Had Naomi seen him then she would have found some difficulty in recognizing Hermann Engelhardt, the little piano-tuner whom already she seemed to have known all her life. Yet she had made a singularly shrewd guess at his whereabouts. Top Scrubby held him fast enough. And when Naomi stretched her arms toward the sunset, it is a strange fact that she also stretched them toward the lost young man, who was lying between it and her, not three miles from the spot on which she stood.
Within a mile of him ran the horse-paddock fence, which he had crossed by mistake at three o'clock that morning. He had never seen it again. All day he hadwandered without striking track, or fence, or water. Once indeed his heart had danced at the sudden revelation of footprints under his very nose. They were crisp and clean and obviously recent. All at once they took a fatally familiar appearance. Slowly he lifted his right foot and compared the mark of it with the marks he had discovered. They were identical. To put the matter beyond a doubt he got both his feet into a couple of the old footprints. They fitted like pipes in a case. And then he knew that he was walking in circles, after the manner of lost men, and that he stood precisely where he had been three hours before.
That was a bitter moment. There were others and worse before sundown. The worst of all was about the time when Naomi flung out her arms and cried aloud in her trouble.
His staggering steps had brought him at last, near sundown, within sight of a ridge of pines which he seemed to know. The nearer he came to them the surer did he become that they were the station pines themselves. Footsore and faint and parched as he was, he plucked up all his remaining strength to reach those pines alive. If he were to drop down now it would be shameful,and he deserved to die. So he did not drop until he gained the ridge, and found the pines merely the outer ranks of a regular phalanx of mallee scrub. There was no mallee among the station pines. Nor would it have been possible to get so near to the homestead without squeezing through the wires of two fences at least. He had made a hideous and yet a fatuous mistake, and, when he realized it, he flung himself on his face in the shade of a hop-bush and burst into tears. To think that he must perish miserably after all, when, not five minutes since, he had felt the bottle-neck of the water-bag against his teeth—the smell of the wet canvas in his nostrils—the shrinking and lightening of the bag between his palms as the deep draught of cold water brought his dead throat to life.
It was all over now. He turned his face to the sand, and waited sullenly for the end. And presently a crow flew down from a pine, and hopped nearer and nearer to the prostrate body, with many a cautious pause, its wise black head now on one side, now on the other. Was it a dead body or a man asleep? There would have been no immediate knowing had not the crow been advancing between the setting sun and the man. Its shadow was a yard long when itcame between Engelhardt's eyes, which were wide open, and the patch of sand that was warm with his breath. An instant later the crow was away with a hoarse scream, and Engelhardt was sitting up with a still hoarser oath upon his lips; indeed, he was inarticulate even to his own ears; but he found himself shaking his only fist at the crow, now a mere smut upon the evening sky, and next moment he was tottering to his feet.
He could hardly stand. His eyes were burning, his tongue swollen, his lips cracking like earth in a drought. He was aching, too, from head to foot, but he was not yet food for the crows. He set his teeth, and shook his head once or twice. Not yet—not yet.
The setting sun made a lane of light through the pines and mallee. The piano-tuner looked right and left along this lane, wondering which way to turn. He had no prejudice in the matter. All day he had been making calculations, and all day his calculations had been working out wrong. Like the struggles of a fly in a spider's web, each new effort left him more hopelessly entangled than the last. So now, without thinking, for thought was of no avail, heturned his face to the sunset, and, after half an hour's painful stumbling, was a mile farther from the station, and a mile deeper in the maze of Top Scrubby.
Night had fallen now, and the air was cool and sweet. This slightly refreshed him, and the continual chewing of leaves also did him some little good, as indeed it had done all day. But he was becoming troubled with a growing giddiness in addition to his other sufferings, and he well knew that the sands of his endurance were almost run. When the stars came out he once more altered his course, taking a new line by the Southern Cross; but it could not be for long, he was losing strength with every step. About this time it occurred to him to cut a branch for a staff, but when he took out his knife he was too weak to open the blade. A fatal lassitude was creeping over him. He could no longer think or even worry. Nothing mattered any more! Naomi—his mother—the plans and aspirations of his own life—they were all one to him now, and of little account even in the bulk. It had not been so a few hours earlier, but body and mind were failing together, and with no more hope there was but little more regret. His head and his heart grew light together, and whenat last he determined to sit down and be done with it all, his greatest care was the choice of a soft and sandy place. It was as though he had been going to lie down for the night instead of for all time. And yet it was this, the mere fad of a wandering mind, that saved him; for before he had found what he wanted, suddenly—as by a miracle—he saw a light.
