Dear Moira and Dear Jimmy,—If you ever read this it will be because I am no more and have failed to bring my plans to a successful conclusion. In that case I look to the two of you to carry on from the point where I left off, but because you are both young, and so have very little sense, I don't intend to let either of you fall into an easy thing. There's money at the back of this, enough to make you rich for life, but you'll have to use the brains you both have got and work like the very dickens to get it. I've put some of the necessary directions in a cypher that a child could read, but apart from that you'll have to use your heads. As you know some things that Moira doesn't, Jimmy, and vice versa, you can see that it won't pay either of you to quarrel.The man who really holds the key to the situation is a gentleman named Abel Cumshaw. Abel, I understand, is in his second childhood, and can never be brought to realise that it is any later than the early eighties, but his son Albert is a most astonishing young fellow, as you'll find when you meet him, if you have not already done so before this falls into your hands. You see I have sufficient confidence in your ability to believe that you will find this package sooner or later. If it's too late when you do find it, of course the joke'll be on the pair of you.Now, a word to you, Moira. Jimmy knows the hidden valley quite well, so don't believe him if he says he doesn't. I spent nearly an hour the other day telling him all about it, and even went the length of showing him a map of the place. If he doesn't help you out, it's because he's got a bad memory.As for yourself, Jimmy, remember that you can't get along without Moira and don't try. Once you've found what you're looking for you can each go your own way, but I rather fancy you won't want to then. I think that's about all, unless to remind you that Mr. Albert Cumshaw will be entitled to his fair share of the spoils.
Dear Moira and Dear Jimmy,—
If you ever read this it will be because I am no more and have failed to bring my plans to a successful conclusion. In that case I look to the two of you to carry on from the point where I left off, but because you are both young, and so have very little sense, I don't intend to let either of you fall into an easy thing. There's money at the back of this, enough to make you rich for life, but you'll have to use the brains you both have got and work like the very dickens to get it. I've put some of the necessary directions in a cypher that a child could read, but apart from that you'll have to use your heads. As you know some things that Moira doesn't, Jimmy, and vice versa, you can see that it won't pay either of you to quarrel.
The man who really holds the key to the situation is a gentleman named Abel Cumshaw. Abel, I understand, is in his second childhood, and can never be brought to realise that it is any later than the early eighties, but his son Albert is a most astonishing young fellow, as you'll find when you meet him, if you have not already done so before this falls into your hands. You see I have sufficient confidence in your ability to believe that you will find this package sooner or later. If it's too late when you do find it, of course the joke'll be on the pair of you.
Now, a word to you, Moira. Jimmy knows the hidden valley quite well, so don't believe him if he says he doesn't. I spent nearly an hour the other day telling him all about it, and even went the length of showing him a map of the place. If he doesn't help you out, it's because he's got a bad memory.
As for yourself, Jimmy, remember that you can't get along without Moira and don't try. Once you've found what you're looking for you can each go your own way, but I rather fancy you won't want to then. I think that's about all, unless to remind you that Mr. Albert Cumshaw will be entitled to his fair share of the spoils.
And on that note the letter ended, and underneath was his sprawling signature, "H. Bryce," written as firmly as ever he had written it.
"Well, what do you make of that?" I asked when I had finished reading it.
"I—I——"
"I know," I cut in. "I feel that way too. Do you think he's put up a joke on us?"
"I just don't want to speak about it," Moira said tearfully. "It's—it's—I wouldn't have expected it of him."
"It's the unexpected that happens," I said with some idea that I was consoling her. I could see that the tears were very near her eyes, and I didn't want her to break down now and cry. A man is always at a great disadvantage in dealing with a weeping woman; she can usually persuade him to do almost anything for her while she's in that state. If I find my wife crying—but it doesn't matter what I'd do, for I've no right to be introducing purely speculative matter that has nothing at all to do with the story.
"It doesn't explain anything," Moira said at length. "It only makes everything worse than ever."
"I wouldn't say that," I said. I saw, or thought I saw, a glimmer of light. It was so faint that I daren't as yet put it into words. "He must have been in a rather frivolous mood when he wrote this," I continued. "All the same, I think we're getting closer. We haven't looked at the cypher yet, you know."
"No more we have, Jim. Let's see what it's like."
I handed it to her. At first sight I could have sworn that it was the identical piece of paper that I had picked up from the kitchen floor that momentous afternoon, but a second glance showed me that I was mistaken. Many of the characters were the same, but the grouping was altogether different. They ran as follows:—
2@3; 5@3 &9; 3 5433-3/4 5@3 @75 £994 1/4; £ 5@3 48-1/2-8;? 1/2-7; 1/4-43 8; &8;3 —3-1/4-1/2-743 1/2-3: 3; "335 3-1/4-1/2-5.5@3; "1/4-/3 £843/5 ;945@3/4 £4-1/4-2 1/4;95@34 &8;3 1/4-5 48?@5 1/4;?&3-1/2 59 5@3 043:897-1/2 9;3 3)53; £8;? "94 523&:3 "335.£8? 5@3.
2@3; 5@3 &9; 3 5433-3/4 5@3 @75 £994 1/4; £ 5@3 48-1/2-8;? 1/2-7; 1/4-43 8; &8;3 —3-1/4-1/2-743 1/2-3: 3; "335 3-1/4-1/2-5.5@3; "1/4-/3 £843/5 ;945@3/4 £4-1/4-2 1/4;95@34 &8;3 1/4-5 48?@5 1/4;?&3-1/2 59 5@3 043:897-1/2 9;3 3)53; £8;? "94 523&:3 "335.£8? 5@3.
"It doesn't seem to mean anything, Jim," she said in consternation.
"I'll admit it's pretty hard to understand," I told her. "It looks like a page out of a ready reckoner or a mathematician's nightmare. But it does mean something or your uncle wouldn't have put it up to us. What it is we've got to find out. Possibly the Mr. Cumshaw of the letter can throw a little light on the subject."
"Who is Mr. Cumshaw, Jim?"
"I never heard of the man until I read this letter," I said. "He's a new element in the plot, and, unless your uncle's pulling our legs, I think he's going to be a very important factor."
"He's got to share with us, too," she reminded me.
"Share with you," I corrected. "I've told you a couple of times already that I'll help you to it, but that I don't intend to take a penny of the money. So, when you're figuring it out, remember it's halves, not thirds, you're working on."
"If it was anybody else but me you'd take it quickly enough," she said accusingly.
"Maybe I would and again maybe I wouldn't," I said with a smile.
"Oh, Jim, I hate you!" she cried in a sudden blaze of temper.
"I'm sorry," I said easily. "It doesn't take much to make you hate seemingly."
She turned and faced me with one of those swift changes of front that made her so hard to deal with. The white-hot anger had gone as suddenly as it had come, and in its place there was nothing but hopelessness. She looked so weary and so miserable that for the moment I was tempted to take her in my arms and tell her that the past did not matter any more than did the future. But the memory of the words with which she had driven me out of her life that summer's evening long ago lashed me like a whip, and in an instant I had hardened my heart.
"Why do you make it so hard for me, Jim?" she moaned. "If only you would help me a little."
"I'm helping you all I can," I said with a touch of cynicism in my voice. "You can count on me until the adventure's finished."
"You know I don't mean that," she said weakly.
