'I'm sure the Captain will never permit any harm to come to me,' says Mrs. Knightley, with a look in her eyes that, in spite of herself, said a deal more than words. 'Why, I danced "vis-a-vis" to him in a quadrille at the Turon ball.'

'I shall never forget the honour,' says Starlight, walking forward and bowing low. 'Permit me to offer you a chair, madam; you look faint.'

As he did so she sank down in it, and really looked as if she would faint away. It wouldn't have been much wonder if she had after what she'd gone through that night.

Then Mr. Knightley began again. He wanted to know how he stood. He didn't like the look of Moran and Wall—they were a deal too quiet for him, and he could read men's faces like a book. The other two prisoners were the German Dr. Schiller—a plucky old chap, who'd been a rebel and a conspirator and I don't know what all in his own country. He'd seen too much of that kind of thing to trouble himself over much about a trifle of this kind. The old woman was a family servant, who had been with them for years and years. She was a kind of worshipper of theirs, and was ready to live or die with her mistress.



Chapter 45



So Mr. Knightley stood up and faced them all like a man. He was one of those chaps that makes up their mind pretty quick about the sort of people they've got to deal with, and if there's anything to be said or done lets 'em have it 'straight from the shoulder'. As he stood there—straight and square—with his head thrown back, and his eyes—very bright and sharp they were—looking every man's face over as if he was reading a notice and had no time to spare, you couldn't have told, from his look, or voice, or manner, whether he was afraid that things would go wrong, or whether he was dead sure they'd go right. Some men are like that. Others you can tell every thought that's passing through their minds just as if it was printed in big letters on their breasts, like a handbill: '200 Pounds reward,' and so on.

Well, Mr. Knightley wasn't one of that sort, though I saw him keep his eye a trifle longer on Moran than the rest of 'em.

'Now then, boys,' he says, 'we've had our flutter out. I've done my best, and you've done yours. I've bagged one of your lot, and you've done your best to pot me. See here,' and he lifts up the collar of his coat and shows a hole through it, touches his head on the side, and brings away a red mark; and takes out his watch with the case all battered in by a revolver bullet. 'You can't say I hadn't cause to show fight,' and he points to his wife. 'Where's the man among you that wouldn't have done the same? An Englishman's house is his castle. What am I to expect?'

He looked over at Starlight, but he didn't take no notice, and made no sign. I saw Mrs. Knightley look over at him too. It was the first time I ever seen him look hard when there was a woman in the case, and such a one! But he kept his face set and stern-like.

Then Moran breaks in—

'Expect, be blowed! What the——do you expect now we've got yer to rights; are we going to let you off after knocking over Daly? No dashed fear, mister, we'll serve you the same way as you served him, as soon as we've had some grub and another glass or two of your grog. You've got some fairish stuff here.'

'Why, Moran,' says Mr. Knightley, still making believe to joke—and, by George! if he could laugh then, he could sing a song with a bullet through him—'you're getting bad-tempered since you used to be horsebreaking for Mr. Lowe. Don't you remember that chestnut Sir Henry colt that no one else could ride, and I backed you not to get thrown, and won a fiver? But I'm a man of the world and know how to play a losing game at billiards as well as most men. Look here now! Daly's dead. We can't bring him to life again, can we? If you shoot me, you'll be nothing to the good, and have every spare man in the three colonies at your heels. This is a game of brag, though the stakes are high. I'll play a card. Listen. You shall have a hundred fivers—500 Pounds in notes—by to-morrow at four o'clock, if you'll let Mrs. Knightley and the doctor ride to Bathurst for the money. What do you say?'

'D—n you and your money too,' growled Moran. 'We'll have your blood, and nothing else. D'ye hear that? You're a dead man now; if you're not buried by this time to-morrow, it won't be because you're not as ready for it as Patsey is.'

I saw Mrs. Knightley turn round and clasp her hands; her face grew as white as death, but she said nothing, only looked over at Starlight, and her eyes grew bigger and bigger, while her mouth trembled just the least bit.

'You're off your head, Moran,' says Mr. Knightley, pulling out a cigar and lighting it. 'But I suppose you're the chief man, and all the rest must do as you tell them.'

'Suppose we talk it over,' says Starlight, very quiet, but I knew by the first word that he spoke something was coming. 'Daly dropped, and it can't be helped. Accidents will happen. If you play at bowls you must take rubbers. It has been a fair fight; no one can say otherwise. Let us put it to the vote. I propose that Mr. Knightley's offer be accepted. Not that I intend to take a shilling of the money.'

'Nor me either,' says I. 'So you three chaps will have it to share between you. I don't see that we can do better. A fight's a fight, and if Patsey got his gruel it might have happened to Mr. Knightley himself. As for shooting in cold blood, I'm not on, and so I tell you.'

'I suppose you think you and Starlight's going to boss the lot of us, because you've been doing it fine at the Turon races along with a lot of blasted swells as 'ud scrag us if they had the chance, and we're to take so much a head for our dashed lives, because we're only working chaps. Not if Dan Moran knows it. What we want is satisfaction—blood for blood—and we're a-goin' to have it, eh, mates?'

Wall and Hulbert hadn't said anything before this. They were not bad chaps underneath, but Moran was such a devil when he was raised that they didn't like to cross him. Besides, they had a down on Mr. Knightley, and wanted to sheet it home to him somehow. They had got to the brandy too, and it didn't make matters any better, you take my word for it.

Starlight didn't speak for a minute or two. I couldn't think what he was at. If Jim had been there we should have been right, three to three. Now we were two to three. I knew Starlight had a good card to play, and was ready to play it, but he was waiting on the deal. Mr. Knightley must have had some sort of notion of the hand; he was wonderful quick at picking up the points of the game.

He said nothing, and looked as cool as you please, smoking his cigar as if he had nothing on his mind and wanted a rest. The lady sat quite still and pale, but her beautiful eyes kept wandering round from one to another, like some pretty creature caught in a trap. Dr. Schiller found it hard lines on him to keep quiet all this time—he couldn't hold it in no longer.

'Good heafens!' he says, 'are you men, and will not say nodings when you haf such an ovver as dis? Subbose you shood us all, what then? Will not the whole coundry rice and hund you down like mat docks?'

'That won't make it any better for you, mate,' says Moran, with a grin. 'When you and he's lying under that old tree outside, it'll make no odds to yer whether our rope's a long or a short 'un.'

'Quite right, Moran,' says Mr. Knightley. 'Doctor, he has you there.'

Starlight moved a step or two over towards him, as if he was uncertain in his mind. Then he says to Wall and Hulbert—

'See here, men; you've heard what Moran says, and what I think. Which are you going to do? To help in a brutal, cowardly murder, and never be able to look a man in the face again, or to take this money to-morrow?—a hundred and seventy each in notes, mind, and get away quietly—or are you going to be led by Moran, and told what you are to do like children?'

'Oh come, Dan, let's take the stuff,' says Wall. 'I think it's good enough. What's the use of being contrary? I think the Captain's right. He knows a dashed sight more than us.'

'He be hanged!' says Moran, with eyes glaring and the whole of his face working like a man in a fit. 'He's no Captain of mine, and never was. I'll never stir from here till I have payment in blood for Daly's life. We may as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. I've sworn to have that man's life to-night, and have it I will.'

'You'll have ours first, you bloodthirsty, murdering dog,' says Starlight; and, as he spoke, he slipped his revolver into Mr. Knightley's hand, who covered Moran that moment. I drew mine, too, and had Wall under aim. Starlight's repeating rifle was up like lightning.

Mrs. Knightley covered her eyes, the old woman screamed, and the doctor sat down on a chair and puffed away at his meerschaum pipe.

'We're three to three, now,' says Starlight; 'you've only to move a finger and you're a dead man. Wall and Hulbert can have a hand in it if they haven't had shooting enough for one evening. Do your worst, you black-hearted brute! I've two minds to take you and run you in myself, if it's only to give you a lesson in manners.'

Moran's face grew as black as an ironbark tree after a bush fire. He raised his revolver, and in one second we should have been in the middle of a desperate hand-to-hand fight; and God knows how it might have ended hadn't Hulbert struck up his arm, and spoke out like a man.

'It's no use, Dan, we won't stand it. You're a dashed fool and want to spoil everything for a bit of temper. We'll take the notes and let Mrs. Knightley and the doctor clear out for Bathurst if you'll say honour bright that you'll be at the Black Stump by to-morrow evening at five, and won't give the police the office.'

Moran, slow and sulkily, put down his hand and glared round like a dingo with the dogs round him—as if he didn't know which to snap at first. Then he looked at Mr. Knightley with a look of hellish rage and spite that ten devils couldn't have improved upon, and, throwing himself down on a chair, drank off half a tumbler of brandy.

'Settle it amongst yourselves, and be——to you,' he said. 'You're all agin me now; but, by——, I'll be square with some of ye yet.'

It was all over now. Mr. Knightley took a match out of the silver match-box at his watch-chain, and lit another cigar. I saw the tears trickling through Mrs. Knightley's fingers. Then she turned away her head, and after a minute or two was as calm and quiet as ever.

'You know your way about the place, Wall,' says Mr. Knightley, as if he was in his own house, just the same as usual; 'run up the horses, there's a good fellow; they're in the little horse paddock. Mrs. Knightley's is a gray, and the doctor's is a mouse-coloured mare with a short tail; you can't mistake them. The sooner they're off the sooner you'll handle the cash.'

Wall looked rather amused, but went out, and we heard him rattle off to go round the paddock. The doctor went upstairs, and buckled on a long-necked pair of old-fashioned spurs, and Mrs. Knightley walked away like a woman in a dream to her own room, and soon afterwards returned in her riding-habit and hat.

I foraged about and found the side-saddle and bridle in the harness-room. Everything was in tip-top order there—glass sides for keeping the dust off the four-in-hand harness and all that kind of thing. All the bits and stirrup-irons like silver. There wasn't much time lost in saddling-up, you bet!

We watched pretty close lest Moran should take a new fancy into his head, but he stuck to the brandy bottle, and very soon put himself from fighting or anything else. I wasn't sorry to see it. I was well aware he was as treacherous as a dingo, and could sham dead or anything else to gain his ends and throw people off their guards.

Well, the horses were brought out, and when Mr. Knightley lifted his wife up on to her saddle on the high-crested gray thoroughbred with a dash of Arab blood from an old Satellite strain, I guess he was never better pleased with anything in the world. They looked in each other's eyes for a minute, and then the old horse started off along the road to Bathurst with his fast, springy walk. Starlight took off his hat and bowed low in the most respectful way. Mrs. Knightley turned in her saddle and tried to say something, but the words wouldn't come—she could only wave her hand—and then her head went down nearly to her saddle. The doctor scrambled on to his horse's back, and trotted off after her. The gray moved off, shaking his head, at a beautiful, easy, springy canter. We raised a cheer, and they swept round a corner of the road and out of sight.

'You'll find these rather good, Captain,' says Mr. Knightley, handing Starlight his cigar-case. 'There's a box upstairs in my dressing-room. If you'll allow me I'll order in dinner. There ought to be something decent if my old cook hasn't been frightened out of his life, but I think he has seen too much to be put out of his way by a little shooting.'

'Now I think of it,' says Starlight, 'I do really feel disposed for refreshment. I say, Wall, see if you can't get that ferocious friend of yours into a room where he can sleep off his liquor. I really must apologise for his bad manners; but you see how the case stands.'

'Perfectly, my dear fellow,' says Mr. Knightley. 'Don't mention it. I shall always feel personally indebted to you for far more than I can express. But let that pass for the present. What shall we do to pass the evening? You play picquet and hazard, of course?'

'Do I not,' says Starlight, his eyes lighting up in a way I didn't remember. 'It's many a day since I've met with any one near my old form.'

'Then suppose we have a game or two,' says Mr. Knightley, 'after dinner or supper, whichever we choose to call it. I have cards; they luckily came up the other day. In the meantime you will find the claret very fair, and this cold wild turkey—I shot a brace last Thursday—is not to be despised.'

We had a rattling good feed, and no mistake, whatever it was. The turkey was a grand bird, and weighed 21 lb., he told us. The cook had sent in some hot potatoes, and chaps like us that had been riding, walking, and fighting for twenty hours right on end had just the sort of appetite that a bird of that kind deserved. He was as fat as butter, too. They feed on dandelion seeds at that time of the year. It gives 'em a sort of gamy flavour such as no other bird, wild or tame, has. To my liking the wild turkey beats the black duck even. He's the best game bird that flies in the bush.

Mr. Knightley, too, now his wife was safe on her way to Bathurst, and things seemed going well, was full of fun, and kept us all going. He helped everybody twice over, and wouldn't hear of any one keeping the bottle standing. The night was close rather, and we were all that thirsty it went down like mother's milk. Wall and Hulbert got pleasant enough and joined in, now that Moran was out of the way. He was snoring in a back room, and, like a man in the deadhouse of a bush shanty, not likely to wake before sunrise. Mr. Knightley told us some out-and-out good yarns, and Hulbert and Wall swore that if they'd known he was such a good sort they'd never have thought of sticking up the place. He said he had been quite mistaken about them, and that another time he should know better than to volunteer for work that was not part of his duty. By that time the claret had gone round pretty often; and without being screwed we'd all had our tongues loosened a bit.

After that we lit our pipes, and we three began to play all-fours and euchre, sometimes one pair, sometimes another. As for Mr. Knightley and Starlight, they got out a curious filigree sort of a little card-table and began to play some outlandish game that I didn't know, and to look very serious over it.

They had notes for counters, and I could see, as I looked over every now and then, that each man was doing all he knew to best the other. Sometimes one had the show; sometimes the other. We got tired and had another smoke and turned in. The beds were snug and comfortable. Mr. Knightley showed us where to go, and we wanted a good night's rest bad enough.

Just before I turned in I went up to the table. They looked as keen at it as if they'd just began, and I heard Starlight say, 'I owe you a hundred now. I'll play you double or quits.' So I left them to it. I could see they were not on for bed just then. Both men were cool enough, but I could see that Starlight (and I'd never known him to touch a card before) was one of those men that would never rise from the table as long as he had a shilling left, and would stake everything he had in the world upon the turn of a card.

We all slept sound, but most of us were up at sunrise. It doesn't do for chaps in our line to be caught napping, and the police might have got wind where we were at work. We had our horses to look to, and to give a look round in a general way to see if things were right.

Starlight and Mr. Knightley didn't turn out, they took it easy, perhaps they'd been up later than us; anyhow, they didn't show till breakfast, when they both made pretty fair time over the eatables.

My word! it was a breakfast, though we'd got a bit tired waiting for it. The old cook had hashed up the turkey; it was stunning, almost better than the day before. Then bacon and eggs, grilled steak, fresh bread and butter, coffee and tea, watercresses. Really, I thought we never should stop. It was lucky the police didn't come, or we shouldn't have done much in the fighting line, or the runaway either. As it turned out, Sir Ferdinand wasn't so very far off the line, but he took another road. He never had any luck somehow in following us up, though he had some first-rate chances. Moran was off his feed, and wouldn't come in. He took a nip and walked down to the creek. We were all glad enough to get shut of him.

After breakfast and a turn round the stables, blest if Starlight and Mr. Knightley didn't have out the cards again, and at it they went as fresh and keen as ever. We didn't know what in the world to do with ourselves till it was time to start to ride out to the Black Stump, where we were to meet the doctor and collar the 500 Pounds. They didn't waste a minute of their time, till about half-past twelve Starlight puts down his cards very gently, and says he—

'I'm afraid we have no more time to spare. I've enjoyed the play more than I have done anything for years. I leave you 100 Pounds now in notes, and you must take my I O U for the balance. What bank shall I pay it into?'

'The Australian,' says Mr. Knightley. 'At your convenience, of course.'

'Within a month,' says Starlight, bowing. 'And now a glass of wine and a biscuit, it's time to be off.'

We had something as good, nearer the mark than that, and Moran sat down too, and played a good knife and fork. He'd come to, after his booze, and was ready for any fresh villainy, as usual. He didn't let on to be nasty, but he looked sulky enough, and I saw his eye fixed on Mr. Knightley and Starlight now and then as if he'd have given a good deal to have had them where they hadn't so many at their backs.



Chapter 46



We ate well and drank better still at the lunch, although we had such a regular tuck-out at breakfast time. Mr. Knightley wouldn't hear of any of us shirking our liquor, and by the time we'd done all hands were pretty well on. Moran himself began to look pleasant, or as good a sample of it as I'd ever seen in him. Mr. Knightley could get round the devil himself, I believe. I never saw his equals at that business; and this particular time he was in great feather, seeing that he was likely to get out of an ugly business all right. He was as sure of the 500 Pounds in notes being there at the appointed hour as he was of the sun setting that particular evening.

'I think it's a fair thing,' says Starlight at last, looking at his watch. Mr. Knightley wasn't the first to speak, no fear. 'Take us all our time to get to the Black Stump. We shall have to ride, too.' Moran and Wall got up and fetched their horses. Mr. Knightley's was led up by one of his men. He was a big handsome roan, in top condition, and the man was riding a black horse with a tan muzzle that looked a trifle better, if anything. Mr. Knightley turned out in boots and breeches, with a gold fox's head on his scarf, swell hunting fashion, as they do it at home, Starlight said.

When Starlight's horse came up he was as lame as a tree, couldn't put his foot to the ground; got a kick or a strain, or trod on a glass bottle or something. Anyhow he had only three legs that he could rise a move out of. Starlight looked rather glum. He wasn't his second best or his third best either. All the same, a horse is a horse, and I never saw the man yet that a lame horse didn't put out a bit.

'Confound it,' says he, 'what a nuisance! It's just the way with these infernal half-bred brutes; they always let me down at the wrong time.'

'Look here, old fellow,' says Mr. Knightley, 'leave him behind and take this black horse the boy's on; he's one of the finest hacks you ever crossed. I refused sixty guineas for him the other day from Morringer.'

'Thanks, very much,' says Starlight, brightening up a bit; 'but I hardly like to deprive you of him. Won't you want him yourself?'

'Oh, I can manage without him,' says Mr. Knightley. 'I'll let you have him for fifty and allow you ten pounds for your screw. You can add it on to your I O U, and pay it in with the other.'

We all laughed at this, and Moran said if he was dealing with Mr. Knightley he'd get him a pound or two cheaper. But Starlight said, very serious-like, that the arrangement would suit him very well. So he had his saddle shifted, and the groom led back the bay and turned him loose in the paddock.

We mounted then, and it looked as if we were all matched for a race to the Black Stump. Moran had a good horse, and when he set him going in the first bit of thick timber we came to, it took a man, I tell you, to keep him in sight. Starlight made the black horse hit out in a way that must have been a trifle strange to him unless he'd been in training lately. As for Mr. Knightley, he took it easy and sailed away on one side with Joe Wall and me. He played it out cool to the last, and wasn't going to hurry himself for anybody.

Half-an-hour before sundown we rode up to the Black Stump. It was a rum-looking spot, but everybody knew it for miles round. There was nothing like it anywhere handy. It was within a reasonable distance of Bathurst, and not so far from a place we could make to, where there was good shelter and hiding too, if we were pushed.

There were two or three roads led up to it, and crossed there—one from Bathurst, one to Turon, and another straight into the forest country, which led range by range to Nulla Mountain. We could see on a good way ahead, and, though there was no one at the tree when we came, a single horseman was riding along the road for Bathurst. We all drew rein round the stump. It had been a tremendous big old ironbark tree—nobody knew how old, but it had had its top blown off in a thunderstorm, and the carriers had lighted so many fires against the roots of it that it had been killed at last, and the sides were as black as a steamer's funnel. After a bit we could make out the doctor's short-tailed, mousy mare and him powdering along at a sort of hand gallop.

When he came up close, he took off his hat and made a bow. 'Chentlemen of the roat, I salude you,' he says. 'You haf kebt your bromise to the letter, and you will fint that Albert von Schiller has kept his. Hauptman!' says he to Starlight, 'I delifer to you the ransom of dies wothy chentleman and his most excellend and hoch-besahltes laty, who has much recovered from her fadigues, and I demant his freetom.'

'Well done, most trust-repaying and not-ever-to-be-entirely-forgotten herald,' says Starlight. 'I hand over to these worthy free companions the frank-geld; isn't that the term?—and when they have counted it (for they won't take your word or mine), the Graf here—most high-born and high-beseeming, but uncommonly-near-ending his glorious career magnate—will be restored to you. Very pleasant company we've found him. I should like to have my revenge at picquet, that's all.'

While this was going on Starlight had collared the bundle of notes from the doctor, and chucked it over quite careless-like to Moran. 'There it is for you,' says he. 'You can divide it between you. Dick and I stand out this time; and you can't say you've done badly.'

Moran didn't say anything, but he and Wall got off their horses and sat down on their heels—native fashion. Then they turned to, counting out the notes one by one. They were all fivers—so it took some time—as they neither of 'em weren't very smart at figures, and after they'd got out twenty or thirty they'd get boxed, like a new hand counting sheep, and have to begin all over again. It must have been aggravating to Mr. Knightley, and he was waiting to be let go, in a manner of speaking. He never showed it, but kept smoking and yarning with Starlight, pointing out how grand the sun was just a-setting on the Bulga Mountains—just for all the world as if he'd given a picnic, and was making himself pleasant to the people that stayed longest.

At long last they'd got to the end of the conning, and divided the notes. Moran tied his up in a bunch, and rolled 'em in his poncho; but Wall crammed his into his pocket and made 'em all stick out like a boy that's been stealing apples. When they mounted their horses, Mr. Knightley shook hands with me and Starlight. Then he turns round to Moran and Wall—'We're parting good friends after all's said and done,' he says. 'Just as well matters have been settled this way. Come, now, in cool blood, ain't you rather glad, Moran?'

'Dashed if I know,' growls he. 'All I know is, you're deuced well out of it; your luck mayn't be so good another time.'

'Nor yours either, my friend,' says Mr. Knightley, drawing up his bridle-rein. 'I had only a snap-shot at you when that bullet went through your poncho, or you'd be lying alongside of Daly. However, I needn't waste my breath talking to that brute,' he says to Starlight. 'I know well all I owe to you and Dick Marston here. Some day I may repay it.'

'You mean what I owe you,' says Starlight, turning it off with a laugh. 'Never fear, you'll find that paid to your credit in the bank. We have agents in all sorts of places. Good-bye, and a safe ride home. My respectful compliments to Mrs. Knightley. Perhaps you'd better follow the doctor now.' The old gentleman had got tired waiting, and ridden on slow and easy.

Two or three weeks after, Starlight and I were taking a ride towards the Bogan Road, not that we was on for anything particular, but just having a turn round for want of something else to do, when we saw a big mob of cattle coming along, with three or four stock-riders behind 'em. Then we met a loaded dray and team in front, that had rations and swags and a tent. The driver asked us if we knew a good place to camp. He was a talking sort of chap, and we yarned away with him for a bit. He told us how the boss was behind in a dogcart and tandem, with two led horses besides. The cattle were going to take up a new run he'd bought on the Lower Bogan, an out-and-out wild place; but he'd got the country cheap, and thought it would pay in the end. He was going ahead after a stage or two, but just now he was camping with them.

'My word, he's well in, is the cove,' says the horse-driver; 'he's got half-a-dozen stations besides this one. He'll be one of the richest men in Australia yet.'

After we saw the cattle (about a thousand head) we thought it would be a middling day's work to 'stick up' the cove and put him through. Going to form a new station, he'd very like have cash about, as he'd have to pay for a lot of things on the nail just at first. If he was such a swell too, he'd have a gold watch and perhaps a few more trifles. Anyhow, he was good for the day's expenses, and we thought we'd try it on.

So we passed the cattle and rode quietly along the road till we saw his dogcart coming; then we stopped inside a yarran scrub, just as he came by—a square-built man he seemed to be, muffled up in a big rough coat. It was a cool morning. We rode up sharpish, and showed our revolvers, singing out to him to 'bail up'. He pulled up quick and stared at us. So we did at him. Then the three of us burst out laughing—regular roared again.

Who should it be but old George Storefield.

'Well, this is a prime joke,' says he. 'I knew you were out somewhere on this road; but I never thought I should live to be stuck up by you, Dick Marston.'

I looked foolish. It was rather a stunner when you come to think of it.

'I beg a thousand pardons,' says Starlight. 'Ridiculous mistake. Want of something to occupy our time. "For Satan finds some mischief still," etc. Isn't that the way the hymn runs? Wonderfully true, isn't it? You'll accept our apologies, Mr. Storefield, I trust. Poor Dick here will never get over it.'

'How was I to know? Why, George, old man, we thought it was the Governor turned squatter, or old Billy Wentworth himself. Your trade pays better than ours, let alone being on the square. Well, shake hands; we'll be off. You won't tell the girls, there's a good fellow, will you?'

'I can't promise,' says old George; 'it's too good a joke.' Here he laughed a good one. 'It isn't often a man gets stuck up by his friends like this. Tell you what; come and have some lunch, and we'll talk it over.'

His man rode up then with the spare horse. Luckily, he was a good way behind, as fellows will keep when they're following a trap, so that they can't be any good when they're wanted. In this case it was just as well. He hadn't seen anything.

'Hobble the horses out and put on their nose-bags, Williams,' says he, 'and then get out the lunch. Put the things under that tree.'

They took out the horses, and the chap got out a basket with cold beef and bread and half a tongue and a bottle of good whisky and water-bag.

We sat down on the grass, and as we'd been riding since sunrise we did pretty well in the feed line, and had a regular good bit of fun. I never thought old George had so much go in him; but good times had made him twice the man he used to be.

After a bit he sends the groom down to the Cowall to water the horses, and, says he—

'Captain, you'd better come and manage Willaroon down there, with Dick for stockman. There's a fortune in it, and it's a good way off yet. Nobody would think of looking for you there. You're a new chum, just out from home, you know. Plenty of spare country. I'll send you some cattle to start you on a new run after a bit.'

'If we could throw our past behind us, I'd do it, and thank God on my knees,' said Starlight. 'It would make me almost a happy man again. But why think of that or any other honest life in this colony now? We've debarred ourselves from it now and for ever. Our only hope is in another land—America—if we can get away. We shan't be long here now; we're both sick of this accursed work.'

'The sooner the better,' says George, taking his hand and giving it a hearty grip. 'And, look here, you work your way quietly down to Willaroon. That's my place, and I'll give you a line across to the Queensland border. From there you can get over to Townsville, and it's easy to sail from there to the islands or any port out of reach of harm from here.'

'We'll tackle it next month if we're alive,' says I. So we parted.

Not long after this we got a letter from Jim. He'd heard all about the way to do it from a man he'd met in Melbourne that had worked his way down overland from the North. He said once you were there, or near there, there was little or no chance of being interfered with. Jeanie was always in a fright every day Jim went away lest he might be taken and not let come back. So she was always keeping him up to the mark, making him inquire here and look out there until he got a bit of information which told him what he wanted.

This man that worked in the store with him was a fast sort of card, who had been mate of a brig cruising all about and back to Sydney with sandalwood, beche-de-mer, and what they call island trade.

Well, the captain of the craft, who was part owner, had settled in his mind that he'd trade regular with San Francisco now, and touch at Honolulu going and coming. He was to be back at Gladstone in about three months, and then start for California straight away.

This was the very thing, just made to suit us all to pieces. If we could make out to one of the Queensland northern ports it would be easy enough to ship under different names. Once in America, we'd be in a new world, and there'd be nothing to stop us from leading a new life.



Chapter 47



When we got the notion into our heads, we set to work to carry it out. We didn't want to leave Aileen and mother behind. So it was settled that I was to go over and see them, and try and persuade them to go down to Melbourne and stop with Jeanie after Jim had started.

Then, if we all got safe over to San Francisco, Jeanie and they could come over by the first ship that sailed. There was no down upon them, so they could do anything they liked. The main thing was to get Jim off safe and me and Starlight. After that the rest might come along when they pleased. As for dad, he was to take his own road; to go and stay as he chose. It wasn't much use trying to make him do anything else. But he was more like to stop at the old Hollow than anywhere else. It wouldn't have seemed home to him anywhere else, even where he was born, I believe.

The first thing of all was to go to the old place and see mother and Aileen. They were both back at the old cottage, and were a bit more comfortable now. George Storefield had married a lady—a real lady, as Aileen said—and, though she was a nice, good-tempered young woman as ever was, Aileen, of course, wouldn't stay there any longer. She thought home was the best place after all.

We took a couple of days figuring it out at the Hollow. Starlight had a map, and we plotted it out, and marked all the stages which could be safely made—went over all the back tracks and cross-country lines; some we had travelled before, and others of which we knew pretty well from hearsay.

After we'd got all this cut and dry, I started away one beautiful sunshiny morning to ride over to Rocky Flat. I remember the day as well as yesterday, because I took notice of it at the time, and had better cause to remember it before all was over. Everything looked so lovely as I began to clear the foot hills of Nulla Mountain. The birds seemed to chirp and whistle gayer than they ever did before. The dewdrops on the grass and all the twigs and shoots of the trees looked as if it was covered with diamonds and rubies as the sun began to shine and melt some of them. My horse stepped along limber and free. 'O Lord,' I says to myself out aloud, 'what a happy cove I might be if I could start fresh—knowing what I know—and not having all these things against me!'

When I got on to the tableland above Rocky Flat I took a good look at the whole place. Everything was as quiet and peaceful as if nothing had ever happened within miles of it—as if I hadn't had Goring's handcuffs on me—as if Jim hadn't had the bullets whistling round him, and risked his life on an unbridled horse—as if the four dead men had not lain staring up to the sky in the gully up yonder for days before they were found and buried.

But now it looked as if only two or three people had ever been there from the beginning of the world. The wild ducks swam and splashed in the little waterhole above the house. Two or three of the cows were walking down to the creek, as quiet and peaceable as you please. There was some poultry at the back, and the little garden was done up that nicely as it hadn't been for many a day.

After I'd pretty well settled in my own mind that there was no one anext or anigh the old place, I drew up by degrees, bit by bit, and sneaked across the creek. I was just making for the barn when I saw two horsemen pop up sudden round the back of the house and ride towards the front gate. I saw with half an eye they were Sir Ferdinand Morringer and a trooper.

Lucky for me they were looking up the gully instead of my way, and, though my heart nearly stood still, I rode as hard as I could lick for the gate of the barn, which was betwixt me and them. They never looked round. They were too much taken up with watching the spot where Hagan and his lot were found. I had just time to chevy straight into the barn and pull off my saddle and bridle and hide under the hay when they shifted full towards where I'd been and then hung up their horses. The trooper tied his to a dead branch of a tree, and then went moving about. I was mortally afraid of his stumbling against something and spoiling the whole affair.

It seems Sir Ferdinand had never given up the notion of our turning up at Rocky Flat some day or other; so he used to take a turn himself that way every now and again on the chance, and a very good chance it nearly turned out to be. Besides this, it seems since he'd heard of her being at the ball at Turon he'd taken a great fancy to Aileen, and used to talk to her as much as she'd let him, when she was at George Storefield's and any other place where he met her. He wouldn't have had much chance of saying the second word, only he was a good-natured, amusing sort, and always as respectful to her as if she'd been a lady. Besides, Aileen had a kind of fancy that it might make things no worse for us if she was civil to him. Any way, she thought, as women will do, that she might get something out of him perhaps once in a way that would be of use to us. I don't believe as it would make a scrap of difference one way or the other. And, like people who try to be too clever, she was pretty near being caught in her own trap this time. Not that I blame the poor thing, she did all for the best, and would have given the eyes out of her head, I believe, to have done us real good, and seen us clear of all our troubles.

Well, she brings a chair out on the verandah, and Sir Ferdinand he sat down on a bench there for half-an-hour, talking away and laughing, just as gentlemen will to pretty girls, no matter who they are. And I could see Aileen look up and laugh now and then, pleased like. She couldn't help it. And there was I stuck in the confounded barn among the straw all the time looking out through one of the cracks and wondering if he was ever going to clear out. Sometimes I thought the trooper, who was getting tired of dodging about doing nothing, couldn't be off seeing my horse's tracks leading slap into the barn door. But he was thinking of something else, or else wasn't much in the tracking line. Some men would see a whole army of fresh tracks, as plain as print, right under their noses and wouldn't drop down to anything.

However, last of all I saw him unhitch his horse and take the bridle on his arm, and then Aileen put on her hat and walked up to the top of the ridge along the stony track with him. Then I saw him mount and start off at a rattling good bat along the road to Turon and the trooper after him. I felt all right again then, and watched Aileen come slowly down the road again with her head down, quite thoughtful like, very different from the way she went up. She didn't stop at the house, but walked straight down to the barn and came in at the door. I wondered what she would do when she saw my horse. But she didn't start, only said—

'You may come out now, Dick; I knew you were here. I saw you ride in just as Sir Ferdinand and the trooper came up.'

'So that's why you were making yourself so pleasant,' says I laughingly. 'I mustn't tell Starlight, I suppose, or we shall be having a new yarn in the newspapers—"Duel between Sir Ferdinand Morringer and Captain Starlight."'

She laughed too, and then looked sad and serious like again.

'I wonder if we shall ever have an end to this wretched hide-and-seek work. God knows I would do anything that an honest girl could do for you boys and him, but it sometimes looks dark enough, and I have dreadful fears that all will be in vain, and that we are fated to death and ruin at the end.'

'Come, come, don't break down before the time,' I said. 'It's been a close shave, though; but Sir Ferdinand won't be back for a bit, so we may as well take it easy. I've got a lot to say to you.'

'He said he wouldn't be back this way till Friday week,' says she. 'He has an escort to see to then, and he expected to be at Stony Creek in a couple of hours from this. He'll have to ride for it.'

We walked over to the house. Neither of us said anything for a bit. Mother was sitting in her old chair by the fire knitting. Many a good pair of woollen socks she'd sent us, and many's the time we'd had call to bless her and her knitting—as we sat our horses, night after night, in a perishing frost, or when the rain set in that run of wet winters we had, when we'd hardly a dry stitch on us by the week together, when we had enough of them and the neck wrappers, I expect plenty of others round about were glad to get 'em. It was partly for good nature, for mother was always a kind-hearted poor soul as ever was, and would give away the shoes off her feet—like most Irish people I've met—to any one that wanted them worse than herself, and partly for the ease it gave her mind to be always doing something steady like. Mother hadn't book-learning, and didn't always understand the things Aileen read to her. She was getting too old to do much in the house now. But her eyes were wonderful good still, and this knitting was about the greatest pleasure she had left in the world. If anything had happened to stop her from going on with that, I don't believe she would have lived a month.

Her poor old face brightened up when she seen me, and for a few minutes you'd have said no thought of trouble could come anigh her. Then the tears rolled down her cheeks, and I could see her lips moving, though she did not speak the words. I knew what she was doing, and if that could have kept us right we'd never have gone wrong in the world. But it was to be, I suppose.

Mother was a deal older-looking, and couldn't move about as well as she did. Aileen said she'd often sit out in the sun for an hour together and watch her walking up the garden, or putting up the calves, and carrying in the water from the creek, and say nothing. Sometimes she thought her mind was going a bit, and then again she'd seem as sensible as ever she was. To-day, after a bit, she came round and talked more and asked about the neighbours, seemed more curious like, than she'd done, Aileen said, for many a long day.

'You must have something to eat, Dick,' says Aileen; 'it's a long ride from—from where we know—and what with one thing and another I daresay you've an appetite. Let me see what there is. Mrs. Storefield sent us over a quarter of veal from the farm yesterday, and we've plenty of bacon of our own. Mother and I live half our time on it and the eggs. I'm making quite a fortune by the butter lately. These diggings are wonderful places to send up the price of everything we can grow.'

So she got out the frying-pan, and she and I and mother had some veal chops, with a slice or two of bacon to give it a flavour. My word! they were good after a forty-mile ride, and we'd had nothing but corned beef in the Hollow lately. Fresh butter and milk too; it was a treat. We had cows enough at the Hollow, but we didn't bother ourselves milking; bread and beef and tea, with a glass of grog now and then, was the general run of our grub.

We had a talk about the merry time at the Turon races, and Aileen laughed in spite of herself at the thought of Starlight walking down the ballroom to be introduced to her, and being taken up to all the swell people of the place. 'He looked grander than any of them, to my fancy,' said she; 'and oh! what a cruel shame it seems that he should ever have done what keeps him from going among his equals as he was born to do. Then I should never have seen him, I suppose, and a thousand times better too. I'd give up every hope of seeing him again in this world, God knows how cheerfully, if it would serve him or help his escape.'

'I'm down here now to see you about the same escape,' I said; and then I told her about Jim's letter, and what he said about the mate of the ship. She listened for a good while patiently, with her hand in mine, like we used to sit in old days, when we were young and happy and alive—alive, not dead men and women walking about and making believe to live. So I told her how we made it up to meet somewhere near the Queensland border. Jim to come up the Murray from Melbourne, and so on to the Darling, and we to make across for the Lower Bogan. If we could carry this out all right—and it looked pretty likely—the rest of the game would be easy; and once on blue water—O my God, what new creatures we should all be!

Aileen threw her arms round my neck and sobbed and cried like a child; she couldn't speak for a bit, and when she looked up her eyes seemed to have a different kind of look in them—a far-away, dreamy sort of light from what I'd ever noticed in them.

'It may come about,' she said, 'Dick. I've prayed whole nights through and vowed my life to the Blessed Virgin. She may accept the service of my years that are to come. It may be permitted after all the sins of our people.'

After this she dried her eyes and went to her room for a bit, while I had a quiet, easy sort of talk with mother, she saying a word or two now and then, and looking at me most of the time, as if that was enough without talking.

Then Aileen came out of her room with her habit and hat on. 'Run up my horse, Dick,' she says, 'and I'll take you over to see George Storefield's new place. A ride will do me good, and I daresay you're not tired.'

I caught her horse and saddled him for her, and off we went down the old track we knew so well all our lives.

I told her all about our lark with old George, and how good he'd been through it all; besides promising to give us a lift through his country when we made the grand start. She said it was just like him—that he was the kindest soul in the world, and the most thoughtful. The new Mrs. Storefield had been very civil and friendly to her, and told her she knew George's feeling towards her, and respected it. But Aileen never could feel at home in the grand new house now, and only would go to see old Mrs. Storefield, who still lived in the family cottage, and found it the best suited to her. So we yarned away till we got in sight of the place. When I saw the new two-story stone house I was regular struck all of a heap.

Old George had got on in the world and no mistake. He'd worked early and late, always been as steady as a rock, and had looked ahead instead of taking his pleasure straight off when he got the first few hundred pounds together. He'd seen fat cattle must be dear and scarce for years to come. Noticed, too, that however cheap a far-away bit of country was held, sometimes bought for 200 or 300 Pounds, it always rose in value year by year. So with store cattle. Now and again they'd fall to nothing. Then he'd buy a whole lot of poor milkers' calves about Burrangong, or some of those thick places where they never fattened, for 1 Pound a head or less, and send them away to his runs in the Lachlan. In six months you wouldn't know 'em. They'd come down well-grown fat cattle in a year or two, and be worth their 6 or 8 Pounds a head.

The same way with land; he bought up all the little bits of allotments with cottages on them round Paramatta and Windsor way and Campbelltown—all them old-fashioned sleepy old places near Sydney, for cash, and cheap enough. The people that had them, and had lived a pokey life in them for many a year, wanted the money to go to the diggings with, and quite right too. Still, and all this land was rising in value, and George's children, if he had any, would be among the richest people in the colony.

After he'd married Miss Oldham—they were Hawkesbury people, her grandfather, old Captain Oldham, was one of the officers in the first regiment that came out—he didn't see why he shouldn't have as good a house as any one else. So he had a gentleman up from Sydney that drew plans, and he had a real stone house built, with rooms upstairs, and furniture to match, a new garden, and a glass house at the side, for all the world like some of them grand places in Darling Point, near Sydney.

Aileen wouldn't go in, and you may be sure I didn't want to, but we rode all round the place, a little way off, and had a real good look at everything. There wasn't a gentleman in the country had better outbuildings of all sorts. It was a real tip-top place, good enough for the Governor himself if he came to live up the country. All the old fencing had been knocked down, and new railings and everything put up. Some of the scraggy trees had been cleared away, and all the dead wood burned. I never thought the old place could have showed out the way it did. But money can do a lot. It ain't everything in this world. But there's precious little it won't get you, and things must be very bad it won't mend. A man must have very little sense if he don't see as he gets older that character and money are the two things he's got to be carefullest of in this world. If he's not particular to a shade about either or both of 'em, he'll find his mistake.

After we'd had a good look round and seen the good well-bred stock in the paddocks, the growing crops all looking first-rate, everything well fed and hearty, showing there was no stint of grub for anything, man or beast, we rode away from the big house entrance and came opposite the slip-rails on the flat that led to the old cottage.

'Wouldn't you like to go in just for a minute, Dick?' says Aileen.

I knew what she was thinking of.

I was half a mind not, but then something seemed to draw me, and I was off my horse and had the slip-rail down before I knew where I was.

We rode up to the porch just outside the verandah where George's father had planted the creeping roses; big clusters of bloom they used to have on 'em when I was a boy. He showed 'em to me, I remember, and said what fine climbers they were. Now they were all over the porch, and the verandah, and the roof of the cottage, all among the shingles. But Mrs. Storefield wouldn't have 'em cut because her old man had planted 'em. She came out to see us.

'Well, Ailie, child,' says she, 'come along in, don't sit there on your horse. Who's this you've got with you? Oh! it's you, Dick, is it? My eyes ain't as good as they were. Well, come along in too. You're on the wrong road, and worse 'll come of it. But come along in, I'm not going to be the one to hunt you. I remember old times when you were a little toddling chap, as bold as a lion, and no one dreamt you'd grow up to be the wild chap you are. Gracey's inside, I think. She's as big a fool about ye as ever.'

I very near broke down at this. I could stand hard usage, and send back as good as I got; but this good old woman, that had no call to think anything of me, but that I'd spoiled her daughter's chance of marrying well and respectably—when she talked to me this way, I came close up to making a fool of myself.

We walked in. Gracey was sewing away in the little parlour, where there always used to be a nosegay when I was a boy, and it was that clean and neat I was afraid to go into it, and never easy till I got out again. There she sat as sober-looking and steady as if she'd been there for five years, and meant to be for five years more. She wasn't thinking of anybody coming, but when she looked up and saw me her face changed all of a sudden, and she jumped up and dropped her work on the floor.

'Why, whatever brings you here, Dick?' she said. 'Don't you know it's terribly dangerous? Sir Ferdinand is always about here now. He stayed at George's new house last night. Wasn't he at Rocky Flat to-day?'

'Yes, but he won't be back for a week. He told Aileen here he wouldn't.' Here I looked at them both.

'Aileen's carrying on quite a flirtation with Sir Ferdinand,' says Gracey. 'I don't know what some one else would say if he saw everything.'

'Doesn't he talk to any one when he comes here, or make himself pleasant?' I said. 'Perhaps there's more than one in the game.'

'Perhaps there is,' says Gracey; 'but he thinks, I believe, that he can get something out of us girls about you and your goings on, and where you plant; and we think we're quite as clever as he is, and might learn something useful too. So that's how the matter lies at present. Are you going to be jealous?'

'Not a bit in the world,' I said, 'even if I had the right. I'll back you two, as simple as you look, against any inspector of police from here to South Australia.'

After this we began to talk about other things, and I told Gracey all about our plans and intentions. She listened very quiet and steady to it all, and then she said she thought something might come of it. Anyhow, she would go whenever I sent for her to come, no matter where.

'What I've said to you, Dick, I've said for good and all. It may be in a month or two, or it may be years and years. But whenever the time comes, and we have a chance, a reasonable chance, of living peaceably and happily, you may depend upon my keeping my word if I'm alive.'

We three had a little more talk together, and Aileen and I mounted and rode home.

It was getting on dusk when we started. They wanted us to stop, but I daren't do it. It was none too safe as it was, and it didn't do to throw a chance away. Besides, I didn't want to be seen hanging about George's place. There was nobody likely to know about Aileen and me riding up together and stopping half-an-hour; but if it came to spending the evening, there was no saying who might have ears and eyes open. At home I could have my horse ready at a minute's warning, and be off like a shot at the first whisper of danger.

So off we went. We didn't ride very fast back. It was many a day since we had ridden over that ground together side by side. It might be many a day, years perhaps, before we did the same thing again. Perhaps never! Who was to know? In the risks of a life like mine, I might never come back—never set eyes again upon the sister that would have given her life for mine! Never watch the stars glitter through the forest-oak branches, or hear the little creek ripple over the slate bar as it did to-night.



Chapter 48



We rode along the old track very quiet, talking about old times—or mostly saying nothing, thinking our own thoughts. Something seemed to put it into my head to watch every turn in the track—every tree and bush by the roadside—every sound in the air—every star in the sky. Aileen rode along at last with her head drooped down as if she hadn't the heart to hold it up. How hard it must have seemed to her to think she didn't dare even to ride with her own brother in the light of day without starting at every bush that stirred—at every footstep, horse or man, that fell on her ear!

There wasn't a breath of air that night. Not a leaf stirred—not a bough moved of all the trees in the forest that we rode through. A 'possum might chatter or a night-owl cry out, but there wasn't any other sound, except the ripple of the creek over the stones, that got louder and clearer as we got nearer Rocky Flat. There was nothing like a cloud in the sky even. It wasn't an over light night, but the stars shone out like so many fireballs, and it was that silent any one could almost have fancied they heard the people talking in the house we left, though it was miles away.

'I sometimes wonder,' Aileen says, at last, raising up her head, 'if I had been a man whether I should have done the same things you and Jim have, or whether I should have lived honestly and worked steadily like George over there. I think I should have done so, I really do; that nothing would have tempted me to take what was not my own—or to—to—do other things. I don't think it is in my nature somehow.'

'I don't say as you would, Ailie,' I put in; 'but there's many things to be thought of when you come to reckon what a boy sees, and how he's brought up in the bush. It's different with girls—though I've known some of them that were no great shakes either, and middling handy among the clearskins too.'

'It's hard to say,' she went on, more as if she was talking to herself than to me; 'I feel that. Bad example—love of pleasure—strong temptation—evil company—all these are heavy weights to drag down men's souls to hell. Who knows whether I should have been better than the thousands, the millions, that have fallen, that have taken the broad road that leads to destruction. Oh! how dreadful it seems to think that when once a man has sinned in some ways in this world there's no turning back—no hope—no mercy—only long bitter years of prison life—worse than death; or, if anything can be worse, a felon's death; a doom dark and terrible, dishonouring to those that die and to those that live. Oh that my prayers may avail—not my prayers only, but my life's service—my life's service.'

Next morning I was about at daybreak and had my horse fed and saddled up with the bridle on his neck, ready all but slipping the bit into his mouth, in case of a quick start. I went and helped Aileen to milk her cows, nine or ten of them there were, a fairish morning's work for one girl; mothering the calves, bailing up, leg-roping, and all the rest of it. We could milk well, all three of us, and mother too, when she was younger. Women are used to cattle in Ireland, and England too. The men don't milk there, I hear tell. That wouldn't work here. Women are scarce in the regular bush, and though they'll milk for their own good and on their own farms, you'll not get a girl to milk, when she's at service, for anybody else.

One of the young cows was a bit strange with me, so I had to shake a stick at her and sing out 'Bail up' pretty rough before she'd put her head in. Aileen smiled something like her old self for a minute, and said—

'That comes natural to you now, Dick, doesn't it?'

I stared for a bit, and then burst out laughing. It was a rum go, wasn't it? The same talk for cows and Christians. That's how things get stuck into the talk in a new country. Some old hand like father, as had been assigned to a dairy settler, and spent all his mornings in the cowyard, had taken to the bush and tried his hand at sticking up people. When they came near enough of course he'd pop out from behind a tree in a rock, with his old musket or a pair of pistols, and when he wanted 'em to stop 'Bail up, d——yer,' would come a deal quicker and more natural-like to his tongue than 'Stand.' So 'bail up' it was from that day to this, and there'll have to be a deal of change in the ways of the colonies and them as come from 'em before anything else takes its place, between the man that's got the arms and the man that's got the money.

After we'd turned out the cows we put the milk into the little dairy. How proud Jim and I used to be because we dug out the cellar part, and built the sod wall round the slabs! Father put on the thatch; then it was as cool and clean as ever. Many a good drink of cold milk we had there in the summers that had passed away. Well, well, it's no use thinking of those sort of things. They're dead and gone, like a lot of other things and people—like I shall be before long, if it comes to that.

We had breakfast pretty comfortable and cheerful. Mother looked pleased and glad to see me once more, and Aileen had got on her old face again, and was partly come round to her old ways.

After breakfast Aileen and I went into the garden and had a long talk over the plan we had chalked out for getting away to Queensland. I got out a map Starlight had made and showed her the way we were going to head, and why he thought it more likely to work than he had done before. I was to make my way down the Macquarie and across by Duck Creek, George's station, Willaroon; start from there with a mob of cattle to Queensland as drover or anything that would suit my book.

Jim was to get on to one of the Murray River boats at Swan Hill, and stick to her till he got a chance to go up the Darling with an Adelaide boat to Bourke. He could get across from there by Cunnamulla towards Rockhampton, and from there we were safe to find plenty of vessels bound for the islands or San Francisco. We had hardly cared where, as far as that goes, as long as we got clear away from our own country.

As soon as Jeanie got a word from Jim that he'd sailed and was clear of Australia, she'd write up to Aileen, who was to go down to Melbourne, and take mother with her. They could stop with Jeanie until they got a message from San Francisco to say he'd safely arrived there. After that they could start by the first steamer. They'd have money enough to take their passages and something handsome in cash when they got to land.

Aileen agreed to it all, but in a curious sort of way. 'It looked well,' she said, 'and might be carried out, particularly as we were all going to work cautiously and with such a lot of preparation.' Everything that she could do would be done, we might be sure; but though she had prayed and sought aid from the Blessed Virgin and the saints—fasting and on her bare knees, night after night—she had not been able to get one gleam of consolation. Everything looked very dark, and she had a terrible feeling of anxiety and dread about the carrying it out. But she didn't want to shake my courage, I could see; so she listened and smiled and cheered me up a bit at the end, and I rode away, thinking there was a good show for us after all.

I got back to the Hollow right enough, and for once in a way it seemed as if the luck was on our side. Maybe it was going to turn—who was to know? There had been men who had been as deep in it as any of us that had got clean away to other countries and lived safe and comfortable to the day of their death—didn't die so soon either—lived to a good round age, and had wives and children round them that never knew but what they'd been as good as the best. That wouldn't be our case; but still if we once were able to put the sea between us and our old life the odds would be all in our favour instead of being a hundred to one that we weren't placed and no takers.

Starlight was glad enough to see me back, and like everything he tackled, had been squaring it all for our getting away with head and hand. We wanted to take everything with us that could do us any good, naturally. Father and he had made it right with some one they knew at Turon to take the gold and give them a price for it—not all it was worth, but something over three-fourths value. The rest he was to keep for his share, for trouble and risk. There was some risk, no doubt, in dealing with us, but all the gold that was bought in them days wasn't square, not by a lot. But there was no way of swearing to it. Gold was gold, and once it was in the banks it was lumped up with the rest. There was a lot of things to be thought of before we regularly made a move for good and all; but when you make up your mind for a dart, it's wonderful how things shape. We hadn't much trouble dividing the gold, and what cash there was we could whack easy enough. There was the live stock that was running in the Hollow, of course. We couldn't well take them with us, except a few of the horses. We made a deal at last with father for them. He took my share and Starlight's, and paid us in cash out of his share of the notes. All we wanted was a couple of horses each, one to carry a pack, one to ride.

As for dad, he told us out, plump and plain, that he wasn't going to shift. The Hollow was good enough for him, and there he was going to stop. If Jim and I and Starlight chose to try and make blank emigrants of ourselves, well and good. He didn't see as they'd have such a rosy time getting over to these new townships on the other side. We might get took in, and wish we was back again before all was said and done. But some people could never let well alone. Here we had everything that any man in his senses could wish for, and we wasn't contented. Every one was going to cut away and leave him; he'd be all by himself, with no one but the dog for company, and be as miserable as a bandicoot; but no one cared a blank brass farden about that.

'Come with us, governor,' says Starlight, 'have a cruise round the world, and smell salt water again. You've not been boxed up in the bush all your life, though you've been a goodish while there. Make a start, and bring old Crib too.'

'I'm too old and getting stiff in the j'ints,' says dad, brightening up a bit, 'or I don't say as I wouldn't. Don't mind my growling. But I'm bound to be a bit lonely like when you are all drawed off the camp. No! take your own way and I'll take mine.'

'Next Monday ought to see us off,' says Starlight. 'We have got the gold and cash part all right. I've had that money paid to Knightley's credit in the Australian Bank I promised him, and got a receipt for it.'

'That's just like yer,' says father, 'and a rank soft thing for a man as has seen the world to drop into. Losin' yer share of the five hundred quid, and then dropping a couple of hundred notes at one gamble, besides buying a horse yer could have took for nothing. He'll never bring twenty pound again, neither.'

'Always pay my play debts,' says Starlight. 'Always did, and always will. As for the horse—a bargain, a bargain.'

'And a dashed bad bargain too. Why didn't ye turn parson instead of taking to the bush?' says father, with a grin. 'Dashed if I ain't seen some parsons that could give you odds and walk round ye at horse-dealin'.'

'You take your own way, Ben, and I'll take mine,' says Starlight rather fierce, and then father left off and went to do something or other, while us two took our horses and rode out. We hadn't a long time to be in the old Hollow now. It had been a good friend to us in time of need, and we was sorry in a kind of way to leave it. We were going to play for a big stake, and if we lost we shouldn't have another throw in.

Our horses were in great buckle now; they hadn't been doing much lately. I had the one I'd brought with me, and a thoroughbred brown horse that had been broken in the first season we came there.

Starlight was to ride Rainbow, of course, and he had great picking before he made up his mind what to choose for second horse. At last he pitched upon a thoroughbred bay mare named Locket that had been stolen from a mining township the other side of the country. She was the fastest mare they'd ever bred—sound, and a weight-carrier too.

'I think I'll take Locket after all,' says he, after thinking about it best part of an hour. 'She's very fast and a stayer. Good-tempered too, and the old horse has taken up with her. It will be company for him.'

'Take your own way,' I said, 'but I wouldn't chance her. She's known to a lot of jockey-boys and hangers-on. They could swear to that white patch on her neck among a thousand.'

'If you come to that, Rainbow is not an every-day horse, and I can't leave him behind, can I? I'll ship him, if I can, that's more. But it won't matter much, for we'll have to take back tracks all the way. You didn't suppose we were to ride along the mail road, did you?'

'I didn't suppose anything,' says I, 'but that we were going to clear out the safest way we could. If we're to do the swell business we'd better do it apart, or else put an advertisement into the "Turon Star" that Starlight, Marston, and Co. are giving up business and going to leave the district, all accounts owing to be sent in by a certain date.'

'A first-rate idea,' says he. 'I'm dashed if I don't do it. There's nothing like making one's exit in good form. How savage Morringer will be! Thank you for the hint, Dick.'

There was no use talking to him when he got into this sort of humour. He was the most mad, reckless character I ever came across, and any kind of checking only seemed to make him worse. So I left him alone, for fear he should want to do something more venturesome still, and went on with my packing and getting ready for the road.

We fixed up to start on the Monday, and get as far away the first couple of days as we could manage. We expected to get a good start by making a great push the first day or two, and, as the police would be thrown off the scent in a way we settled—and a good dodge it was—we should have all the more time to be clear of New South Wales before they regularly dropped that we were giving them leg bail for it.

The Sunday before Starlight started away by himself, taking a couple of good horses with him—one he led, and a spare saddle too. He took nothing but his revolver, and didn't say where he was going, but I pretty well guessed to say good-bye to Aileen. Just as he started he looked back and says—

'I'm going for a longish ride to-day, Dick, but I shall be here late if I'm back at all. If anything happens to me my share of what there is I give to her, if she will take it. If not, do the best you can with it for her benefit.'

He didn't take Warrigal with him, which I was sorry for, as the half-caste and I didn't hit it well together, and when we were by ourselves he generally managed to do or say something he knew I didn't like. I kept my hands off him on account of Starlight, but there was many a time my fingers itched to be at him, and I could hardly keep from knocking some of the sulkiness out of him. This day, somehow, I was not in the best of tempers myself. I had a good lot on my mind. Starting away seems always a troublesome, bothering sort of thing, and if a man's at all inclined to be cranky it'll come out then.

Next day we were going to start on a long voyage, in a manner of speaking, and whether we should have a fair wind or the vessel of our fortune would be wrecked and we go down with it no one could say. This is how it happened. One of the horses was bad to catch, and took a little trouble in the yard. Most times Warrigal was quiet enough with 'em, but when he got regular into a rage he'd skin a horse alive, I really believe. Anyhow, he began to hammer the colt with a roping-pole, and as the yard was that high that no beast could jump it he had him at his mercy. I wouldn't have minded a lick or two, but he went on and on, nearly knocking the poor brute down every time, till I could stand it no longer, and told him to drop it.

He gave me some saucy answer, until at last I told him I'd make him. He dared me, and I rushed at him. I believe he'd have killed me that minute if he'd had the chance, and he made a deuced good offer at it.

He stuck to his roping-stick—a good, heavy-ended gum sapling, six or seven feet long—and as I came at him he struck at my head with such vengeance that, if it had caught me fair, I should never have kicked. I made a spring to one side, and it hit me a crack on the shoulder that wasn't a good thing in itself. I was in at him before he could raise his hands, and let him have it right and left.

Down he went and the stick atop of him. He was up again like a wild cat, and at me hammer and tongs—but he hadn't the weight, though he was quick and smart with his hands. I drew off and knocked him clean off his pins. Then he saw it wasn't good enough, and gave it best.

'Never mind, Dick Marston,' says he, as he walked off; and he fixed his eyes on me that savage and deadly-looking, with the blood running down his face, that I couldn't help shivering a bit, 'you'll pay for this. I owe it you and Jim, one a piece.'

'Confound you,' I said, 'it's all your own fault. Why couldn't you stop ill-using the horse? You don't like being hit yourself. How do you think he likes it?'

'What business that of yours?' he said. 'You mind your work and I'll mind mine. This is the worst day's work you've done this year, and so I tell you.'

He went away to his gunyah then, and except doing one or two things for Starlight would not lift his hand for any one that day.

I was sorry for it when I came to think. I daresay I might have got him round with a little patience and humbugging. It's always a mistake to lose your temper and make enemies; there's no knowing what harm they may do ye. People like us oughtn't to throw away a chance, even with a chap like Warrigal. Besides, I knew it would vex Starlight, and for his sake I would have given a trifle it hadn't happened. However, I didn't see how Warrigal could do me or Jim any harm without hurting him, and I knew he'd have cut off his hand rather than any harm should come to Starlight that he could help.

So I got ready. Dad and I had our tea together pretty comfortable, and had a longish talk. The old man was rather down in the mouth for him. He said he somehow didn't expect the fakement to turn out well. 'You're going away,' he said, 'from where you're safe, and there's a many things goes against a man in our line, once he's away from his own beat. You never know how you may be given away. The Captain's all right here, when he's me to look after him, though he does swear at me sometimes; but he was took last time. He was out on his own hook, and it's my belief he'll be took this time if he isn't very careful. He's a good man to fight through things when once he's in the thick of 'em, but he ain't careful enough to keep dark and close when the play isn't good. You draw along steady by yourself till you meet Jim—that's my advice to ye.'

'I mean to do that. I shall work my way down to old George's place, and get on with stock or something till we all meet at Cunnamulla. After that there ain't much chance of these police here grabbing us.'

'Unless you're followed up,' says the old man. 'I've known chaps to go a deuce of a way, once they got on the track, and there's getting some smart fellows among 'em now—native-born chaps as'll be as good at picking up the tracks as you and Jim.'

'Well, we must take our chance. I'm sorry, for one thing, that I had that barney with Warrigal. It was all his fault. But I had to give him a hardish crack or two. He'd turn dog on me and Jim, and in a minute, if he saw his way without hurting Starlight.'

'He can't do it,' says dad; 'it's sink or swim with the lot of you. And he dursn't either, not he,' says father, beginning to growl out his words. 'If I ever heard he'd given away any one in the lot I'd have his life, if I had to poleaxe him in George Street. He knows me too.'

We sat yarning away pretty late. The old man didn't say it, but I made out that he was sorry enough for that part of his life which had turned out so bad for us boys, and for mother and Aileen. Bad enough he was in a kind of way, old dad, but he wasn't all bad, and I believe if he could have begun again and thought of what misery he was going to bring on the lot of us he would never have gone on the cross. It was too late, too late now, though, to think of that.

Towards morning I heard the old dog growl, and then the tramp of a horse's feet. Starlight rode up to the fire and let his horse go, then walked straight into his corner and threw himself down without speaking. He had had a precious long ride, and a fast one by the look of his horse. The other one he had let go as soon as he came into the Hollow; but none of the three would be a bit the worse after a few hours' rest. The horses, of course, were spare ones, and not wanted again for a bit.

Next morning it was 'sharp's the word', and no mistake. I felt a deal smarter on it than yesterday. When you've fairly started for the road half the journey's done. It's the thinking of this and forgetting that, and wondering whether you haven't left behind the t'other thing, that's the miserablest part of going a journey; when you're once away, no matter what's left behind, you can get on some way or other.

We didn't start so over and above early, though Starlight was up as fresh as paint at sunrise, you'd thought he hadn't ridden a yard the day before. Even at the very last there's a lot of things to do and to get. But we all looked slippy and didn't talk much, so that we got through what we had to do, and had all the horses saddled and packed by about eight o'clock. Even Warrigal had partly got over his temper. Of course I told Starlight about it. He gave him a good rowing, and told him he deserved another hammering, which he had a good mind to give him, if we hadn't been starting for a journey. Warrigal didn't say a word to him. He never did. Starlight told me on the quiet, though, he was sorry it happened, 'though it's the rascal's own fault, and served him right. But he's a revengeful beggar,' he says, 'and that he would play you some dog's trick if he wasn't afraid of me, you may depend your life on.'

'Now,' says he, 'we must make our little arrangements. I shall be somewhere about Cunnamulla by the end of this month' (it was only the first week). 'Jim knows that we are to meet there, and if we manage that all right I think the greatest part of the danger will be over. I shall get right across by Dandaloo to the back blocks of the West Bogan country, between it and the Lachlan. There are tracks through the endless mallee scrub, only known to the tribes in the neighbourhood, and a few half-castes like Warrigal, that have been stock-riding about them. Sir Ferdinand and his troopers might just as well hunt for a stray Arab in the deserts of the Euphrates. If I'm alive—mind you, alive—I'll be at Cunnamulla on the day I mean. And now, good-bye, old fellow. Whatever my sins have been, I've been true to you and your people in the past, and if Aileen and I meet across the seas, as I hope, the new life may partly atone for the old one.'



Chapter 49



He shook hands with me and dad, threw his leg over Rainbow, took Locket's bridle as if he was going for an easy day's ride, and cantered off.

Warrigal nodded to both of us, then brought his pack-horse up level, and followed up.

