[120]CHAPTER VTherewas still, however, one haunting mystery, one problem unsolved, in the solution of which Mrs. Banneret felt more interest than in all the other uncertainties and sensational historiettes put together. Who and what was Mrs. Lilburne? Handsome, strikingly so, indeed—refined—cultured—aristocraticau bout des ongles; what strange movement of the hour hand of fate had brought her to the often distasteful work, the dire climatic hardships of a hospital nurse on a West Australian goldfield? Who could doubt her stainless purity who gazed on the banded hair—the calm, brave countenance, equally free from doubt or fear—the sweet, sad eyes which so rarely gave token of the spirit-light which illumined them, at rarest moments, ‘like melancholy stars,’ of which Mrs. Banneret said they always reminded her. Had she lost, by death, by desertion, by treachery, her soul’s idol, to whom she had been vowed in happy, radiant girlhood’s day? What a ‘phantom of delight’ must she then have appeared to her social world—at that entrancing age, when ‘standing with reluctant feet, where[121]the brook and river meet,’ she had so fully realised the poet’s dream!—the dream of all poets that ever strove to paint the delicious embodiment of soul and sense, the flower season of happy, innocent, loveliest girlhood.However, it was distinctly patent to all the inquiring or admiring minds of Pilot Mount that the oracle, in the case of Nurse Lilburne’s antecedents, was at present dumb, nor could cries or lamentations extract an answer. To Mrs. Banneret once, indeed, she relented so far as to say, ‘Some day you will know, if to any one I may show gratitude for true friendship and womanly sympathy. In the meantime think of me only as Nurse Lilburne. For your husband I have only done what I would have done for the humblest miner. And may God grant that some day I may be counted worthy to receive payment in kind!’So they parted on the last day of the Bannerets’ sojourn on the great ‘Last Chance’ goldfield, as it was now called,—famed throughout all Australia as the wonderland of that Far South land which had given so many wonders and surprises to the old world, and to the country which had founded it; which a hundred years from its birth, in peril from starvation, from conquest, from criminal surroundings and ignorant misrepresentation, had established an export trade of many millions, and borne sons who fought shoulder to shoulder with Britain’s best troops in defence of the Empire.Mrs. Banneret was not the only person on the goldfields who was interested in the story of[122]Nurse Lilburne’s life. So attractive, so exceptional a personage could not long remain in such a community, where the men outnumbered the women in the ratio of at least a hundred to one, without being admired, flattered, besieged, indeed, by importunate suitors who were only too willing to condone her past—whatever it might have been. But to all such approaches she was adamant. She quietly put them by, not coldly or haughtily, but with a nun-like aloofness, as if all matters unconnected with her duties were not only impossible of acceptance, but even of consideration. Even the most ordinary civilities, such as a seat in a buggy or pony cart to the Polo Club matches, or the races connected with the club formed for the encouragement of that fashionable game, were quietly declined, even though proffered by the president, a married man, whose wife had always been most friendly and sympathetic. Jim Allerton, whose tandem was the admiration of all beholders, implored her to honour him by accepting a seat to the ground—the day being brilliant, with a cool breeze—the occasion certain to be historical in years to come; such an opportunity would perhaps never occur again: the Governor of West Australia, with his wife and daughter, were to be present. She smiled graciously, and confessed that she could not have refused such an offer—once upon a time—but now—he must excuse her. Jim retired heartbroken, so he said.He was not the only admirer—the Adonis of the field, Eachin Durward, a tall, handsome,[123]grand-looking Highlander, was known to be devoted to her,—was well-off too,—would have left for EuropeviaCairo, and the East generally, if only she would deign to express a wish—a preference for any particular route. But she was dumb as the Sphinx.As deaf also, to all entreaties of men, as she who sits by the Pyramids—sad, silent, awful in lonely sorrow—in wisdom unspeakable, in experience vast—in knowledge coeval with the æons, whose memorial—save of her, and the eternal pyramidal monuments—hath perished.. . . . . . . . .Eastward ho! Home again,—blessed word, thrice blessed reality. The hot desert blast—the dust—the heat—the swarming flies—the glaring sun at noon—the scarce less tyrannous heat at even,—all things that bore so hard on frail humanity—all left behind for a season! What a paradise of hope and joy seemed opening before the ‘happy pair,’ in truest re-adjusted sense of the word. And the calm, peaceful savour of all the best joys of life was heightened by the recurring thought that under all things there was the solid foundation of success—success undoubted—ungrudged—won by enterprise and work, a wide-spread treasure-house in which so many of the most honest toilers of earth were permitted, nay, invited to share.With health assured—indeed benefited by recovery from the dread fever-grip—so rarely relaxed—it seemed apparent that he, Arnold Banneret, ‘never looked better,’ as his friends assured him, than on his return from the Golden[124]West—that fateful Eldorado which numbered so many of the best and noblest of Australia’s—Britain’s—sons among the ‘unreturning brave.’The voyage completed—the harbour—the haven par excellence of all fair havens, regained, the meeting on the wharf—of the entire family—wild with joy, and shouting all kinds of differing information, in one breath—all rosy with health and frantic with delight, may be left to be imagined by those home-returning parents of similar experiences. Nothing had gone wrong. The household had been discreetly, lovingly, capably managed in the absence of the high-contracting parties of the little state,—that state, when multiplied by thousands and ten thousands, which makes so much in valour, virtue, and stability, in the onward march of Empire.Again established in their most comfortable house, on one of the heights which overlooked the harbour on the winding highway to the South Head—a dream of beauty by day or starlit night, by sweet moonrise or palest dawn—unequalled, unapproachable beneath the Southern Cross—how pure, how peaceful, how unspeakable was their happiness! What avenues of enjoyment opening out daily, stretching in the future to illimitable distance, filled the perspective!The New Holland Club, of which Mr. Banneret had for many years been a member, again opened its arms to receive the absent member, whom they thought never again to behold. Reports had reached them that he was dead—not expected to survive, what not? It is not a wholly unpleasant[125]sensation to personally contradict the report of one’s decease,—that report, ‘upon the best authority,’ quoted from the morning papers, that one has been cut off in the flower of one’s youth, or the zenith of one’s fame, as the case may be. Even there the candid friend is not wholly at a disadvantage. ‘No idea that I was such a fine fellow,’ says Horatio, returning, let us say, from Philippi, where he was reported slain. ‘Really,’ drawls the inevitable ‘friend,’ ‘but, you know, dear boy, people exaggerate so fearfully on such occasions!’It is good to be rich, for some, for many reasons. It is good even to be thought rich, if one is not thereby tempted to spend extravagantly. As mankind are constituted, whether the money is inherited, gained by accident, by the hardly reputable means of gambling, so long as it is known to be there, a certain kind of respect and deference goes along with its possession. Perhaps in Arnold Banneret’s case, whose exploration of an inhospitable desert where men’s lives were but as counters in the game, and had been expended as recklessly, it disposed the critics of the clubs and swagger hotels to regard him as having achieved true distinction. Younger sons and others, who had gone out with hazy ideas of digging a fortune out of the dreary wastes, of which they had heard, and had returned to the city without one, comprehended the preliminary hardships which he must have undergone. They enlarged upon these, in all good faith, until the readers of newspapers and the public generally were disposed to look upon him as[126]a general of Division and a scientific millionaire combined.‘Heard of him before,’ men would say in the smoking room. ‘Been at the front all his life. Squatter in old days—took up outside country—rows with blacks—bushrangers, that sort of man. Dropped his money when stock went down. Took to the Civil Service later on. Wife and children—so on. Makes up his mind to be Goldfields Warden—tired of that—believed in another cast of the dice—goes to W.A.—and before he’s been there a month, hits on the discovery of the age—the biggest of the century—regular Mount Morgan, y’know.’‘Mayn’t be quite as big a quarry as that,’ interposes another man—a pastoralist, whose grizzled beard and bronzed countenance has ‘Waste Lands of the Crown’ writ large thereon—‘but told by men, been there and seen, half a dozen fortunes in it,’ and so on, and so on. Thus the hero-worship progressed.Rich—beyond any ofhisdreams of avarice—so far, he saw himself so high on the ladder of prosperity that he began to consider how he might benefit those friends and relations (perhaps) whom he had so often pitied, lamenting at the same time his inability to aid them. It was one of the anomalies of life, he had reflected, that people in possession of superfluous means seldom showed much disposition to use them in this way; while those who, like himself, would have taken pleasure in dispensing timely aid seldom had the wherewithal to gratify benevolent intentions. However,[127]if the future yields of the ‘Last Chance’ kept up its present rate, there would be enough, and to spare, for years to come. He could enact the Uncle from India—they are always rich (or used to be)—for the benefit of deserving relations who would be touchingly grateful to the end of their lives. How he could assist all benevolent institutions—repay those who had been kind to him in the early struggles of his life! He had a good memory for such positions and people. Then, after a few years, which he could spend comfortably, not to say luxuriously, in Sydney—he would take the family to England. The boys would be of an age to benefit by public-school training, preparatory to being entered at Oxford or Cambridge. He would buy an estate—not too large, but sufficiently so, to give them the pleasures of English country life, without the drawbacks of having to attend to the responsibilities and details of a large estate. He might even go into parliament—that was to be managed more easily in the old country than in the new one, where the low suffrage, combined with the intense jealousy which wealth and a cultured intellect aroused in the lower-class voters, made it difficult, if not impossible, for their possessor to enter parliament. However, these hopes and enterprises were for the future to justify and develop in action. For the present here was he, Arnold Banneret, back again in Sydney—safe and sound, fully recovered from the fever scourge of outside habitations—wife and children well—heartily enjoying his recovered freedom from anxiety, the society of his friends, and[128]in a moderate way the prestige which had accrued to him as a favourite of fortune, and a successful, energetic, worthy recipient of her gifts.Of the good things now so lavishly bestowed upon them his wife had her full share. Always ready to indulge her with such pleasures as he could afford, and knowing well that in the matter of expenditure she was far more prudent, as well as practical, than himself—he had relinquished to her willingly in his official days the power to draw on a separate bank account, into which his pay as it came in was deposited. From this she was expected to provide for household expenses—dress—schooling—all things needful for their station in life. He contracted to discharge his private personal expenses,—having subsidiary grants, such as coroners’ and other fees, travelling allowances for the long rides and drives he was obliged to take in connection with mining matters, the settlement of disputes about claims, or reports on the sale of auriferous lands: in fact, upon the thousand and one matters only to be settled satisfactorily by the presence and judicial action of the resident magistrate.Now, of course, Mrs. Banneret’s bank account was increased—enlarged upon a scale commensurate with the imposing amounts which regularly arrived from the goldfield of Balgowrie in the district of Sturt, in the colony of West Australia. Like most married women, the spending of money gratified her, more especially when she had no doubt of the solvency of the bank account, and the propriety of the manner in which it was[129]disbursed. That the children should be well and handsomely dressed, as became their station in life, was to her a matter not only of right and justice, but of keen enjoyment. That they were enabled to join in such entertainments as were suited to their age, and station in life, was also a part of her satisfaction. They had often, in former days, been denied these innocent pleasures—to her secret mortification. Now and henceforth this disability was abrogated for all future time.How very delightful it all was! What a glorious thing was life! (Of course there were drawbacks—but they must be expected.) Here Arnold Banneret’s mind reverted to that little hospital at Pilot Mount, to the delirious patient in one bed—suspected in lucid intervals to be himself—to Nurse Lilburne’s grave, compassionate face—to the dead miner but two beds away—to the empty couch, which had been occupied last night!Thinking of such things, a wave of deep and earnest gratitude to the Lord and Giver of Life for a while took possession of all his faculties, to the exclusion of all merely pleasurable sensations. While sitting in the broad, flower-wreathed verandah, as the evening shadows deepened into those of night, and looking over the waveless water-plain of the harbour, lit up from time to time by the lights of passing steamers—the silence broken but by their warning bells—the deep blue heavens, star fretted, and but faintly luminous in the southern midnight—the hands of the husband and wife stole together; for they were lovers still,[130]though so long wedded. ‘Oh, Arnold!’ said the wife, ‘is not this a fragment of Paradise, after what we have gone through, and do you think it will—itcanlast? I feel almost too happy. God has indeed answered our prayers—in many an eventide it has been light, but this is the crown—the glory of all our life!’‘That we have fought our fight fairly—through good and evil hap—I think we are entitled to say, though humbly; and thankfully do I acknowledge God’s mercy and goodness in the troubled times of our married life. But it really looks now as if peace was declared, and the war was over. Let us trust so, and hope that in time to come, as in the past, a hand may be stretched out to save in time of need. May our children who have their lives before them, with all their trials and dangers, be not less happy, less fortunate than we have been!’. . . . . . . . .Years passed on. The family of Banneret had become accustomed to living at the rate of four or five thousand a year—not by any means so difficult a task as declining from that desirable income to as many hundreds. They were accredited members of the ‘Upper Ten,’ as translated into Australian Society terms.Their parents having belonged to well-known colonial families, the young people found themselves invited to all the gaieties going. They had many old friends and relatives—some in influential positions—who stood loyally by them, so that in all the more desirable festivities, from a Government House ball or garden party, to the[131]annual regatta in the harbour, the available members of the family were always in the front rank. Races, hunt clubs, tennis matches—golf—water parties—theatricals—church and hospital bazaars,—they enjoyed them all: in moderation, be it spoken, always. There was no reckless abandonment to pleasure, no love of excitement for that reason only. But their temperaments held a strong infusion ofla joie de vivre, which, along with energy and intelligence above the average, rendered it possible for them to combine much healthy recreation with a reasonable outlook on the great issues of life. The mild but firm parental rule was always available to restrain enthusiasm, to check impulsive imprudence. Thus all things progressed satisfactorily, in an apparently well-balanced mean between comfort and extravagance.All reasonable indulgence in the pleasures of youth for the young people, with the calm satisfactions of middle age for the seniors, seemed assured. Not only for the present, but for years in advance, their position was unassailable by fate. Mrs. Banneret, to be sure, could not help suggesting from time to time, in a mild, tentative way, that they weretoohappy, the sky was too bright, the outlook too fair to last—something adversemusthappen—it was unnatural that this fairyland, lotos-eating state of matters should remain unchanged!‘My dear,’ he would make answer, ‘surely you are not going to take the part of the—a—what’s-his-name—at the feast. Must I hire a slave to repeat at intervals, “Arnold Banneret, thou art mortal”?