and gold and watches and rings and things

I've seen the girls handling would have stunned you. But that was all to

come.

Well, about an hour before dark Jim wakes us up, and we both felt as

right as the bank. It took a good deal to knock either of us out of time

in those days. I looked round for a bit and then burst out laughing.

'What's that about, Dick?' says Jim, rather serious.

'Blest if I didn't think I was in the thundering old cell again,' I

said. 'I could have sworn I heard the bolt snap as your foot sounded in

the room.'

'Well, I hope we shan't, any of us, be shopped again for a while,' says

he, rather slow like. 'It's bad work, I'm afraid, and worse to come; but

we're in it up to our neck and must see it out. We'll have another feed

and be off at sundown. We've the devil's own ride before daylight.'

'Anybody called?' says Starlight, sauntering in, washed and dressed and

comfortable-looking. 'You told them we were not at home, Jim, I hope.'

Jim smiled in spite of himself, though he wasn't in a very gay humour.

Poor old Jim was looking ahead a bit, I expect, and didn't see anything

much to be proud of.

We had a scrumptious feed that night, beefsteaks and eggs, fresh butter

and milk, things we hadn't smelt for months. Then the girls waited

on us; a good-looking pair they was too, full of larks and fun of all

kinds, and not very particular what sort of jokes they laughed at. They

knew well enough, of course, where we'd come from, and what we laid by

all day and travelled at night for; they thought none the worse of us

for that, not they. They'd been bred up where they'd heard all kinds of

rough talk ever since they was little kiddies, and you couldn't well put

them out.

They were a bit afraid of Starlight at first, though, because they seen

at once that he was a swell. Jim they knew a little of; he and father

had called there a good deal the last season, and had done a little in

the stock line through Jonathan Barnes. They could see I was something

in the same line as Jim. So I suppose they had made it up to have a bit

of fun with us that evening before we started. They came down into the

parlour where our tea was, dressed out in their best and looking very

grand, as I thought, particularly as we hadn't seen the sight of so much

as a woman's bonnet and shawl for months and months.

'Well, Mr. Marston,' says the eldest girl, Bella, to Jim, 'we didn't

expect you'd travel this way with friends so soon. Why didn't you tell

us, and we'd have had everything comfortable?'

'Wasn't sure about it,' says Jim, 'and when you ain't it's safest to

hold your tongue. There's a good many things we all do that don't want

talking about.'

'I feel certain, Jim,' says Starlight, with his soft voice and pleasant

smile, which no woman as I ever saw could fight against long, 'that any

man's secret would be safe with Miss Bella. I would trust her with my

life freely--not that it's worth a great deal.'

'Oh! Captain,' says poor Bella, and she began to blush quite innocent

like, 'you needn't fear; there ain't a girl from Shoalhaven to Albury

that would let on which way you were heading, if they were to offer her

all the money in the country.'

'Not even a diamond necklace and earrings? Think of a lovely pendant, a

cross all brilliants, and a brooch to match, my dear girl.'

'I wouldn't “come it”, unless I could get that lovely horse of yours,'

says the youngest one, Maddie; 'but I'd do anything in the world to have

him. He's the greatest darling I ever saw. Wouldn't he look stunning

with a side-saddle? I've a great mind to “duff” him myself one of these

days.'

'You shall have a ride on Rainbow next time we come,' says Starlight.

'I've sworn never to give him away or sell him, that is as long as

I'm alive; but I'll tell you what I'll do--I'll leave him to you in my

will.'

'How do you mean?' says she, quite excited like.

'Why, if I drop one of these fine days--and it's on the cards any

time--you shall have Rainbow; but, mind now, you're to promise me'--here

he looked very grave--'that you'll neither sell him, nor lend him, nor

give him away as long as you live.'

'Oh! you don't mean it,' says the girl, jumping up and clapping her

hands; 'I'd sooner have him than anything I ever saw in the world. Oh!

I'll take such care of him. I'll feed him and rub him over myself; only

I forgot, I'm not to have him before you're dead. It's rather rough on

you, isn't it?'

'Not a bit,' says Starlight; 'we must all go when our time comes. If

anything happens to me soon he'll be young enough to carry you for years

yet. And you'll win all the ladies' hackney prizes at the shows.'

'Oh! I couldn't take him.'

'But you must now. I've promised him to you, and though I am a--well--an

indifferent character, I never go back on my word.'

'Haven't you anything to give me, Captain?' says Bella; 'you're in such

a generous mind.'

'I must bring you something,' says he, 'next time we call. What shall it

be? Now's the time to ask. I'm like the fellow in the “Arabian Nights”,

the slave of the ring--your ring.' Here he took the girl's hand, and

pretending to look at a ring she wore took it up and kissed it. It

wasn't a very ugly one neither. 'What will you have, Bella?'

'I'd like a watch and chain,' she said, pretending to look a little

offended. 'I suppose I may as well ask for a good thing at once.'

Starlight pulled out a pocket-book, and, quite solemn and regular, made

a note of it.

'It's yours,' he said, 'within a month. If I cannot conveniently call

and present it in person, I'll send it by a sure hand, as they used to

say; and now, Jim, boot and saddle.'

The horses were out by this time; the groom was walking Rainbow up and

down; he'd put a regular French-polish on his coat, and the old horse

was arching his neck and chawing his bit as if he thought he was going

to start for the Bargo Town Plate. Jonathan himself was holding our two

horses, but looking at him.

'My word!' he said, 'that's a real picture of a horse; he's too good for

a--well--these roads; he ought to be in Sydney carrying some swell about

and never knowing what a day's hardship feels like. Isn't he a regular

out-and-outer to look at? And they tell me his looks is about the worst

of him. Well--here's luck!' Starlight had called for drinks all round

before we started. 'Here's luck to roads and coaches, and them as lives

by 'em. They'll miss the old coaching system some day--mark my word.

I don't hold with these railways they're talkin' about--all steam and

hurry-scurry; it starves the country.'

'Quite right, Jonathan,' says Starlight, throwing his leg over Rainbow,

and chucking the old groom a sovereign. 'The times have never been half

as good as in the old coaching days, before we ever smelt a funnel in

New South Wales. But there's a coach or two left yet, isn't there? and

sometimes they're worth attending to.'