In a flash the man was alive and electrified. All the nerves in his body tightened like harp-strings, and the breath of life swept over them, leaving his heart singing of Naomi and his mother and the deeds to be done in this world. And the thrill remained; for the light was no phantom of a rocking brain, but a glorious reality that showed brighter and lighter every moment.
Yet it was a very long way off. He might never reach it at all. But he rushed on with never a look right or left, or up or down, as if his one chance of life lay in keeping his grip of that light steadfast and unrelaxed. His headlong course brought him twice to his knees with a thud that shook him to the very marrow. Once he ran his face into a tangle of small branches, and felt a hot stream flowing over his lips and chin; he sucked at it as it leapt his lips, and reeled on,thanking heaven that he could still see out of his eyes. The light had grown into a camp-fire, and he could hear men's voices around it. Their faces he could not see—only the leaping, crackling fire. He tried to coo-ee, but no sound would come. The thought crossed him that even now, within sight and ear-shot of his fellow-men, he might drop for good. His heart kept throbbing against his ribs like an egg boiling in a pan, and his every breath was as a man's last gasp. He passed some horses tethered among the trees. Then before the fire there stood a stout figure with shaded eyes and pistols in his belt; another joined him; then a third, with a rifle; and the three loomed larger with every stride, until Engelhardt fell sprawling and panting in their midst, his hat gone, his long hair matted upon his forehead, and the white face beneath all streaming with sweat and blood.
"By God, he's dying!" said one of the men, flinging away his fire-arm. "Yank us the water-bag, mate, and give the cuss a chance."
Engelhardt looked up, and saw one of his two enemies, the swagmen, reaching out his hand for the bag. It was the smaller and quieter of the pair—the man with theweather-beaten face and the twinkling eye—and as Engelhardt looked further he saw none other than Simons, the discharged shearer, handing the dripping bag across. But a third hand stretched over and snatched it away with a bellowing curse.
"What a blessed soft pair you are! Can't you see who 'e is? It's 'is bloomin' little nibs with the broke arm, and not a damned drop does he get from me!"
"Come on, Bill," said the other tramp. "Why not?"
"He knows why not," said Bill, who, of course, was the stout scoundrel with the squint. "Don't you, sonny?" And he kicked Engelhardt in the side with his flat foot.
"Easy, mate, easy. The beggar's dying!"
"All the better! If he don't look slippy about it I'll take an' slit his throat for him!"
"Well, give him a drop o' water first."
"Ay, give 'im a drink, whether or no," put in Simons. "No tortures, mate! The plain thing's good enough for me."
"And me, too!"
"Why, Bo's'n," cried Bill, "you've got no more spunk than a blessed old ewe!You sailors and shearers are plucky fine chaps to go mates with in a job like ours! You wouldn't have done for poor old Tigerskin!"
"To hell with Tigerskin," said Simons, savagely. "We've heard more than enough of him. Give the beggar a drink, or, by cripes, I'm off it!"
"All right, boys, all right. You needn't get so scotty about it, matey. But he sha'n't drink more than's good for 'im, and he sha'n't drink much at a time, or 'e'll burst 'is skin!"
As he spoke Bill uncorked the water-bag, hollowed a filthy palm, flooded it, and held it out to the piano-tuner, who all this time had been sitting still and listening without a word.
"Drink out o' my hand," said he, "or not at all."
But Engelhardt could only stare at the great hairy paw thrust under his nose. It had no little finger. He was trying to remember what this meant.
"Drink out o' that, you swine," thundered Bill, "and be damned to you!"
Human nature could endure no more. Instead of drinking, Engelhardt knocked the man's hand up, and made a sudden grabat the water-bag. He got it, too, and had swallowed a mouthful before it was plucked away from him. The oaths came pouring out of Bill's mouth like sheep racing through a gate. But the piano-tuner had tasted what was more to him than blood, and he made a second dash at the bag, which resulted in a quantity of water being spilled; so without struggling any more, he fell upon his face with his lips to the wet sand.