"There's nothing else you can mean," I answered stubbornly.
For the space of a heart-beat we stood facing each other. I saw that she was on the verge of a breakdown, and I knew that my own resolution was failing. After all, what need was there for me to be so brutal? She had suffered more than enough for the idle words spoken in haste all those years ago. There is no knowing what might have happened had not Fate intervened. But just as things had reached breaking-strain the door-bell rang. The prosaic sound brought us back instantly to earth, and a dramatic situation, tense with possibilities, became in a moment common-place.
"There's the door-bell," Moira said calmly. "I wonder who it can be."
"Some visitor or other," I remarked.
"What visitor could it be?" she asked. "I know of no one who'd have business here."
I knew of one at least, but I did not put my thoughts into words. Instead I remarked, "Quite possibly it's some house-hunter."
We heard the maid's steps go up the hall past us. There was a whispered colloquy at the door, and then, quite distinctly, the maid's voice said, "I'll see if he is in."
"That must be me," I guessed. "I'm the only 'he' in the house."
"But who knows you're here?" Moira objected.
"That's right," I said. "Who does?"
I opened the door of the room and looked out. The maid, who was coming down the passage, caught sight of me. "There's a gentleman wishes to see you, Mr. Carstairs," she announced.
"Show him in here," I said.
I turned back into the room. "You'd better stop here, Moira," I said as she made a movement to go. "It can't be anything private. It's just as likely that it's something that interests you too."
She sat down again.
The maid ushered the newcomer into the room. I ran my eye over him as I advanced to meet him. He was small and dapper, and his air of self-possession was almost perfect. His features were clean-cut, dark eyes glowed in a face that had evidently been exposed to the weather for many years, and his brow was surmounted by a mass of black curls.
"Mr. Carstairs?" he asked.
"That's me," I said truthfully but ungrammatically.
"This will explain my business," he said, and handed me a piece of pasteboard. I took it from him; it was one of Bryce's visiting cards, and scribbled across the foot of it were these words:—"Introducing Mr. Albert Cumshaw. H. Bryce."
"I've been expecting you, Mr. Cumshaw," I said. "I've been expecting you for some days now."
As a matter of fact I hadn't, but it is always a good rule to allow the other man to think you know everything.
"Moira," I said, "this is the Mr. Cumshaw we've been waiting for. Mr. Cumshaw, Miss Drummond."
"Pleased to meet you," he said and looked as if he meant it.
"Take a seat, Mr. Cumshaw," I said, and when he had accepted a chair, "What can I do for you?" I enquired.
He looked curiously from one to the other of us as if to seek an inspiration. "I presume Mr. Bryce is not about," he said at length.
"Well, hardly," I answered. "He's been dead this last couple of weeks." It was longer than that in reality, but I mentioned the first period that came into my head. Anyway, it didn't matter much how long it was since he died; nothing could make him any the less dead now.
"Oh," said Mr. Cumshaw quietly, as though my news was just what he had been expecting all along. "It is most regrettable," he added.
"Now what can I do for you?" I persisted.
"Touching the little matter of the gold escort," he said and fixed me with a glowing eye.
"Yes, the gold escort, Mr. Cumshaw. What about it!"
He did not answer that immediately, but eyed both Moira and me as if to test our receptive capacities. I maintained an attitude of complete indifference; Moira leaned forward a little with interest plainly marked in every line of her face.
"You were both in Mr. Bryce's confidence?" His quiet remark took the form of a question.
I nodded.
"Go on," Moira urged. "You came to tell us about your father, Mr. Abel Cumshaw."
"That's right," said the young man with amazing alacrity. "You're all right too. I wasn't sure at first, but now I see you're in the game with me. From what I know of it we're all like pieces of a jig-saw puzzle. We all fit in, and none of us is any use without the others. That being so, I fancy that we had better all place our cards on the table. Now which of you has got the cypher?"
Moira looked at me for guidance. I was pleased to see that she was learning that she couldn't do without me. I was pleased—no, I wasn't pleased at all, for it didn't matter now what Moira thought of me.
"What cypher is that?" I enquired innocently.
"There is only one cypher, Mr. Carstairs," Mr. Cumshaw stated. He seemed so sure about it that my curiosity was aroused.
"Indeed?" I said politely. I knew better than to contradict him outright, so I did it by implication.
"There's only the one," the young man repeated. "You should know, because Mr. Bryce left it to you."
If I had had any doubts before as to the genuine character of my visitor they all vanished at that last remark of his. It was one of those things that a man could not have guessed, however clever he might be. He must have had inside knowledge. Hitherto I had been indulging in that pleasant pastime that is known in boxing circles as "sparring for wind," but now I dropped the pose completely and answered him as straightforwardly as was consistent with reasonable caution.
"Yes, he did leave a cypher to me," I admitted. "But what do you know about it?"
"Only what Mr. Bryce wrote me. I'm sorry I can't show you the letter, but Mr. Bryce had an invariable rule that all correspondence from him must be burnt as soon as read."
"I guess I've got to accept you at your face value, Mr. Cumshaw," I said. "You'll pardon me for doubting you at first, but it pays to be cautious in a game like this. Now I'd like to know just how we are going to assist each other."
"That's more than I can say," the young man smiled. "If I tell you the story from start to finish, maybe you'll get a better idea of what we're after."
"Would it take long?" I said diffidently. "It's fairly late now."
"If Mr. Cumshaw would stop to tea," Moira suggested, and looked to me for approval of her proposition. Under the circumstances there was only one thing for me to do, so I did it.
"You'll greatly oblige us if you stop," I said. "That is if it won't be causing any inconvenience?" I added questioningly.
"None at all," he said cheerily. "Nothing of this sort ever inconveniences me"—this latter with a glance at Moira.
"So that's the game, is it, young man?" I said to myself. "Well, here's luck to you."
Aloud I said, "I am pleased to hear it." The funny part of it all was that I really meant it. There was something open and honest about the man himself, there was a healthful glow in his dark eyes, and he had a way of looking at one that was the very essence of frankness itself. Without knowing more of him than I had learnt in the few minutes we had been conversing, I felt that he was as open as the day. In this case at least my first impressions were more than justified by the course of events.
Mr. Cumshaw stopped to tea and made himself very much at home, and afterwards he told us the story of the gold escort. I have not set out his tale as we heard it that evening. For one thing he only related what he happened to know about the matter, and as a result there were many little blanks he had to leave unfilled. But with the completion of our enterprise many additional facts have come to light, and so it is that, with Mr. Cumshaw's aid and at his suggestion, I give here a fuller and more comprehensive version of the affair than he related to us that evening.
Far away to the west the fiery globe of the setting sun dropped lazily down to rest behind the quaint goblin peaks of the Grampians. Its last lingering rays touched their summits with a crimson glow, flooded the valleys with garish light, and even penetrated into the recesses of the nearby woodlands until the whole place seemed to blaze as with the red fire of Hell. It was not a peaceful sunset; it did not even hold the promise of peace. It was alive and active, in the sense that light can live, and one could but feel that its potency was malignant and assured. There were clouds aplenty in the sky, light clouds looking as if they had been trailed through red ink, but there was nothing about them to suggest that a storm was brewing, or that even the slightest change in the weather could be expected. Nevertheless the air contained a hint of evil, so much so that an imaginative person would have peopled the hills with gnomes and the woods with devils. Even had fairies existed in the glades, one would have instinctively known them to be bad fairies. Yet one could not say offhand whence or from whom the evil that was to be, would originate; all earth and sky seemed somehow to be in the dread conspiracy.