'There goes the Captain,' says father. 'It's hard to say if we'll ever see him again. I shan't, anyhow, nor you either, maybe. Somehow I've had a notion coming over me this good while as my time ain't going to be long. It don't make no odds, neither. Life ain't no great chop to a man like me, not when he gets the wrong side o' sixty, anyhow. Mine ain't been such a bad innings, and I don't owe much to any man. I mean as I've mostly been square with them that's done me a bad turn. No man can say Ben Marston was ever back'ard in that way; and never will be, that's more. No! them as trod on me felt my teeth some day or other. Eh, old man?' Crib growled. He understood things regular like a Christian, that old dog did. 'And now you're a-goin' off and Jim's gone—seems only t'other day as you and he was little toddlin' chaps, runnin' to meet me when I come home from work, clearin' that fust paddock, and telling me mammy had the tea ready. Perhaps I'd better ha' stuck to the grubbin' and clearin' after all. It looked slow work, but it paid better than this here in the long run.' Father turns away from me then, and walks back a step or two. Then he faces me. 'Dash it, boy, what are ye waitin' for? Shake hands, and tell Jim the old man han't forgot him yet.'

It was many a day since I'd felt father's hand in kindness; he didn't do them sort of things. I held out mine and his fingers closed on it one minute, like a vice—blest if I didn't expect to feel the bones grate agin one another; he was that strong he hardly knew his own strength, I believe. Then he sits down on the log by the fire. He took out his pipe, but somehow it wouldn't light. 'Good-bye, Crib,' says I. The old dog looked at me for a bit, wagged his tail, and then went and sat between dad's knees. I took my horse and rode away slowish. I felt all dead and alive like when I got near the turn in the track. I looked back and seen the dog and him just the same. I started both horses then. I never set eyes on him again. Poor old dad!

I wasn't very gay for a bit, but I had a good horse under me, another alongside, a smartish lot of cash in notes and gold, some bank deposits too, and all the world before me. My dart now was to make my way to Willaroon and look sharp about it. My chance of getting through was none too good, but I settled to ride a deal at night and camp by day. I began to pick up my spirits after I got on the road that led up the mountain, and to look ahead to the time when I might call myself my own man again.

Next day after that I was at Willaroon. I could have got there overnight, but it looked better to camp near the place and come next morning. There I was all right. The overseer was a reasonable sort of man, and I found old George had been as good as his word, and left word if a couple of men like me and Starlight came up we were to be put on with the next mob of cattle that were going to Queensland. He did a store cattle trade with the far-out squatters that were stocking up new country in Queensland, and it paid him very well, as nearly everything did that he touched. We were to find our own horses and be paid so much a week—three pounds, I think—and so on.

As luck would have it, there was a biggish mob to start in a week, and road hands being scarce in that part the overseer was disappointed that my mate, as he called him, hadn't come on, but I said he'd gone another track.

'Well, he'll hardly get such wages at any other job,' says he, 'and if I was Mr. Storefield I wouldn't hire him again, not if he wanted a billet ever so bad.'

'I don't suppose he will,' says I, 'and serves him quite right too.'

I put my horses in the paddock—there was wild oats and crowsfoot knee-high in it—and helped the overseer to muster and draft. He gave me a fresh horse, of course. When he saw how handy I was in the yard he got quite shook on me, and, says he—

'By George, you're just the chap the boss wants to send out to some new country he's going to take up in Queensland. What's your name? Now I think of it he didn't tell me.'

'William Turner,' says I.

'Very well, William,' says he, 'you're a dashed good man, I can see, and I wish I could pick up a few more like you. Blessed if I ever saw such a lot of duffers in my life as there are on this side. I've hardly seen a man come by that's worth his grub. You couldn't stop till the next mob starts, I suppose? I'd make it worth your while.'

'I couldn't well this time,' says I; 'my mate's got a friend out north just from home, and we're tied to time to meet him. But if I come back this way I'll put in a year with you.'

'Well, an offer's an offer,' says he. 'I can't say more, but I think you'll do better by stopping on here.'

I got away with the cattle all right, and the drover in charge was told to do all he could for me. The overseer said I was as good as two men, and it was 'Bill' here and 'William' there all the time till we were off. I wasn't sorry to be clear away, for of course any day a trooper might have ridden up and asked questions about the horses, that were a little too good for a working drover.

Besides, I'd had a look at the papers, and I saw that Starlight had been as good as his word, in the matter of the advertisement. Sure enough, the 'Turon Star' and a lot of other papers had, on the same day, received the same advertisement, with a pound note enclosed, and instructions to insert it four times.

NOTICE.

To all whom it may concern.

The Messrs. Marston Brothers and Co., being about to leave the district, request that all accounts against them may be sent to the Police Camp, Turon, addressed to the care of Sir Ferdinand Morringer, whose receipt will be a sufficient discharge. For the firm, Starlight.

I couldn't have believed at first that he'd be so mad. But after a bit I saw that, like a lot of his reckless doings, it wasn't so far out after all.

All the papers had taken it up as usual, and though some of them were pretty wild at the insult offered to the Government and so on, I could see they'd most of them come to think it was a blind of some sort, meant to cover a regular big touch that we were going in for, close by home, and wanting to throw the police off the scent once more. If we'd really wanted to make tracks, they said, this would be the last thing we'd think of doing. Bit by bit it was put about as there should be a carefully laid plot to stick up all the banks in Turon on the same day, and make a sweep of all the gold and cash.

I laughed when I saw this, because I knew that it was agreed upon between Aileen and Gracey that, about the time we were fairly started, whichever of them saw Sir Ferdinand first should allow it to be fished out of her, as a great secret, that we were working up to some tremendous big affair of this sort, and which was to put the crown on all our other doings. To make dead sure, we had sent word to Billy the Boy (and some money too) to raise a sham kind of sticking-up racket on the other side of the Turon, towards Bathurst way. He was to frighten a few small people that would be safe to talk about it, and make out that all the bush-rangers in the country were camped about there. This was the sort of work that the young villain regularly went in for and took a pleasure in, and by the way the papers put it in he had managed to frighten a lot of travellers and roadside publicans out of their senses most.

As luck would have it, Wall and Hulbert and Moran had been working up towards Mudgee lately and stuck up the mail, and as Master Billy thought it a great lark to ride about with them with a black mask on, people began to think the gangs had joined again and that some big thing, they didn't know what, was really on the cards. So a lot of police were telegraphed for, and the Bathurst superintendent came down, all in a hurry, to the Turon, and in the papers nothing went down but telegrams and yarns about bush-rangers. They didn't know what the country was coming to; all the sober going people wishing they'd never got an ounce of gold in Australia, and every little storekeeper along the line that had 100 Pounds in his cash-box hiding it every night and afraid of seeing us ride up every time the dogs barked.

All the time we were heading for Cunnamulla, and leaving New South Wales behind us hand over hand.

The cattle, of course, couldn't travel very fast; ten or twelve miles a day was enough for them. I could have drowned myself in the creeks as we went crawling along sometimes, and I that impatient to get forward. Eighty miles it was from Cunnamulla to the Queensland border. Once we were over that we'd have to be arrested on warrant, and there were lots of chaps, like us, that were 'wanted', on the far-out north stations. Once we sighted the waters of the Warrego we should feel ourselves more than half free.

Then there was Jim, poor old Jim! He wrote to say he was just starting for Melbourne, and very queer he felt about leaving his wife and boy. Such a fine little chap as he'd grown too. He'd just got his head down, he said, and taken to the pulling (he meant working) like our old near-side poler, and he was as happy as a king, going home to Jeanie at night, and having his three pounds every Saturday. Now he was going away ever so far by land and sea, and God knows when he might see either of 'em again. If it wasn't for the fear he had of being pitched upon by the police any day, and the long sentence he was sure to get, he'd stay where he was. He wasn't sure whether he wouldn't do so now.

After that Aileen had a letter, a short one, from Jeanie. Jim had gone. She had persuaded him for the sake of the boy, though both their hearts were nearly broken. She didn't know whether she'd done right. Perhaps she never might see him again. The poor fellow had forfeited his coach fare once, and come back to stay another day with her. When he did go he looked the picture of misery, and something told her it was their last parting.

Well, we struck the river about ten miles this side of Cunnamulla, where there was a roadside inn, a small, miserable kind of place, just one of those half-shanties, half-public-houses, fit for nothing but to trap bushmen, and where the bad grog kills more men in a year than a middling break-out of fever.

Somewhere about here I expected to hear of the other two. We'd settled to meet a few miles one side or the other of the township. It didn't much matter which. So I began to look about in case I might get word of either of 'em, even if they didn't turn up to the time.

Somewhere about dinner time (twelve o'clock) we got the cattle on to the river and let 'em spread over the flat. Then the man in charge rode up to the inn, the Traveller's Rest, a pretty long rest for some of 'em (as a grave here and there with four panels of shickery two-rail fence round it showed), and shouted nobblers round for us.

While we was standing up at the bar, waiting for the cove to serve it out, a flash-looking card he was, and didn't hurry himself, up rides a tall man to the door, hangs up his horse, and walks in. He had on a regular town rig—watch and chain, leather valise, round felt hat, like a chap going to take charge of a store or something. I didn't know him at first, but directly our eyes met I saw it was old Jim. We didn't talk—no fear, and my boss asked him to join us, like any other stranger. Just then in comes the landlady to sharpen up the man at the bar.

'Haven't you served those drinks yet, Bob?' she sings out. 'Why, the gentlemen called for them half-an-hour ago. I never saw such a slow-going crawler as you are. You'd never have done for the Turon boys.'

We all looked at her—not a bad-looking woman she'd been once, though you could see she'd come down in the world and been knocked about a bit. Surely I knew her voice! I'd seen her before—why, of course—