"Let the joker suck," said Bill; "I'll back the sand!"
But Engelhardt rolled over on his left side and moved no more.
Simons knelt over him.
"He's a stiff 'un, mates. My blessed oath he is! That's number two, an' both on 'em yours, Bill."
Bill laughed.
"That'll be all right," said he. "Where's my pipe got to? I'm weakenin' for a smoke."
There was life in Engelhardt yet, though for some time he lay as good as dead. The thing that revived him was the name of Naomi Pryse on the lips of the late ringer of the Taroomba shed. The piano-tuner listened for more without daring to open his eyes or to move a muscle. And more came with a horrifying flow of foul words.
"She had the lip to sack me! But I'll be even with her before the night's out. Yes, by cripes, by sunrise she'll wish she'd never been born!"
"It's not the girl we're after," said Bill's voice, with a pause and a spit. "It's the silver." And Engelhardt could hear him puffing at his pipe.
"It's gold and silver. She's the gold."
"I didn't dislike her," said the sailor-man. "I'd leave her be."
"She didn't sack you from the shed. Twelve pound a week it meant, with that image over the board!"
"Bo's'n'd let the whole thing be, I dobelieve," said Bill, "if we give 'im 'alf a chance."
"Not me," said Bo's'n. "I'll stick to my messmates. But we've stiffened two people already. It's two too many."
"What about your skipper down at Sandridge?"
"Well, I reckon he's a stiff 'un, too."
"Then none o' your skite, mate," said Bill, knocking out a clay pipe against his heel. "Look ye here, lads; it's a blessed Providence that's raked us together, us three. Here's me, straight out o' quod, coming back like a bird to the place where there's a good thing on. Here's Bo's'n, he's bashed in his skipper's skull and cut and run for it. We meet and we pal on. The likeliest pair in the Colony! And here's old Simons, knocked cock-eye by this 'ere gal, and swearing revenge by all that's bloody. He has a couple of horses, too—just the very thing we wanted—so he's our man. Is he on? He is. Do we join hands an' cuss an' swear to see each other through? We do—all three. Don't we go to the township for a few little necessaries an' have a drink on the whole thing? We do. Stop a bit! Doesn't a chap and a horse come our way, first shot off? Don't we want another horse, an'take it, too, ay and cook that chap's hash in fit an' proper style? Of course we do. Then what's the good o' talking? Tigerskin used to say, 'We'll swing together, matey, or by God we'll drive together in a coach-and-four with yeller panels and half-a-dozen beggars in gold lace and powdered wigs.' So that's what I say to you. There's that silver. We'll have it and clear out with it at any blessed price. We've let out some blood already. A four-hundred-gallon tankful more or less can make no difference now. We can only swing once. So drink up, boys, and make your rotten lives happy while you have 'em. There's only one thing to settle: whether do we start at eleven, or twelve, or one in the morning?"
Engelhardt heard a pannikin passed round and sucked at by all three. Then a match was struck and a pipe lit. His veins were frozen; he was past a tremor.
"Eleven's too early," said Simons; "it's getting on for ten already. I'm for a spell before we start; there's nothing like a spell to steady your nerve."
"I'd make it eight bells—if not seven," argued the Bo's'n. "The moon'll be up directly. The lower she is when we start, the better for us. You said the station laydue east, didn't you, Bill? Then it'll be easy steering with a low moon."
The other two laughed.
"These 'ere sailors," said Bill, "they're a blessed treat. Always in such an almighty funk of getting bushed. I've known dozens, and they're all alike."
"There's no fun in it," said the Bo's'n. "Look at this poor devil."
Engelhardt held his breath.
"I suppose heiscorpsed?" said Bill.
"Dead as junk."
"Well, he's saved us the trouble. I'd have stuck the beggar as soon as I'd stick a sheep. There's only one more point, lads. Do we knock up her ladyship, and make her let us into the store——"
"Lug her out by her hair," suggested Simons. "I'll do that part."