He bowed and smiled to the girls, and Rainbow sailed off with his

beautiful easy, springy stride. He always put me in mind of the deer I

once saw at Mulgoa, near Penrith; I'd never seen any before. My word!

how one of them sailed over a farmer's wheat paddock fence. He'd been in

there all night, and when he saw us coming he just up and made for the

fence, and flew it like a bird. I never saw any horse have the same

action, only Rainbow. You couldn't tire him, and he was just the

same the end of the day as the beginning. If he hadn't fallen into

Starlight's hands as a colt he'd have been a second-class racehorse, and

wore out his life among touts and ringmen. He was better where he was.

Off we went; what a ride we had that night! Just as well we'd fed and

rested before we started, else we should never have held out. All

that night long we had to go, and keep going. A deal of the road was

rough--near the Shoalhaven country, across awful deep gullies with

a regular climb-up the other side, like the side of a house. Through

dismal ironbark forests that looked as black by night as if all the

tree-trunks were cast-iron and the leaves gun-metal. The night wasn't as

dark as it might have been, but now and again there was a storm, and the

whole sky turned as black as a wolf's throat, as father used to say. We

got a few knocks and scrapes against the trees, but, partly through the

horses being pretty clever in their kind of way, and having sharpish

eyesight of our own, we pulled through. It's no use talking, sometimes

I thought Jim must lose his way. Starlight told us he'd made up his mind

that we were going round and round, and would fetch up about where we'd

started from, and find the Moss Vale police waiting there for us.

'All right, Captain,' says Jim; 'don't you flurry yourself. I've been

along this track pretty often this last few months, and I can steer by

the stars. Look at the Southern Cross there; you keep him somewhere on

the right shoulder, and you'll pull up not so very far off that black

range above old Rocky Flat.'

'You're not going to be so mad as to call at your own place, Jim, are

you?' says he. 'Goring's sure to have a greyhound or two ready to slip

in case the hare makes for her old form.'

'Trust old dad for that,' says Jim; 'he knows Dick and you are on the

grass again. He'll meet us before we get to the place and have fresh

horses. I'll bet he's got a chap or two that he can trust to smell out

the traps if they are close handy the old spot. They'll be mighty clever

if they get on the blind side of father.'

'Well, we must chance it, I suppose,' I said; 'but we were sold once,

and I've not much fancy for going back again.'

'They're all looking for you the other way this blessed minute, I'll go

bail,' says Jim. 'Most of the coves that bolt from Berrima takes down

the southern road to get across the border into Port Philip as soon as

they can work it. They always fancy they are safer there.'

'So they are in some ways; I wouldn't mind if we were back there again,'

I said. 'There's worse places than Melbourne; but once we get to the

Hollow, and that'll be some time to-day, we may take it easy and spell

for a week or two. How they'll wonder what the deuce has become of us.'

The night was long, and that cold that Jim's beard was froze as stiff

as a board; but I sat on my horse, I declare to heaven, and never felt

anything but pleasure and comfort to think I was loose again. You've

seen a dog that's been chained up. Well, when he's let loose, don't he

go chevying and racing about over everything and into everything that's

next or anigh him? He'll jump into water or over a fence, and turn aside

for nothing. He's mad with joy and the feeling of being off the chain;

he can't hardly keep from barking till he's hoarse, and rushing through

and over everything till he's winded and done up. Then he lies down with

his tongue out and considers it all over.

Well a man's just like that when he's been on the chain. He mayn't

jump about so much, though I've seen foreign fellows do that when their

collar was unbuckled; but he feels the very same things in his heart as

that dog does, you take my word for it.

So, as I said, though I was sitting on a horse all that long cold

winter's night through, and had to mind my eye a bit for the road and

the rocks and the hanging branches, I felt my heart swell that much and

my courage rise that I didn't care whether the night was going to turn

into a snowstorm like we'd been in Kiandra way, or whether we'd have

a dozen rivers to swim, like the head-waters of the M'Alister, in

Gippsland, as nearly drowned the pair of us. There I sat in my saddle

like a man in a dream, lettin' my horse follow Jim's up hill and down

dale, and half the time lettin' go his head and givin' him his own road.

Everything, too, I seemed to notice and to be pleased with somehow.

Sometimes it was a rock wallaby out on the feed that we'd come close

on before we saw one another, and it would jump away almost under the

horse's neck, taking two or three awful long springs and lighting square

and level among the rocks after a drop-leap of a dozen feet, like a cat

jumping out of a window. But the cat's got four legs to balance on and

the kangaroo only two. How they manage it and measure the distance

so well, God only knows. Then an old 'possum would sing out, or a

black-furred flying squirrel--pongos, the blacks call 'em--would come

sailing down from the top of an ironbark tree, with all his stern sails

spread, as the sailors say, and into the branches of another, looking

as big as an eagle-hawk. And then we'd come round the corner of a little

creek flat and be into the middle of a mob of wild horses that had come

down from the mountain to feed at night. How they'd scurry off through

the scrub and up the range, where it was like the side of a house, and

that full of slate-bars all upon edge that you could smell the hoofs of

the brumbies as the sharp stones rasped and tore and struck sparks out

of them like you do the parings in a blacksmith's shop.

Then, just as I thought daybreak was near, a great mopoke flits close

over our heads without any rustling or noise, like the ghost of a

bird, and begins to hoot in a big, bare, hollow tree just ahead of us.

Hoo-hoo! hoo-hoo! The last time I heard it, it made me shiver a bit. Now

I didn't care. I was a desperate man that had done bad things, and was

likely to do worse. But I was free of the forest again, and had a good

horse under me; so I laughed at the bird and rode on.

Chapter 21

Daylight broke when we were close up to the Black Range, safe enough,

a little off the line but nothing to signify. Then we hit off the track

that led over the Gap and down into a little flat on a creek that ran

the same way as ours did.

Jim had managed for father and Warrigal to meet us somewhere near here

with fresh horses. There was an old shepherd's hut that stood by itself

almost covered with marsh-mallows and nettles. As we came down the steep

track a dog came up snuffing and searching about the grass and stones as

if he'd lost something. It was Crib.