The lurid hues of the sunset flared and faded into the drabber colors of twilight, the shadows swept down in phalanxes from the hills, and the still lifeless trees, stirring in the evening breeze, became black mocking shapes of infamy. The yellow disc of a moon, climbing up over the woods, took on the semblance of the leering face of a drunken man.
The two men who presently came riding along through the tangled fastnesses of what a couple of score years or more ago were the untenanted and, to a great extent, the unexplored depths of a Victorian forest, were very evidently unaffected by the grim fancies of the evening. They were not laughing certainly, and when they spoke it was in whispers, but the younger man hummed a music-hall tune under his breath. There was something rakish, not to say reckless, in the way the elder sat his mount. They went carefully, though, taking every possible precaution against making needless noise. Once the horse of the elder man stumbled and set a stone rolling down a declivity. Both men reined in instantly and listened until the echoes died away in the distance.
"You're as nervous as a rabbit, Jack," the younger man remarked when presently they resumed their journey. "Every little sound seems to startle you."
"There's no sense in taking chances, man," said the one called Jack.
"If it comes to that there's no chances to take."
"Only that of being caught and hanged, Abel."
"There's not much hope of that," Abel Cumshaw replied. "Gentry like ourselves are rather out of fashion now since they've squashed the Kellys. The country's quietened down a lot, and a 'ranger's supposed to be a thing of the past. As it is, there's never been bushrangers in this part of the State, and what hasn't been is the least likely to happen in most people's estimation."
"I'm with you there, Abel," Jack said. "But even that's no reason why we shouldn't go carefully. You must remember that we don't know this part of the State too well. That's the beauty of it, I suppose. Nobody knows it very much."
"It'll make pursuit difficult," the other suggested. "But what I can't understand is why the banks should send so much gold across country when there's the railway."
"The railway, friend Cumshaw, isn't the safest route. There's just as clever men working that as used to be working the stages. Moreover, this cross-country route's much the quicker way of the two."
"For which we may thank the Lord," said Abel Cumshaw, with cheerful impiety.
"Time enough to thank the Lord," the other retorted, "when we've finished the job successfully. All the same, I wish we had a pack horse."
"If we had brought a pack-horse," said Cumshaw, "we'd have had half the country-side wondering what the deuce was up. Like as not they'd think there was a new gold-strike on."
"And they wouldn't have been wrong in that," the other answered with grim humor. "But let's get to the business of the evening, Abel. I've got a good idea to put the pursuers off the scent, that is, if there's any pursuit."
"Out with it, then," said Cumshaw.
The elder man reined in his horse, and, leaning over, whispered in his companion's ear. As the tale proceeded a cheerful grin spread over Cumshaw's face.
"That'll do fine," he said gleefully. "You almost make me wish they do pursue us just for the fun of seeing them fall in."
"There's nothing to be gained by being foolhardy," the elder man warned him. "Now we can't afford to waste time. Let us get to work at once."
Without more ado he led the way down through the tangle of forest and across the open glades until they reached the narrow track that wound like a monstrous brown ribbon through the enormous gums. At the edge of the road they both dismounted and tethered their horses to convenient trees. Then, stepping very gingerly, and taking extreme care not to leave any footprints on the dusty surface of the track, they groped about on the roadside. Presently they both returned to the horses, each of them carrying an armful of heavy stones which they loaded carefully into the enormous saddle-bags that dangled one on each side of the saddle-flaps.
"That should about do it," Cumshaw remarked, when this was completed.
"I hope so," the other answered curtly. He sprang to the saddle, loosed the reins that had tethered the animal, and setting his spurs deep into its flank galloped up the track for a matter of a hundred yards or so, closely followed by his companion. Then they turned sharply off into the bush, designedly traversing the soft impressionable ground. The heavily-laden horses floundered in the soft soil, and gradually the pace dropped away from a gallop to a canter, and finally to a walk. When nearly two miles of this sort of country had been covered, the two men reined in and dismounted. Next they unloaded the stones from the saddle-bags and hid them carefully in the undergrowth. Cumshaw then proceeded to cut his thick blanket into strips, each of about eighteen inches square. There were eight of these strips in all—four he kept himself and the others he handed to his companion.
"It's a smart enough dodge, all right," the man remarked. "The only possible flaw in it is that there might be some gentleman present who's dealt with cattle-duffers in the past. If so, he'd be pretty sure to scent our little game, and block it."
"Let's hope for the best," said Mr. Cumshaw, cheerfully, looking up from his work with a smile that even the darkness of the night could not hide. He was systematically wrapping the squares of blankets round the hoofs of his mount and securing them in such a way that they would remain fast even during a wild gallop over rough country. The trick itself was an old one; it had its origin many years previous in Texas and Arizona when the raiding Indians made their horses walk over blankets spread on the ground in order to hide the direction of their retreat. The idea had been adopted and developed by the Australian cattle-duffers to meet the exigencies of the country they worked in. The trick therefore was by no means a new one, and there was just a chance, as the man Jack remarked, that someone might drop to it. But the false hoof-prints were an unprecedented addition that would probably keep the pursuers long enough on the wrong scent to enable the precious pair to "escape" and "cache" their plunder.
It was characteristic of the two men that once they had taken all precautions they quietly dismissed the matter from their minds and rode slowly back to the roadway with scarce a thought for the business in hand. Abel Cumshaw would have whistled had he dared; as it was he hummed softly to himself. The moon was now well up in the heavens, and its fitful light creeping through the leafy roof above, made gibbering ghosts of the swaying gums. Mr. Abel Cumshaw and his companion, Jack Bradby, had been brought up in the Australian bush, their nerves were as steady as a rock, and where others saw grim visions of fancy they saw only waving bushes and stripped gums. Though the present adventure was their first essay in ranging, both of them had lived by their wits, or rather by others' want of wits, for more years than were good for them. Singly or together they had run other people's sheep and cattle and made a lucrative, if dishonest, living at the game, and during their visits to the towns had made it a point of warped honor to pay their expenses with the ill-gotten gold of some duller fellow-creature. On top of it all they had a carelessness of life and a free hand with their easily-earned wealth that found them friends wherever they went.
Bradby pulled up suddenly and held up his hand in warning to his companion. Some faint noise had caught his ear, and, excellent bushman that he was, he would not rest content until he had located and defined it. Silently as a shadow he slipped from his saddle and dropped recumbent on the ground. With one ear to the earth beneath he listened. He remained in this posture for perhaps a minute and a half, then he rose abruptly and turned to Mr. Cumshaw.
"Horses," he said laconically.
"Must be them," Mr. Cumshaw replied with almost equal brevity.
Deftly, and without haste of any sort, each man knotted a red and white spotted handkerchief across the lower half of his face, leaving only the eyes and forehead visible. Then each tilted his hat so that the shadow thrown by the brim shrouded the uncovered portion of the face. Mr. Cumshaw, with the amazing simplicity of a conjurer, produced a pair of ugly-looking revolvers from apparent nothingness, while his companion slipped his holsters round so that his weapons were within easy and immediate reach. He did not, however, remount his horse, but threw the reins to Mr. Cumshaw, who draped them over his arm in such a way that they did not hamper his movements in the least.