"Or do we smash into it for ourselves? That's the game Tigerskin an' me tried, ten years ago. It wasn't good enough. You know how it panned out. Still, we ain't got old Pryse to reckon with now. He was a terror, he was! So what do you say, boys? Show hands for sticking-up—and now for breaking in. Then that settles it."
Engelhardt never knew which way it was settled.
"The she-devil!" said Simons. "The little snake! I can see her now, when she come along the board and sang out for the tar-boy all on her own account. That little deader, there, he was with her. By cripes, if she isn't dead herself by morning she'll wish she was! I wonder how she'll look to-night? Not that way, by cripes, that's one thing sure! You leave her to me, mates! I shall enjoy that part. She sha'n't die, because that's what she'd like best; but she shall apologize to me under my own conditions—you wait and see what they are. They'll make you smile. The little devil! Twelve pound a week! By cripes, but I'll make her wish she was as dead as her friend here. I'll teach her——"
"Stiffen me purple," roared Bill, "if the joker's not alive after all!"
The rogues were sitting round their fire in a triangle, Simons with his back to the supposed corpse; when he looked over his shoulder, there was his dead man glaring at him with eyes like blots of ink on blood-stained paper.
Engelhardt, in fact, had been physically unable to lie still any longer and hear Naomi so foully threatened and abused. But the moment he sat up he saw his folly, andtried, quick as thought, to balance it by gaping repeatedly in Simons's face.
"I beg your pardon, I'm sure," said he, in the civilest manner. "I'd been asleep, and couldn't think where I was. I assure you I hadn't the least intention of interrupting you."
His voice was still terribly husky. Bill seized the water-bag and stuck it ostentatiously between his knees. Simons only scowled.
"Please go on with what you were saying," said Engelhardt, crawling to the fire and sitting down between these two worthies. "All I ask is a drink and a crust. I've been out all day without bite or sup. Yes, and all last night as well! That's all I ask. I am dead tired. I'd sleep like a stone."
No one spoke, but presently, without a word, Bill took a pannikin, filled it from the water-bag, and sullenly handed it to the piano-tuner. Then he knifed a great wedge from a damper and tossed it across. Engelhardt could scarcely believe his eyes, so silently, so unexpectedly was it done. He thanked the fellow with unnecessary warmth, but no sort of notice was taken of his remarks. He was half afraid to touch without express permission the water which heneeded so sorely. He even hesitated, pannikin in hand, as he looked from one man to the other; but the villanous trio merely stared at him with fixed eyeballs, and at last he raised it to his lips and swallowed a pint at one draught.
Even the mouthful he had fought for earlier in the evening—even that drop had sent a fresh stream of vitality swimming through his veins. But this generous draught made a new man of him in ten seconds. He wanted more, it is true; but the need was now a mere desire; and then there was the damper under his eyes. He never knew how hungry he was until he had quenched his thirst and started to eat. Until he had finished the slice of damper, he took no more heed of his companions than a dog with a bone. Bill threw him a second wedge, and this also he devoured without looking up. But his great thirst had never been properly slaked, and the treatment he was now receiving emboldened him to hold out the pannikin for more water. Even this was granted him, but still without a word. Since he had arisen and joined them by the fire, not one of the men had addressed a single remark to him, and his own timid expressions of thanks and attempts at affabilityhad been received all alike in impenetrable silence. Nor were the ruffians talking among themselves. They just sat round the fire, their rough faces reddened by the glow, their weapons scintillating in the light, and stared fixedly at the little man who had stumbled among them. Their steady taciturnity soon became as bad to bear as the conversation he had overheard while feigning insensibility. There was a kind of sinister contemplation in their looks which was vague, intangible, terrifying. Then their vile plot ringing in his ears, with dark allusions to a crime already committed, made the piano-tuner's position sickening, intolerable. He spoke again, and again received no answer. He announced that he was extremely grateful to them for saving his life, but that he must now push on to the township. They said nothing to this. He wished them good-night; they said nothing to that. Then he got to his feet, and found himself on the ground again quicker than he had risen. Bill had grabbed him by the ankle, still without a syllable. When Engelhardt looked at him, however, the heavy face and squinting eyes met him with a series of grimaces, so grotesque, so obscene, that he was driven to bury his face in his onefree hand, and patiently to await his captors' will. He heard the Bo's'n chuckling; but for hours, as it seemed to him, that was all.