[132]I have never been unthankful for the blessings which in God’s great mercy have been showered upon us. My whole being is permeated with thankfulness. In our small way we have done good according to our lights, in the way of charity and benevolence, to our fellow-creatures. But I decline to be apprehensive, in advance of disaster—for which I may state that I shall not be wholly unprepared. If it comes, we can stand up to it, as we have done before—more than once—without repining or presumption. In the meantime let us enjoy ourselves while we may.’It was strange—passing strange—as the members of this family had occasion to reflect full many a time and oft, in the aftertime—that immediately after this conversation the great banking disaster which smote cities, towns, villages, throughout Australia, broke like a tidal wave over the land. Ancient mercantile institutions—time-honoured banks—mortgage and agency companies—loan and building companies felt the blow.Banks on deposit, offering high rates of interest, while chiefly unsound, swept thousands of the lesser investors into a whirlpool of ruin. Fine old crusted banks, whose solvency had never been questioned, were whelmed in one common cataclysm.A panic set in. After the first few banks and loan agencies fell, other banks and institutions hitherto unquestioned thought it good policy to go down before the blast in good company, and so profit by the general overthrow to reconstruct. This latter process consisted in writing off as great a volume of inconvenient liabilities as the[133]shareholding public would permit, without too great an outcry, and starting on a new, unencumbered career—free from vexatious hindrance or liability. They were much in the position of the deeply laden bark that in stormy weather, amid mountainous seas, jettisons the cargo, the weight of which may disturb buoyancy at a critical moment. It is not asserted that all interest due on deposits or debentures was sacrificed. It went into a reserve fund of deferred payments, which, after a decent interval, were eventually paid up. But many of the humbler depositors lost the savings of years, and this was the hardest part of all—being no longer able to pay the calls which were necessary for the financial existence of the institution in question. Perhaps this unsparing treatment, though apparently harsh to individuals, was the safer policy. And at this eventful period, when long-trusted financial houses in Britain tottered to their fall, the Premier of the oldest Australian colony, himself a native-born Australian, took the strong, perhaps unprecedented step of declaring bank-notes to be a legal tender. To the ordinary citizen, much more to the rural depositor, a bank-note had always represented ready cash.The movement was well timed. It inspired confidence and calmed the apprehension of general as well as individual wreck and ruin. In a sister colony the Government of the day, with paternally indulgent policy, directed all banks to close for three days—presumably to permit time for declaration of a policy. All the banks availed themselves of this, with the exception offour, who refused to[134]comply with the quasi-royal edict. Three of them were old and long-established—coeval almost with the birth of the colony and the infancy of the commercial system. The fourth was comparatively new and unknown. Yet it rode out the gale as gallantly as its more dignified compeers. The news was communicated to Mr. Banneret with startling suddenness by one of his school-boy sons, who, returning from town at lunch time, it being the holiday season, greeted him with the question, ‘Father, have you heard the news?’‘No; what is it?’‘The Bank of New Holland has stopped payment.’‘What? The Bank—thatBank! Impossible! Are you sure?’‘Well, Jack Burton’s brother is accountant. He told me; some of the other fellows knew about it. And the door’s shut. I went to look. Burton says lots of other ones will stop. They are refusing bank-notes at the railway.’Mr. Banneret groaned. ‘And is this the end of my life’s work?’ he thought—‘a bolt from the blue, and so on. Well, it’s lucky I put that thirty thousand into the British “Reduced Counsels,” as Mr. Weller, senr., called them. Rum time to fall back on Dickens, isn’t it? Might find a worse author, though. We shall have to adopt “Reduced Counsels” literally, it appears. Tell your mother I want her.’His countenance informed that good wife and[135]trusty mother thatsomethinghad happened out of the common track of surprises.‘What is it? Anything the matter with Reggie and Rosamond?’ They were on their way to England by the P. & O. boatIspahan.‘Well, nothing very serious; but there’s a difficulty about money.’‘Is that all? How did it come about? No imprudence, I hope?’‘Not on Reggie’s part. Read his cable—short and strong: “Credit stopped. Please arrange.”’‘How did it happen? I feel so relieved. Money’s nothing, compared with health, or accident. I thought Reggie might be ill, or hurt. But tell me.’‘The main facts are, that all the banks in Sydney, beginning with the Eastern, have stopped payment, provisionally at present, pending reconstruction, liquidation, or some other delayed arrangement, the immediate effect of which is, that nobody can get any money just at present.’‘What—none at all? Whatever shall we do?’‘I daresay I can manage a small advance. I put thirty thousand pounds into British Consols, as a stand-by in case of accidents. So we can pay the butcher and baker, at any rate.’‘But the mine hasn’t stopped?’‘No, thank God! It’s a pity I banked the last month’s dividend, though. It’s going better than ever. So, when next month’s comes in, I can put it into a trust account. Meanwhile I have wired a draft for £500 to Reggie.’[136]‘Poor things! It must have given them a cruel shock.’‘Yes, indeed; but some of their fellow-passengers must have had a worse one. Hard lines to have to come back when they were half-way home, like the Thompsons and Franklins. Poor Mrs. Franklin! She was only telling me last week what a round of the Continent she and the girls proposed.’. . . . . . . . .This cyclonic disturbance abated in time; matters moved on again in their accustomed order. But there were wrecks left behind—mercantile, moral, and political—which no future prosperity could re-establish. Long was it indeed before the fatal year of 18— was even partially restored, much less forgotten. But, as Mrs. Banneret truly said, ‘Money counts as nothing in family history compared with health.’ And this was only a temporary inconvenience, as the Bank of New Holland paid up all liabilities eventually, with interest up to date. Paterfamilias betook himself to one of the banks which had weathered the storm, and found that with the promise of removing the account of the ‘Last Chance’ Gold Mining Company to their long-established corporation, he could have practically all the money he needed. Which was certainly satisfactory. So the Banneret family went on their way rejoicing, and denied themselves, as ‘before the war,’ nothing in reason. The younger boys and girls went to high-class schools, as before; learned all the extras and accomplishments; played football, tennis, hockey,[137]and cricket; rowed and yachted in the harbour; took the whole round of exercises in mind and body for which no people in the British Empire are more eager than the youthful Australian.It was now nearly five years since Arnold Banneret had seen the mine—the centre and source of the family fortunes. He had been kept fully posted up in its progress and development, in the size and splendour of the city which had arisen around Pilot Mount, the grand scheme of water supply which had been successfully completed, the electric lighting of public and private buildings, streets, etc., but he thought it advisable to have personal evidence as to all these wonders and miracles. Besides, he was getting rather tired of the almost too easy and prosperous routine of his daily life. Travel had always been the very breath of his nostrils, the very salt and savour of his life. He would try the tonic again.. . . . . . . . .How different were all things from the rude discomfort of his first visit!—the earlier stages and stopping-places grown from camps to villages, from villages to towns, from towns to cities having mayors and aldermen; telegraph and post offices, court-houses and churches, in almost, as the newly arrived traveller considered, unnecessary profusion. However, the gold returns had kept up—that was the main, the chief consideration. This month’s return from the field had been the largest yet. Other centres of gold production had been discovered, and were advancing along the road to riches and recognition. There had been cases of[138]excessive capitalisation, of course; but nothing that had in any way trenched upon the reputation or resources of the parent mine.Arnold Banneret arrived late, and preferred to dine and sleep at the Palace Hotel—as, of course, the leading caravanserai at the city was named.Here, though partly prepared for a series of surprises, he was genuinely amazed at the luxurious details of the apartments and the comparative excellence of the cuisine: fresh fish brought daily by train from the coast, packed in ice; fruit forwarded in the same way; the duly-kept saddle of mutton—the sirloin,—all good of their kind. Though the tariff savoured rather of a recent war, the retiring traveller was not disposed to find fault. The service generally was good, the attendance most creditable. Having slept the sleep of the just (and the tired-out), and arranged for an early breakfast, he left for Pilot Mount in a hired buggy, behind a pair of fresh, well-groomed horses.A hot climate has its days of tyranny and oppression, but there are compensating advantages—even in summer. By leaving shortly after sunrise, you secure a sample of climate which is little short of perfection,—especially, as in this particular experience, where there is no wind. The sun appeared to be slowly, almost imperceptibly, disengaging his golden sphere from the mists and vapours of the lower world, and as he rose regally from his couch, all nature appeared to welcome the life-giving presence of the fire-worshipping god. Far as eye could see, over the mighty sweep[139]of plain that stretched to the horizon, were the evidences of recent occupation, more or less connected with the great industry which had lured the army of toilers, that Mr. Banneret saw before him, into the gold-seekers’ ranks—some destined to fortune, some to poverty, sickness, and death. In his own case, how nearly had his career come to an untimely end! His heart swelled with thankfulness as he remembered the hospital experiences—the lonely boding days, the faithful watchers by his couch, the unspeakable relief of convalescence.As he neared the monolith which had been the pillar of hope and guidance in his journey through the wilderness, he was conscious of a certain feeling of disappointment in noting the comparatively small size of the encampment round the mine. He had expected a township of larger proportions, and had not reckoned on the attraction of the Great Aqueduct, recently completed, which will always stand as a monument to the courage and foresight of the Minister who planned and carried it through to successful fulfilment. May he live to crown his life-work with the completion of that other great undertaking with which his name will be always indissolubly connected! Worthily and suitably should the name be venerated, as of one who, himself a son of the soil, had, as an explorer, dared the perils of that waterless desert region.Not being tied to time on this occasion, and having the satisfaction of seeing all things going well with the mine, Mr. Banneret permitted himself a season of leisure and recreation, so to speak,[140]which suited his personal tastes. He carefully inspected the machinery and general working of the ‘Reward Claim,’ as among the mining community it was generally known; the hundred head of stamps, the Diehl process of extraction, which inexorably dragged the last grain of the precious metal from the crushed rock. The wages men, the shift, and underground ‘boss,’ respectively and individually, were carefully noted and interviewed by him. Practised in the art of eliciting information and making acquaintance with the various and heterogeneous population of a goldfield, he from time to time noted, quietly and unobtrusively, many of the leaders and men of mark in the community. The results of this inquiry, he deemed, might be of value to him in time to come.In his peregrinations he met with many individuals whom he had known or heard of under different circumstances. The majority of these were unaffectedly pleased to see him—even, rather to his surprise, some of those to whom he had been compelled officially to award pains and penalties. This seemed to make no difference in the cordiality of their recognition. Offenders under such circumstances rarely bear malice, as long as they believe in the justice and impartiality of the decision. The criminal classes, as a body, do not harbour revengeful feelings against administrators of justice. Their common expression is: ‘It’s the law, and it’s his business to carry it out. It’s all in the day’s work.’ True, they do not approve of the official ‘going out of his way’ to[141]arrest a convict. To any ordinary advantage, taken in pursuit or capture, they do not object. ‘It’s his business to run us in, and ours to get away,’ they admit. ‘But he ought to play the game.’ If he fails in this particular, they conspire to be revenged. And as colonial history tells us, they are prone to inflict terrible vengeance in such cases.It was strangely interesting in its way for the retired magistrate—so unobtrusive of dress and manner, as he rambled from camp to camp in the early mornings or late afternoons, when the wind had ceased and the sun had lost his fiercer rays—to come across the men or women whom he had known under such different conditions of life and occupation in the long-dead days of his earlier life. Some had risen curiously high, while others had fallen unspeakably low.It was pathetic to mark the sudden gleam of recognition, impossible to suppress, that lit up the eyes, and for an instant transformed the features of the ‘old hand,’ well known—toowell known, in fact—to the police of more than one colony; the half-humble, half-defiant change of manner, as if to say, ‘I am free now, and unless I get into fresh “trouble” neither you nor any living man can touch me.’To such he made a point of speaking a few words, such as, ‘Doing well, Connor? Fine field this? Anything fresh turned up?’ Whatever the answer, it would merely mean that he, the Commissioner, the man of dread and awful powers in days gone by, had simply recognised him: that[142]it depended wholly upon his future conduct whether that fact would tend to his injury. More than one of such former acquaintances sought him out at his hotel, and trusted that he would not ‘put the police’ on him. He was earning an honest living, and sending money to his wife and family in Melbourne, Sydney, or Hobart, as the case might be. ‘My good fellow,’ Mr. Banneret would reply, ‘as long as you behave yourself, I would much rather that you did well than not. You are getting another chance here, far away from people that know you and what you have been. It is no business of mine to inform the police, or any one else. Don’t drink; work hard—I know you can dothat—and see that your people in Melbourne are not starving while you’re living comfortably here.’‘No fear, sir! I sent ’em twenty pound last mail.’ So the man of a chequered career went back to his tent with his heart lightened, and a renewed resolve to go straight and reform—if indeed such a changing of spots of the proverbial member of the carnivora were possible. Sometimes he did, sometimes he didn’t. In any case his heart was softened, and the impulse to a better life, faint though it might have been, was distinct.One day he came upon a claim of four men’s ground at which the shareholders had evidently been working hard, judging by the size of their ‘tip.’ The men on top were, apparently, new arrivals, judging by their fresh complexions and ruddy faces.‘Now, Sailor Bill!’ said the taller man, ‘what are you a-thinkin’ of?—the clapper’s gone twice—to[143]haul up. Dick Andrews ’ll know you’re wool-gathering agin, same as you was when you lowered the bucket yesterday, without puttin’ the “sprag” in, and nearly finished him.’‘Hang Dick, and you too! I was a-thinkin’ if it was true as I seen in the paper—as the p’leece was agoin’ to make a raid, as they call it, upon the runaway sailors on the field here. There’s a goodish lot, you know. They won’t get me. Afore I’d go home in that old tub as I come out in, with that devil of a skipper and his mate as is worse, I’d chuck myself down the deepest hole in the field, and make an end of it.’‘Better show them cornstalk fellers, as they call theirselves, that an Englishman can do any work as they can, and handle any tools. It don’t do to let ’em have the laugh at us, Bill.’‘Well, I’ll give my mind a bit closer to it after this, but the chaps work like navvies—and it’s not the only trade they’ve larnt, I can see. Wonder what they’ve been at afore they come here?—there’s summat queer about ’em, I’ll swear.’‘Don’t know and don’t care. They’re hard-workin’ smart hands at mining work—and that’s all we care about. There goes the double clapper—it’s dinner time.’Up came the bucket to the brace, with the man referred to as ‘Dick’ therein—a tall man, fully six feet in height, or perhaps an inch over. He was well made, though he carried but little flesh, and had the air of being fully acquainted with mining and pastoral matters. He wore a beard, with a full moustache hiding his mouth[144]and withholding the expression of his face from the casual observer.He spoke with the drawling intonation peculiar to the natives of New South Wales, more especially those reared in the country towns of the interior. His features were regular, his eyes grey and apparently unobservant, though, like those of other races remote from cities and the haunts of men, there were few objects, or incidents, which were not quickly and comprehensively revealed to their vision. The countenance was impassive, as of a man who was not desirous of imparting his thoughts to chance comrades, and at the same time too little interested in the minor matters of life to furnish conversation about them. His hair and beard, of a fair or light brown hue, were streaked with grey. Verging upon middle age, he was probably a few years older, though the activity which he showed when roused to exertion forbade the idea. Indifferent and careless as to surroundings as he appeared to the ordinary observer, there was a hint of calm watchfulness about his air and lounging pose which, as of a hunter in ‘Injun country,’ conveyed the idea that it would be difficult to take him by surprise.The Commissioner looked fixedly at him. The man returned his gaze with a quiet steadiness, at once remote from fear or defiance, yet as one ready for the next movement, whether hostile or pacific.‘I see you know me, sir,’ said the man; ‘it’s a good few years since we met last. You won’t give me away?’—and here the expression changed[145]to that of a hunted creature, which, driven into the last stronghold, has yet the defiant courage of the wolf quarry amid the baying hounds.‘My good fellow, you don’t suppose I bother myself about likenesses for all the people I’ve met during the last twenty years. I may have seen you, or some one like you, before; but I’m a mine-owner now, and I don’t know that I could swear to you positively. Butifyou’ve done anything in another colony, under another name, that has brought you into trouble with the police, don’t get into any scrapes here; and if ever you’re arrested again, it won’t be through me, mind that.’‘God bless you, sir!’ said the man. ‘You’ve not changed. If I’m “copped” again, it won’t matter, for I’ll be a dead man.’Mr. Banneret walked away—rather hastily, as though he could not trust himself to say more. ‘Poor devil!’ he said to himself—almost audibly—‘I wonder how he will end? The odds are a hundred to one against him; that’s a good paying claim, I hear, and he may—onlymay—save up his share. He’s afraid to drink for fear of letting out secrets—there’s a price on his head too—a big reward—which some of his own “friends” wouldn’t mind handling. Well, there’s the last of the lawless lot. “’Tis pity of him too,” as the Douglas said.’ It was rather past the hour of the mid-day meal when he regained Pilot Mount, and his face still wore an expression of doubt, almost of anxiety, as he entered the tent, where Mr. Newstead’s lively chatter, and Southwater’s more serious observations about business matters, and the probable[146]month’s ‘clean up,’ chased the cloud from his brow.Not only smoothly, but on the crest of the wave of prosperity, with fair wind, and every sail set, sped on the ‘Last Chance’—that argosy in special favour with gods and men.
Therewas still, however, one haunting mystery, one problem unsolved, in the solution of which Mrs. Banneret felt more interest than in all the other uncertainties and sensational historiettes put together. Who and what was Mrs. Lilburne? Handsome, strikingly so, indeed—refined—cultured—aristocraticau bout des ongles; what strange movement of the hour hand of fate had brought her to the often distasteful work, the dire climatic hardships of a hospital nurse on a West Australian goldfield? Who could doubt her stainless purity who gazed on the banded hair—the calm, brave countenance, equally free from doubt or fear—the sweet, sad eyes which so rarely gave token of the spirit-light which illumined them, at rarest moments, ‘like melancholy stars,’ of which Mrs. Banneret said they always reminded her. Had she lost, by death, by desertion, by treachery, her soul’s idol, to whom she had been vowed in happy, radiant girlhood’s day? What a ‘phantom of delight’ must she then have appeared to her social world—at that entrancing age, when ‘standing with reluctant feet, where[121]the brook and river meet,’ she had so fully realised the poet’s dream!—the dream of all poets that ever strove to paint the delicious embodiment of soul and sense, the flower season of happy, innocent, loveliest girlhood.
However, it was distinctly patent to all the inquiring or admiring minds of Pilot Mount that the oracle, in the case of Nurse Lilburne’s antecedents, was at present dumb, nor could cries or lamentations extract an answer. To Mrs. Banneret once, indeed, she relented so far as to say, ‘Some day you will know, if to any one I may show gratitude for true friendship and womanly sympathy. In the meantime think of me only as Nurse Lilburne. For your husband I have only done what I would have done for the humblest miner. And may God grant that some day I may be counted worthy to receive payment in kind!’
So they parted on the last day of the Bannerets’ sojourn on the great ‘Last Chance’ goldfield, as it was now called,—famed throughout all Australia as the wonderland of that Far South land which had given so many wonders and surprises to the old world, and to the country which had founded it; which a hundred years from its birth, in peril from starvation, from conquest, from criminal surroundings and ignorant misrepresentation, had established an export trade of many millions, and borne sons who fought shoulder to shoulder with Britain’s best troops in defence of the Empire.
Mrs. Banneret was not the only person on the goldfields who was interested in the story of[122]Nurse Lilburne’s life. So attractive, so exceptional a personage could not long remain in such a community, where the men outnumbered the women in the ratio of at least a hundred to one, without being admired, flattered, besieged, indeed, by importunate suitors who were only too willing to condone her past—whatever it might have been. But to all such approaches she was adamant. She quietly put them by, not coldly or haughtily, but with a nun-like aloofness, as if all matters unconnected with her duties were not only impossible of acceptance, but even of consideration. Even the most ordinary civilities, such as a seat in a buggy or pony cart to the Polo Club matches, or the races connected with the club formed for the encouragement of that fashionable game, were quietly declined, even though proffered by the president, a married man, whose wife had always been most friendly and sympathetic. Jim Allerton, whose tandem was the admiration of all beholders, implored her to honour him by accepting a seat to the ground—the day being brilliant, with a cool breeze—the occasion certain to be historical in years to come; such an opportunity would perhaps never occur again: the Governor of West Australia, with his wife and daughter, were to be present. She smiled graciously, and confessed that she could not have refused such an offer—once upon a time—but now—he must excuse her. Jim retired heartbroken, so he said.
He was not the only admirer—the Adonis of the field, Eachin Durward, a tall, handsome,[123]grand-looking Highlander, was known to be devoted to her,—was well-off too,—would have left for EuropeviaCairo, and the East generally, if only she would deign to express a wish—a preference for any particular route. But she was dumb as the Sphinx.
As deaf also, to all entreaties of men, as she who sits by the Pyramids—sad, silent, awful in lonely sorrow—in wisdom unspeakable, in experience vast—in knowledge coeval with the æons, whose memorial—save of her, and the eternal pyramidal monuments—hath perished.
. . . . . . . . .
Eastward ho! Home again,—blessed word, thrice blessed reality. The hot desert blast—the dust—the heat—the swarming flies—the glaring sun at noon—the scarce less tyrannous heat at even,—all things that bore so hard on frail humanity—all left behind for a season! What a paradise of hope and joy seemed opening before the ‘happy pair,’ in truest re-adjusted sense of the word. And the calm, peaceful savour of all the best joys of life was heightened by the recurring thought that under all things there was the solid foundation of success—success undoubted—ungrudged—won by enterprise and work, a wide-spread treasure-house in which so many of the most honest toilers of earth were permitted, nay, invited to share.
With health assured—indeed benefited by recovery from the dread fever-grip—so rarely relaxed—it seemed apparent that he, Arnold Banneret, ‘never looked better,’ as his friends assured him, than on his return from the Golden[124]West—that fateful Eldorado which numbered so many of the best and noblest of Australia’s—Britain’s—sons among the ‘unreturning brave.’
The voyage completed—the harbour—the haven par excellence of all fair havens, regained, the meeting on the wharf—of the entire family—wild with joy, and shouting all kinds of differing information, in one breath—all rosy with health and frantic with delight, may be left to be imagined by those home-returning parents of similar experiences. Nothing had gone wrong. The household had been discreetly, lovingly, capably managed in the absence of the high-contracting parties of the little state,—that state, when multiplied by thousands and ten thousands, which makes so much in valour, virtue, and stability, in the onward march of Empire.
Again established in their most comfortable house, on one of the heights which overlooked the harbour on the winding highway to the South Head—a dream of beauty by day or starlit night, by sweet moonrise or palest dawn—unequalled, unapproachable beneath the Southern Cross—how pure, how peaceful, how unspeakable was their happiness! What avenues of enjoyment opening out daily, stretching in the future to illimitable distance, filled the perspective!
The New Holland Club, of which Mr. Banneret had for many years been a member, again opened its arms to receive the absent member, whom they thought never again to behold. Reports had reached them that he was dead—not expected to survive, what not? It is not a wholly unpleasant[125]sensation to personally contradict the report of one’s decease,—that report, ‘upon the best authority,’ quoted from the morning papers, that one has been cut off in the flower of one’s youth, or the zenith of one’s fame, as the case may be. Even there the candid friend is not wholly at a disadvantage. ‘No idea that I was such a fine fellow,’ says Horatio, returning, let us say, from Philippi, where he was reported slain. ‘Really,’ drawls the inevitable ‘friend,’ ‘but, you know, dear boy, people exaggerate so fearfully on such occasions!’
It is good to be rich, for some, for many reasons. It is good even to be thought rich, if one is not thereby tempted to spend extravagantly. As mankind are constituted, whether the money is inherited, gained by accident, by the hardly reputable means of gambling, so long as it is known to be there, a certain kind of respect and deference goes along with its possession. Perhaps in Arnold Banneret’s case, whose exploration of an inhospitable desert where men’s lives were but as counters in the game, and had been expended as recklessly, it disposed the critics of the clubs and swagger hotels to regard him as having achieved true distinction. Younger sons and others, who had gone out with hazy ideas of digging a fortune out of the dreary wastes, of which they had heard, and had returned to the city without one, comprehended the preliminary hardships which he must have undergone. They enlarged upon these, in all good faith, until the readers of newspapers and the public generally were disposed to look upon him as[126]a general of Division and a scientific millionaire combined.
‘Heard of him before,’ men would say in the smoking room. ‘Been at the front all his life. Squatter in old days—took up outside country—rows with blacks—bushrangers, that sort of man. Dropped his money when stock went down. Took to the Civil Service later on. Wife and children—so on. Makes up his mind to be Goldfields Warden—tired of that—believed in another cast of the dice—goes to W.A.—and before he’s been there a month, hits on the discovery of the age—the biggest of the century—regular Mount Morgan, y’know.’
‘Mayn’t be quite as big a quarry as that,’ interposes another man—a pastoralist, whose grizzled beard and bronzed countenance has ‘Waste Lands of the Crown’ writ large thereon—‘but told by men, been there and seen, half a dozen fortunes in it,’ and so on, and so on. Thus the hero-worship progressed.
Rich—beyond any ofhisdreams of avarice—so far, he saw himself so high on the ladder of prosperity that he began to consider how he might benefit those friends and relations (perhaps) whom he had so often pitied, lamenting at the same time his inability to aid them. It was one of the anomalies of life, he had reflected, that people in possession of superfluous means seldom showed much disposition to use them in this way; while those who, like himself, would have taken pleasure in dispensing timely aid seldom had the wherewithal to gratify benevolent intentions. However,[127]if the future yields of the ‘Last Chance’ kept up its present rate, there would be enough, and to spare, for years to come. He could enact the Uncle from India—they are always rich (or used to be)—for the benefit of deserving relations who would be touchingly grateful to the end of their lives. How he could assist all benevolent institutions—repay those who had been kind to him in the early struggles of his life! He had a good memory for such positions and people. Then, after a few years, which he could spend comfortably, not to say luxuriously, in Sydney—he would take the family to England. The boys would be of an age to benefit by public-school training, preparatory to being entered at Oxford or Cambridge. He would buy an estate—not too large, but sufficiently so, to give them the pleasures of English country life, without the drawbacks of having to attend to the responsibilities and details of a large estate. He might even go into parliament—that was to be managed more easily in the old country than in the new one, where the low suffrage, combined with the intense jealousy which wealth and a cultured intellect aroused in the lower-class voters, made it difficult, if not impossible, for their possessor to enter parliament. However, these hopes and enterprises were for the future to justify and develop in action. For the present here was he, Arnold Banneret, back again in Sydney—safe and sound, fully recovered from the fever scourge of outside habitations—wife and children well—heartily enjoying his recovered freedom from anxiety, the society of his friends, and[128]in a moderate way the prestige which had accrued to him as a favourite of fortune, and a successful, energetic, worthy recipient of her gifts.
Of the good things now so lavishly bestowed upon them his wife had her full share. Always ready to indulge her with such pleasures as he could afford, and knowing well that in the matter of expenditure she was far more prudent, as well as practical, than himself—he had relinquished to her willingly in his official days the power to draw on a separate bank account, into which his pay as it came in was deposited. From this she was expected to provide for household expenses—dress—schooling—all things needful for their station in life. He contracted to discharge his private personal expenses,—having subsidiary grants, such as coroners’ and other fees, travelling allowances for the long rides and drives he was obliged to take in connection with mining matters, the settlement of disputes about claims, or reports on the sale of auriferous lands: in fact, upon the thousand and one matters only to be settled satisfactorily by the presence and judicial action of the resident magistrate.
Now, of course, Mrs. Banneret’s bank account was increased—enlarged upon a scale commensurate with the imposing amounts which regularly arrived from the goldfield of Balgowrie in the district of Sturt, in the colony of West Australia. Like most married women, the spending of money gratified her, more especially when she had no doubt of the solvency of the bank account, and the propriety of the manner in which it was[129]disbursed. That the children should be well and handsomely dressed, as became their station in life, was to her a matter not only of right and justice, but of keen enjoyment. That they were enabled to join in such entertainments as were suited to their age, and station in life, was also a part of her satisfaction. They had often, in former days, been denied these innocent pleasures—to her secret mortification. Now and henceforth this disability was abrogated for all future time.
How very delightful it all was! What a glorious thing was life! (Of course there were drawbacks—but they must be expected.) Here Arnold Banneret’s mind reverted to that little hospital at Pilot Mount, to the delirious patient in one bed—suspected in lucid intervals to be himself—to Nurse Lilburne’s grave, compassionate face—to the dead miner but two beds away—to the empty couch, which had been occupied last night!
Thinking of such things, a wave of deep and earnest gratitude to the Lord and Giver of Life for a while took possession of all his faculties, to the exclusion of all merely pleasurable sensations. While sitting in the broad, flower-wreathed verandah, as the evening shadows deepened into those of night, and looking over the waveless water-plain of the harbour, lit up from time to time by the lights of passing steamers—the silence broken but by their warning bells—the deep blue heavens, star fretted, and but faintly luminous in the southern midnight—the hands of the husband and wife stole together; for they were lovers still,[130]though so long wedded. ‘Oh, Arnold!’ said the wife, ‘is not this a fragment of Paradise, after what we have gone through, and do you think it will—itcanlast? I feel almost too happy. God has indeed answered our prayers—in many an eventide it has been light, but this is the crown—the glory of all our life!’
‘That we have fought our fight fairly—through good and evil hap—I think we are entitled to say, though humbly; and thankfully do I acknowledge God’s mercy and goodness in the troubled times of our married life. But it really looks now as if peace was declared, and the war was over. Let us trust so, and hope that in time to come, as in the past, a hand may be stretched out to save in time of need. May our children who have their lives before them, with all their trials and dangers, be not less happy, less fortunate than we have been!’
. . . . . . . . .
Years passed on. The family of Banneret had become accustomed to living at the rate of four or five thousand a year—not by any means so difficult a task as declining from that desirable income to as many hundreds. They were accredited members of the ‘Upper Ten,’ as translated into Australian Society terms.
Their parents having belonged to well-known colonial families, the young people found themselves invited to all the gaieties going. They had many old friends and relatives—some in influential positions—who stood loyally by them, so that in all the more desirable festivities, from a Government House ball or garden party, to the[131]annual regatta in the harbour, the available members of the family were always in the front rank. Races, hunt clubs, tennis matches—golf—water parties—theatricals—church and hospital bazaars,—they enjoyed them all: in moderation, be it spoken, always. There was no reckless abandonment to pleasure, no love of excitement for that reason only. But their temperaments held a strong infusion ofla joie de vivre, which, along with energy and intelligence above the average, rendered it possible for them to combine much healthy recreation with a reasonable outlook on the great issues of life. The mild but firm parental rule was always available to restrain enthusiasm, to check impulsive imprudence. Thus all things progressed satisfactorily, in an apparently well-balanced mean between comfort and extravagance.
All reasonable indulgence in the pleasures of youth for the young people, with the calm satisfactions of middle age for the seniors, seemed assured. Not only for the present, but for years in advance, their position was unassailable by fate. Mrs. Banneret, to be sure, could not help suggesting from time to time, in a mild, tentative way, that they weretoohappy, the sky was too bright, the outlook too fair to last—something adversemusthappen—it was unnatural that this fairyland, lotos-eating state of matters should remain unchanged!
‘My dear,’ he would make answer, ‘surely you are not going to take the part of the—a—what’s-his-name—at the feast. Must I hire a slave to repeat at intervals, “Arnold Banneret, thou art mortal”?[132]I have never been unthankful for the blessings which in God’s great mercy have been showered upon us. My whole being is permeated with thankfulness. In our small way we have done good according to our lights, in the way of charity and benevolence, to our fellow-creatures. But I decline to be apprehensive, in advance of disaster—for which I may state that I shall not be wholly unprepared. If it comes, we can stand up to it, as we have done before—more than once—without repining or presumption. In the meantime let us enjoy ourselves while we may.’
It was strange—passing strange—as the members of this family had occasion to reflect full many a time and oft, in the aftertime—that immediately after this conversation the great banking disaster which smote cities, towns, villages, throughout Australia, broke like a tidal wave over the land. Ancient mercantile institutions—time-honoured banks—mortgage and agency companies—loan and building companies felt the blow.Banks on deposit, offering high rates of interest, while chiefly unsound, swept thousands of the lesser investors into a whirlpool of ruin. Fine old crusted banks, whose solvency had never been questioned, were whelmed in one common cataclysm.
A panic set in. After the first few banks and loan agencies fell, other banks and institutions hitherto unquestioned thought it good policy to go down before the blast in good company, and so profit by the general overthrow to reconstruct. This latter process consisted in writing off as great a volume of inconvenient liabilities as the[133]shareholding public would permit, without too great an outcry, and starting on a new, unencumbered career—free from vexatious hindrance or liability. They were much in the position of the deeply laden bark that in stormy weather, amid mountainous seas, jettisons the cargo, the weight of which may disturb buoyancy at a critical moment. It is not asserted that all interest due on deposits or debentures was sacrificed. It went into a reserve fund of deferred payments, which, after a decent interval, were eventually paid up. But many of the humbler depositors lost the savings of years, and this was the hardest part of all—being no longer able to pay the calls which were necessary for the financial existence of the institution in question. Perhaps this unsparing treatment, though apparently harsh to individuals, was the safer policy. And at this eventful period, when long-trusted financial houses in Britain tottered to their fall, the Premier of the oldest Australian colony, himself a native-born Australian, took the strong, perhaps unprecedented step of declaring bank-notes to be a legal tender. To the ordinary citizen, much more to the rural depositor, a bank-note had always represented ready cash.
The movement was well timed. It inspired confidence and calmed the apprehension of general as well as individual wreck and ruin. In a sister colony the Government of the day, with paternally indulgent policy, directed all banks to close for three days—presumably to permit time for declaration of a policy. All the banks availed themselves of this, with the exception offour, who refused to[134]comply with the quasi-royal edict. Three of them were old and long-established—coeval almost with the birth of the colony and the infancy of the commercial system. The fourth was comparatively new and unknown. Yet it rode out the gale as gallantly as its more dignified compeers. The news was communicated to Mr. Banneret with startling suddenness by one of his school-boy sons, who, returning from town at lunch time, it being the holiday season, greeted him with the question, ‘Father, have you heard the news?’
‘No; what is it?’
‘The Bank of New Holland has stopped payment.’
‘What? The Bank—thatBank! Impossible! Are you sure?’
‘Well, Jack Burton’s brother is accountant. He told me; some of the other fellows knew about it. And the door’s shut. I went to look. Burton says lots of other ones will stop. They are refusing bank-notes at the railway.’
Mr. Banneret groaned. ‘And is this the end of my life’s work?’ he thought—‘a bolt from the blue, and so on. Well, it’s lucky I put that thirty thousand into the British “Reduced Counsels,” as Mr. Weller, senr., called them. Rum time to fall back on Dickens, isn’t it? Might find a worse author, though. We shall have to adopt “Reduced Counsels” literally, it appears. Tell your mother I want her.’
His countenance informed that good wife and[135]trusty mother thatsomethinghad happened out of the common track of surprises.
‘What is it? Anything the matter with Reggie and Rosamond?’ They were on their way to England by the P. & O. boatIspahan.
‘Well, nothing very serious; but there’s a difficulty about money.’
‘Is that all? How did it come about? No imprudence, I hope?’
‘Not on Reggie’s part. Read his cable—short and strong: “Credit stopped. Please arrange.”’
‘How did it happen? I feel so relieved. Money’s nothing, compared with health, or accident. I thought Reggie might be ill, or hurt. But tell me.’
‘The main facts are, that all the banks in Sydney, beginning with the Eastern, have stopped payment, provisionally at present, pending reconstruction, liquidation, or some other delayed arrangement, the immediate effect of which is, that nobody can get any money just at present.’
‘What—none at all? Whatever shall we do?’
‘I daresay I can manage a small advance. I put thirty thousand pounds into British Consols, as a stand-by in case of accidents. So we can pay the butcher and baker, at any rate.’
‘But the mine hasn’t stopped?’
‘No, thank God! It’s a pity I banked the last month’s dividend, though. It’s going better than ever. So, when next month’s comes in, I can put it into a trust account. Meanwhile I have wired a draft for £500 to Reggie.’
[136]‘Poor things! It must have given them a cruel shock.’
‘Yes, indeed; but some of their fellow-passengers must have had a worse one. Hard lines to have to come back when they were half-way home, like the Thompsons and Franklins. Poor Mrs. Franklin! She was only telling me last week what a round of the Continent she and the girls proposed.’
. . . . . . . . .
This cyclonic disturbance abated in time; matters moved on again in their accustomed order. But there were wrecks left behind—mercantile, moral, and political—which no future prosperity could re-establish. Long was it indeed before the fatal year of 18— was even partially restored, much less forgotten. But, as Mrs. Banneret truly said, ‘Money counts as nothing in family history compared with health.’ And this was only a temporary inconvenience, as the Bank of New Holland paid up all liabilities eventually, with interest up to date. Paterfamilias betook himself to one of the banks which had weathered the storm, and found that with the promise of removing the account of the ‘Last Chance’ Gold Mining Company to their long-established corporation, he could have practically all the money he needed. Which was certainly satisfactory. So the Banneret family went on their way rejoicing, and denied themselves, as ‘before the war,’ nothing in reason. The younger boys and girls went to high-class schools, as before; learned all the extras and accomplishments; played football, tennis, hockey,[137]and cricket; rowed and yachted in the harbour; took the whole round of exercises in mind and body for which no people in the British Empire are more eager than the youthful Australian.
It was now nearly five years since Arnold Banneret had seen the mine—the centre and source of the family fortunes. He had been kept fully posted up in its progress and development, in the size and splendour of the city which had arisen around Pilot Mount, the grand scheme of water supply which had been successfully completed, the electric lighting of public and private buildings, streets, etc., but he thought it advisable to have personal evidence as to all these wonders and miracles. Besides, he was getting rather tired of the almost too easy and prosperous routine of his daily life. Travel had always been the very breath of his nostrils, the very salt and savour of his life. He would try the tonic again.
. . . . . . . . .
How different were all things from the rude discomfort of his first visit!—the earlier stages and stopping-places grown from camps to villages, from villages to towns, from towns to cities having mayors and aldermen; telegraph and post offices, court-houses and churches, in almost, as the newly arrived traveller considered, unnecessary profusion. However, the gold returns had kept up—that was the main, the chief consideration. This month’s return from the field had been the largest yet. Other centres of gold production had been discovered, and were advancing along the road to riches and recognition. There had been cases of[138]excessive capitalisation, of course; but nothing that had in any way trenched upon the reputation or resources of the parent mine.
Arnold Banneret arrived late, and preferred to dine and sleep at the Palace Hotel—as, of course, the leading caravanserai at the city was named.
Here, though partly prepared for a series of surprises, he was genuinely amazed at the luxurious details of the apartments and the comparative excellence of the cuisine: fresh fish brought daily by train from the coast, packed in ice; fruit forwarded in the same way; the duly-kept saddle of mutton—the sirloin,—all good of their kind. Though the tariff savoured rather of a recent war, the retiring traveller was not disposed to find fault. The service generally was good, the attendance most creditable. Having slept the sleep of the just (and the tired-out), and arranged for an early breakfast, he left for Pilot Mount in a hired buggy, behind a pair of fresh, well-groomed horses.
A hot climate has its days of tyranny and oppression, but there are compensating advantages—even in summer. By leaving shortly after sunrise, you secure a sample of climate which is little short of perfection,—especially, as in this particular experience, where there is no wind. The sun appeared to be slowly, almost imperceptibly, disengaging his golden sphere from the mists and vapours of the lower world, and as he rose regally from his couch, all nature appeared to welcome the life-giving presence of the fire-worshipping god. Far as eye could see, over the mighty sweep[139]of plain that stretched to the horizon, were the evidences of recent occupation, more or less connected with the great industry which had lured the army of toilers, that Mr. Banneret saw before him, into the gold-seekers’ ranks—some destined to fortune, some to poverty, sickness, and death. In his own case, how nearly had his career come to an untimely end! His heart swelled with thankfulness as he remembered the hospital experiences—the lonely boding days, the faithful watchers by his couch, the unspeakable relief of convalescence.
As he neared the monolith which had been the pillar of hope and guidance in his journey through the wilderness, he was conscious of a certain feeling of disappointment in noting the comparatively small size of the encampment round the mine. He had expected a township of larger proportions, and had not reckoned on the attraction of the Great Aqueduct, recently completed, which will always stand as a monument to the courage and foresight of the Minister who planned and carried it through to successful fulfilment. May he live to crown his life-work with the completion of that other great undertaking with which his name will be always indissolubly connected! Worthily and suitably should the name be venerated, as of one who, himself a son of the soil, had, as an explorer, dared the perils of that waterless desert region.
Not being tied to time on this occasion, and having the satisfaction of seeing all things going well with the mine, Mr. Banneret permitted himself a season of leisure and recreation, so to speak,[140]which suited his personal tastes. He carefully inspected the machinery and general working of the ‘Reward Claim,’ as among the mining community it was generally known; the hundred head of stamps, the Diehl process of extraction, which inexorably dragged the last grain of the precious metal from the crushed rock. The wages men, the shift, and underground ‘boss,’ respectively and individually, were carefully noted and interviewed by him. Practised in the art of eliciting information and making acquaintance with the various and heterogeneous population of a goldfield, he from time to time noted, quietly and unobtrusively, many of the leaders and men of mark in the community. The results of this inquiry, he deemed, might be of value to him in time to come.
In his peregrinations he met with many individuals whom he had known or heard of under different circumstances. The majority of these were unaffectedly pleased to see him—even, rather to his surprise, some of those to whom he had been compelled officially to award pains and penalties. This seemed to make no difference in the cordiality of their recognition. Offenders under such circumstances rarely bear malice, as long as they believe in the justice and impartiality of the decision. The criminal classes, as a body, do not harbour revengeful feelings against administrators of justice. Their common expression is: ‘It’s the law, and it’s his business to carry it out. It’s all in the day’s work.’ True, they do not approve of the official ‘going out of his way’ to[141]arrest a convict. To any ordinary advantage, taken in pursuit or capture, they do not object. ‘It’s his business to run us in, and ours to get away,’ they admit. ‘But he ought to play the game.’ If he fails in this particular, they conspire to be revenged. And as colonial history tells us, they are prone to inflict terrible vengeance in such cases.
It was strangely interesting in its way for the retired magistrate—so unobtrusive of dress and manner, as he rambled from camp to camp in the early mornings or late afternoons, when the wind had ceased and the sun had lost his fiercer rays—to come across the men or women whom he had known under such different conditions of life and occupation in the long-dead days of his earlier life. Some had risen curiously high, while others had fallen unspeakably low.
It was pathetic to mark the sudden gleam of recognition, impossible to suppress, that lit up the eyes, and for an instant transformed the features of the ‘old hand,’ well known—toowell known, in fact—to the police of more than one colony; the half-humble, half-defiant change of manner, as if to say, ‘I am free now, and unless I get into fresh “trouble” neither you nor any living man can touch me.’
To such he made a point of speaking a few words, such as, ‘Doing well, Connor? Fine field this? Anything fresh turned up?’ Whatever the answer, it would merely mean that he, the Commissioner, the man of dread and awful powers in days gone by, had simply recognised him: that[142]it depended wholly upon his future conduct whether that fact would tend to his injury. More than one of such former acquaintances sought him out at his hotel, and trusted that he would not ‘put the police’ on him. He was earning an honest living, and sending money to his wife and family in Melbourne, Sydney, or Hobart, as the case might be. ‘My good fellow,’ Mr. Banneret would reply, ‘as long as you behave yourself, I would much rather that you did well than not. You are getting another chance here, far away from people that know you and what you have been. It is no business of mine to inform the police, or any one else. Don’t drink; work hard—I know you can dothat—and see that your people in Melbourne are not starving while you’re living comfortably here.’
‘No fear, sir! I sent ’em twenty pound last mail.’ So the man of a chequered career went back to his tent with his heart lightened, and a renewed resolve to go straight and reform—if indeed such a changing of spots of the proverbial member of the carnivora were possible. Sometimes he did, sometimes he didn’t. In any case his heart was softened, and the impulse to a better life, faint though it might have been, was distinct.
One day he came upon a claim of four men’s ground at which the shareholders had evidently been working hard, judging by the size of their ‘tip.’ The men on top were, apparently, new arrivals, judging by their fresh complexions and ruddy faces.
‘Now, Sailor Bill!’ said the taller man, ‘what are you a-thinkin’ of?—the clapper’s gone twice—to[143]haul up. Dick Andrews ’ll know you’re wool-gathering agin, same as you was when you lowered the bucket yesterday, without puttin’ the “sprag” in, and nearly finished him.’
‘Hang Dick, and you too! I was a-thinkin’ if it was true as I seen in the paper—as the p’leece was agoin’ to make a raid, as they call it, upon the runaway sailors on the field here. There’s a goodish lot, you know. They won’t get me. Afore I’d go home in that old tub as I come out in, with that devil of a skipper and his mate as is worse, I’d chuck myself down the deepest hole in the field, and make an end of it.’
‘Better show them cornstalk fellers, as they call theirselves, that an Englishman can do any work as they can, and handle any tools. It don’t do to let ’em have the laugh at us, Bill.’
‘Well, I’ll give my mind a bit closer to it after this, but the chaps work like navvies—and it’s not the only trade they’ve larnt, I can see. Wonder what they’ve been at afore they come here?—there’s summat queer about ’em, I’ll swear.’
‘Don’t know and don’t care. They’re hard-workin’ smart hands at mining work—and that’s all we care about. There goes the double clapper—it’s dinner time.’
Up came the bucket to the brace, with the man referred to as ‘Dick’ therein—a tall man, fully six feet in height, or perhaps an inch over. He was well made, though he carried but little flesh, and had the air of being fully acquainted with mining and pastoral matters. He wore a beard, with a full moustache hiding his mouth[144]and withholding the expression of his face from the casual observer.
He spoke with the drawling intonation peculiar to the natives of New South Wales, more especially those reared in the country towns of the interior. His features were regular, his eyes grey and apparently unobservant, though, like those of other races remote from cities and the haunts of men, there were few objects, or incidents, which were not quickly and comprehensively revealed to their vision. The countenance was impassive, as of a man who was not desirous of imparting his thoughts to chance comrades, and at the same time too little interested in the minor matters of life to furnish conversation about them. His hair and beard, of a fair or light brown hue, were streaked with grey. Verging upon middle age, he was probably a few years older, though the activity which he showed when roused to exertion forbade the idea. Indifferent and careless as to surroundings as he appeared to the ordinary observer, there was a hint of calm watchfulness about his air and lounging pose which, as of a hunter in ‘Injun country,’ conveyed the idea that it would be difficult to take him by surprise.
The Commissioner looked fixedly at him. The man returned his gaze with a quiet steadiness, at once remote from fear or defiance, yet as one ready for the next movement, whether hostile or pacific.
‘I see you know me, sir,’ said the man; ‘it’s a good few years since we met last. You won’t give me away?’—and here the expression changed[145]to that of a hunted creature, which, driven into the last stronghold, has yet the defiant courage of the wolf quarry amid the baying hounds.
‘My good fellow, you don’t suppose I bother myself about likenesses for all the people I’ve met during the last twenty years. I may have seen you, or some one like you, before; but I’m a mine-owner now, and I don’t know that I could swear to you positively. Butifyou’ve done anything in another colony, under another name, that has brought you into trouble with the police, don’t get into any scrapes here; and if ever you’re arrested again, it won’t be through me, mind that.’
‘God bless you, sir!’ said the man. ‘You’ve not changed. If I’m “copped” again, it won’t matter, for I’ll be a dead man.’
Mr. Banneret walked away—rather hastily, as though he could not trust himself to say more. ‘Poor devil!’ he said to himself—almost audibly—‘I wonder how he will end? The odds are a hundred to one against him; that’s a good paying claim, I hear, and he may—onlymay—save up his share. He’s afraid to drink for fear of letting out secrets—there’s a price on his head too—a big reward—which some of his own “friends” wouldn’t mind handling. Well, there’s the last of the lawless lot. “’Tis pity of him too,” as the Douglas said.’ It was rather past the hour of the mid-day meal when he regained Pilot Mount, and his face still wore an expression of doubt, almost of anxiety, as he entered the tent, where Mr. Newstead’s lively chatter, and Southwater’s more serious observations about business matters, and the probable[146]month’s ‘clean up,’ chased the cloud from his brow.
Not only smoothly, but on the crest of the wave of prosperity, with fair wind, and every sail set, sped on the ‘Last Chance’—that argosy in special favour with gods and men.
[147]CHAPTER VIAnunusually large ‘clean up’ was expected for the Christmas month; bets had been made that no yield in Australia would rival it. It was to go down by private escort, that is, by the waggonette belonging to the lease, which would be driven by one of the men employed in the mine, who was a relation of the chief shareholder, and had turned up a few months since. He had been out of luck lately, but being a remarkably good all-round man, a noted bushman, and ‘as hard as nails,’ preferred work as an ordinary hand on the mine to doing nothing, and was earning his £3 or £4 a week by manual labour. Among his accomplishments—and he had many—were the arts of riding and driving. Everything belonging to the use and education of ‘the noble animal’ had been familiar to him since childhood. It was therefore arranged that he should take charge of a four-in-hand team with the precious cargo from Pilot Mount to the nearest railway station; and, with Newstead, who would embrace that opportunity of ‘going home,’ be responsible for the gold until delivered to the Master of the Mint.[148]All necessary arrangements were made—the solid, iron-clamped boxes, heavy to lift, mysterious and secret of appearance, were duly weighed, counted, and placed ready to go into the body of the strong though light-running vehicle.In the early days of the vast goldfields, where now a city stands, with ten thousand inhabitants, having shops and buildings, water supply, electric power and light, the value of each consignment of gold to the ‘port’ was accurately known. There were people who considered this to be imprudent, inasmuch as the fact of there being from thirty to fifty thousand pounds’ worth of gold on any given vehicle, with only four or six men as a defence force, would operate as a powerful temptation to a class of criminals well represented on any rich goldfield. But nothing in the way of violent spoliation had taken place so far. The waterless character of the country had been against highway robbery, rendering such enterprises less difficult to interrupt or follow up. Still, experienced police officers held the opinion that it might not always be so. Miners and companies had grown careless, by reason of the offences at present being confined to trifling sums and localities in the city. It was well known that criminals of the class of ‘Long Jack,’ ‘The Nugget,’ and ‘The Gipsy’ were on the field—daring, not to say desperate men—with a long list of convictions behind them; ready to stick at nothing when a robbery of the first class, such as they would term ‘a big touch,’ might be brought off. A clever disguise, with a ticket for the mail steamer, would land the actors far away[149]from all chance of arrest. There were good police and sharp detectives around Pilot Mount, but up to this stage of the field their energies had been comparatively wasted.Compared with the more important tragedies from time to time enacted in New South Wales and Queensland, the ‘Golden Belt,’ as the auriferous district had been named, was wonderfully free from the higher developments of criminal activity. This, however, in the opinion of the Chief Commissioner of the police department, could not be expected to continue. As the output of gold, increasing in value and volume, swelled the monthly reports, while as yet no adequate scheme of defence had been organised, the more satisfied was he that a novel and original raid on the treasure claim might at any moment be looked for. Perhaps even now one might be maturing.In the meantime, the start for the coast could not come off for several days, which were devoted to preparing for the important journey. The waggonette was carefully examined: wheels, axles, and springs tested—in some cases strengthened, as a breakdown on the road would be a serious affair, and repairs difficult, if not impossible, to effect. Nearly a week was devoted to this needful precautionary work. In the meanwhile, the English mail steamer had arrived at Fremantle, and among the letters forwarded to Arnold Banneret, Pilot Mount, ‘Last Chance Mine,’ was an offer from an influential Syndicate, with more than one noble, world-renowned name upon the Committee, to purchase the right, title, and interest of the adjoining[150]leases, including the Reward Claim of that name. The Prospectus was elaborate, setting forth that the large yields of the past foreshadowed an even more stupendous income in the future. It pointed out that the management might be simplified, and working expenses reduced, by association with a group of well-known dividend-paying mines, already owned, or controlled, by the Syndicate, while the profits would be proportionately increased, and the dividends accruing to shareholders might be confidently stated to be such as no modern mine, with the exception of Mount Morgan, in Queensland, had ever touched. Of course it would be necessary to issue a largely increased number of shares, the capital value of which would run into millions, but the guarantee of ‘The Southern World Associated Gold Mines Companies’ would, while assuring shareholders of unusual dividends, make the shares negotiable at their face value all over the English-speaking world. The present shareholders would receive 500,000 shares—present value £500,000—with £100,000 in cash,—estimated to represent one-half of the value of the mine. If the present monthly output remained stationary, the dividends would be exceptional. But if, as was almost certain, they were increased proportionately to the improved machinery and up-to-date management proposed to be inaugurated without delay, there would not be an investment in Australia or South Africa which would bear comparison with it.This proposal, when all mining property was[151]going up by leaps and bounds, met with the fullest support from all the local, and indeed the colonial press generally. It seemed from the eulogistic notices which poured in from all sides, British, foreign, and provincial, as if any man or woman, with a capital exceeding a ten-pound note, must be wanting in ordinary intelligence, criminally indifferent to the interests of his family, of the colony in which he dwelt, or the Empire to which he owed fealty, if he or she did not immediately take advantage of this wonderful opportunity to enrich himself and his family, his friends and his countrymen.This proposal, however, did not find favour in the eyes of the principal shareholder. He had seen the decline and fall of so many magnificent projects—over-capitalised, and ‘boomed’ up to highly speculative if not fictitious values, with flattering reports and favourable surveys, dwelling more upon the visions of the future than the facts of the present. They had soared to an aerial height, only to waver, and finally, after irregular gyrations, fell to rise no more, involving all connected with the enterprise in ruinous loss, besides damaging the reputation of solid, legitimate mining properties. He preferred to accept the honestly earned profits of the mine, carefully worked and safely managed; issuing monthly reports, regularly supplied to the press, and open to all men for general information. He placed his views so strongly before the shareholders and partners in the ‘Last Chance Proprietary Mine, Limited,’ at a special meeting summoned to decide upon the[152]offer of the Syndicate referred to, that it was respectfully declined.. . . . . . . . .Meanwhile the city, which had grown and flourished around the once bare, solitary Pilot Mount, had reached a stature—a transformation, indeed, resembling one of the dream-cities of the Eastern story-teller,—broad streets, bright with electric lamps, and gardens watered by an aqueduct fed from a reservoir miles distant. Thronged, too, with every kind of vehicle, every kind of beast of burden; every kind of horse, from the Clydesdale to the thoroughbred, from the dog-cart trotter to the polo pony; bullock teams and camel trains jostled one another; while well-horsed coaches daily, hourly indeed, brought mails and passengers from distant goldfields and lately discovered ‘rushes.’ These last were often founded upon ‘Great Expectations,’ which too often proved unsubstantial, if not illusory. Nevertheless, progresswasmade notwithstanding; and the monthly output remains to testify to the stability of the Great Industry, energy of the population, and the increasing richness of the auriferous area. Wonderful hotels, livery stables containing saddle-horses sufficient to remount a squadron, arose on every side, with race-courses and polo grounds where the young bloods of the ‘field’ disported themselves—where, indeed, such prizes as the Golden Belt Handicap, value one thousand pounds—second horse, two hundred, were competed for. All these, and other wonders and marvels, had been produced—had arisen[153]literallyout of the earth—the auriferous earth—so miraculously productive, by methods compared with which the ancient processes of the sower and the reaper were contemptibly ineffective. Think of a month’s output such as this!. . . . . . . . .It was the evening before the great event. Every one in the camp had been working at high pressure since daylight. All things had been arranged—all hindrances foreseen and provided for. The horses, well fed and well groomed, were tried, staunch, and equal to long stages at a high rate of speed. In addition to Arnold Banneret, Newstead, and the acting coachman, another personage had been granted a seat after consultation with old Jack. This was the miner Dick Andrews, who had urgent private reasons for getting to Perth, and made petition to Mr. Banneret to that end. Having, as he told that gentleman in a conversation a few days previously, fallen upon a stroke of luck, he was anxious to leave West Australia, and, taking his wife and children with him, to settle in the Argentine, where, among people who had neither seen nor heard of him before, he might lead a new life, and cut himself clear of old ties and associations.‘I’ve nigh on five hundred ounces in this bag, sir,’ he said, ‘and if you’ll have it put up with your lot you can hold it as security, like, till you’re banking your own. It’s been weighed all right, and there’s Mr. Stewart’s handwriting along with it in the wash-leather bag. I don’t read, nor write either, as you know—more’s the pity—but[154]I seen him take it from the scales, and write on it, and seal it up all reg’lar. Life’s uncertain (as the parson says), and our lot’s not the sort to make old bones. I’d trust you, Commissioner, with my life. It’s no great odds off that now, I reckon. And you’ll stand by me now, won’t you? I’ve been a bad chap, but I’ve not had much of a chance. A little thing would have turned me on the right track—and that little I didn’t get. You never knowed me do anything crooked, sir? and the shootin’ racket was straightforrard between man and man.’‘I don’t know that I’m doing right, Dick, in helping you off the field this way, but I saw your wife and the boy and girl at Southern Cross. I’ll chance it for their sakes—I’ve heard you were always good to them.’The man called ‘Dick’ did not speak—perhaps the words would not come—but as he turned his head away with an indistinct murmur, a keen observer might have seen in those eyes, which had looked so often upon danger, and fronted Death unfalteringly, an unfamiliar moisture—scarcely to be distinguished from a tear.The day closed murkily, and with a faint pretence of storm and shower, such as, on a hundred former occasions, had resulted in the usual disappointment to the dwellers in that sun-scorched land. Wind probably, thought the Camp generally, or perhaps a ‘Darling River shower’—four drops upon five acres! Meanwhile the sky grew black, the air became heavy, the sultry heat oppressive—appearances such as in[155]any other land would have immediately preceded a thunderstorm, with a fall of rain: an unspoken call to the elements to clear the air and relieve the o’erburdened senses; but none answered. Gradually the clouds dispersed, the sun receded below the dim, distant horizon, and, save the occasional flicker of sheet-lightning, nothing remained as result of the portentous threatening which so lately seemed to disturb the illimitable waste, hardly less solitary, save for this ephemeral gathering, than the unbounded sea.The evening meal had been long concluded. The different groups sat smoking, or conversing in low tones. The skies were again clear, and the heavenly host lit up the dark-blue firmament, throwing a kindly mantle over the homelier features of the desolate levels upon which the Pilot Mount looked down.Mr. Newstead was calmly smoking, and playing with his pet fox-terrier, a well-bred animal, boasting a pedigree from distinguished English prize-winners. ‘Yes, Minniekins,’ said he, ‘I’m going home, and you’re going too, first cabin. Isn’t it a lark? don’t think I ever saw a dog of your age show so much class. You’ll scoop all the prizes in our County Show next year—if you don’t get sea-sick and ruin your constitution, as some passengers do. Won’t we have a jolly time when we see Old England, eh, Minniekins? You’ve never seen grass yet, y’know, nor rain either. That sounds droll, doesn’t it? You’re only two years old, and it rains once in five years here, don’t y’know? Droll country—no rain, no[156]grass, no grain; grows nothing but gold. That’s good enough, though. Won’t we talk to them when we get to the little village, eh? Now what areyouthinking of, Minniekins—smelling a nigger, or a dingo? No camels in sight. What is it? I can see you’re nervous—what an excitable little woman it is! You mustn’t bite the butcher again, or we’ll be brought before the beak for keeping a ferocious dog, don’t y’know?’The terrier raised herself quietly, and stood looking out into the starlit night. She was a remarkably intelligent animal, much attached to her master, who had given a fancy price for her, and often stated that a plainer dog in England, of her class, had cost him £50. She stretched her neck, as if looking for something, and gave vent to a low, querulous whine. Still uneasy, she continued to exhibit the same anxious air of disapproval, though, as yet, not committing herself to the arrival of an enemy, possibly only a suspicious stranger. Once before, when camped out near a lonely ‘soak’ with Denzil Southwater, he had been warned by her long before the approach of a thievish aboriginal, and had therefore time for preparation, which enabled them to rout the ‘Injun’ with loss. Since then the character of Minniekins had stood deservedly high in the camp, where she took rank as a general favourite, to be petted, and bragged about by every man on the pay-sheet of the ‘Last Chance Proprietary, Limited.’Minniekins growled in a low, menacing manner. Then suddenly dashing forward, she[157]barked furiously, and rushed at a man who was advancing rapidly on the camp. A smothered oath, and a savage kick which sent the poor little thing yards away, with a broken leg, told of a frontal attack by the enemy. At the same moment, as it appeared, the man, and a dozen others, mysteriously emerging from the shadows at different points, made a rush for the room in which the gold-boxes had been stacked, firing their revolvers as they came on. The unarmed inmates of the camp—two shift bosses and Mr. Newstead, with three or four wages men—were taken completely by surprise.Denzil Southwater was in his tent writing a home letter. For a moment it seemed, as the compact body of strangers moved up perilously near to the treasure-room, that the fort would be carried by assault.But two of the garrison were neither unarmed nor unprepared: these were the man called ‘Dick,’ and old Jack. The latter was dressed for a walk to the township, a ceremonious visit which included a revolver in his hip-pocket loaded in every chamber. ‘Nothin’ like bein’ “heeled,” as we used ter say in the States,’ he would answer to any remark made on this as a superfluous precaution. ‘It’s come in handy mor’n once or twice either, since then; yer never know what’ll turn up on a goldfield.’ His habit was justified on this occasion. The tall robber had fired point blank at Mr. Newstead, who, struck on the point of the shoulder, fell as if badly wounded, when Dick Andrews sprang[158]forward, firing two shots with lightning quickness.The tall man dropped on his face, and lay still, while a shorter ruffian, apparently bent on reaching the camp, staggered wildly, then fell backwards, discharging his revolver in the act. A younger man had been badly hit by old Jack, while another had been captured by Denzil Southwater, who, dashing at him, unarmed, knocked up his revolver, and catching him a half-arm blow on the ‘point,’ held him, dazed, with a broken jaw, till the mine hands came up, and tied his hands behind him. The other men, seeing that the game was up, took to their heels, and lost themselves in the crowd which was pouring with increasing volume up the slopes of the Pilot Mount. The tableau was imposing—Minniekins on three legs, still barking furiously; the tall man, easily identified as ‘Long Jack,’ a criminal of many aliases, lying on his face, stone dead! while Mr. Southwater’s prisoner, bound and blasphemous, stood in the centre of an excited crowd apparently anxious to lynch him then and there. However, Inspector Furnival, arriving with a strong body of police soon after, carried him off in the name of the Law, much to the disappointment of the public, who openly expressed their regret that Judge Lynch was not afforded an opportunity of proving the superiority of prompt trial and decisive action to the tardy verdict of an Assize Court. In the camp the casualties were: Arnold Banneret, bullet graze on temple; Newstead, wound in left shoulder;[159]Minniekins, broken fore-leg; while the man called ‘Dick,’ shot through the lungs, was in a serious, if not dangerous condition.What a change from the gay hopes of the morning, when all had risen with the prospect of welcome travel—a respite from the monotonous toil of goldfield life; and, in the case of the escort party, returning to the luxuries of city life—to the society of friends and relatives, with the prestige of successful adventurers!How narrowly, thought Arnold Banneret, had he himself escaped the fate of the robber, slain in his last fight against society; a shade nearer to the vital centre, and he would have lain ready for his coffin, even as the outcast criminal who, indeed, had paid the last penalty of a life of crime, in which even murder had been familiar. What a termination to the joyous imaginations with which he and his wife had regarded the speculation which promised so fairly! Fancy the headlines of the localpapers:—‘The Last Chance Mine.’Attempt to carry off the Escort Gold!Five-and-twenty thousand ounces!Desperate encounter. Two men killed:Mr. Banneret and ‘Long Jack.’Several of the Escort wounded.Immense excitement on the Field.Special Evening Edition ofTheClarion.Our Contemporary misinformed:Mr. Banneret not killed.[160]He and Dick Andrews, the well-known Miner,dangerously wounded—the latter, whiledefending the Escort heroically, shot throughthe body. ‘The Gipsy’ captured by the HonourableDenzil Southwater, a Shareholder, who was unarmed.Lord Newstead suffering from a broken arm.Full particulars in our morning issue.The effect of this and similar announcements may be imagined. Public feeling was stirred to its inmost depths. The police force, as usual, was denounced for incapacity and indolence, and the Government of the day arraigned for want of foresight, unreadiness, and general ignorance of its duties. As to the administration of law and order on this, the richest, the most extensive goldfield in Australia—the only parallel case commensurate with its abnormal inefficiency was that of the British War Office. But the West Australian Cabinet might yet earn the notoriety of having sacrificed a colony if this sort of thing was allowed to go on unchecked—and so on, and so on. The opposition journal of course discounted ‘the habitual exaggeration of a contemporary, the editor of which could not allude to an attempt at the looting of a rich treasure-cargo—an attempt which had signally failed, moreover—without dragging in absurd parallels equally out of date and out of reason. Omniscient as he claimed to be, he had not become acquainted with the fact, now for the first time divulged to their reporter, a gentleman of wide experience in Australian and American mines, that “Dick Andrews,” a working miner, and shareholder in[161]the Reward Claim, who shot dead the well-known desperado “Long Jack” and wounded “The Nugget”—formerly of Port Arthur—was no other than the notorious Richard Lawless, the brother of Ned and Kate, concerned in the killing of Inspector Francis Dayrell, in pursuance of a vendetta cherished for years by the Lawless family. They eventually accomplished his death. Lured into an ambush, thus fell one of the most daring and energetic officers of the Police Force of Victoria. They had evaded the warrants issued for their apprehension, disappearing in the “Never-Never” regions of Queensland, chiefly populated, if all tales be true, by refugees of their class and character. From this “land of lost souls” Kate Lawless returned to die by her own hand on the grave of her child at Running Creek on Monaro; while her brother Richard, a marvellous bushman and all-round worker, as are many of his compatriots, has been employed under the very noses of the police as “Dick Andrews,” remarkable only for his steady, hardworking habits and inoffensive general demeanour. Tall, spare, and sinewy, wearing the ordinary beard of the dweller in the Waste, he was in no way distinguishable from the thousands of Australians whom the magnet of the “Golden Belt” has drawn with resistless force to our colony. There is no intention, we hear, of putting the law in force against him; for he will be arraigned before a Higher Court, a more august Judge, than Australia can furnish. His wounds are mortal. His hours are numbered. And before to-morrow’s sun leaves Pilot Mount in[162]darkness, the soul of the erring, but not wholly lost homicide, whom men knew as Dick Lawless, will have quitted its earthly tenement for the final audit.’The editorial dictum was prophetic. Mr. Banneret and Denzil Southwater, watching by the dying man’s couch, listened to his last words while the labouring breath grew faint—then failed for ever. One bullet had pierced his left lung; another had lodged in the spine. Both injuries were mortal. It was a question of hours—of few of them indeed.‘I stopped “Long Jack,” Commissioner!’ he said, while a slow smile of satisfaction lit up the calm features, ‘afore he got in another pot at you. He’d not have missed twice. I’m goin’ out, and except for the wife and kids I don’t know as it’s much odds; there’s enough to keep them when she gets back to Tumut, where her people live. Land’s easy got there; a bit of corn-flat with a few cows ’ll keep her easy and comfortable. The boy and girl ’ll get schoolin’ till they’re out in the world, and their mother won’t tell ’em too much about me—their poor father, as died in his right place—a-standin’ off them as tried to collar the gold he’d worked hard for. You write it out, Mr. Southwater—all as I’ve said, and just put Richard Lawless his mark at the foot. The Commissioner might witness it—if he’ll be so good—and you too, sir.’They complied with the sufferer’s request. Great drops of blood welled up from the shattered lung, as between gasps he laboriously formed the[163]cross which validated his will, made for the benefit of the woman who had followed him from the green, fertile valley, where the sparkling river comes leaping down from the snow-crowned alp. With her he had been ever mild and patient—a tireless worker when work was to be had—often away for months at a time, but reserved as to his occupation. Brokenly, and with hesitation, he said: ‘Commissioner! I’ll die easier like if you’ll shake hands afore I go. It’s a suspension o’ labour in a manner of speakin’.’ And with a quiet smile on his lips at an old goldfields jest, the soul of ‘Dick Andrews,’ otherwise Richard Lawless, fled away from its earthly tenement, leaving the hand of Arnold Banneret, ex-Commissioner of Barrawong, New South Wales, still enclosed in a dead man’s rigid grasp.‘Poor Dick! poor chap!’ said Banneret; ‘there goes a man’s life made for better things. I suppose hedidsave mine—barring accident. That long ruffian wouldn’t have missed twice. With the exception of the vendetta business with Dayrell—and there are two versions of that story—I never heard of his doing anything mean or dishonest—that is “crooked”’—he added reflectively—having regard to the prevailing tone of Monaro morality.. . . . . . . . .The fervour of the editors of all the journals, printed within a thousand miles or so, having exhausted itself and the public interest, matters returned to their normal state and condition. The escort waggonette, artistically tooled by Gore[164]Chesterfield, cleared out for Perth at sunrise one fine morning, ‘laden’ (as the local mining organ put it) ‘with gold, ammunition, firearms, and decayed gentlefolk.’ On the box-seat, between Mr. Banneret and the charioteer, sat an aristocratic society dame of ducal connections, who, originally voyaging to Fremantle with maternal solicitude, had remained to take a hand in the mining adventure of the period. Having been down the deepest mine of the ‘field,’ and across the desert on a camel as far as the famous ‘Leonora’ and ‘Mount Idalia,’ in both of which ‘shows’ she had invested sensationally, she was not to be daunted by the off-chance of a bullet wound on the present journey. The perils of this passage through the wilderness were, however, minimised by the attendance of a doubled police escort and half a hundred volunteer guards, who (shares in the popular investment of the day, the ‘Rotherwood’ mine, being at a premium and rising fast) resolved to combine the performance of a patriotic duty with the excitement of a ‘jamberoo’ in Perth, and ‘a whiff of the briny’ long looked forward to, and, before this happy conjunction of profit and pleasure, almost despaired of. When it is considered that most of the men who composed this advanced guard were young, or youthful-seeming—that the prospects of the majority were like the climate, sunny in the extreme—that fortune had lately showered favours upon nearly all,—it may be imagined what a joyous cavalcade, dashing at reckless speed through plain and thicket—waking the long-silent, solitary champaign with[165]song and shout—the ‘Last Chance’ escort must have appeared to the ordinary wayfarer.O Death in Life, the days that are no more.The treasure was duly deposited in the banks of the period; certain favourites of fortune, among them the lady of the box-seat, took passage by the outgoing mail-steamer. Lord Newstead was bound for ‘England, home, and beauty,’ whence his return was problematical; Arnold Banneret for Sydney; while Messrs. Chesterfield and Southwater would return to the vicinity of Pilot Mount, not having as yet acquired the ‘pile’ which was to crown the pyramid of a life’s endeavour. Arnold Banneret made a final adieu to the ‘Reward Claim,’ having by wire received a declaration from his wife that, ‘no matter how many ounces to the ton the “Last Chance” produced, never again would she consent to his putting foot on that goldfield; even if his presence was indispensable to prevent Pilot Mount from being turned into a volcano in full working order, her resolve remained unalterable. What she had suffered when she heard the news (false as it turned out to be) of his death, could never be endured twice. So now, he knew.’ When Mrs. Banneret concluded an argument with these words the ‘incident was closed.’ Her sympathetic partner ‘for better for worse’ resigned himself to a future existence hampered only by the necessity of finding use for a capital of a hundred thousand pounds or two, ‘with all the woes it brings.’He promised himself the satisfaction, however,[166]of revisiting Tumut, and personally assuring the future of Mrs. Richard Lawless and her children, which, as he had always loved and admired the place and people, he regarded as a sacred duty, and a delightful holiday not to be neglected. Thus, filled with anticipations of home-returning joys, as he trod once more the deck of the P. & O. linerBaghdad, marked once more the Oriental garb, and heard the familiar-sounding voices of the Lascar crew, his heart swelled within him, as in ‘the dear, dead days beyond recall.’. . . . . . . . .The return voyage in theBaghdadwas pure unmixed delight. Very rarely is it otherwise in the ‘floating clubs’ of the P. & O. ‘The liner she’s a lady,’ in every sense of the word. In the eyes of the outward-bound passengers for England Arnold Banneret and Lord Newstead were heroes and ‘conquistadores,’ rivalling the comrades of Pizarro returning from Peru laden with the treasure of the Incas. Lord Newstead secured the larger share of admiration—young and handsome, heir to an historic name, wounded in the fight, what modern gallant could hope to rival him in the good graces of the lady passengers? His right arm still supported by a sling, and his disabled condition, called forth many proffers of active sympathy.Mr. Banneret, on account of his age and patriarchal rank, was not so much an object of interest and admiration; nevertheless, the ‘scar on his brown cheek revealed’ if not ‘a token true of Bosworth Field,’ a genuine record of a ‘close call,’[167]as an American ‘shift boss,’ travelling east from ‘Great Holder,’ entitled the incident.Their gold, now safe under hatches, was variously estimated at from fifty to a hundred thousand ounces, according to the experience or imagination of the narrator. The winds and waves were kind; the Great Bight was so smooth that ‘you’d hardly know it,’ as a fair voyager of experience in the South Pacific characterised it. And shortly after the dawnlight—clearer grown, and faintly roseate-hued—opened to view the sandstone portals of the harbour lake of the South, theBaghdad’spassengers, in cabs, carriages, trams, and omnibuses, distributed themselves throughout the Sydney clubs and hotels, with an economy of time and trouble unattainable in any but the mother State.. . . . . . . . .Home again! Everything had gone well in his absence. For the twentieth time Arnold Banneret vowed that never again would he leave the domestic Eden for the outer world, how fair soever might be the lure held out by inconstant fortune. The girls were growing up; his boys, like every other man’s boys, needed the occasional parental warning—the guiding hand. His wife’s cheek paled as she traced the still visible track of the robber’s bullet. ‘What was sufficient repayment, what compensation adequate, for such risks? And if——’ but she would not suffer him to proceed with the conjectures of whatmighthave happened. The ‘if’ had remained undeveloped, so there was no use speculating on grisly possibilities.[168]Sydney was more beauteous than ever, with glorious gardens, and the daily ocean breeze. Say that the noonday heat was at times oppressive, what was it in comparison with the terrible sun-rays of the West—a tent only between the dweller therein and the cloudless, relentless sky? The glorious semi-tropical foliage of the sea-girt city, the lawns so freshly verdurous, the stately pines, the flowering shrubs, the rose thickets, the carefully tended, if somewhat narrow roads, which, winding around the harbour cliffs, open out such enchanting views of sea and shore, earth and sky—specially arranged for the delectation of strangers and pilgrims! The swift-winged yachts and pleasure-boats still floated like sea-gulls above the translucent wave. All these delights and refreshments smote the senses of the home-returning wayfarer almost as freshly as if tasted for the first time.Then the delicious awakening in the fair, sweet dawn of the early summer, with the certainty that there was now no need for doubt or anxiety touching the family fortunes. A competence, nay, more than a sufficiency for all their needs, was assured. Their luck had turned. No more was it necessary to go stolidly on with the daily work which gained the daily bread. There was not, could not be again, the necessity for calculation as to what liability required to be arranged for—what pressing account to be paid in full, or if not, compromised by payment on account. Such things had been in the past—in that shadowy region now so dim and distant-seeming. No, thank God! and a wave of gratitude passed through his every sense and faculty[169]as he realised that those days and their accompanying sacrifices had passed away for ever. Were they happier now? In his musings by the seashore, at eve or moonrise, he sometimes asked himself the question. The reply was not always in the affirmative. They had been happy—truly, consciously happy, then. If there were difficulties, they had overcome them. If there had been debts and doubts, anxiety never far distant, succour unexpected had come in time of need. The responsibilities of official position had been great—at times almost overpowering, but their very magnitude had stimulated his energies—he had never faltered; strong in the resolve to deal justly, impartially, with the high questions committed to his judgment, he had fought through opposition, misrepresentation, and discouragement, to emerge at last, with the approval of his conscience and the confidence of the heterogeneous workers whom he had ruled for a quarter of a century.And now, having passed through theSturm und Drangof early manhood, he had reached a period of life when youth had flown—when strength and activity could no longer be looked for—when whatever changes took place must necessarily be, in some respects, for the worse. What would the future be? In what direction would the rising generation of the family, nay, of Australia, be impelled?
Anunusually large ‘clean up’ was expected for the Christmas month; bets had been made that no yield in Australia would rival it. It was to go down by private escort, that is, by the waggonette belonging to the lease, which would be driven by one of the men employed in the mine, who was a relation of the chief shareholder, and had turned up a few months since. He had been out of luck lately, but being a remarkably good all-round man, a noted bushman, and ‘as hard as nails,’ preferred work as an ordinary hand on the mine to doing nothing, and was earning his £3 or £4 a week by manual labour. Among his accomplishments—and he had many—were the arts of riding and driving. Everything belonging to the use and education of ‘the noble animal’ had been familiar to him since childhood. It was therefore arranged that he should take charge of a four-in-hand team with the precious cargo from Pilot Mount to the nearest railway station; and, with Newstead, who would embrace that opportunity of ‘going home,’ be responsible for the gold until delivered to the Master of the Mint.[148]All necessary arrangements were made—the solid, iron-clamped boxes, heavy to lift, mysterious and secret of appearance, were duly weighed, counted, and placed ready to go into the body of the strong though light-running vehicle.
In the early days of the vast goldfields, where now a city stands, with ten thousand inhabitants, having shops and buildings, water supply, electric power and light, the value of each consignment of gold to the ‘port’ was accurately known. There were people who considered this to be imprudent, inasmuch as the fact of there being from thirty to fifty thousand pounds’ worth of gold on any given vehicle, with only four or six men as a defence force, would operate as a powerful temptation to a class of criminals well represented on any rich goldfield. But nothing in the way of violent spoliation had taken place so far. The waterless character of the country had been against highway robbery, rendering such enterprises less difficult to interrupt or follow up. Still, experienced police officers held the opinion that it might not always be so. Miners and companies had grown careless, by reason of the offences at present being confined to trifling sums and localities in the city. It was well known that criminals of the class of ‘Long Jack,’ ‘The Nugget,’ and ‘The Gipsy’ were on the field—daring, not to say desperate men—with a long list of convictions behind them; ready to stick at nothing when a robbery of the first class, such as they would term ‘a big touch,’ might be brought off. A clever disguise, with a ticket for the mail steamer, would land the actors far away[149]from all chance of arrest. There were good police and sharp detectives around Pilot Mount, but up to this stage of the field their energies had been comparatively wasted.
Compared with the more important tragedies from time to time enacted in New South Wales and Queensland, the ‘Golden Belt,’ as the auriferous district had been named, was wonderfully free from the higher developments of criminal activity. This, however, in the opinion of the Chief Commissioner of the police department, could not be expected to continue. As the output of gold, increasing in value and volume, swelled the monthly reports, while as yet no adequate scheme of defence had been organised, the more satisfied was he that a novel and original raid on the treasure claim might at any moment be looked for. Perhaps even now one might be maturing.
In the meantime, the start for the coast could not come off for several days, which were devoted to preparing for the important journey. The waggonette was carefully examined: wheels, axles, and springs tested—in some cases strengthened, as a breakdown on the road would be a serious affair, and repairs difficult, if not impossible, to effect. Nearly a week was devoted to this needful precautionary work. In the meanwhile, the English mail steamer had arrived at Fremantle, and among the letters forwarded to Arnold Banneret, Pilot Mount, ‘Last Chance Mine,’ was an offer from an influential Syndicate, with more than one noble, world-renowned name upon the Committee, to purchase the right, title, and interest of the adjoining[150]leases, including the Reward Claim of that name. The Prospectus was elaborate, setting forth that the large yields of the past foreshadowed an even more stupendous income in the future. It pointed out that the management might be simplified, and working expenses reduced, by association with a group of well-known dividend-paying mines, already owned, or controlled, by the Syndicate, while the profits would be proportionately increased, and the dividends accruing to shareholders might be confidently stated to be such as no modern mine, with the exception of Mount Morgan, in Queensland, had ever touched. Of course it would be necessary to issue a largely increased number of shares, the capital value of which would run into millions, but the guarantee of ‘The Southern World Associated Gold Mines Companies’ would, while assuring shareholders of unusual dividends, make the shares negotiable at their face value all over the English-speaking world. The present shareholders would receive 500,000 shares—present value £500,000—with £100,000 in cash,—estimated to represent one-half of the value of the mine. If the present monthly output remained stationary, the dividends would be exceptional. But if, as was almost certain, they were increased proportionately to the improved machinery and up-to-date management proposed to be inaugurated without delay, there would not be an investment in Australia or South Africa which would bear comparison with it.
This proposal, when all mining property was[151]going up by leaps and bounds, met with the fullest support from all the local, and indeed the colonial press generally. It seemed from the eulogistic notices which poured in from all sides, British, foreign, and provincial, as if any man or woman, with a capital exceeding a ten-pound note, must be wanting in ordinary intelligence, criminally indifferent to the interests of his family, of the colony in which he dwelt, or the Empire to which he owed fealty, if he or she did not immediately take advantage of this wonderful opportunity to enrich himself and his family, his friends and his countrymen.
This proposal, however, did not find favour in the eyes of the principal shareholder. He had seen the decline and fall of so many magnificent projects—over-capitalised, and ‘boomed’ up to highly speculative if not fictitious values, with flattering reports and favourable surveys, dwelling more upon the visions of the future than the facts of the present. They had soared to an aerial height, only to waver, and finally, after irregular gyrations, fell to rise no more, involving all connected with the enterprise in ruinous loss, besides damaging the reputation of solid, legitimate mining properties. He preferred to accept the honestly earned profits of the mine, carefully worked and safely managed; issuing monthly reports, regularly supplied to the press, and open to all men for general information. He placed his views so strongly before the shareholders and partners in the ‘Last Chance Proprietary Mine, Limited,’ at a special meeting summoned to decide upon the[152]offer of the Syndicate referred to, that it was respectfully declined.
. . . . . . . . .
Meanwhile the city, which had grown and flourished around the once bare, solitary Pilot Mount, had reached a stature—a transformation, indeed, resembling one of the dream-cities of the Eastern story-teller,—broad streets, bright with electric lamps, and gardens watered by an aqueduct fed from a reservoir miles distant. Thronged, too, with every kind of vehicle, every kind of beast of burden; every kind of horse, from the Clydesdale to the thoroughbred, from the dog-cart trotter to the polo pony; bullock teams and camel trains jostled one another; while well-horsed coaches daily, hourly indeed, brought mails and passengers from distant goldfields and lately discovered ‘rushes.’ These last were often founded upon ‘Great Expectations,’ which too often proved unsubstantial, if not illusory. Nevertheless, progresswasmade notwithstanding; and the monthly output remains to testify to the stability of the Great Industry, energy of the population, and the increasing richness of the auriferous area. Wonderful hotels, livery stables containing saddle-horses sufficient to remount a squadron, arose on every side, with race-courses and polo grounds where the young bloods of the ‘field’ disported themselves—where, indeed, such prizes as the Golden Belt Handicap, value one thousand pounds—second horse, two hundred, were competed for. All these, and other wonders and marvels, had been produced—had arisen[153]literallyout of the earth—the auriferous earth—so miraculously productive, by methods compared with which the ancient processes of the sower and the reaper were contemptibly ineffective. Think of a month’s output such as this!
. . . . . . . . .
It was the evening before the great event. Every one in the camp had been working at high pressure since daylight. All things had been arranged—all hindrances foreseen and provided for. The horses, well fed and well groomed, were tried, staunch, and equal to long stages at a high rate of speed. In addition to Arnold Banneret, Newstead, and the acting coachman, another personage had been granted a seat after consultation with old Jack. This was the miner Dick Andrews, who had urgent private reasons for getting to Perth, and made petition to Mr. Banneret to that end. Having, as he told that gentleman in a conversation a few days previously, fallen upon a stroke of luck, he was anxious to leave West Australia, and, taking his wife and children with him, to settle in the Argentine, where, among people who had neither seen nor heard of him before, he might lead a new life, and cut himself clear of old ties and associations.
‘I’ve nigh on five hundred ounces in this bag, sir,’ he said, ‘and if you’ll have it put up with your lot you can hold it as security, like, till you’re banking your own. It’s been weighed all right, and there’s Mr. Stewart’s handwriting along with it in the wash-leather bag. I don’t read, nor write either, as you know—more’s the pity—but[154]I seen him take it from the scales, and write on it, and seal it up all reg’lar. Life’s uncertain (as the parson says), and our lot’s not the sort to make old bones. I’d trust you, Commissioner, with my life. It’s no great odds off that now, I reckon. And you’ll stand by me now, won’t you? I’ve been a bad chap, but I’ve not had much of a chance. A little thing would have turned me on the right track—and that little I didn’t get. You never knowed me do anything crooked, sir? and the shootin’ racket was straightforrard between man and man.’
‘I don’t know that I’m doing right, Dick, in helping you off the field this way, but I saw your wife and the boy and girl at Southern Cross. I’ll chance it for their sakes—I’ve heard you were always good to them.’
The man called ‘Dick’ did not speak—perhaps the words would not come—but as he turned his head away with an indistinct murmur, a keen observer might have seen in those eyes, which had looked so often upon danger, and fronted Death unfalteringly, an unfamiliar moisture—scarcely to be distinguished from a tear.
The day closed murkily, and with a faint pretence of storm and shower, such as, on a hundred former occasions, had resulted in the usual disappointment to the dwellers in that sun-scorched land. Wind probably, thought the Camp generally, or perhaps a ‘Darling River shower’—four drops upon five acres! Meanwhile the sky grew black, the air became heavy, the sultry heat oppressive—appearances such as in[155]any other land would have immediately preceded a thunderstorm, with a fall of rain: an unspoken call to the elements to clear the air and relieve the o’erburdened senses; but none answered. Gradually the clouds dispersed, the sun receded below the dim, distant horizon, and, save the occasional flicker of sheet-lightning, nothing remained as result of the portentous threatening which so lately seemed to disturb the illimitable waste, hardly less solitary, save for this ephemeral gathering, than the unbounded sea.
The evening meal had been long concluded. The different groups sat smoking, or conversing in low tones. The skies were again clear, and the heavenly host lit up the dark-blue firmament, throwing a kindly mantle over the homelier features of the desolate levels upon which the Pilot Mount looked down.
Mr. Newstead was calmly smoking, and playing with his pet fox-terrier, a well-bred animal, boasting a pedigree from distinguished English prize-winners. ‘Yes, Minniekins,’ said he, ‘I’m going home, and you’re going too, first cabin. Isn’t it a lark? don’t think I ever saw a dog of your age show so much class. You’ll scoop all the prizes in our County Show next year—if you don’t get sea-sick and ruin your constitution, as some passengers do. Won’t we have a jolly time when we see Old England, eh, Minniekins? You’ve never seen grass yet, y’know, nor rain either. That sounds droll, doesn’t it? You’re only two years old, and it rains once in five years here, don’t y’know? Droll country—no rain, no[156]grass, no grain; grows nothing but gold. That’s good enough, though. Won’t we talk to them when we get to the little village, eh? Now what areyouthinking of, Minniekins—smelling a nigger, or a dingo? No camels in sight. What is it? I can see you’re nervous—what an excitable little woman it is! You mustn’t bite the butcher again, or we’ll be brought before the beak for keeping a ferocious dog, don’t y’know?’
The terrier raised herself quietly, and stood looking out into the starlit night. She was a remarkably intelligent animal, much attached to her master, who had given a fancy price for her, and often stated that a plainer dog in England, of her class, had cost him £50. She stretched her neck, as if looking for something, and gave vent to a low, querulous whine. Still uneasy, she continued to exhibit the same anxious air of disapproval, though, as yet, not committing herself to the arrival of an enemy, possibly only a suspicious stranger. Once before, when camped out near a lonely ‘soak’ with Denzil Southwater, he had been warned by her long before the approach of a thievish aboriginal, and had therefore time for preparation, which enabled them to rout the ‘Injun’ with loss. Since then the character of Minniekins had stood deservedly high in the camp, where she took rank as a general favourite, to be petted, and bragged about by every man on the pay-sheet of the ‘Last Chance Proprietary, Limited.’
Minniekins growled in a low, menacing manner. Then suddenly dashing forward, she[157]barked furiously, and rushed at a man who was advancing rapidly on the camp. A smothered oath, and a savage kick which sent the poor little thing yards away, with a broken leg, told of a frontal attack by the enemy. At the same moment, as it appeared, the man, and a dozen others, mysteriously emerging from the shadows at different points, made a rush for the room in which the gold-boxes had been stacked, firing their revolvers as they came on. The unarmed inmates of the camp—two shift bosses and Mr. Newstead, with three or four wages men—were taken completely by surprise.
Denzil Southwater was in his tent writing a home letter. For a moment it seemed, as the compact body of strangers moved up perilously near to the treasure-room, that the fort would be carried by assault.
But two of the garrison were neither unarmed nor unprepared: these were the man called ‘Dick,’ and old Jack. The latter was dressed for a walk to the township, a ceremonious visit which included a revolver in his hip-pocket loaded in every chamber. ‘Nothin’ like bein’ “heeled,” as we used ter say in the States,’ he would answer to any remark made on this as a superfluous precaution. ‘It’s come in handy mor’n once or twice either, since then; yer never know what’ll turn up on a goldfield.’ His habit was justified on this occasion. The tall robber had fired point blank at Mr. Newstead, who, struck on the point of the shoulder, fell as if badly wounded, when Dick Andrews sprang[158]forward, firing two shots with lightning quickness.
The tall man dropped on his face, and lay still, while a shorter ruffian, apparently bent on reaching the camp, staggered wildly, then fell backwards, discharging his revolver in the act. A younger man had been badly hit by old Jack, while another had been captured by Denzil Southwater, who, dashing at him, unarmed, knocked up his revolver, and catching him a half-arm blow on the ‘point,’ held him, dazed, with a broken jaw, till the mine hands came up, and tied his hands behind him. The other men, seeing that the game was up, took to their heels, and lost themselves in the crowd which was pouring with increasing volume up the slopes of the Pilot Mount. The tableau was imposing—Minniekins on three legs, still barking furiously; the tall man, easily identified as ‘Long Jack,’ a criminal of many aliases, lying on his face, stone dead! while Mr. Southwater’s prisoner, bound and blasphemous, stood in the centre of an excited crowd apparently anxious to lynch him then and there. However, Inspector Furnival, arriving with a strong body of police soon after, carried him off in the name of the Law, much to the disappointment of the public, who openly expressed their regret that Judge Lynch was not afforded an opportunity of proving the superiority of prompt trial and decisive action to the tardy verdict of an Assize Court. In the camp the casualties were: Arnold Banneret, bullet graze on temple; Newstead, wound in left shoulder;[159]Minniekins, broken fore-leg; while the man called ‘Dick,’ shot through the lungs, was in a serious, if not dangerous condition.
What a change from the gay hopes of the morning, when all had risen with the prospect of welcome travel—a respite from the monotonous toil of goldfield life; and, in the case of the escort party, returning to the luxuries of city life—to the society of friends and relatives, with the prestige of successful adventurers!
How narrowly, thought Arnold Banneret, had he himself escaped the fate of the robber, slain in his last fight against society; a shade nearer to the vital centre, and he would have lain ready for his coffin, even as the outcast criminal who, indeed, had paid the last penalty of a life of crime, in which even murder had been familiar. What a termination to the joyous imaginations with which he and his wife had regarded the speculation which promised so fairly! Fancy the headlines of the localpapers:—
‘The Last Chance Mine.’Attempt to carry off the Escort Gold!Five-and-twenty thousand ounces!Desperate encounter. Two men killed:Mr. Banneret and ‘Long Jack.’Several of the Escort wounded.Immense excitement on the Field.Special Evening Edition ofTheClarion.Our Contemporary misinformed:Mr. Banneret not killed.[160]He and Dick Andrews, the well-known Miner,dangerously wounded—the latter, whiledefending the Escort heroically, shot throughthe body. ‘The Gipsy’ captured by the HonourableDenzil Southwater, a Shareholder, who was unarmed.Lord Newstead suffering from a broken arm.Full particulars in our morning issue.
‘The Last Chance Mine.’Attempt to carry off the Escort Gold!Five-and-twenty thousand ounces!Desperate encounter. Two men killed:Mr. Banneret and ‘Long Jack.’Several of the Escort wounded.Immense excitement on the Field.
Special Evening Edition ofTheClarion.
Our Contemporary misinformed:Mr. Banneret not killed.[160]He and Dick Andrews, the well-known Miner,dangerously wounded—the latter, whiledefending the Escort heroically, shot throughthe body. ‘The Gipsy’ captured by the HonourableDenzil Southwater, a Shareholder, who was unarmed.Lord Newstead suffering from a broken arm.Full particulars in our morning issue.
The effect of this and similar announcements may be imagined. Public feeling was stirred to its inmost depths. The police force, as usual, was denounced for incapacity and indolence, and the Government of the day arraigned for want of foresight, unreadiness, and general ignorance of its duties. As to the administration of law and order on this, the richest, the most extensive goldfield in Australia—the only parallel case commensurate with its abnormal inefficiency was that of the British War Office. But the West Australian Cabinet might yet earn the notoriety of having sacrificed a colony if this sort of thing was allowed to go on unchecked—and so on, and so on. The opposition journal of course discounted ‘the habitual exaggeration of a contemporary, the editor of which could not allude to an attempt at the looting of a rich treasure-cargo—an attempt which had signally failed, moreover—without dragging in absurd parallels equally out of date and out of reason. Omniscient as he claimed to be, he had not become acquainted with the fact, now for the first time divulged to their reporter, a gentleman of wide experience in Australian and American mines, that “Dick Andrews,” a working miner, and shareholder in[161]the Reward Claim, who shot dead the well-known desperado “Long Jack” and wounded “The Nugget”—formerly of Port Arthur—was no other than the notorious Richard Lawless, the brother of Ned and Kate, concerned in the killing of Inspector Francis Dayrell, in pursuance of a vendetta cherished for years by the Lawless family. They eventually accomplished his death. Lured into an ambush, thus fell one of the most daring and energetic officers of the Police Force of Victoria. They had evaded the warrants issued for their apprehension, disappearing in the “Never-Never” regions of Queensland, chiefly populated, if all tales be true, by refugees of their class and character. From this “land of lost souls” Kate Lawless returned to die by her own hand on the grave of her child at Running Creek on Monaro; while her brother Richard, a marvellous bushman and all-round worker, as are many of his compatriots, has been employed under the very noses of the police as “Dick Andrews,” remarkable only for his steady, hardworking habits and inoffensive general demeanour. Tall, spare, and sinewy, wearing the ordinary beard of the dweller in the Waste, he was in no way distinguishable from the thousands of Australians whom the magnet of the “Golden Belt” has drawn with resistless force to our colony. There is no intention, we hear, of putting the law in force against him; for he will be arraigned before a Higher Court, a more august Judge, than Australia can furnish. His wounds are mortal. His hours are numbered. And before to-morrow’s sun leaves Pilot Mount in[162]darkness, the soul of the erring, but not wholly lost homicide, whom men knew as Dick Lawless, will have quitted its earthly tenement for the final audit.’
The editorial dictum was prophetic. Mr. Banneret and Denzil Southwater, watching by the dying man’s couch, listened to his last words while the labouring breath grew faint—then failed for ever. One bullet had pierced his left lung; another had lodged in the spine. Both injuries were mortal. It was a question of hours—of few of them indeed.
‘I stopped “Long Jack,” Commissioner!’ he said, while a slow smile of satisfaction lit up the calm features, ‘afore he got in another pot at you. He’d not have missed twice. I’m goin’ out, and except for the wife and kids I don’t know as it’s much odds; there’s enough to keep them when she gets back to Tumut, where her people live. Land’s easy got there; a bit of corn-flat with a few cows ’ll keep her easy and comfortable. The boy and girl ’ll get schoolin’ till they’re out in the world, and their mother won’t tell ’em too much about me—their poor father, as died in his right place—a-standin’ off them as tried to collar the gold he’d worked hard for. You write it out, Mr. Southwater—all as I’ve said, and just put Richard Lawless his mark at the foot. The Commissioner might witness it—if he’ll be so good—and you too, sir.’
They complied with the sufferer’s request. Great drops of blood welled up from the shattered lung, as between gasps he laboriously formed the[163]cross which validated his will, made for the benefit of the woman who had followed him from the green, fertile valley, where the sparkling river comes leaping down from the snow-crowned alp. With her he had been ever mild and patient—a tireless worker when work was to be had—often away for months at a time, but reserved as to his occupation. Brokenly, and with hesitation, he said: ‘Commissioner! I’ll die easier like if you’ll shake hands afore I go. It’s a suspension o’ labour in a manner of speakin’.’ And with a quiet smile on his lips at an old goldfields jest, the soul of ‘Dick Andrews,’ otherwise Richard Lawless, fled away from its earthly tenement, leaving the hand of Arnold Banneret, ex-Commissioner of Barrawong, New South Wales, still enclosed in a dead man’s rigid grasp.
‘Poor Dick! poor chap!’ said Banneret; ‘there goes a man’s life made for better things. I suppose hedidsave mine—barring accident. That long ruffian wouldn’t have missed twice. With the exception of the vendetta business with Dayrell—and there are two versions of that story—I never heard of his doing anything mean or dishonest—that is “crooked”’—he added reflectively—having regard to the prevailing tone of Monaro morality.
. . . . . . . . .
The fervour of the editors of all the journals, printed within a thousand miles or so, having exhausted itself and the public interest, matters returned to their normal state and condition. The escort waggonette, artistically tooled by Gore[164]Chesterfield, cleared out for Perth at sunrise one fine morning, ‘laden’ (as the local mining organ put it) ‘with gold, ammunition, firearms, and decayed gentlefolk.’ On the box-seat, between Mr. Banneret and the charioteer, sat an aristocratic society dame of ducal connections, who, originally voyaging to Fremantle with maternal solicitude, had remained to take a hand in the mining adventure of the period. Having been down the deepest mine of the ‘field,’ and across the desert on a camel as far as the famous ‘Leonora’ and ‘Mount Idalia,’ in both of which ‘shows’ she had invested sensationally, she was not to be daunted by the off-chance of a bullet wound on the present journey. The perils of this passage through the wilderness were, however, minimised by the attendance of a doubled police escort and half a hundred volunteer guards, who (shares in the popular investment of the day, the ‘Rotherwood’ mine, being at a premium and rising fast) resolved to combine the performance of a patriotic duty with the excitement of a ‘jamberoo’ in Perth, and ‘a whiff of the briny’ long looked forward to, and, before this happy conjunction of profit and pleasure, almost despaired of. When it is considered that most of the men who composed this advanced guard were young, or youthful-seeming—that the prospects of the majority were like the climate, sunny in the extreme—that fortune had lately showered favours upon nearly all,—it may be imagined what a joyous cavalcade, dashing at reckless speed through plain and thicket—waking the long-silent, solitary champaign with[165]song and shout—the ‘Last Chance’ escort must have appeared to the ordinary wayfarer.
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.
The treasure was duly deposited in the banks of the period; certain favourites of fortune, among them the lady of the box-seat, took passage by the outgoing mail-steamer. Lord Newstead was bound for ‘England, home, and beauty,’ whence his return was problematical; Arnold Banneret for Sydney; while Messrs. Chesterfield and Southwater would return to the vicinity of Pilot Mount, not having as yet acquired the ‘pile’ which was to crown the pyramid of a life’s endeavour. Arnold Banneret made a final adieu to the ‘Reward Claim,’ having by wire received a declaration from his wife that, ‘no matter how many ounces to the ton the “Last Chance” produced, never again would she consent to his putting foot on that goldfield; even if his presence was indispensable to prevent Pilot Mount from being turned into a volcano in full working order, her resolve remained unalterable. What she had suffered when she heard the news (false as it turned out to be) of his death, could never be endured twice. So now, he knew.’ When Mrs. Banneret concluded an argument with these words the ‘incident was closed.’ Her sympathetic partner ‘for better for worse’ resigned himself to a future existence hampered only by the necessity of finding use for a capital of a hundred thousand pounds or two, ‘with all the woes it brings.’
He promised himself the satisfaction, however,[166]of revisiting Tumut, and personally assuring the future of Mrs. Richard Lawless and her children, which, as he had always loved and admired the place and people, he regarded as a sacred duty, and a delightful holiday not to be neglected. Thus, filled with anticipations of home-returning joys, as he trod once more the deck of the P. & O. linerBaghdad, marked once more the Oriental garb, and heard the familiar-sounding voices of the Lascar crew, his heart swelled within him, as in ‘the dear, dead days beyond recall.’
. . . . . . . . .
The return voyage in theBaghdadwas pure unmixed delight. Very rarely is it otherwise in the ‘floating clubs’ of the P. & O. ‘The liner she’s a lady,’ in every sense of the word. In the eyes of the outward-bound passengers for England Arnold Banneret and Lord Newstead were heroes and ‘conquistadores,’ rivalling the comrades of Pizarro returning from Peru laden with the treasure of the Incas. Lord Newstead secured the larger share of admiration—young and handsome, heir to an historic name, wounded in the fight, what modern gallant could hope to rival him in the good graces of the lady passengers? His right arm still supported by a sling, and his disabled condition, called forth many proffers of active sympathy.
Mr. Banneret, on account of his age and patriarchal rank, was not so much an object of interest and admiration; nevertheless, the ‘scar on his brown cheek revealed’ if not ‘a token true of Bosworth Field,’ a genuine record of a ‘close call,’[167]as an American ‘shift boss,’ travelling east from ‘Great Holder,’ entitled the incident.
Their gold, now safe under hatches, was variously estimated at from fifty to a hundred thousand ounces, according to the experience or imagination of the narrator. The winds and waves were kind; the Great Bight was so smooth that ‘you’d hardly know it,’ as a fair voyager of experience in the South Pacific characterised it. And shortly after the dawnlight—clearer grown, and faintly roseate-hued—opened to view the sandstone portals of the harbour lake of the South, theBaghdad’spassengers, in cabs, carriages, trams, and omnibuses, distributed themselves throughout the Sydney clubs and hotels, with an economy of time and trouble unattainable in any but the mother State.
. . . . . . . . .
Home again! Everything had gone well in his absence. For the twentieth time Arnold Banneret vowed that never again would he leave the domestic Eden for the outer world, how fair soever might be the lure held out by inconstant fortune. The girls were growing up; his boys, like every other man’s boys, needed the occasional parental warning—the guiding hand. His wife’s cheek paled as she traced the still visible track of the robber’s bullet. ‘What was sufficient repayment, what compensation adequate, for such risks? And if——’ but she would not suffer him to proceed with the conjectures of whatmighthave happened. The ‘if’ had remained undeveloped, so there was no use speculating on grisly possibilities.
[168]Sydney was more beauteous than ever, with glorious gardens, and the daily ocean breeze. Say that the noonday heat was at times oppressive, what was it in comparison with the terrible sun-rays of the West—a tent only between the dweller therein and the cloudless, relentless sky? The glorious semi-tropical foliage of the sea-girt city, the lawns so freshly verdurous, the stately pines, the flowering shrubs, the rose thickets, the carefully tended, if somewhat narrow roads, which, winding around the harbour cliffs, open out such enchanting views of sea and shore, earth and sky—specially arranged for the delectation of strangers and pilgrims! The swift-winged yachts and pleasure-boats still floated like sea-gulls above the translucent wave. All these delights and refreshments smote the senses of the home-returning wayfarer almost as freshly as if tasted for the first time.
Then the delicious awakening in the fair, sweet dawn of the early summer, with the certainty that there was now no need for doubt or anxiety touching the family fortunes. A competence, nay, more than a sufficiency for all their needs, was assured. Their luck had turned. No more was it necessary to go stolidly on with the daily work which gained the daily bread. There was not, could not be again, the necessity for calculation as to what liability required to be arranged for—what pressing account to be paid in full, or if not, compromised by payment on account. Such things had been in the past—in that shadowy region now so dim and distant-seeming. No, thank God! and a wave of gratitude passed through his every sense and faculty[169]as he realised that those days and their accompanying sacrifices had passed away for ever. Were they happier now? In his musings by the seashore, at eve or moonrise, he sometimes asked himself the question. The reply was not always in the affirmative. They had been happy—truly, consciously happy, then. If there were difficulties, they had overcome them. If there had been debts and doubts, anxiety never far distant, succour unexpected had come in time of need. The responsibilities of official position had been great—at times almost overpowering, but their very magnitude had stimulated his energies—he had never faltered; strong in the resolve to deal justly, impartially, with the high questions committed to his judgment, he had fought through opposition, misrepresentation, and discouragement, to emerge at last, with the approval of his conscience and the confidence of the heterogeneous workers whom he had ruled for a quarter of a century.
And now, having passed through theSturm und Drangof early manhood, he had reached a period of life when youth had flown—when strength and activity could no longer be looked for—when whatever changes took place must necessarily be, in some respects, for the worse. What would the future be? In what direction would the rising generation of the family, nay, of Australia, be impelled?