The little group of horsemen, four, or perhaps five in all, clattered down the track as unsuspiciously as a man could wish. They were chatting quite easily, even joyously, of the thousand and one little matters that supplied their daily lives with interest, and nothing must have been further from their thoughts than what actually occurred. The bank that had sent them had departed from all precedent in parcelling out the gold amongst the messengers. It was certainly against the rather strict regulations of the bank, but the man who had instructed them had that contempt for rules and regulations which is the mark of a man destined to rise in the world.
"The expense of sending you," he had said, "is certainly no greater than that of the recognised method of forwarding by coach. The security of my method is even greater as you are not at all open to suspicion."
As a matter of fact, all would have gone well had not one of the chosen messengers been a little too fond of his nightly drink, and more or less inclined to talk when in his cups. True, on this particular evening he had exercised a kind of maudlin caution, but the tactics of Mr. Jack Bradby were of the sort to extract valuable information in the least noticeable way possible, and as a consequence the man, while keeping a strict guard of his tongue, at the same time let fall enough information to satisfy the curiosity of the 'ranger.
The first intimation the little cavalcade had of the presence of the knights of the road was when a shadow moved out from behind a huge gum and a clear resounding voice invited them to halt or take the consequences. With one accord the riders pulled up, one man swore violently, and the hand of another dropped round to his belt in a hesitant manner. But Mr. Jack Bradby had eyes like an eagle, for he cried sharply, "Put your hands up instantly!"
All the men shot their hands skywards with a precision that could not have been bettered by weeks of training.
"You look ever so much better like that," said Mr. Jack Bradby pleasantly. "Just keep still. I'd hate to make corpses of any of you—you all look so much better alive."
The humor of this was apparently lost on the captured ones, for they received it in silence, much to Mr. Bradby's disgust.
"Laugh when I crack a joke!" he roared. "Laugh, all of you, damn you!"
Somebody giggled in a half-hearted manner.
"That's no sort of a laugh," snorted Mr. Bradby. "When I say laugh, I mean laugh. I don't want you to bubble like that jackass did." He indicated the giggler with one of his ugly-looking revolvers. "Now laugh altogether as if you meant it. One, two, three; off you go!"
They all roared at that, but there was a lack of enthusiasm in their voices. Mr. Bradby, however, passed that over and proceeded to the business of the evening.
"Now please keep your hands in the same position," Mr. Bradby continued. "You've got quite a lot of valuables in those saddle-bags of yours, and I'm going to annex them. And don't any of you move a hand or foot or you'll be shot before you can say 'Jack Robinson.' There's men in plenty in among those trees, so don't play any hanky-panky tricks if you value your lives."
The scared horsemen with one accord glanced toward the trees that fringed the road. Mr. Bradby had stage-managed the affair with such consummate skill that they could only see the dim forms of several horses. The shadows were cast so that it was impossible to say how many there were; as far as the captives were concerned a regiment of cavalry might have been massed behind the trees for all they could say to the contrary. They had a feeling that unseen eyes watched them and invisible firearms covered their every movement. A solitary ray of moonlight, glinting for an instant on one of Cumshaw's revolvers lent color to this suggestion, so like wise men they surrendered to the inevitable and allowed the explosive Mr. Bradby to relieve them first of all of their weapons, and, when he had "drawn their teeth," as he succinctly expressed it, to rifle their saddle-bags for the little packages of gold that it was their mission to guard with their lives. Life at all times is dearer than gold, and the men realised that they were in a trap from which there was only one way of escape. They submitted meekly to their fate, saw the saddle-bags rifled without a word of protest, and, deceived by the shadows, watched what they took to be half a dozen men at least loading up with the gold. It speaks well for the dominant personality of Mr. Bradby that no one seemed to have suspected that only two men were concerned in the hold-up, despite the fact that they really only saw one man and the shadowy outline of another.
"Turn round, all of you!" Mr. Bradby commanded when the transfer had been completed. "Turn round and keep your hands in the air!"
Obediently, albeit clumsily, since they could not use their hands, the horsemen wheeled their mounts around, and Mr. Bradby surveyed the scene with satisfaction.
"You all look nice from the rear," he remarked. "Some of you've got real fine backs. Just you keep like that now and see what the fairies'll send you."
So silently that he might have been a disembodied spirit he turned on his heel, seized the reins Mr. Cumshaw threw him and vaulted into the saddle. As softly as two shadows the horses melted into the night, their muffled hoofs making no sound on the hard earth.
Ten minutes later one of the horsemen, grown tired of the unearthly inaction and suspecting something of what had happened, slewed his head round very cautiously. In a flash he realised the position and imparted his discovery to his companions.
"We can't follow them," the leader said. "We're unarmed. Furthermore we've got no idea which way they went. The only thing we can do is to get back to the nearest police station and report."
The man who had first discovered the absence of the bushrangers had been employing his time in examining the ground for traces of the gang, and very shortly he came across the tracks that the precious pair had made earlier in the evening. An exclamation from him drew the others to the spot. By the flickering light of a match they inspected the hoof-marks, and then the leader of the party gave vent to a snort of disgust.
"There's only two of them," he said. "What fools we've been!"
"They completely took us in," remarked another member of the party.
"That's so," agreed a third, "but we can't make people understand. If we tell them how two men stuck us up, we're going to look a lot of goats. I For one think we'd better keep the number to ourselves, or, better still, we might say that there was a big party of them."
One or two demurred at this, but the bulk of the party knew well the ridicule that the truth would attach to them, and the result was that between them a story carrying the marks of probability was invented, and, thus armed against the laughter of the State, the party set out for the nearest town.
In the meanwhile Bradby and Cumshaw had doubled back on their tracks and were heading for the Grampians. Though neither of them had explored the mountains before, they were quite satisfied from what they knew of the general formation of the country that there were gullies, even valleys, where an army might lie hidden. So confident were the two adventurers that there was no danger of pursuit that they did not press forward at anything like a reasonable speed. They took things easy. Somewhere about two o'clock in the morning they halted and removed the blanket-pads from their horses' hoofs. Mr. Cumshaw was just going to throw them into the bushes when Mr. Bradby stopped him.
"Don't do that," he said, "we'd better destroy them outright."
"How?" queried Abel.
"Burn 'em, I should say," Mr. Bradby answered. "You make a good job of it, and you don't leave anything behind. If you throw them away someone's sure to find them just when it's most awkward for you. No, Abel, burn them and hurry up about it."
So it came about that presently a tiny spot of light glowed like a red warning beacon from the lower slopes of the range. A lonely prospector, a few miles to the east, saw the spark and wondered at it. He knew that no one lived in that part of the country. The more he thought of it the more it puzzled him, though with the morning there came an unexpected solution.
A body of mounted troopers left Ararat an hour or so before daylight the next morning, and by seven o'clock had reached the scene of the robbery. They had with them a capable black tracker who had figured in recent events in the Wombat Ranges. He was a silent individual who answered to the name of "Jacky," a name that seems to be the heritage of all blacks who serve in the police force. He quickly picked up the false scent, and the party turned east. It wasn't until the horses stumbled over the heap of stones that some brilliant intellect dropped to the trick that had been played on them. Then, with the better part of an hour to the bad, the party returned to the starting-point of the trail.