"Whoisthe joker?" said Bill, at last. "What does he do for his rations?"
"They say as 'e tunes pianners," said Simons.
"Then he don't hang out on Taroomba?"
"No; 'e only come the other day, an' goes an' breaks his arm off a buck-jumper. So they were saying at the shed."
"Well, he enjoyed his supper, didn't he? It's good to see 'em enjoying theirselves when their time is near. Boys, you was right; it would have been a sin to send 'im to 'ell with an empty belly an' a sandy throat. If ever I come to swing, I'll swing with a warm meal in my innards, my oath!"
Engelhardt held up his head.
"So you mean to kill me, do you?" said he, very calmly, but with a kind of scornful indignation. Bill gave him a horrible leer, but no answer.
"I suppose there's nothink else for it," said Simons, half-regretfully; "though mark you, mates, I'm none so keen on the kind o' game."
"No more ain't I," cried the Bo's'n, with vigor. "I'd give the cove a chance, Bill."
"How?" said Bill.
"I'd lash the beggar to a tree and leave him to snuff out for hisself."
Engelhardt laughed aloud in mock gratitude.
"Oh, I ain't partickler as to ways," said Bill. "One way's as good as another for me. There's no bloomin' 'urry, any'ow. The moon ain't up yet, and before we go this beggar's got to tell us things. He heard what we was saying, mates. I seen it in his eye. Didn't you, you swine?"
Engelhardt took no kind of notice.
"Didn't you—you son of a mangy bandicoot?"
Still Engelhardt would have held his tongue; but Bill started kicking him on one side, and Simons on the other; and the pain evoked an answer in a note of shrill defiance.
"I did!" he cried. "I heard every word."
"We're after that silver."
"I know you are."
"You've seen it?"
"I have."
"Tell us all about it."
"Not I!"
For this he got a kick on each side.
"Is it in the store yet?"
No answer.
"Is the chest easy to find?"
No answer.
"Is it covered up?"
"Or underground?"
"Or made to look like something else?"
Each man contributed a question; none elicited a word; no more did their boots; it was no use kicking him.
There was a long pause. Then Bill said:
"You've lost your hat. You need another. Here you are."
He had blundered to his feet, stepped aside out of the ring of light, and spun a wide-awake into Engelhardt's lap. He started. It was adorned with a blue silk fly-veil.
"Recognize it?"
He had recognized it at once; it was Sam Rowntree's; and Sam Rowntree had been missing, yesterday, before Engelhardt himself said his secret farewell to the homestead.
He looked for more. No more was said. The villains had relapsed into that silence which was more eloquent of horror than all their threats. But Bill now flung fresh branches on the fire; the wood crackled; the flames spurted starward; and in the trebled light, Engelhardt, peering among the trees for some further sign of Sam, sawthat which set the pores pringling all over his skin.
It was the glint of firelight upon a pair of spurs that hung motionless in the scrub—not a yard from the ground—not ten paces from the fire.
He looked again; the spurs were fixed to a pair of sidespring boots; the boots hung out of a pair of moleskins, with a few inches of worsted sock in between. All were steady, immovable as the stars above. He could see no higher than the knees; but that was enough; a hoarse cry escaped him, as he pointed with a quivering finger, and turned his white face from man to man.
Neither Simons nor the Bo's'n would meet his look; but Bill gripped his arm, with a loud laugh, and dragged him to his feet.
"Come and have a look at him," he said. "He isn't pretty, but he'll do you good."
Next instant Engelhardt stood close to the suspended body of the unfortunate Rowntree. Both hands were tied behind his back, his hair was in his eyes, and the chin drooped forward upon his chest like that of a man lost in thought.
"See what you'll come to," said Bill, giving the body a push that set it swinging like a pendulum, while the branch creakedhorribly overhead. "See what you'll come to if you don't speak out! It was a good ten minutes before he stopped kicking and jingling his spurs; you're lighter, and it'd take you longer. Quarter of an hour, I guess, or twenty minutes."
Engelhardt had reeled, and would have fallen, but the Bo's'n jumped up and caught him in his arms.
He did more.