'Now we're getting home, Jim,' says Starlight. 'It's quite a treat to

see the old scamp again. Well, old man,' he says to the dog, 'how's all

getting on at the Hollow?' The dog came right up to Rainbow and rubbed

against his fetlock, and jumped up two or three times to see if he could

touch his rider. He was almost going to bark, he seemed that glad to see

him and us.

Dad was sitting on a log by the hut smoking, just the same as he was

before he left us last time. He was holding two fresh horses, and we

were not sorry to see them. Horses are horses, and there wasn't much

left in our two. We must have ridden a good eighty miles that night, and

it was as bad as a hundred by daylight.

Father came a step towards us as we jumped off. By George, I was that

stiff with the long ride and the cold that I nearly fell down. He'd got

a bit of a fire, so we lit our pipes and had a comfortable smoke.

'Well, Dick, you're back agin, I see,' he says, pretty pleasant for him.

'Glad to see you, Captain, once more. It's been lonesome work--nobody

but me and Jim and Warrigal, that's like a bear with a sore head half

his time. I'd a mind to roll into him once or twice, and I should too

only for his being your property like.'

'Thank you, Ben, I'll knock his head off myself as soon as we get

settled a bit. Warrigal's not a bad boy, but a good deal like a Rocky

Mountain mule; he's no good unless he's knocked down about once a month

or so, only he doesn't like any one but me to do it.'

'You'll see him about a mile on,' says father. 'He told me he'd be

behind the big rock where the tree grows--on the left of the road. He

said he'd get you a fresh horse, so as he could take Rainbow back to the

Hollow the long way round.'

Sure enough after we'd just got well on the road again Warrigal comes

quietly out from behind a big granite boulder and shows himself. He was

riding Bilbah, and leading a well-bred, good-looking chestnut. He was

one of the young ones out of the Hollow. He'd broken him and got him

quiet. I remembered when I was there first spotting him as a yearling. I

knew the blaze down his face and his three white legs.

Warrigal jumps off Bilbah and throws down the bridle. Then he leads the

chestnut up to where Starlight was standing smoking, and throws himself

down at his feet, bursting out crying like a child. He was just like

a dog that had found his master again. He kept looking up at Starlight

just like a dog does, and smiling and going on just as if he never

expected to see such a good thing again as long as he lived.

'Well, Warrigal,' says Starlight, very careless like, 'so you've brought

me a horse, I see. You've been a very good boy. Take Rainbow round

the long way into the Hollow. Look after him, whatever you do, or I'll

murder you. Not that he's done, or anything near it; but had enough

for one ride, poor old man. Off with you!' He changed the saddle, and

Warrigal hopped on to Bilbah, and led off Rainbow, who tossed his head,

and trotted away as if he'd lots to spare, and hadn't had twelve hours

under saddle; best part without a halt or a bait. I've seen a few good

'uns in my time, but I never saw the horse that was a patch on Rainbow,

take him all round.

We pushed on again, then, for ten miles, and somewhere about eight

o'clock we pulled up at home--at home. Aileen knew we were coming, and

ran out to meet us. She threw her arms round me, and kissed and cried

over me for ever so long before she took any notice of Starlight, who'd

got down and was looking another way. 'Oh! my boy, my boy,' she said, 'I

never thought to see you again for years. How thin you've got and pale,

and strange looking. You're not like your old self at all. But you're

in the bush again now, by God's blessing. We must hide you better next

time. I declare I begin to feel quite wicked, and as if I could fight

the police myself.'

'Well spoken, Miss Marston,' said Starlight, just lifting his hat and

making a bit of a bow like, just as if she was a real lady; but he was

the same to all women. He treated them all alike with the same respect

of manner as if they were duchesses; young or old, gentle or simple--it

made no odds to him. 'We must have your assistance if we're to do any

good. Though whether it wouldn't be more prudent on your part to cut us

all dead, beginning with your father, I shouldn't like to say.'

Aileen looked at him, surprised and angry like for a second. Then she

says--

'Captain Starlight, it's too late now; but words can never tell how I

hate and despise the whole thing. My love for Dick got the better of my

reason for a bit, but I could----Why, how pale you look!'

He was growing pale, and no mistake. He had been ill for a bit before

he left Berrima, though he wouldn't give in, and the ride was rather too

much for him, I suppose. Anyhow, down he tumbles in a dead faint. Aileen

rushed over and lifted up his head. I got some water and dabbed it over

him. After a bit he came to. He raises himself on his elbows and looks

at Aileen. Then he smiles quietly and says--

'I'm quite ashamed of myself. I'm growing as delicate as a young lady. I

hope I haven't given you much trouble.'

When he got up and walked to the verandah he quite staggered, showing he

was that weak as he could hardly walk without help.

'I shall be all right,' he said, 'after a week's riding again.'

'And where are you going when you leave this place?' she asked. 'Surely

you and my brothers never can live in New South Wales after all that has

passed.'

'We must try, at all events, Miss Marston,' Starlight answered, raising

up his head and looking proud. 'You will hear something of us before

long.'

We made out that there was no great chance of our being run into at the

old place. Father went on first with Crib. He was sure to give warning

in some way, best known to father himself, if there was any one about

that wasn't the right sort. So we went up and went in.

Mother was inside. I thought it was queer that she didn't come outside.

She was always quick enough about that when we came home before, day or

night. When I went in I could see, when she got up from her chair, that

she was weak, and looked as if she'd been ill. She looked ever so much

older, and her hair was a lot grayer than it used to be.

She held out her arms and clung round my neck as if I'd been raised from

the dead. So I was in a kind of a way. But she didn't say much, or ask

what I was going to do next. Poor soul! she knew it couldn't be much

good anyway; and that if we were hunted before, we'd be worse hunted

now. Those that hadn't heard of our little game with the Momberah cattle

would hear of our getting out of Berrima Gaol, which wasn't done every

day.