"Seems to me," the sergeant in charge remarked to his subordinate, "that they've laid this trail with a good reason. Now if a man wanted to put you on the wrong track, what would you think he'd naturally do?"
"Send us in the opposite direction," said the other promptly.
"Quite so," said the sergeant. "Now the false trail leads east, so it's only reasonable to suppose that they've gone west."
"That's so," the other agreed. "Get-up, you brute." The latter remark was addressed to the horse, which showed an inclination to drop into a walk.
"Here you, Jacky!" the sergeant called, and when the black came to him he said, "Those white men have gone this way," pointing westward. "Look out for their tracks, though I don't fancy we'll see any for some time."
The black grunted non-committally. He had much the same idea himself, though he could not understand how the white man had guessed. Still he knew enough of the white men to realise that they were very, very clever, and sometimes found out things that even the black trackers did not understand. The black went back to his work in silence. Presently he grunted again. His quick eyes had noticed a grey woollen thread stamped into the earth. He lifted it gingerly up in his hand and held it out to the police. The sergeant took it, examined it carefully, and then, without any comment, handed it round to the others. There was no need to ask what it meant. All knew without being told that someone had lately passed that way, and who could that someone be unless one of the rangers?
The black went back again to the trail, bending down close to the ground for all the world like a little dog following the scent of the chase. He turned sharply off into the bushes and the troop went after him. Here and there—wherever the earth had chanced to be a little softer than usual—one could see round depressions somewhat about the size of a saucer, and one patch of damp soil gave a remarkably clear imprint of the fibres of some material.
"Clever chaps, by George!" the sergeant remarked. "They've got brains among them."
"How's that?" queried one of the police.
"They've tried the old duffers' dodge of blanketing the horses' hoofs. Sort of thing that works, too, unless a man happens to have his eyes well open. Luckily I've stumbled up against this sort of thing before."
The other man, who had his own ideas about the matter, nodded his head, but otherwise made no comment.
About ten o'clock the troopers debouched from the trees into a low-lying stretch of land. One could not call it a gully; it was more of a depression, a fault in the earth due to some local subsidence. On the nearest ridge a prospector's hut was perched, from the chimney of which a wisp of smoke ascended. When one of the mounted men dropped from the saddle and opened the door he found no one in charge, though a dinner was merrily simmering away on the fire.
"Whoever he is he can't be far away," the sergeant commented. "He wouldn't leave his dinner unless he was handy. Have a look for him, boys. He might be able to tell us something."
The men scattered in different directions down the depression, and presently a shout from one of them announced that the prospector had been found. He came toiling slowly up the slope, side by side with his discoverer. He was a small wiry man, with a heavy iron-grey beard, and his age, as well as one could guess, was something near to sixty.
"You don't happen to have seen a body of men, horsemen, passing this way late last night or early this morning?" the sergeant queried.
"Nobody passed this way last night," the man answered in a colorless voice. "Why?"
"A gold escort was robbed yesterday evening," the sergeant said, "and we've got information that the robbers came this way."
The man turned slowly and studied the lower slopes of the distant range. He saw, or seemed to see, something that interested him, and he stared so long that the sergeant said impatiently, "Well, what about it?"
"I was just wondering," said the little man in the same colorless voice. "I was just wondering if that was them."
"If who was?" the sergeant demanded. "Out with it, man, and don't keep us waiting all day."
"Last night," said the man distinctly, "there was a fire up on those ranges. It wasn't a bush-fire. I know a bush-fire. It was just a tiny little glow from here. I thought it was a fire showing through the open door of a hut, until I remembered that nobody lived up there. It didn't last long; it must have burnt out in ten minutes or so, so I knew that it was started by some traveller. It wasn't a camp-fire and they weren't cooking anything."
"How do you know that?" the sergeant said quickly.
"How do I know that?" the little man repeated slowly. "It's easy enough. The fire was only alight ten minutes at the most, and you can't cook anything or boil a billy in that time, I know."
"The old chap's right," one of the troopers said in an undertone to his superior.
The sergeant nodded. He turned again to the old prospector. "You're sure you didn't see anyone pass this way?" he queried.
"No, I'm not sure," said the man. "I'm only saying that I didn't hear anyone."
"What do you mean by saying you're not sure that you didn't see anyone?" the sergeant asked curiously.
"When there's shadows in the trees," said the old man, "there's times when you can't tell whether they're men or not. That's what I mean. I'm only saying that I didn't hear anyone. I'd have heard horses."
"The man's a hatter," the sergeant remarked as the troop galloped off towards the ranges. "As mad as a March hare."
The other grinned cheerfully. "Still there's a lot in what he said," he answered. "Now that about the fire——"
"I wonder why they lighted it," the sergeant cut-in.
"Don't know," the other said. "What's the sense of worrying anyway? We'll know soon enough. But don't you think we should have brought the old chap along with us?"
The sergeant shook his head. "What'd be the good?" he said. "He couldn't do any more than he's done already."
He swung round in his saddle and faced the troop. "Now, men," he said, "we've got to put our best foot foremost. Those 'rangers are somewhere ahead of us, making for the mountains. Keep your eyes skinned, for you never know the minute we'll catch up to them. They can't have such a big start of us, and they're heavily loaded at that."
The troopers unslung their carbines and examined the loading, then, satisfied that every preparation had been made, they set spurs to their horses and cantered up the track that led to the ranges.
It was Mr. Abel Cumshaw who first discovered the pursuers. Early in the afternoon the two men commenced to ascend the mountains proper. Just before they disappeared into the belt of timber that fringed the slopes the younger man turned in his saddle and cast one last backward glance at the valley they had left beneath them. Far away below them, in among the misty shapes of the distant trees, he caught a glimpse of a collection of dark little dots whose unfamiliar look puzzled him. He called Mr. Bradby's attention to them, and that gentleman glanced at them in an offhand way and pronounced them to be kangaroos.
"Come on," he added in a different tone. "Hurry up with you there!"
Mr. Cumshaw had no intention of moving until he was fully satisfied in his own mind that the little black dots were really kangaroos. Something seemed to whisper that they weren't.
"They're not kangaroos," he said with conviction. He had caught the glint of sunlight on metal, a brass button of a man's uniform, or perhaps the polished barrel of a carbine.
"Oh," said Mr. Bradby, "so you've tumbled."
"They're police," Mr. Cumshaw stated. "That's what they are."
"Didn't you know that, Abel? I guessed it as soon as I saw them. I'd never confuse a trooper with a kangaroo. I only said that to—well, I didn't want to scare you unnecessarily."
"You needn't be afraid of that," said Mr. Cumshaw airily. "I'm in the game for good or ill, and I'm taking all risks equally with you. It's as much my funeral as yours."
"It doesn't matter whose funeral it is," Jack Bradby said impatiently. "We've got to get away and do it smart. You must remember that neither of us knows anything at all about this country, and it's ten to one that those infernal police have got a black tracker or some other imp of Satan who'll be able to follow us, even if we left as little trace as so many flies."
"Where are we heading for anyway?" Abel Cumshaw enquired as he spurred his horse alongside his companion's.
"That's more than I can say," Bradby retorted. "If we'd had any gumption we'd have explored the place before we took on this last job. But we hadn't the time, and that's all there is to say about it. It's my impression that this section of the State is as full of hiding-places as ever the Blue Mountains or the Wombats were. If we only keep up this spurt of ours we'll make a gully or a valley where we can hide for months without a soul being a whit the wiser."
"I hope so," said Cumshaw, in the manner of a man who has very grave doubts.
"Hold your breath for your work," Mr. Bradby advised. "You might need it all yet."
They had made good headway by this, and the path that they had picked out took them every hour deeper into the unexplored heart of the country. On every side of them stretched the unbroken fastnesses of the primeval wilderness, sheer precipices dropping suddenly into infinite space, jagged peaks towering dizzily into the misty vault of heaven, quaintly situated valleys so masked by timber and brushwood that one came across them only by accident. There is something in the naked face of Nature, in the sheer magnificence of incredible heights and the marvellous massiveness of big timber that somehow dwarfs man into insignificance and makes him realise the puniness of his strength. There was something in the scenes now opening up before the rangers that subdued them and beat them into silence. There was beauty in the sight, the soft eternal beauty of an unravished land, but over and above that was the suggestion that the travellers were fighting not merely against their kind but against the untrammelled forces of an all-powerful wilderness.
The time was early December, and the golden wattle in full bloom. From end to end the ranges were a blaze of color, near at hand deep gold, fading away in the distance into that hazy blue-grey peculiar to Australian mountains. Hour by hour the men rode on in silence, at times galloping down the slopes, at others crawling slowly and painfully up hills that stretched apparently to heaven, hills that yet dropped suddenly into space when one had almost given up all hope of ever reaching the summit.
They had lost all sight of the pursuers, though once Bradby caught a glimpse of smoke far away to the east, smoke that he fancied came from the mid-day fire of the troopers.
They halted at sunset in the shadow of a clump of red gums and made the first meal since morning. As a result of a hurried consultation they decided to press on until midnight. But the horses were wearied with the rough and constant travelling, and it took the better part of two hours for them to cover a little under three miles.
"They've got to have a rest and so have we," Bradby said finally. "The pace is killing, and I'm quite satisfied that the police are taking it fairly easy. We've got scared over nothing. They might not even be on our track. At any rate I suggest we finish for the night and get what sleep we can."
Abel Cumshaw raised no objection to this—as a matter of fact he was almost falling from his mount out of sheer saddle-weariness—so a halt was called, the horses were unsaddled, the men unrolled their blankets and settled down to slumber just as the silver ghost of the moon flooded the place with its cool white light.
It was broad daylight when they awoke, and the sun was already high up in the heavens.
"Somewhere about nine or ten o'clock," Cumshaw guessed. "We've slept in, Jack."
Bradby ruefully admitted that this was so, but excused it on the ground that they would be better fitted for the day's work.
"I'm hanged if I like this game," Cumshaw growled as they made a meagre breakfast on almost the last of their rations. "The food's running short, and it's only a matter of time until they wear us down. You know what it means for us, Jack, if they catch us with the gold. Now I've got an idea, and if we carry it out I see a chance of escaping scot-free. The gold's weighing us down, so what we've got to do is to get rid of it."
"You're surely not going to throw it away after all we've gone through," said Bradby, aghast at the proposal.
"No, I'm not," Cumshaw told him. "What I suggest is that we hide it somewhere handy, make a note of the spot, and then clear out of this particular section for a time. We can easily keep afloat for a couple of months, and when the hue and cry has died down, we can come back and dig it up at our leisure. We'll gain nothing by sticking to it now and we'll run a chance of losing everything."
"Not a bad idea," Bradby agreed. "But the trouble's to find a suitable spot."
"We passed dozens of such places already, Jack. We're just as likely to strike something as good or even better during the course of the day. The whole country-side is honeycombed with hiding-places; it's like a rabbit-warren."
"There's nothing like being an optimist," Bradby said. "Have it your way, Abel. Now the sooner you find some nice secure little spot the better for us, I'm thinking. For one thing the food's running short, as you just remarked, and for another I don't intend keeping up this dodging game for ever. We can't last; they'll wear us down."
"That's supposing they don't get tired and go home," said the cheerful Mr. Cumshaw.
"Not much chance of that," Mr. Bradby retorted. "I only wish they would."
During the morning Bradby's horse developed lameness, and, though the two men slackened the pace in order to give it every chance, by mid-day it could barely limp along.
"This won't do," said Bradby in despair. "We're losing time we can ill afford. All the same this old crock'll have to struggle on until nightfall, and then we'll see whether we'll have to shoot it."
"I don't like shooting a horse," Cumshaw remarked. "It's like murder."
Bradby's only answer was a muttered oath. The trials of the Journey were bringing out the worst side of the man, a side that Cumshaw had never seen before. He eyed his companion thoughtfully. If the wilderness was to get on Bradby's nerves at this early stage, Cumshaw could see that there was likely to be very serious trouble before the end came. The air in the highlands was laden with a freshness which, while it stung the men to action, at the same time put a keen edge on their tempers. Both of them were children of the warm, sun-kissed lowlands, and the difference of even a few degrees of temperature had a remarkable effect on them. With Abel Cumshaw it was such as to send a warm glow into his cheeks; the cold bite of the air made his blood sparkle like new wine and urged him on to fresh efforts. It affected Mr. Bradby in another and a worse way. He became sullen, and there was a certain marked vindictiveness in the way he spurred his lame horse on to exertions that were plainly too much for it. Once or twice Abel was on the point of remonstrating with him, but for the sake of peace he held his tongue and waited, in the hope that the day would bring forth some measure of relief. But nothing happened that morning, and the hope died within him.
Late that day, when the pace had slowed down almost to a crawl, they stumbled across the place by the simplest kind of accident. They had been dropping down to lower levels the greater part of the day, and somewhere about three o'clock in the afternoon—they were not quite sure of the hour, since the sun was masked by the trees—they found themselves in what looked like a narrow gully. Both sides of it were lined with thick bushes of golden wattle that shut out all view on either hand. There were shadows galore in this narrow gully, and the place itself looked almost as dark as the entrance to the Pit. Cumshaw, who had a classical education and had not been able to forget it, any more than the fact that he had once been a gentleman, murmured under his breath.
"What's that?" Bradby asked sharply.
Cumshaw repeated his quotation. "Facilis est descensus Averno," he said.
"What does that mean?" Bradby enquired, in the tone of a man who imagines he is being insulted in a language he does not understand.
"It's easy to go to hell," Cumshaw translated.
Bradby shot one sharp curious glance at him, but made no comment on what he had said. They rode on in silence.
Presently they came to a patch of ground that had been broken by the wind or the rain, or perhaps both together. The shadows so fell that the travellers did not realise the treacherous nature of the soil until they were right in the middle of it. Cumshaw's horse floundered and would have fallen on its knees had he not reined in sharply. This caused him to cannon into his companion's mount. Bradby pulled back sharply, in some way jarring his animal's sore leg as he did so. It reared up on its haunches with the pain, and in the most approved manner bucked its rider off. He shot up in the air, described a beautiful half-circle, and sailed through the barrier of wattle like a human projectile.
Cumshaw slipped off his horse with the quickness of thought. He had enough presence of mind to tether both his own and Bradby's mount, and then he cautiously parted the bushes. For the moment he could see nothing but a great wall of golden blossoms, and then out of the depths came Bradby's furious voice. He was cursing the horse and the slope and everything and everyone within hearing in the simple and forceful fashion of the Australian bushman.