"Listen to reason, messmate," said the sailor, with a touch of rude friendliness in his lowered tone. "There ain't no sense in keeping mum with us. If you won't speak, you'll swing at the yard-arm along with t'other cove in a brace of shakes; if you will, you'll get a chance whether or no. Besides, what good do you think you can do? We know all that's worth knowing. Anything you tell us'll make less trouble in at the homestead—not more."
"All right," said Engelhardt, faintly. "Let me sit down; I'll tell you anything you like."
"That's more like. Take my place, then you'll be stern-on to that poor devil. Now then, Bill, fire away. The little man's hisself again."
"Good for him," growled Bill. "Lookat me, you stuck pig, and answer questions. Where's that chest?"
"In the store."
"Didn't I say so! Never been shifted! Whereabouts in the store?"
"Inside the counter."
"Much of a chest to bust into?"
"Two locks, and clamps all over."
"Where's the keys?"
"I don't know. Miss Pryse keeps them."
"She won't keep 'em long. See here, you devil, if you look at me again like that I'll plug your eyes into your mouth! You seem to know a fat lot about this silver. Have you seen it, or haven't you?"
"I have."
"What is there?"
"Not much. A couple of candlesticks; a few spoons; some old skewers; a biscuit-box; a coffee-pot—but it's half ivory; an epergne——"
"What the 'ells that? None o' your Greek, you swine!"
"It's a thing for flowers."
"Why didn't you say so, then? What else?"
"Let me see——"
"You'd best look slippy!"
"Well, there's not much more. Acake-basket, some napkin-rings, and a pair of nut-crackers. And that's about all. It's allIsaw, anyhow."
"All silver?"
"I shouldn't think it."
"You liar! You plucky well know it is. And not a bad lot neither, even if itwasthe lot. By the Lord, I've a good mind to strip and sit you on that fire for not telling me the truth!"
"Easy, mate, easy!" remonstrated the Bo's'n. "That sounds near enough."
"By cripes," cried Simons, "it's near enough for me. 'Tain't the silver I want. It's the gold, and that's the girl!"
"You won't get her," said Engelhardt.
"Why not?"
"She'll put a bullet through you."
"Can she shoot straight?"
"As straight as her father, I should say. I never saw him. But I've seen her."
"What do?"
"Stand in the veranda and knock a crow off the well fence—with her own revolver."
"By cripes,that'sa lie."
(It was.)
"I'm not so blooming sure," said Bill. "I recollect how the old man dropped Tigerskin at nigh twenty yards. She waswith him, too, at the time—a kid out of bed. I took a shot at her and missed. She'd be as likely as not to knock a hole through one or other of us, lads, if you hadn't got me to see you through. You trust to Bill for ideas! He's got one now, but it'll keep. See here, you swine, you! When was it you saw all what you pretend to have seen, eh?"
Engelhardt laughed. His answer could do no harm, and it gave him a thrill of satisfaction to score even so paltry a point against his bestial antagonist.
"It was the day you two came around the station."
"That morning?"
"Yes."
"Where did you see it?"
"In the store."
"Before we came?"
"While you were there. When Miss Pryse locked the door, it was all over the place. While we were in the kitchen she got it swept out of sight."
"Good God!" screamed Bill; "if only I'd known. You little devil, if only I'd guessed it!"
His vile face was convulsed and distorted with greed and rage; his hairy, four-fingeredfist shaking savagely in Engelhardt's face. Bo's'n remonstrated again.
"What's the sense o' that, messmate? For God's sake shut it! A fat lot we could ha' done without a horse between us."
"We could have rushed the store, stretched 'em stiff——"
"And carried a hundredweight o' silver away in our bluies! No, no, my hearty; it's a darn sight better as it is. What do you say, Simons?"
"I'm glad you waited, but I'm bleedin' dry."
"An' me, too," said Bill, sulkily, as he uncorked a black bottle. "Give us that pannikin, you spawn!"
Engelhardt handed it over unmoved. He was past caring what was said or done to him personally. Bill drank first.
"Here's fun!" said he, saluting the other two simultaneously with a single cross-eyed leer.
"'An' they say so—an' we hope so!'" chanted the Bo's'n, who came next. "Anyway, here's to the moon, for there she spouts!"