We hadn't a deal of time to spare, because we meant to start off for the

Hollow that afternoon, and get there some time in the night, even if

it was late. Jim and dad knew the way in almost blindfold. Once we got

there we could sleep for a week if we liked, and take it easy all roads.

So father told mother and Aileen straight that we'd come for a good

comfortable meal and a rest, and we must be off again.

'Oh! father, can't Dick and Jim stop for a day?' cries out Aileen. 'It

does seem so hard when we haven't seen Dick for such a while; and he

shut up too all the time.'

'D'ye want to have us all took the same as last time?' growls father.

'Women's never contented as I can see. For two pins I wouldn't have

brought them this way at all. I don't want to be making roads from this

old crib to the Hollow, only I thought you'd like one look at Dick.'

'We must do what's best, of course,' said poor Aileen; 'but it's

hard--very hard on us. It's mother I'm thinking of, you know. If you

knew how she always wakes up in the night, and calls for Dick, and cries

when she wakes up, you'd try to comfort her a bit more, father.'

'Comfort her!' says dad; 'why, what can I do? Don't I tell you if we

stay about here we're shopped as safe as anything ever was? Will that

comfort her, or you either? We're safe today because I've got telegraphs

on the outside that the police can't pass without ringing the bell--in

a way of speaking. But you see to-morrow there'll be more than one lot

here, and I want to be clean away before they come.'

'You know best,' says Aileen; 'but suppose they come here to-morrow

morning at daylight, as they did last time, and bring a black tracker

with them, won't he be able to follow up your track when you go away

to-night?'

'No, he won't; for this reason, we shall all ride different ways as soon

as we leave here. A good while before we get near the place where we all

meet we shall find Warrigal on the look-out. He can take the Captain in

by another track, and there'll be only Jim and I and the old dog, the

only three persons that'll go in the near way.'

'And when shall we see--see--any of you again?'

'Somewheres about a month, I suppose, if we've luck. There's a deal

belongs to that. You'd better go and see what there is for us to eat.

We've a long way and a rough way to go before we get to the Hollow.'

Aileen was off at this, and then she set to work and laid a clean

tablecloth in the sitting-room and set us down our meal--breakfast, or

whatever it was. It wasn't so bad--corned beef, first-rate potatoes,

fresh damper, milk, butter, eggs. Tea, of course, it's the great drink

in the bush; and although some doctors say it's no good, what would

bushmen do without it?

We had no intention of stopping the whole night, though we were tempted

to do so--to have one night's rest in the old place where we used to

sleep so sound before. It was no good thinking of anything of that kind,

anyhow, for a good while to come. What we'd got to do was to look out

sharp and not be caught simple again like we was both last time.

After we had our tea we sat outside the verandah, and tried to make the

best of it. Jim stayed inside with mother for a good while; she didn't

leave her chair much now, and sat knitting by the hour together. There

was a great change come over her lately. She didn't seem to be afraid

of our getting caught as she used to be, nor half as glad or sorry about

anything. It seemed like as if she'd made up her mind that everything

was as bad as it could be, and past mending. So it was; she was right

enough there. The only one who was in real good heart and spirits was

Starlight. He'd come round again, and talked and rattled away, and made

Aileen and Jim and me laugh, in spite of everything. He said we had all

fine times before us now for a year or two, any way. That was a good

long time. After that anything might happen. What it would be he neither

knew nor cared. Life was made up of short bits; sometimes it was hard

luck; sometimes everything went jolly and well. We'd got our liberty

again, our horses, and a place to go to, where all the police in the

country would never find us. He was going in for a short life and

a merry one. He, for one, was tired of small adventures, and he was

determined to make the name of Starlight a little more famous before

very long. If Dick and Jim would take his advice--the advice of a

desperate, ill-fated outcast, but still staunch to his friends--they

would clear out, and leave him to sink or swim alone, or with such

associates as he might pick up, whose destination would be no great

matter whatever befell them. They could go into hiding for a while--make

for Queensland and then go into the northern territory. There was new

country enough there to hide all the fellows that were 'wanted' in New

South Wales.

'But why don't you take your own advice?' said Aileen, looking over at

Starlight as he sat there quite careless and comfortable-looking, as if

he'd no call to trouble his head about anything. 'Isn't your life worth

mending or saving? Why keep on this reckless miserable career which you

yourself expect to end ill?'

'If you ask me, Miss Marston,' he said, 'whether my life--what is left

of it--is worth saving, I must distinctly answer that it is not. It is

like the last coin or two in the gambler's purse, not worth troubling

one's head about. It must be flung on the board with the rest. It might

land a reasonable stake. But as to economising and arranging details

that would surely be the greatest folly of all.'

I heard Aileen sigh to herself. She said nothing for a while; and then

old Crib began to growl. He got up and walked along the track that

led up the hill. Father stood up, too, and listened. We all did except

Starlight, who appeared to think it was too much trouble, and never

moved or seemed to notice.

Presently the dog came walking slowly back, and coiled himself up again

close to Starlight, as if he had made up his mind it didn't matter.

We could hear a horse coming along at a pretty good bat over the hard,

rocky, gravelly road. We could tell it was a single horse, and more than

that, a barefooted one, coming at a hand-gallop up hill and down dale

in a careless kind of manner. This wasn't likely to be a police trooper.

One man wouldn't come by himself to a place like ours at night; and no

trooper, if he did come, would clatter along a hard track, making row

enough to be heard more than a mile off on a quiet night.

'It's all right,' says father. 'The old dog knowed him; it's Billy the

Boy. There's something up.'

Just as he spoke we saw a horseman come in sight; and he rattled down

the stony track as hard as he could lick. He pulled up just opposite

the house, close by where we were standing. It was a boy about fifteen,

dressed in a ragged pair of moleskin trousers, a good deal too large

for him, but kept straight by a leather strap round the waist. An old

cabbage-tree hat and a blue serge shirt made up the rest of his rig.

Boots he had on, but they didn't seem to be fellows, and one rusty spur.

His hair was like a hay-coloured mop, half-hanging over his eyes, which

looked sharp enough to see through a gum tree and out at the other side.

He jumped down and stood before us, while his horse's flanks heaved up

and down like a pair of bellows.