Cumshaw called to him and was answered with an oath.
"Where are you?" he repeated.
"Down here," said the voice, this time modifying its language. "Step carefully or you'll come a cropper."
Mr. Cumshaw pulled the bushes apart and found that he was standing on the verge of a sheer descent.
"Mind your eye," said the voice of the still invisible Mr. Bradby. "I've found the very place we've been looking for."
Abel Cumshaw caught at the bushes to save himself from slipping and turned a curious eye on the scene before him. Really there wasn't very much for him to see. Bradby had fallen into a miniature valley so small that it looked like the creation of a child. The place was heavily timbered, and almost all definable features were masked beneath the trees. Abel saw even in the first glance that here was just that ideal hiding-place for which they had been searching. Softly and cautiously he commenced to descend. The slope was slippery with green grass, and he finished the last few yards with a run. He came down amongst a lot of bracken and fern, and suffered no worse harm than the shock of a sudden stoppage. Mr. Bradby, he saw, was sitting almost buried in a mass of bracken, and looking much cheerier than his recent utterance would seem to suggest.
"Are you hurt?" Cumshaw asked him. He held out a helping hand. Mr. Bradby struggled to his feet and smiled at his questioner.
"Hurt? No," he said. "Only surprised. Why, Abel, here's the very place we want. We could hide here for years, and they could be scouring the country for us, and them not a penny the wiser. That tumble of mine was just the luckiest thing imaginable. You talk about falling into hell! Why, man, we've fallen into heaven, and if we don't make the best use we can of the place we're the biggest duffers alive."
"How are we to get the horses down here?" queried the practical Mr. Cumshaw.
Mr. Bradby eyed the slope down which he had come so precipitately, and then pursed up his lips.
"It don't look so easy from here," he said at length. "And from what I can see this place is walled in all round."
"Whether it is or not," said Cumshaw, "we've got to get those horses down, and get them down at once."
"But how?"
"That's what we've got to find out," said Cumshaw. And with that he commenced to climb up the slope again. It was hard work, much harder than coming down, but in the end he managed it. When he reached the top he turned, to find that Bradby was almost at his heels. He surveyed the place with the eye of a trained bushman; then he said, "We can manage it, Jack. It's a case of sliding them down, but once we get them started they'll go right enough."
"We'll give it a try," said Mr. Bradby. His usual good humor was fast re-asserting itself now that they had reached a haven of comparative safety, and he was ready to try any scheme that promised even the smallest chance of success.
Without wasting any further words on the matter the two men scrambled through the bushes and made their way towards the horses. The lame animal had quite recovered from its fright, and suffered its owner to lead it up the slight rise to the wattles, though there it drew back as if conscious of the drop beneath. But by dint of prodding and coaxing Bradby forced it through the crackling brush, and then, with a wild whinny of fear, it lost its footing and slid down the slope in an avalanche of grass and twigs. Cumshaw's mount made the descent in fine style, and the two men followed.
"Now," said Bradby, when they stood once more on level ground, "the further we get into this timber the better, I say. I don't suppose any passer-by would be likely to notice that we've come down here, do you?"
"All things considered," Mr. Cumshaw said slowly, "we've made little mess. We've got to thank that grassy slope for that. If it had been dry earth there'd have been tracks enough in all conscience. Yes, I think we can reasonably say that we've no need to fear anything—unless accidents."
As near as they could judge the valley was about a mile across at its widest, but it merged so gently into the further side of the ranges that it was almost impossible to say exactly. The wood grew thicker as the men advanced, until presently it was with difficulty that they could make their way forward.
"Getting pretty close," Bradby said at length.
Cumshaw nodded. He was too busy thinking over certain little peculiarities of the wood to take much notice of his companion's remarks. His quick eye had seen little cuts in the trees, bits of bark that had been chipped off here and there, and the sight set him wondering. The cuts were curiously like the blazing of a trail. They were regular, they were all about the same height on the tree-trunks, and they looked as if they had been made with an axe, not the crude stone weapon of an aborigine, but the sharp steel axe of a white man. Yet the place seemed deserted, and in all the air was that sense of utter desolation and absence of life that only those who have lived close to Nature can feel and understand.
"We're not the first here," Cumshaw said suddenly.
Bradby turned on him in alarm. "What d'y' mean?" he asked indistinctly.
"Some of the trees are blazed," Cumshaw pointed out. "The cuts are clean, and that means they've been done with an axe. But they're all weather-worn, so it must have been some time ago."
"I don't like the look of it all the same," Bradby said despondently. "It means that someone else has stumbled on this place—it doesn't matter much whether it was yesterday or ten years ago—and what has been done before will almost certainly be done again. If those troopers come this way——"
"What's the good of crossing the bridge before you come to it?" Cumshaw interrupted. "We've been lucky so far, and who's to say our luck won't hold out till the end?"
"It's the end I'm looking at," Bradby said gloomily. "It might be the sort of end neither of us'd fancy."
Mr. Cumshaw made no immediate reply. He was peering very intently through the boles of the trees as if he was not quite sure that what he saw was really there.
"What are you looking at?" Bradby demanded irritably.
"If that's not a bit of a clearing and a hut on the edge of it, I'm a lunatic," Abel Cumshaw said.
"Hell!" ejaculated Bradby, and he in his turn peered through the trees.
"There's no smoke coming from it," Cumshaw said comfortingly. "It looks deserted. I daresay it's been like that for years."
"I don't like this place," Bradby remarked with naive irrelevance. "It fair gives me the creeps. There's spooks about here."
"If you talk that way," said Cumshaw fiercely, "I'll put a bullet through you. That sort of talk's only fit for children. You're not a child. You ought to have more sense. There's things here doubtless that you and I don't understand, but they're quite capable of a rational explanation, so don't go digging up any stuff about ghosts until you find you can't explain them any other way. There's the hut in front of us, and either there's someone in it or there isn't. If there is, we've got to use our wits; if there isn't, the game's ours."
"Have it your own way," said Bradby. "I'm game enough when I know what I'm tackling. I only mentioned I didn't like the feel of the place, and I don't see that that gives you any call to say what you have."
"We'll call it off until we've investigated," Cumshaw replied. "You stay here with the horses, and I'll creep forward a bit and see if anyone's home. All the same, I'm willing to bet that the place's deserted."
"Maybe it is and maybe it isn't," suggested Bradby. "However, you go off as you say and I'll wait here for you."
Abel Cumshaw threw the reins to his companion, slid his revolver holsters round to the front within easy reach, should he need the weapons they contained, and slipped through the trees with the silence of a marauding tom-cat. Bradby watched him with some misgiving. No man could say with certainty just what secret the dilapidated hut held, and Bradby's state of mind was such that he took the gloomier view of the situation. He would not have been very much surprised to see half a dozen troopers issue from the hut. He would have taken it as the inevitable ending of such an adventure. He failed to understand the natural cheerfulness with which Cumshaw faced the situation. He was bright and volatile enough himself when dealing with the ordinary man—his courage was of that average quality that is always at its best when exercised before an admiring or frightened audience—but the abnormal brought home to him his own futility of purpose and his natural helplessness. While realising all this he was not man enough to rise above and overcome the limitations of his spirit.