As he raised his pannikin, he pointed it over Engelhardt's shoulder, and the latter involuntarily turned his head. He broughtit back next moment, with a jerk and a shudder. Far away, behind the scrub, on the edge of the earth, lay the moon, with a silvery pathway leading up to her, and a million twigs and branches furrowing her face. But against the top of the great white disc there fell those horrible boots and spurs, in grisly silhouette, and still swaying a little to the mournful accompaniment of the groaning bough above. Surely the works of God and man were never in ghastlier contrast than when Engelhardt turned his head without thinking and twitched it back with a shudder. And yet to him this was not the worst; he was now in time to catch that which made the blood run colder still in all his veins.
Simons was toasting Naomi Pryse. It took Engelhardt some moments to realize this. The language he could stand; but no sooner did he grasp its incredible application than his self-control boiled over on the spot.
"Stop it!" he shrieked at the shearer."How dare you speak of her like that? How dare you?"
The foul mouth fell open, and the camp-fire flames licked the yellow teeth within. Engelhardt was within a few inches of them, with a doubled fist and reckless eyes. To his amazement, the man burst out laughing in his face.
"The little cuss has spunk," said he. "I like to see a cove stick up for 'is gal, by cripes I do!"
"So do I," said Bo's'n. "Brayvo, little man, brayvo!"
"My oath," said Bill, "I'd have cut 'is stinkin' throat for 'alf as much if I'd been you, matey!"
"Not me," said Simons. "I'll give 'im a drink for 'is spunk. 'Ere, kiddy, you wish us luck!"
He held out the pannikin. Engelhardt shook his head. He was, in fact, a teetotaler, who had made a covenant with himself, when sailing from old England, to let no stimulant pass his lips until his feet should touch her shores again. The covenant was absolutely private and informal, as between a man and his own body, but no power on earth would have made him break it.
"Come on," said Simons. "By cripes, we take no refusals here!"
"I must ask you to take mine, nevertheless."
"Why?"
"Because I don't drink."
"Well, you've got to!"
"I shall not!"
Simons seemed bent upon it. Perhaps he had taken a drop too much himself; indeed, none of the three were entirely above such a suspicion; but it immediately appeared that this small point was to create more trouble than everything that had gone before. Small as it was, neither man would budge an inch. Engelhardt said again that he would not drink. Simons swore that he should either drink or die. The piano-tuner cheerfully replied that he expected to die in any case, but he wasn't going to touch whiskey for anybody; so he gave Simons leave to do what he liked and get it over—the sooner the better. The shearer promptly seized him by his uninjured wrist, twisted it violently behind his back, and held out his hand to Bo's'n for the pannikin. Engelhardt was now helpless, his left arm a prisoner and in torture, his right lying useless in a sling. Bo's'n, however, came to hisrescue once more, by refusing to see good grog wasted when there was little enough left.
"What's the use?" said he. "If the silly devil won't drink, we'll make him sing us a song. He says he tunes pianners. Let him tune up now!"
"That's better," assented Bill. "The joker shall give us a song before we let his gas out; and I'll drink his grog. Give it here, Bo's'n."
The worst of a gang of three is the strong working majority always obtainable against one or other of them. Simons gave in with a curse, and sent Engelhardt sprawling with a heavy kick. As he picked himself up, they called upon him to sing. He savagely refused.
"All right," said Bill, "we'll string him up an' be done with him. I'm fairly sick o' the swine—I am so!"
"By cripes, so am I."
"Then up he goes."
"The other beggar's got the rope," said Bo's'n.
"Then cut him down. He won't improve by hanging any longer. We ain't a-going to eat him, are we? Cut him down, and sling this one up. It's your job, Bo's'n."
Bo's'n was disposed to grumble. Bill cut him short.
"All right," said he, getting clumsily to his feet, "I'll do it myself. You call yourself a bloomin' man! I'd make a better bloomin' man than you with bloomin' baccy-ash. Out of the light, you cripple, an' the thing'll be done in half the time you take talking about it!"