'Well, what's up?' says father.

'My word, governor, you was all in great luck as I come home last night,

after bein' away with them cattle to pound. Bobby, he don't know a

p'leeceman from a wood-an'-water joey; he'd never have dropped they was

comin' here unless they'd pasted up a notice on the door.'

'How did you find out, Billy?' says father, 'and when'll they be here?'

'Fust thing in the morning,' says the young wit, grinning all over his

face. 'Won't they be jolly well sold when they rides up and plants by

the yard, same as they did last time, when they took Dick.'

'Which ones was they?' asks father, fillin' his pipe quite

business-like, just as if he'd got days to spare.

'Them two fellers from Bargo; one of 'em's a new chum--got his hair cut

short, just like Dick's. My word, I thought he'd been waggin' it from

some o' them Gov'ment institoosh'ns. I did raly, Dick, old man.'

'You're precious free and easy, my young friend,' says Starlight,

walking over. 'I rather like you. You have a keen sense of humour,

evidently; but can't you say how you found out that the men were her

Majesty's police officers in pursuit of us?'

'You're Cap'n Starlight, I suppose,' says the youngster, looking

straight and square at him, and not a bit put out. 'Well, I've been

pretty quick coming; thirty mile inside of three hours, I'll be bound.

I heard them talking about you. It was Starlight this and Starlight that

all the time I was going in and out of the room, pretending to look for

something, and mother scolding me.'

'Had they their uniform on?' I asked.

'No fear. They thought we didn't tumble, I expect; but I seen their

horses hung up outside, both shod all round; bits and irons bright.

Stabled horses, too, I could swear. Then the youngest chap--him with the

old felt hat--walked like this.'

Here he squared his shoulders, put his hands by his side, and marched up

and down, looking for all the world like one of them chaps that played

at soldiering in Bargo.

'There's no hiding the military air, you think, Billy?' said Starlight.

'That fellow was a recruit, and had been drilled lately.'

'I d'no. Mother got 'em to stay, and began to talk quite innocent-like

of the bad characters there was in the country. Ha! ha! It was as good

as a play. Then they began to talk almost right out about Sergeant

Goring having been away on a wrong scent, and how wild he was, and how

he would be after Starlight's mob to-morrow morning at daylight, and

some p'leece was to meet him near Rocky Flat. They didn't say they was

the p'leece; that was about four o'clock, and getting dark.'

'How did you get the horse?' says Jim. 'He's not one of yours, is he?'

'Not he,' says the boy; 'I wish I had him or the likes of him. He

belongs to old Driver. I was just workin' it how I'd get out and

catch our old moke without these chaps being fly as I was going to

talligrarph, when mother says to me--

'“Have you fetched in the black cow?”

'We ain't got no black cow, but I knowed what she meant. I says--

'“No, I couldn't find her.”

'“You catch old Johnny Smoker and look for her till you do find her, if

it's ten o'clock to-night,” says mother, very fierce. “Your father'll

give you a fine larrupin' if he comes home and there's that cow lost.”

'So off I goes and mans old Johnny, and clears out straight for here.

When I came to Driver's I runs his horses up into a yard nigh the angle

of his outside paddock and collars this little 'oss, and lets old Johnny

go in hobbles. My word, this cove can scratch!'

'So it seems,' says Starlight; 'here's a sovereign for you, youngster.

Keep your ears and eyes open; you'll always find that good information

brings a good price. I'd advise you to keep away from Mr. Marston, sen.,

and people of his sort, and stick to your work, if I thought there was

the least earthly chance of your doing so; but I see plainly that you're

not cut out for the industrious, steady-going line.'

'Not if I know it,' said the boy; 'I want to see life before I die.

I'm not going to keep on milling and slaving day after day all the year

round. I'll cut it next year as sure as a gun. I say, won't you let me

ride a bit of the way with ye?'

'Not a yard,' says father, who was pretty cranky by this time; 'you

go home again and put that horse where you got him. We don't want old

Driver tracking and swearing after us because you ride his horses; and

keep off the road as you go back.'

Billy the Boy nodded his head, and jumping into his saddle, rode

off again at much about the same pace he'd come at. He was a regular

reckless young devil, as bold as a two-year-old colt in a branding-yard,

that's ready to jump at anything and knock his brains out against a

stockyard post, just because he's never known any real regular hurt or

danger, and can't realise it. He was terrible cruel to horses, and would

ruin a horse in less time than any man or boy I ever seen. I always

thought from the first that he'd come to a bad end. Howsoever, he was

a wonderful chap to track and ride; none could beat him at that; he

was nearly as good as Warrigal in the bush. He was as cunning as a

pet dingo, and would look as stupid before any one he didn't know, or

thought was too respectable, as if he was half an idiot. But no one

ever stirred within twenty or thirty miles of where he lived without our

hearing about it. Father fished him out, having paid him pretty well for

some small service, and ever after that he said he could sleep in peace.

We had the horses up, ready saddled and fed, by sundown, and as soon as

the moon rose we made a start of it. I had time for a bit of a talk

with Aileen about the Storefields, though I couldn't bring myself to say

their names at first. I was right in thinking that Gracey had seen me

led away a prisoner by the police. She came into the hut afterwards with

Aileen, as soon as mother was better, and the two girls sat down beside

one another and cried their eyes out, Aileen said.

George Storefield had been very good, and told Aileen that, whatever

happened to us or the old man, it would make no difference to him or

to his feelings towards her. She thanked him, but said she could never

consent to let him disgrace himself by marrying into a family like

ours. He had come over every now and then, and had seen they wanted for

nothing when father and Jim were away; but she always felt her heart

growing colder towards him and his prosperity while we were so low down

in every way. As for Gracey, she (Aileen) believed that she was in love

with me in a quiet, steady way of her own, without showing it much, but

that she would be true to me, if I asked her, to the end of the world,

and she was sure that she could never marry any one else as long as

I lived. She was that sort of girl. So didn't I think I ought to do

everything I could to get a better character, and try and be good enough

for such a girl? She knew girls pretty well. She didn't think there was

such another girl in the whole colony, and so on.

And when we went away where were we going to hide? I could not say about

particular distances, but I told her generally that we'd keep out of

harm's way, and be careful not to be caught. We might see her and mother

now and then, and by bush-telegraphs and other people we could trust

should be able to send news about ourselves.

'What's the Captain going to do?' she said suddenly. 'He doesn't look

able to bear up against hardship like the rest of you. What beautiful

small hands he has, and his eyes are like sleeping fires.'

'Oh, he's a good deal stronger than he looks,' I said; 'he's the

smartest of the lot of us, except it is dad, and I've heard the old man

say he must knock under to him. But don't you bother your head about

him; he's quite able to take care of himself, and the less a girl like

you thinks about a man like him the better for her.'

'Oh, nonsense,' she said, at the same time looking down in a

half-confused sort of way. 'I'm not likely to think about him or any one

else just now; but it seems such a dreadful thing to think a man like

him, so clever and daring, and so handsome and gentle in his ways,

should be obliged to lead such a life, hunted from place to place

like--like----'

'Like a bush-ranger, Ailie,' I said, 'for that'll be the long and short

of it. You may as well know it now, we're going to “turn out”.'

'You don't say that, Dick,' she said. 'Oh! surely you will never be so

mad. Do you want to kill mother and me right out? If you do, why not

take a knife or an axe and do it at once? Her you've been killing all

along. As for me, I feel so miserable and degraded and despairing at

times that but for her I could go and drown myself in the creek when I

think of what the family is coming to.'

'What's the use of going on like that, Aileen?' I said roughly. 'If

we're caught now, whatever we do, great or small, we're safe for years

and years in gaol. Mayn't we as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb? What

odds can it make? We'll only have bolder work than duffing cattle and

faking horse-brands like a lot of miserable crawlers that are not game

for anything more sporting.'

'I hear, I hear,' says sister, sitting down and putting her head in her

hands. 'Surely the devil has power for a season to possess himself of

the souls of men, and do with them what he will. I know how obstinate

you are, Dick. Pray God you may not have poor Jim's blood to answer for

as well as your own before all is done. Good-bye. I can't say God bless

you, knowing what I do; but may He turn your heart from all wicked

ways, and keep you from worse and deadlier evil than you have committed!

Good-night. Why, oh why, didn't we all die when we were little

children!'

Chapter 22

I brought it out sudden-like to Aileen before I could stop myself, but

it was all true. How we were to make the first start we couldn't agree;

but we were bound to make another big touch, and this time the police

would be after us for something worth while. Anyhow, we could take it

easy at the Hollow for a bit, and settle all the ins and outs without

hurrying ourselves.

Our dart now was to get to the Hollow that night some time, and not to

leave much of a track either. Nobody had found out the place yet, and

wasn't going to if we knew. It was too useful a hiding-place to give

away without trouble, and we swore to take all sorts of good care to

keep it secret, if it was to be done by the art of man.

We went up Nulla Mountain the same way as we remembered doing when Jim

and I rode to meet father that time he had the lot of weaners. We kept

wide and didn't follow on after one another so as to make a marked

trail. It was a long, dark, dreary ride. We had to look sharp so as not

to get dragged off by a breast-high bough in the thick country. There

was no fetching a doctor if any one was hurt. Father rode ahead. He knew

the ins and outs of the road better than any of us, though Jim, who had

lived most of his time in the Hollow after he got away from the

police, was getting to know it pretty well. We were obliged to go slow

mostly--for a good deal of the track lay along the bed of a creek, full

of boulders and rocks, that we had to cross ever so many times in a

mile. The sharp-edged rocks, too, overhung low enough to knock your

brains out if you didn't mind.

It was far into the night when we got to the old yard. There it stood,

just as I recollect seeing it the time Jim and I and father branded the

weaners. It had only been used once or twice since. It was patched up a

bit in places, but nobody seemed to have gone next or nigh it for a long

time. The grass had grown up round the sliprails; it was as strange and

forsaken-looking as if it belonged to a deserted station.

As we rode up a man comes out from an angle of the fence and gives a

whistle. We knew, almost without looking, that it was Warrigal. He'd

come there to meet Starlight and take him round some other way. Every

track and short cut there was in the mountains was as easy to him as

the road to George Storefield's was to us. Nulla Mountain was full of

curious gullies and caves and places that the devil himself could hardly

have run a man to ground in, unless he'd lived near it all his life as

Warrigal had. He wasn't very free in showing them to us, but he'd have

made a bridge of his own body any time to let Starlight go safe. So when

they rode away together we knew he was safe whoever might be after us,

and that we should see him in the Hollow some time next day.

We went on for a mile or two farther; then we got off, and turned our

horses loose. The rest of the way we had to do on foot. My horse and

Jim's had got regularly broke into Rocky Flat, and we knew that they'd

go home as sure as possible, not quite straight, but keeping somewhere

in the right direction. As for father he always used to keep a horse

or two, trained to go home when he'd done with him. The pony he rode

to-night would just trot off, and never put his nose to the ground

almost till he got wind of home.

We humped our saddles and swags ourselves; a stiffish load too, but the

night was cool, and we did our best. It was no use growling. It had to

be done, and the sooner the better. It seemed a long time--following

father step by step--before we came to the place where I thought the

cattle were going to be driven over the precipice. Here we pulled up for

a bit and had a smoke. It was a queer time and a queer look-out.

Three o'clock in the morning--the stars in the sky, and it so clear

that we could see Nulla Mountain rising up against it a big black lump,

without sign of tree or rock; underneath the valley, one sea of mist,

and we just agoing to drop into it; on the other side of the Hollow, the

clear hill we called the Sugarloaf. Everything seemed dead, silent, and

solitary, and a rummier start than all, here were we--three desperate

men, driven to make ourselves a home in this lonesome, God-forsaken

place! I wasn't very fanciful by that time, but if the devil had risen

up to make a fourth amongst us I shouldn't have been surprised. The

place, the time, and the men seemed regularly cut out for him and his

mob.

We smoked our pipes out, and said nothing to each other, good or bad.

Then father makes a start, and we follows him; took a goodish while, but

we got down all right, and headed for the cave. When we got there our

troubles were over for a while. Jim struck a match and had a fire going

in no time; there was plenty of dry wood, of course. Then father rolls

a keg out of a hole in the wall; first-rate dark brandy it was, and we

felt a sight better for a good stiff nip all round. When a man's cold

and tired, and hungry, and down on his luck as well, a good caulker of

grog don't do him no harm to speak of. It strings him up and puts him

straight. If he's anything of a man he can stand it, and feel all the

better for it; but it's a precious sight too easy a lesson to learn, and

there's them that can't stop, once they begin, till they've smothered

what brains God Almighty put inside their skulls, just as if they was

to bore a hole and put gunpowder in. No! they wouldn't stop if they were

sure of going to heaven straight, or to hell next minute if they put the

last glass to their lips. I've heard men say it, and knew they meant it.

Not the worst sort of men, either.

We were none of us like that. Not then, anyhow. We could take or leave

it, and though dad could do with his share when it was going, he always

knew what he was about, and could put the peg in any time. So we had

one strongish tot while the tea was boiling. There was a bag of ship

biscuit; we fried some hung beef, and made a jolly good supper. We were

that tired we didn't care to talk much, so we made up the fire last

thing and rolled ourselves in our blankets; I didn't wake till the sun

had been up an hour or more.

I woke first; Jim was fast asleep, but dad had been up a goodish while

and got things ready for breakfast. It was a fine, clear morning;

everything looked beautiful, 'specially to me that had been locked up

away from this sort of thing so long. The grass was thick and green

round the cave, and right up to the big sandstone slabs of the floor,

looking as if it had never been eat down very close. No more it had. It

would never have paid to have overstocked the Hollow. What cattle and

horses they kept there had a fine time of it, and were always in grand

condition.

Opposite where we were the valley was narrow. I could see the sandstone

precipices that walled us in, a sort of yellowish, white colour, all

lighted up with the rays of the morning sun, looking like gold towers

against the heavy green forest timber at the foot of them. Birds were

calling and whistling, and there was a little spring that fell drip,

drip over a rough rock basin all covered with ferns. A little mob of

horses had fed pretty close up to the camp, and would walk up to look

curious-like, and then trot off with their heads and tails up. It was a

pretty enough sight that met my eyes on waking. It made me feel a sort

of false happiness for a time, to think we had such a place to camp in

on the quiet, and call our own, in a manner of speaking.

Jim soon woke up and stretched himself. Then father began, quite

cheerful like--

'Well, boys, what d'ye think of the Hollow again? It's not a bad earth

for the old dog-fox and his cubs when the hounds have run him close.

They can't dig him out here, or smoke him out either. We've no call to

do anything but rest ourselves for a week or two, anyhow; then we must

settle on something and buckle to it more business-like. We've been too

helter-skelter lately, Jim and I. We was beginning to run risks, got

nearly dropped on more nor once.'

There's no mistake, it's a grand thing to wake up and know you've got

nothing to do for a bit but to take it easy and enjoy yourself. No

matter how light your work may be, if it's regular and has to be done

every day, the harness 'll gall somewhere; you get tired in time and

sick of the whole thing.

Jim and I knew well that, bar accidents, we were as safe in the Hollow

as we used to be in our beds when we were boys. We'd searched it through

and through last time, till we'd come to believe that only three or

four people, and those sometimes not for years at a time, had ever been

inside of it. There were no tracks of more.

We could see how the first gang levied; they were different. Every now

and then they had a big drink--'a mad carouse', as the books say--when

they must have done wild, strange things, something like the Spanish

Main buccaneers we'd read about. They'd brought captives with them, too.

We saw graves, half-a-dozen together, in one place. THEY didn't belong

to the band.

We had a quiet, comfortable meal, and a smoke afterwards. Then Jim and I

took a long walk through the Hollow, so as to tell one another what was

in our minds, which we hadn't a chance to do before. Before we'd gone

far Jim pulls a letter out of his pocket and gives it to me.

'It was no use sending it to you, old man, while you was in the jug,'

he says; 'it was quite bad enough without this, so I thought I'd keep it

till we were settled a bit like. Now we're going to set up in business

on our own account you'd best look over your mail.'

I knew the writing well, though I hadn't seen it lately. It was from

her--from Kate Morrison that was. It began--not the way most women

write, like HER, though--

So this is the end of your high and mighty doings, Richard Marston,

passing yourself and Jim off as squatters. I don't blame him--[no, of

course not, nobody ever blamed Jim, or would, I suppose, if he'd burned

down Government House and stuck up his Excellency as he was coming out

of church]--but when I saw in the papers that you had been arrested for

cattle-stealing I knew for the first time how completely Jeanie and I

had been duped.

I won't pretend that I didn't think of the money you were said to have,

and how pleasant it would be to spend some of it after the miserable,

scrambling, skimping life we had lately been used to. But I loved you,

Dick Marston, for YOURSELF, with a deep and passionate love which you

will never know now, which you would scorn and treat lightly, perhaps,

if you did know. You may yet find out what you have lost, if ever you

get out of that frightful gaol.

I was not such a silly fool as to pine and fret over our romance so

cruelly disturbed, though Jeanie was; it nearly broke her heart. No,

Richard, my nature is not of that make. I generally get even with people

who wrong me. I send you a photo, giving a fair idea of myself and my

HUSBAND, Mr. Mullockson. I accepted his offer soon after I saw your

adventures, and those of your friend Starlight, in every newspaper in

the colonies. I did not hold myself bound to live single for your

sake, so did what most women do, though they pretend to act from other

motives, I disposed of myself to the best advantage.

Mr. Mullockson has plenty of money, which is NEARLY everything in this

world, so that I am comfortable and well off, as far as that goes. If

I am not happy that is your fault--your fault, I say, because I am not

able to tear your false image and false self from my thoughts. Whatever

happens to me in the future you may consider yourself to blame for. I

should have been a happy and fairly good woman, as far as women go,

if you had been true, or rather if everything about you had not been

utterly false and despicable.

You think it fortunate after reading this, I daresay, that we are

separated for ever, BUT WE MAY MEET AGAIN, Richard Marston. THEN you may

have reason to curse the day, as I do most heartily, when you first set

eyes on KATE MULLOCKSON.

Not a pleasant letter, by no manner of means. I was glad I didn't get it

while I was eating my heart out under the stifling low roof of the cell

at Nomah, or when I was bearing my load at Berrima. A few pounds more

when the weight was all I could bear and live would have crushed the

heart out of me. I didn't want anything to cross me when I was looking

at mother and Aileen and thinking how, between us, we'd done everything

our worst enemy could have wished us to do. But here, when there was

plenty of time to think over old days and plan for the future, I could

bear the savage, spiteful sound of the whole letter and laugh at the

way she had got out of her troubles by taking up with a rough old fellow

whose cheque-book was the only decent thing about him. I wasn't sorry to

be rid of her either. Since I'd seen Gracey Storefield again every other

woman seemed disagreeable to me. I tore up the letter and threw it away,

hoping I had done for ever with a woman that no man living would ever

have been the better for.

'Glad you take it so quiet,' Jim says, after holding his tongue longer

than he did mostly. 'She's a bad, cold-hearted jade, though she is

Jeanie's sister. If I thought my girl was like her she'd never have

another thought from me, but she isn't, and never was. The worse luck

I've had the closer she's stuck to me, like a little brick as she is.

I'd give all I ever had in the world if I could go to her and say, “Here

I am, Jim Marston, without a penny in the world, but I can look every

man in the face, and we'll work our way along the road of life cheerful

and loving together.” But I CAN'T say it, Dick, that's the devil of

it, and it makes me so wild sometimes that I could knock my brains out

against the first ironbark tree I come across.'

I didn't say anything, but I took hold of Jim's hand and shook it.

We looked in each other's eyes for a minute; there was no call to say

anything. We always understood one another, Jim and I.

As we were safe to stop in the Hollow for long spells at a time we took

a good look over it, as far as we could do on foot. We found a rum sort

of place at the end of a long gully that went easterly from the main

flat. In one way you'd think the whole valley had been an arm of the sea

some time or other. It was a bit like Sydney Harbour in shape, with one

principal valley and no end of small cover and gullies running off from

it, and winding about in all directions. Even the sandstone walls, by

which the whole affair, great and small, was hemmed in, were just like

the cliff about South Head; there were lines, too, on the face of them,

Jim and I made out, just like where the waves had washed marks and

levels on the sea-rock. We didn't trouble ourselves much about that part

of it. Whatever might have been there once, it grew stunning fine grass

now, and there was beautiful clear fresh water in all the creeks that

ran through it.

Well, we rambled up the long, crooked gully that I was talking about

till about half-way up it got that narrow that it seemed stopped by a

big rock that had tumbled down from the top and blocked the path. It was

pretty well grown over with wild raspberries and climbers.

'No use going farther,' says Jim; 'there's nothing to see.'

'I don't know that. Been a track here some time. Let's get round and

see.'

When we got round the rock the track was plain again; it had been well

worn once, though neither foot nor hoof much had been along it for many

a year. It takes a good while to wear out a track in a dry country.

The gully widened out bit by bit, till at last we came to a little

round green flat, right under the rock walls which rose up a couple of

thousand feet above it on two sides. On the flat was an old hut--very

old it seemed to be, but not in bad trim for all that. The roof was of

shingles, split, thick, and wedge shaped; the walls of heavy ironbark

slabs, and there was a stone chimney.

Outside had been a garden; a few rose trees were standing yet, ragged

and stunted. The wallabies had trimmed them pretty well, but we knew

what they were. Been a corn-patch too--the marks where it had been hoed

up were there, same as they used to do in old times when there were more

hoes than ploughs and more convicts than horses and working bullocks in

the country.

'Well, this is a rum start,' says Jim, as we sat down on a log outside

that looked as if it had been used for a seat before. 'Who the deuce

ever built this gunyah and lived in it by himself for years and years?

You can see it was no two or three months' time he done here. There's

the spring coming out of the rock he dipped his water from. The track's

reg'lar worn smooth over the stones leading to it. There was a fence

round this garden, some of the rails lying there rotten enough, but it

takes time for sound hard wood to rot. He'd a stool and table too, not

bad ones either, this Robinson Crusoe cove. No end of manavilins either.

I wonder whether he come here before them first--Government men--chaps

we heard of. Likely he did and died here too. He might have chummed in

with them, of course, or he might not. Perhaps Starlight knows something

about him, or Warrigal. We'll ask them.'

We fossicked about for a while to see if the man who lived so long by

himself in this lonely place had left anything behind him to help us

make out what sort he was. We didn't find much. There was writing on

the walls here and there, and things cut on the fireplace posts. Jim

couldn't make head or tail of them, nor me either.

'The old cove may have left something worth having behind him,' he said,

after staring at the cold hearth ever so long. 'Men like him often leave

gold pieces and jewels and things behind them, locked up in brass-bound

boxes; leastways the story-books say so. I've half a mind to root up the

old hearthstone; it's a thundering heavy one, ain't it? I wonder how he

got it here all by himself.'

'It IS pretty heavy,' I said. 'For all we know he may have had help to

bring it in. We've no time now to see into it; we'd better make tracks

and see if Starlight has made back. We shall have to shape after a bit,

and we may as well see how he stands affected.'

'He'll be back safe enough. There's no pull in being outside now with

all the world chevying after you and only half rations of food and

sleep.'

Jim was right. As we got up to the cave we saw Starlight talking to the

old man and Warrigal letting go the horse. They'd taken their time to

come in, but Warrigal knew some hole or other where they'd hid before

very likely, so they could take it easier than we did the night we left

Rocky Creek.

'Well, boys!' says Starlight, coming forward quite heartily, 'glad to

see you again; been taking a walk and engaging yourselves this fine

weather? Rather nice country residence of ours, isn't it? Wonder how

long we shall remain in possession! What a charm there is in home! No

place like home, is there, governor?'

Dad didn't smile, he very seldom did that, but I always thought he never

looked so glum at Starlight as he did at most people.

'The place is well enough,' he growled, 'if we don't smother it all by