Cumshaw swung round the corner of the hut and out of sight. Then it was that Bradby began to feel absolutely deserted, and the queer oppressiveness of the place descended on him as one shuts down the lid of a box. He was not the type of man who finds companionship in animals, and the nearness of the horses in nowise mitigated his fear. For he was afraid, unashamedly afraid, though of what he could no more have said than he could fly. He knew without understanding how the knowledge came to him that the valley was filled with the ghosts of dead things, dead trees, dead leaves, and perhaps dead hopes. His nerve was going; the intolerably close atmosphere of the wood brought little beads of perspiration out on him, and when he brushed his forehead with a trembling hand he was surprised to find it wet.
The horses stirred uneasily, and the lame animal gave a low whinny.
Then in the next instant the eternal silence of the valley was broken by a human voice. The suddenness of it startled Bradby, and it wasn't until he saw Cumshaw waving to him that he realised that the sound he had heard was his companion's "Coo-ee." He loosed his hold on the reins, allowing the two horses to wander where they might, and commenced to run towards the hut. Even as he ran his faculties collected themselves, and when he reached the corner of the hut he was almost his own man again.
Cumshaw eyed him curiously as he pulled up. "Startled you a bit, didn't I?" he said.
"I thought something had happened to you when I heard you call," Bradby answered, a trifle untruthfully.
"Don't you worry about me," Cumshaw said with affected unconcern, though something in the man's nervous tone troubled him in a way he could not define. "I've found the old chap who made the marks on the trees," he ran on.
"Where?" Bradby demanded. But he looked towards the hut-door apprehensively.
"He's in there," Cumshaw said, following the other's glance, "but there isn't anything to worry about. He's as dead as a door-nail."
"Dead," Bradby repeated dazedly.
Cumshaw nodded. "This many a day," he said in semi-explanation. "But come in and see what there is to be seen."
As if perfectly sure of his companion's acquiescence he turned and walked into the hut. After a moment's hesitation Bradby followed. The place smelt a trifle musty, and all the air was full of the subtle reek of decay. It was rather dim in the hut, and at first Mr. Bradby could see nothing but some indefinite shapes that might be anything at all. Gradually his eyes accustomed themselves to the gloom, and in the farthest corner he spied a rough bed of planks.
"That's him," said Mr. Cumshaw irreverently, and stirred something with his foot.
Mr. Bradby looked a little closer this time. The something that Cumshaw had stirred turned out to be the whitened skeleton of a man. The hideous thing about it was that it was not stretched out on the plank bed; it was propped up, as if the man had died while sitting. A rusted gun lay in line with the thing's left thigh, and Bradby, following the muzzle with a trained eye, saw that it was pointed at the man's head.
"Suicide," said Cumshaw. "Look at his head. He's blown out what little brains he had."
He was right. The frontal bones of the skull were shattered and twisted by the force of the charge; they gave the rest of the face a ghastly, leering look which turned Bradby physically sick. The other man was evidently troubled by no such qualms, for he loosened the gun from the bony hand that had clung to it so desperately through all those years, and tumbled the skeleton itself on to the plank bed.
"I'm going outside," said Mr. Bradby suddenly, and disappeared through the doorway with suspicious alacrity.
Mr. Cumshaw laughed softly. "Weak stomach," he murmured. "Well, someone's got to clear this old chap out, and, as it's certain to be me, I might as well do it first as last."
At that he gathered the white, clean-picked bones up in his arms, carried his burden through the doorway, and deposited it carefully on the grass outside the hut. His eye lighted on Mr. Bradby, who was sitting on the ground some distance away, looking very pale, and having all the appearance of a man who had reluctantly parted with his lunch.
"What the deuce are you doing?" he asked in tones that betrayed a certain amount of trepidation not unmixed with vague horror.
"Evicting the late tenant," Mr. Cumshaw grinned with cheerful inconsequence.
"Why?"
There was more than a question in the quick monosyllable. It contained also a hint of protest.
"Because we're going to camp inside the hut, and two's company and three's more of a crowd than I like. This old chap can stop out here for the night; I don't suppose he'll mind it much. If he's gone to the Abode of the Blessed he'll be above worrying over such mundane matters, and if he's anywhere else he'll be too much occupied to do anything but attend to the burnt spots."
"You shouldn't speak like that of the dead," Bradby said solemnly. "It's not right."
"If we stopped to consider whether a thing was right or wrong before we did it," Cumshaw retorted, "you and I wouldn't be here this evening. If you're wise, you'll leave all that talk till morning. The shadows are closing in, and we'll have the night on us before we know where we are. I'd suggest that we catch the horses while the light's still good. You must remember they've got those saddle-bags on them still. Of course, there's just enough food to make a meal for a pair of small-sized tom-cats, but I fancy we'll manage on it till morning. Who knows what we may find then? Perhaps a kangaroo, or at the worst a native-bear."
Bradby rose reluctantly to his feet, and, with a nervous glance at the remains of the unknown, followed his partner in crime. The horses had not strayed far; they were busily cropping the grass, and seemed quite content with their lot. The two men unloaded the saddle-bags and carried the contents into the hut. Then they hobbled the horses and turned them loose for the night.
The shadows were gathering in by this, and already the trees were full of misty shapes that had no relation to fact. The bulk of the hills shut out the last rays of the sun, though the western sky was still faintly tinged with crimson. Just as they entered the hut Cumshaw paused for a moment and ran his eye over the scene. The place seemed peaceful enough, but he had that queer sense of the bushman, a sense almost amounting to an instinct, that told him that there was trouble ahead. He shook the feeling off almost immediately and entered the hut. Bradby, despite his dislike of the conglomeration of bones on the grass outside, lingered a second or so longer. There was a light in the eastern sky, perhaps a faint reflection of the glow of the dying day, that lit up the hump of the nearest hill. It was practically bare of vegetation; only a solitary tree stood a lone sentinel on its very summit, showing black against the horizon.
The thought that sprung into Bradby's mind at that was that here was a landmark which there could be no possibility of mistaking. Already certain plans were germinating in his brain, and he saw, or fancied he saw, a way of turning this latest discovery to practical use. The bleached bones in front of him, too, became a means to an end, and, with the smile of a man who sees the way suddenly made clear, he too entered the hut in his turn.
Cumshaw was busily engaged in laying a fire in the centre of the hut, taking care, however, that its glow would not show through the open doorway. He looked up as Bradby entered and said, "I think we're safe in starting a fire here. It can't be seen by anyone crossing the hills, though there isn't much likelihood of that, and all the smoke we make won't do us any harm. There's always a certain amount of mist in a place like this, and a man a mile away wouldn't be able to tell the difference."
"Go ahead," said Mr. Bradby quietly. "You know what you are doing."
The compliment in the last remark was desperately like an insult, but Cumshaw did not seem to notice anything out of the way, for he bent down to his work and whistled cheerfully while he coaxed the fire into a blaze. Presently it was burning brightly, the billy was filled with water from the water-bottle, and tea was in a fair way of being prepared. "Great place, this," Cumshaw said presently.
"Great place," Mr. Bradby assented. "A man can die here without anyone being any the wiser."
Mr. Cumshaw made no reply to that, but the corners of his mouth tightened as if he suspected some hidden meaning beneath that smooth remark.