Engelhardt was left sitting between Simons and the ill-used Bo's'n. The latter had his grumble out, but Bill took no more account of him. As for the shearer, the ferocity of his attitude toward the doomed youth was now second to none. He sat very close to him, with a hellish scowl and a great hand held ready to blast any attempt at escape. But none was made. The piano-tuner stuck his thumbs into his ears, covered his closed eyes with his palms, and tried both to think and to pray. He could not think; vague visions of Naomi crowded his mind, but they formed no thought. Nor could he pray for anything but courage to meet his fate. Within a few yards of him was the body of a dead man murdered by these thieves among whom he himself had fallen. He could not but doubt that they were about to murder him too. His last hourhad come. He wanted courage. That was all he asked for as he sat with plugged ears and tight-shut eyes.
He was aroused by a smart kick in the ribs. As he got up to go to his doom, Bill seized him by the shoulders and pushed him roughly toward the hanging rope; it hung so low, it bisected the rising moon.
"Let me alone," he cried, wriggling fiercely. "I can get there without your help."
"Well, we'll see."
He got there fast enough. A little deeper in the scrub he could see a shapeless mass of moleskin and Crimean shirting, with a spurred boot half covered by a stiff hand. He was thankful to turn his face to the blazing camp-fire, even though the noose went round his neck as he did so.
"Now then," said Bill, hauling the rope taut, "will you give us a song or won't you?"
He could not speak.
"If you sing us a song we may give you another hour," said the Bo's'n from the ground. Simons and he had been whispering together. Bill shook his head at them.
"That rests with me," said he to Engelhardt. "Don't you make any mistake."
"Another hour!" cried the young man, bitterly, as he found his voice. "What's another hour? If you're men at all, put an end to me now and be done with it."
"How's that?" said Bill, hauling him upon tip-toe. "No, no, sonny, we want our song first," he added, as he let the rope fall slack again.
"Sing up, and there's no saying what'll happen," cried the Bo's'n, cheerily.
"What shall I sing?"
"Anything you like."
"Something funny to cheer us up."
"Ay, ay, a comic song!"
Engelhardt wavered—as once before under the eyes and ears of a male audience. "I'll do my best," he said at last. And Bo's'n clapped.
A minute later the bushrangers' camp was the scene of as queer a performance as ever was given. A very young man, with a pallid, blood-stained face, and a rope round his neck, was singing a "comic" song to a parcel of cut-throats who were presently to hang him, as they had hanged already the corpse at his heels. Meanwhile they surrendered themselves like simple innocents to a thorough enjoyment of the fine fun provided. The replenished camp-fire littheir villanous faces with a rich red glow. They grinned, they laughed, they displayed their pleasure and satisfaction each after his own fashion. The fat man shook in his fat; the long man showed his grinning teeth; the sailor-man slapped his thighs and rolled on the ground in paroxysms of spirituous mirth. It must have been the humor of the situation, rather than that of the song, which so powerfully appealed to them. The former had the piquant charm of being entirely their own creation. The latter was that poetic paraphrase of the early chapters of the Book of Genesis which the singer had tried upon another back-block audience but a few nights before. Of the two, this audience, as such, was decidedly the better. At any rate they let him get to the end. And when that came, and Bo's'n clapped again, even the other two joined in the applause.
"By cripes," said Simons, "that's not so bad!"
"Bad?" cried the enthusiastic Bo's'n. "It's as good as fifty plays. We'll have some more, and I'll give you a song myself."
"Right!" said Bill. "The night's still young. Stiffin me purple if we haven't forgot them weeds we laid in at the township! Out with 'em, mateys, an' pass round thegrog; we'll make a smokin' concert of it. A bloomin' smoker, so help me never!"
The cigars were unearthed from the pockets of Bill himself. He and Simons at once put two of them in full blast. Meantime, Bo's'n was trying his voice.
"Any of you know any sailors' chanties?" said he.
A pause, and then—
"Yes, I do."
The voice was none other than Engelhardt's.
"You?The devil you do! How's that, then?"
"I came out in a sailing ship."
"What do you know?"
"Some of the choruses."
"'Blow the land down?'"
"Yes—best of all."
"Then we'll have that! Messmates you join his nibs in the chorus. I sing yarn and chorus too. Ready? Steady! Here goes!"
And in a rich, rolling voice, that had been heard above many a gale on the high seas, he began with the familiar words: