A RED HERRING
Rigden cantered to the horse-paddock gate, and on and on along the beaten track which intersected that enclosure, and which led ultimately to a wool-shed pitched further from the head-station than wool-shed ever was before or since. Rigden rode as though he were on his way thither; he certainly had not the appearance of a man come to cut out horses in a horse-paddock. His stock-whip was added to the bulging contents of the dust-coat pockets, instead of being ready as a lance in rest. The rider looked neither right nor left as he rode. He passed a mob of horses in the moonlight, not without seeing them, but without a second glance.
Suddenly he left the track at a tangent; but there was no symptom of the sudden thought. Rigden sat loosely in his saddle,careless but alert, a man who knew every inch of the country, and his own mind to an irreducible nicety. A clump of box rose in his path; a round-shot would have cut through quicker, but not more unerringly. Rigden came out on the edge of a chain of clay-pans, hard-baked by the sun, and shining under the moon like so many water-holes.
Rigden rode a little way upon the nearest hard, smooth surface; then he pulled up, and, looking back, could see scarcely any trace of his horse's hoofs. He now flung a leg across the saddle, and sat as the ladies while his quiet beast stood like bronze. A night-horse isex officioa quiet beast.
Rigden wondered whether any man had ever before changed his boots on horseback. When he proceeded it was afoot, with his arm through the reins, and the pockets of the dust-coat bulging more than ever. From his walk it was manifest that the new shoes pinched.
But they left no print unless he stamped with all his might. And that was a very painful process. Rigden schooled himselfto endure it, however, and repeated the torture two or three times on his way across the clay-pans. On such occasions the night-horse was made to halt (while the stamping was done under its nose) and to pirouette in fashion that must have astonished the modest animal almost as much as each fresh inspiration astonished Rigden himself.
On the sandy ground beyond he merely led the horse until a fence was reached. Here some minutes were spent, not only in strapping down the wires and coaxing the night-horse over, but in some little deliberation which ended in the making of mock footprints with his own boots, without, however, putting them on. Rigden had still another mile to do in the tight shoes for this his sin. It brought him to the pouting lips of a tank (so called) where the moon shone in a mirror of still water framed in slime. Here he gave his horse a drink, and, remounting, changed his boots once more. A sharp canter brought him back to the fence; it was crossed as before; the right horses were discoveredand cut out with the speed and precision of a master bushman; and at half-past eleven exactly the thunder of their hoofs and the musketry of Rigden's stock-whip were heard together in the barracks, where the rest had gathered for a final pipe.
"Good time," said the sergeant, who was seated with his subordinate on the storekeeper's bed.
"Not for him," said Spicer. "He said he'd be back by eleven. He's generally better than his word."
"A really good man at his work—what?"
Bethune had been offered the only chair, and was not altogether pleased with himself for having accepted it. It was rather a menagerie, this storekeeper's room, with these policemen smoking their rank tobacco. Theodore had offered them his cigars, to put an end to the reek, but his offer had come too late. He hardly knew why he remained; not even to himself would he admit his anxiety to know what was going to happen next. A criminal case! It wouldteach him nothing; he never touched criminal work; none of your obvious law and vulgar human interest for him.
"Good man?" echoed Spicer the loyal. "One of the best on God's earth; one of the straightest that ever stepped. Don't you make any mistake about that, Bethune! I've known him longer than you."
The testimonial was superfluous in its warmth and fulness, yet not uncalled for if Bethune's tone were taken seriously. It was, however, merely the tone in which that captious critic was accustomed to refer to the bulk of humanity; indeed, it was complimentary for him. Before more could be added, "the straightest man that ever stepped" had entered, looking the part. His step was crisp and confident; there was a lively light in his eye.
"Have a job to find them?" inquired his champion.
"Well," said Rigden, "I found something else first."
"The man?" they all cried as one.
"No, not the man," said Rigden smiling. "Where's your tracker, sergeant?"
"Put him in your travellers' hut, Mr. Rigden."
"Quite right. I only wanted to ask him something, but I dare say you can tell me as well. Get that track pretty plain before you lost it this afternoon?"
"Plain as a pikestaff, didn't we?" said the sergeant to his sub.
"My oath!" asseverated the trooper, who was a man of few words.
"Notice any peculiarity about it, Harkness?"
"Yes," said the sergeant.
"What?" pursued Rigden.
"That," said Harkness; and he produced a worn heel torn from its sole and uppers.
"Exactly," said Rigden, nodding.
The sergeant sprang from the bed.
"Have you struck his tracks?"
"I won't say that," said Rigden. "All I undertake is to show you a distinct track with no left heel to it all down the line. No, I won't shake hands on it. It may lead to nothing."
All was now excitement in the smalland smoky bedroom. The jackeroo had appeared on the scene from his own room, to which his sensitive soul ever banished him betimes. All were on their feet but Bethune, who retained the only chair, but with eyes like half-sheathed blades, and head at full-cock.
"Did you follow it up?" asked the sergeant.
"Yes, a bit."
"Where did you strike it?"
"I'll tell you what: you shall be escorted to the spot."
"Um!" said the sergeant; "not by all hands, I hope?"
"By Mr. Spicer and nobody else. I'd come myself, only I've found other fish to fry. Look here, Spicer," continued Rigden, clapping the storekeeper on the shoulder; "you know the clay-pans in the horse-paddock? Well, you'll see my tracks there, and you'd better follow them; there are just one or two of the others; but on the soft ground you'll see the one as plain as the other. You'll have to cross the fence into Butcher-boy; you'll seewhere I crossed it. That's our killing-sheep paddock, Harkness; think your man could kill and eat a sheep?"
"I could kill and eat you," said the sergeant cordially, "for the turn you've done me."
"Thanks; but you wait and see how it pans out. All I guarantee is that the tracks are there; how far they go is another matter. I only followed them myself as far as the tank in Butcher-boy. And that reminds me: there'll be a big muster to-morrow, Spicer. The tank in Butcher-boy's as low as low; the Big Bushy tanks always go one worse; we'll muster Big Bushy to-morrow, whether or no. I've been meaning to do it for some time. Besides, it'll give you all the freer hand for those tracks, sergeant: we shall be miles apart."
"That's all right," said the sergeant. "But I should have liked to get on them to-night."
"The moon's pretty low."
Harkness looked out.
"You're right," he said. "We'll give itbest till morning. Come, mate, let's spell it while we can."
The rest separated forthwith. Bethune bade his future brother-in-law good-night without congratulation or even comment on the discovery of the tracks. Rigden lingered a moment with his lieutenants, and then remarked that he had left his coat in the harness-room; he would go and fetch it, and might be late, as he had letters to write for the mail.
"Can't I get the coat, sir?" asked the willing jackeroo.
Rigden turned upon him with unique irritation.
"No, you can't! You can go to bed and be jolly well up in time to do your part to-morrow! It's you I am studying, my good fellow," he made shift to add in a kindlier tone; "you can't expect to do your work unless you get your sleep. And I want you to round up every hoof in the horse-paddock by sunrise, and after that every man in the hut!"
BELOW ZERO
"May I come in?"
It was her brother at Moya's door, and he began to believe she must be asleep after all. Theodore felt aggrieved; he wanted speech with Moya before he went to bed. He was about to knock again when the door was opened without a word. There was no light in the room. Yet the girl stood fully dressed in the last level rays of the moon. And she had been crying.
"Moya!"
"What do you want?"
"Only to speak to you."
"What about?"
"Yourself, to begin with. What's the trouble, my dear girl?"
He had entered in spite of her, and yet she was not really sorry that he had come.She had suffered so much in silence that it would be relief to speak about anything to anybody. Theodore was the last person in whom she could or would confide. But there was something comfortable in his presence just there and then. She could tell him a little, if she could not tell him all; and he could tell her something in return.
She heard him at his match-box, and shut the door herself as he lit the candles.
"Don't speak loud, then," said Moya. "I—I'd rather they didn't hear us—putting our heads together."
"No fear. We've got the main building to ourselves, you and I. Rather considerate of Rigden, that."
Indeed it was the best parlour that had been prepared for Moya, for in your southern summers the best parlour of all is the shadiest verandah. Theodore took to the sofa and a cigarette.
"Do you mind?" he said. "Then do please tell me what's the matter with you, Moya!"
"Oh, can't you see? I'm so unhappy!"
Her eyes had filled, but his next words dried them.
"Had a row with Rigden?"
And he was leaning forward without his cigarette.
Moya hated him.
"Is that all that occurs to you?" she asked cuttingly. "I'm sorry to disappoint you, I'm sure! I should have thought even you could have seen there was enough to make one unhappy, without the consummation you so devoutly——"
"Good, Moya! That's all right," said her brother, as he might have complimented her across the net at lawn-tennis.
"It's quite unpleasant enough," continued Moya, with spirit, "without your making it worse. The police in possession, and a runaway convict goodness knows where!"
"I agree," said Theodore. "Itisunpleasant. I wonder where the beggar can be?"
"It's no use asking me," said Moya; for the note of interrogation had been in his voice.
"You didn't see any suspicious-looking loafers, I suppose? I mean this afternoon."
"How could I? I was with Pelham all the time."
She would never marry him, never! That was no reason why she should give him away. She would never marry a man with discreditable secrets which she might not share, not because they were discreditable, but for the other reason. Yet she must be a humbug for his sake! Moya felt a well-known eye upon her, felt her face bathed in fire; luckily her explanation itself might account for that, and she had the wit to see this in time.
"I mean," she stammered, "one was on the verandah all the afternoon. Nobody could have come without our seeing them."
"I don't know about that. Love is blind!"
His tone carried relief to Moya. The irony was characteristic, normal. It struck her as incompatible with any strong suspicion. But the ground was dangerous all the same.
"If we are made uncomfortable," said Moya, shifting it, "what must it be for Pelham! It's on his account I feel so miserable."
And she spoke the truth; indeed, a truism; but she would be still more miserable if she married him. She would never marry a man——the haunting sentence went for once unfinished. Theodore was favouring her with a peculiar scrutiny whose import she knew of old. She was on her guard just in time.
"You haven't heard the latest development, I suppose?"
"Has there been something fresh since I came away?"
And even Theodore did not know that she was holding her breath.
"Something as fresh as paint," said he dryly. "Rigden thinks he's got on the fellow's tracks."
Moya had braced herself against any sudden betrayal of alarm; she was less proof against the inrush of a new contempt for her lover.
"You don't mean it!" she cried with indignation.
"Why not?" asked Theodore blandly.
"Oh, nothing. Only it's pretty disgraceful—on the part of the police, I mean—that they should spend hours looking for what a mere amateur finds at once!"
The brother peeped at her from lowered lids. He was admiring her resource.
"I agree," he said slowly, "if—our friend is right."
"Whom do you mean?" inquired Moya, up in arms on the instant.
"Rigden, of course."
"So you think he may be mistaken about the tracks, do you?"
"I think it's possible."
"You know a lot about such things yourself, of course! You have a wide experience of the bush, haven't you? What do the police think?"
"They're leaving it till the morning. They hope for the best."
"So everybody is pleased except my brilliant brother! I want to know why—I want to know more about these tracks."
He told her more with unruffled mien; he rather enjoyed her sarcasm; it both justified and stimulated his own. Sarcasm he held to be the salt of intercourse. It was certainly a game at which two Bethunes could always play.
"But we shall see in the morning," concluded Theodore. "The heathen is to be put upon the scent at dawn; if he passes it, well and good."
"Meanwhile you don't?"
"No, I'm hanged if I do," said Theodore, bluntly.
"Because you haven't been to see?"
Theodore smiled.
"Because you wouldn't know a man's track from a monkey's if you went?"
Theodore laughed.
"Why drag in Darwin, my dear girl? No, I've not been to look, and yet I'm not convinced. I just have my doubts, and a reason or so for them; then I haven't your admirable ground of belief in the infallibility of our host's judgment. He may be mistaken. Mistakes do get made by moonlight. Let's put it at that."
But Moya knew that he was not putting it at that in his mind, and she made up hers to learn the worst of his suspicions.
"If the tracks are not his, whose are they?" she demanded, as though it mattered. "If the creature is not somewhere about the run, where is he?"
And this did matter.
"If you ask me," said Theodore, with great gravity for him, "I should say that he was within a few yards of us all the time!"
"A few yards?"
"I should say," repeated Theodore, "that he was somewhere about the homestead, not the run. And you know perfectly well that you agree!"
"I?"
She jumped up in a fury.
"How dare you say that to me? How dare you, Theodore?"
"My dear Moya, I'm at a loss to understand you!" and his eyebrows underlined the words into largest capitals. "How on earth have I offended? I'm quite sure that you have the same suspicion—not to call it fear—that I entertain myself. If not,why be in such a state? Why not go to bed and to sleep like a rational person? I confess I don't feel like doing so myself—with the chance of waking up to find an escaped criminal on your chest. I prefer to sit up and keep watch. I'm convinced he's somewhere about; all these huts afford far better cover than the open paddocks, bless you! He could easily have slipped among them without either of you seeing him, and the chances are he has."
"If you think that," said Moya, "why didn't you suggest it?"
"I did—to Rigden. Wouldn't listen to me; so, of course, I can't expect you to be so disloyal as to do so either."
But Moya had no more of that kind of fight in her. "So you intend to sit up and watch?" was her sole rejoinder.
"I do."
"Then so do I!"
Theodore looked dubious, but only for an instant.
"You begin to think there may be something in my theory?"
"I think there—may be."
"Then I'll tell you more!" exclaimed Theodore with decision: "I believe the fellow's over yonder in that store!"
His eyes were waiting for her face to change. But it changed very little. Moya was beginning to wonder whether her terrible brother did not already know all. One moment she thought he did, the next that he did not; indifference was creeping over her with the long-drawn strain of the situation. What did it matter if he did know? It would make no difference between her and Pelham. That was at an end, in any case; all that was at an end for ever.
Meanwhile she humoured Theodore just a little, particularly in the matter of her sitting up. He begged her not to do so, and she feigned consent. One of his objects in sitting up himself was to secure her safety. He might be wrong in all his conjectures, and Rigden might be right. Theodore was none the less virtuously determined not to give a chance away.
"And if I am right I'll nab him the moment he shows his nose; and the credit willbelong to your humble brother. It isn't as if I hadn't mentioned my general ideas to Rigden; otherwise it might be rather much to take upon one's self; but as it is I have no scruples. If nothing happens, I've simply been sleeping on the verandah, because it's cooler there, and that long chair's as good as any bed. Do you mind doing something for me, Moya?"
"What is it?"
"My room's at the back, as you know; do you mind keeping a look-out while I go round and get into my pyjamas?"
"No, I don't mind."
"Particularly on the store, you know."
"Yes, I know."
"If anything happens come straight to me, but as quietly as possible."
"Very well."
"I mean if you see anybody."
"Yes."
"But I shan't be many minutes."
And he was gone.
At last!
Moya flung herself upon the bed, and lay for a few seconds with closed eyes. Herforehead was wondrous white; the fine eyebrows and the long lashes seemed suddenly to have gone black; the girl was fainting under the triple strain of fear and shame and outraged love. Yes, she was in love, but she would never marry him. Never! It was the irony of her fate to love a man whom she would rather die than marry, after this! Yet she loved him none the less; that was the last humiliation of women whom she had scorned all her days for this very thing, only to become one of them in the end.
But she at least would never marry the man she loved and yet despised. That would be the only difference, yet a fairly essential one. And now her strength was renewed with her resolve, so that she was up and doing within the few seconds aforesaid; her first act was to blow out the candle; her next, to open the door an inch and to take her stand at the opening.
Nor was she much too soon. It was as though Rigden had been only waiting for her light to go out. Within a minute he appeared in the sandy space between themain building and the store. He was again wearing the yellow silk dust-coat of which enough has been heard; it was almost all that could be seen of him in the real darkness which had fallen with the setting of the moon.
Moya heard his key in the heavy door opposite. Should she tell him of Theodore's suspicions, or should she not? While she hesitated, he let himself in, took out the key, and once more locked the door behind him. Next moment a thread of light appeared upon the threshold; and, too late, Moya repented her indecision.
Theodore would return, and then——
But for once he was singularly slow; minute followed minute, and there was neither sign nor sound of him.
And presently the store door opened once more; the figure in the dust-coat emerged as it had entered; and vanished as it had appeared, in the direction of the horse-yard.
Once more the door was shut; but, once more, that thread of incriminating lightburnt like a red-hot wire beneath. And this time Moya could not see it burn: the red-hot wire had entered her soul. Theodore had been so long, he might be longer; risk it she must, and take the consequences. Two steps carried her across the verandah; lighter she had never taken in a ball-room, where her reputation was that of a feather. Once in the kindly sand, however, she ran desperately, madly, to the horse-yard. And she was just in time to hear the dying beat of a horse's canter into infinity.
Then she must inform the wretch himself, the runaway ruffian in the store! One sob came, and then this quick resolve.
She gained the store, panting; and instinctively tried the door before knocking. To her amazement and alarm it was open. She stood confounded on the threshold, and a head bending over the desk, under the lamp, behind the counter, was suddenly transformed into a face. And it was not the runaway at all; it was Rigden himself!
"I saw you come out!" she gasped, past recrimination, past anger, past memory itself in the semi-insensibility of over-whelmingsurprise. He looked at her very gravely across the desk.
"No, that was the man who has wrecked my life," he said. "I've got him through them at last, I do believe."
And his eyes flashed their unworthy triumph.
"You could actually give him your horse!"
"I wish I could. It would be missed in a minute. No, he's only just to run the gauntlet on it, and I shall find it at the first gate. But what is it, Moya? You came for something?" and he was a miserable man once more.
"I'm ashamed to say why I came—but I will!" cried Moya in a low voice. "I did not want you to be found out through my own brother. He suspected the man was in here—I don't know why. He was going to watch the store all night, and I was watching it for him while he changed, and the light under the door——"
Rigden held up his hand.
"Hush!" he said. "Hereisyour brother."
Theodore was more than decent; he was positively gorgeous in striped and tasselled silk. He stood in the doorway with expressive eyebrows and eloquent nostrils, looking from Moya to Rigden until his gaze settled upon the latter. It was almost an innocuous gaze by then.
"So it was you in here," he said. Rigden nodded. "Do you know who I was ass enough to think it was?" continued Theodore, using a word which Moya had never heard him apply to himself before, even in fun. "Has Moya told you?"
"She has."
"I saw the light," said Moya, in elliptical explanation. Theodore continued to address his host.
"I oughtn't to have interfered," he said, with a humility which was already arousing Moya's suspicions. "I should have minded my own business, Rigden, and I apologise. I'd got it into my head—I can't tell you why. Will you forgive me? And have you any more whisky?"
"I've nothing to forgive," said Rigden,sincerely enough. "But a drink we'll have; that's an excellent idea!"
But the counter was between them, and Theodore was the first to leave the store; but on the threshold he stopped, and just turned to Moya for an instant.
"By the way, you didn't see anybody else, I suppose?" said he.
There was an instant's pause. Then Moya committed her sin.
"Of course I didn't," were the words.
Theodore strolled over to the verandah. Moya waited behind as in devotion while Rigden locked that fatal door for the last time.
"You see what you've brought me to!" she hissed. "But don't think it's because I care a bit what happens to you—once I'm gone. And Ihateyou for it—and I always shall!"
"Thank you," he said.
And that was all.
A CAVALIER
Moya went to bed like one already in a dream. She smiled when she realised what she was doing; there would be no sleep for her that night. Yet she went through with the empty form, even to putting out the light to rest her aching eyes. And in five minutes her troubles ceased for as many hours; she had passed that pitch of excitement which is another name for insomnia; she had reached the stage of sheer exhaustion, and she reaped the recompense.
Spurred feet treading gingerly nevertheless awoke her towards dawn. It was a bitter awakening. Further sleep was impossible, further rest intolerable; besides, something must be done at once. It was an ordeal to face, but sooner or later Theodore must be told, and then—good-bye!Obviously the sooner the better, since the thing was settled between the two whom it concerned; and Moya had the temperament which prefers to precipitate the absolutely inevitable; but temperament for once was not her lord. It was too hard!
Character came to the rescue. It must be done. And Moya dressed by candle-light with a craven but a resolute heart.
Meanwhile the cautious footsteps and the low voices died away; and the girl found a bare verandah, chill and silent as a vault in the twilight of early morning. A lamp was burning in the dining-room, but the chairs were pushed back, crusts left, and tea-cups half full. The teapot felt quite heavy; and Moya took a cup and a bite before going to see whether Theodore was awake. If not, she must wake him, for she could not wait. But his room was deserted; his very boots were gone; and the craven heart leapt, for all its resolution.
Moya returned to the verandah in time to see the new chum, Ives, coming at a canter through the pines. She cut him offat the barracks, where, however, he flung himself from the saddle and almost into her arms.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Bethune! Forgotten something as usual, you see!"
Hurry and worry were behind his smile. Yet Moya had the heart to detain him.
"Good morning, Mr. Ives. Where's everybody?"
"Gone mustering."
"Not my brother?"
"No; he's gone with the police."
"The police."
"You know, they've gone to follow up some tracks——"
"Oh, yes, I know!" cried Moya.
So Theodore was hand-in-glove with the enemy! Not that the police were the enemy at all; they were onlyhisenemies; but the fact remained that Theodore was one of them. Very likely he had already made them a present of his suspicions; nothing likelier, or more fitting, than the exposure of her "lover" through her own brother's agency. It will be seen that her bitterness against one was rapidly embitteringMoya's view of all and sundry. She was not original in that.
"I forgot my water-bag," the jackeroo remarked. "I shall have to gallop to catch them up."
But he was too polite to move.
"Must you catch them up?" inquired Moya, in flattering dumps: but indeed it would be deadly at the station all day, and such a day, without a soul to speak to!
"Well, they won't wait for me, because they told me what to do," said Ives on reflection.
"And what have you to do?" asked Moya, smiling.
"Go down the fence; it's easiest, you know."
"But what are you all going to do? What does this mustering mean?"
Ives determined in his own mind to blow the odds. He was not only a gentleman; he was a young man; and Miss Bethune should have all the information she wanted and he could give. Ives began to appreciate her attractions, and Rigden's good fortune, for the first time as they deserved.It would be another place after the marriage. She was a ripper when you got her to yourself.
Aloud he explained the mustering as though he had the morning to spare. It meant sweeping up all the sheep in a given paddock, either to count them out, or to shift them altogether if feed or water was failing where they were. A big job in any case, but especially so in Big Bushy, which was by far the largest paddock on Eureka; it was seven miles by seven.
"And do you generally go mustering at a night's notice?"
"No, as a rule we know about it for days before; but last night the boss—I beg your pardon——"
"What for?" said Moya. "I like to hear him called that."
And she would have liked it, she hardly knew why. But he was not her boss, and never would be.
"Thanks awfully. Well, then, the boss found a tank lower than he expected in Butcher-boy, that's the killing-sheep paddock, and it's next door to Big Bushy,which is stocked with our very best. If the tanks were low in Butcher-boy, they might be lower still in Big Bushy——"
"Why?" asked Moya, like a good Bethune.
"Oh, I don't know; only the boss seemed to think so; and of course it wouldn't do to let our best sheep bog. So we've got to shift every hoof into Westwells, where there's the best water on the run."
Moya said no more. This seemed genuine. Only she was suspicious now of every move of Rigden's; she could not help it.
"And why must you have a water-bag?" she asked, for asking's sake.
"Oh, we never go without one in this heat. The boss won't let us. So of course I went and forgot mine. I'm no good in the bush, Miss Bethune!"
"Not even at mustering?" asked sympathetic Moya.
"Why, Miss Bethune, that's the hardest thing of the lot, and it's where I'm least use. It's my sight," said the young fellow ruefully; "I'm as blind as a mole. Youought to be able to see sheep at three miles, but I can't swear to them at three hundred yards."
"That's a drawback," said Moya, looking thoughtfully at the lad.
"It is," sighed he. "Then I haven't a dog, when I do see 'em; altogether it's no sinecure for me, though they do give me the fence; and—and I'm afraid I really ought to be making a start, Miss Bethune."
The outward eye of Moya was still fixed upon him, but what it really saw was herself upon that lonely verandah all day long—waiting for the next nice development—and waiting alone.
"I have excellent eyes," she observed at length.
"To say the least!" cried her cavalier.
"I meant for practical purposes," rejoined Moya, with severity. "I'm sure that I could see sheep at three miles."
"I shouldn't wonder," said he enviously.
"And I see you have a spare horse in the yard."
"Yes, in case of accidents."
"And I know you have a lady's saddle."
"It was got for you."
Moya winced, but her desire was undiminished.
"I mean to be the accident, Mr. Ives," said she.
"And come mustering?" he cried. "And be my—my——"
"The very eyes of you," said Moya, nodding. "I shall be ready in three minutes!"
And she left him staring, and bereft of breath, but flushed as much with pleasure as with the rosy glow of the Riverina sunrise which fell upon him even as she spoke; she was on the verandah before he recovered his self-possession.
"Your horse'll be ready in two!" he bawled, and rushed to make good his word. Moya had to remind him of the water-bag after all.
First and last she had not delayed him so very long, and the red blob of a sun was but clear of the horizon when they obtained their first unimpeded view of it. This was when they looked back from the gate leading into Butcher-boy: the homestead pinesstill ran deep into the red, and an ink-pot would still have yielded their hue.
In Butcher-boy, which was three miles across, there was nothing for them to do but to ride after their shadows and to talk as they rode, neck and neck, along the fluted yellow ribbon miscalled a road, between tufts of sea-green saltbush and faraway clumps of trees.
"I wish I wasn't such a duffer in the bush," said Ives, resolved to make the most of the first lady he had met for months. "The rum thing is that I'm frightfully keen on the life."
"Are you really?" queried Moya, and she was interested on her own account, for what might have been.
"Honestly," said Ives, "though I begin to see it isn't the life for me. The whole thing appeals to one, somehow; getting up in the middle of the night (though it was an awful bore), running up the horses (though I can't even crack a stock-whip), and just now the station trees against the sunrise. It's so open and fresh and free, and unlike everything else; it gets at me to the core;but, of course, they don't give me my rations for that."
"Should you really like to spend all your days here?"
"No; but I shouldn't be surprised if I were to spend half my nights here for the term of my natural life! I shall come back to these paddocks in my dreams. I can't tell why, but I feel it in my bones; it's the light, the smell, the extraordinary sense of space, and all the little things as well. The dust and scuttle of the sheep when two or three are gathered together; it's really beastly, but I shall smell it and hear it till I die."
Moya glanced sidelong at her companion, and all was enthusiasm behind the dusty spectacles. There was something in this new chum after all. Moya wondered what.
"You're not going to stick to it, then?"
Ives laughed.
"I'm afraid it won't stick to me. I can't see sheep, I'm no real good with horses, and I couldn't even keep the station books; the owner said my education had been sadlyneglected (one for Rugby, that was!) when he was up here the other day. It's only through Mr. Rigden's good-nature that I'm hanging on, and because—I—can't—tear myself away."
"And what do you think of doing eventually?"
"Oh, I don't know. I shall go home again, I suppose; I only came out for the voyage. After that, goodness knows; I was no real use at school either."
Insensibly the rocking-chair canter of the bush horses had lapsed into the equally easy amble which is well-nigh their one alternative; and the shadows were shortening, and the back of the neck and the ears were beginning to burn. The jackeroo was sweeping the horizon for pure inexplicable delight in its dirty greens and yellows; but had quite forgotten that he ought already to have been scouring it for sheep.
"And so the boss is good-natured, is he?" said Moya, she could not have told herself why; for she would not have admitted that it could afford her any further satisfaction to hear his praises.
"Good-natured?" cried the jackeroo. "He's all that and much more; there's not a grander or a straighter chap in Riverina, and we all swear by him; but—well, he is the boss, and let's you know it."
A masterful man; and Moya had wanted her master all these years! She asked no more questions, and they rode a space in silence, Ives glancing sidelong in his turn, and in his heart congratulating Rigden more and more.
"By Jove," he cried at last, "I think I shall have to get you to use your influence on my behalf!"
"For what?" asked Moya, wincing again.
"Another chance! They mustn't give me the sack just yet—I must be here when you come. It's the one thing we need—a lady. It's the one thingheneeds to make him as nearly perfect as it's comfortable for other people for a man to be. And I simply must be here to see."
"Let's canter," said Moya. The blood came rushing to his face.
"I apologise," he cried. "It was horrid cheek of me, I know!"
Moya's reassuring smile was all kindly, and not all forced; indeed, the tears were very close to the surface, and she could not trust herself to say much.
"Not cheek at all," was what she did say, with vigour. "Only—you'll change your mind."
With that her eyes glistened for an instant; and young Ives loved her himself. But neither of them was sorry when another gate grew large above the horses' ears, with posts and wires dwindling into perspective on either side to mark the eastern frontier of Big Bushy.
THE KIND OF LIFE
"Now what do we do, Mr. Ives?"
He had shut the gate and joined her on a sandy eminence, whence Moya was seeking to prove the excellence of her eyesight at the very outset. But the paddock had not got its name for nothing; it was overrun with the sombre scrub, short and thick as lichen on a rock; and from the open spaces no sheep swam into Moya's ken.
"Turn sharp to the left, and follow the fence," replied the jackeroo.
"But I can't see a solitary sheep!"
"No, because you're looking slap into the paddock; that's the ground the others are going over, and they've already cleared it as far as we can see for the scrub. Each man takes his own line of country from this gate to the one opposite—seven miles away—andcollects every hoof on the way. My line is the left-hand fence. Got to keep it in sight, and drive everything down it, and right round to the gate."
"Well, my line is yours," said Moya, smiling; and they struck off together from the track.
"It's the long way round, but we can't miss it," said Ives; "all we have to do is to hug the fence. Slightly inglorious, but I'd rather that than make a fool of myself in the middle."
"Is it so very difficult to ride straight through the bush?"
"The most difficult thing in the world. Why, only the other week——"
"I see some!"
The girl was pointing with her riding-switch, to make other use of it next instant. Her mount, a shaggy-looking roan mare, as yet imperfectly appreciated by Moya, proved unexpectedly open to persuasion, and found her gallop in a stride. Ives followed, though he could see nothing but sand and saltbush in the direction indicated. Sheep there were, however, anda fair mob of them, whose behaviour was worthy of their kind. In all docility they stood until the last instant, then broke into senseless stampede, with the horses at their stubby tails.
"Round them up," cried Ives, "but look out! That mare can turn in her own length, and will when they do!"
The warning was timely to the very second: almost simultaneously the sheep doubled, and round spun both horses as in the air. Moya jerked and swayed, but kept her seat. Ives headed the mob for the fence, and for the moment the nonsense was out of them.
"Bravo, Miss Bethune!" said he. "You'll make a better bushman than ever I should."
Moya clouded like an April sky; the instant before she had been deliciously flushed and excited. Her companion, however, was happily intent upon his sheep.
"That's the way to start," he said, "with fifty or sixty at one swoop; you can work a mob like that; it's the five or six thatgive the trouble. I have reason to know! There's a corner of one of the paddocks in our South Block where a few of the duffers have a meet every morning, just because there's some water they can smell across the fence; won't draw to their own water at the opposite corner of their own paddock, not they! No, there they'd stick and die of thirst if one of us wasn't sent to rout them out. It was my billet every day last week, and a tougher one I never want. One time there was less than half a dozen of 'em: think of driving five weak sheep through eight or nine miles of scrub without a dog! It would be ten miles if I followed both fences religiously; but I'm getting so that I can cut off a pretty fair corner. Yes, it's pretty hard graft, as they say up here, a day like that; but your water-bag holds nectar, while it lasts; and may your wedding-cake taste as good as the bit of browny under a pine, Miss Bethune!"
"What's browny?" asked Moya hastily.
"Raisins and baking-powder," said Ives, with a laugh; "but I've got enough fortwo in my pocket, so you shall sample it whenever you like. By the way, aren't you thirsty yet?"
Moya was.
"It's the dust from the sheep, which you profess to relish, Mr. Ives."
"Only because it's like no other dust," explained the connoisseur. "And water-bag water's like no other kind."
The canvas bag was wet and heavy as he detached it from the saddle and handed it to Moya after drawing the cork from the glass mouthpiece; and from the latter Moya drank as to the manner born, the moist bag shrinking visibly between her hands.
"Steady!" cried Ives, "or we shall perish of thirst before we strike the gate. Well, what do you think of it?"
"A little canvassy, but I never tasted anything cooler, or more delicious," said Moya in all sincerity, for already the sun was high, and the dry heat of it stupendous.
The jackeroo sighed as he replaced the cork after a very modest sip.
"Ah!" said he, "I wish we were takingsheep to water in the paddock I was telling you about! Long before you get to their water, you strike a covered-in tank, that is if you cut off your corner properly and hit the other fence in the right place. It's really more like a well, without much water in it, but with a rope and a bucket with a hole in it. That bucket's the thing! You fill it a bumper, but it runs out faster than it comes up, and you're lucky if you can pour a wineglassful into the crown of your hat; but that wineglassful's sweeter than the last drop from the bag; it's sweeter than honey from the honeycomb, and I shall say so all my life!"
The boy's enthusiasm was very hard on Moya. It pricked every impression deep in her heart for ever; she caught the contagion of his acute receptivity, upon which the veriest trifles stamped themselves with indelible definition; and it was the same with her. She felt that she should never quite lose the sharp sensations of this one day of real bush life, her first and her last.
Down the fence they fell in with frequent stragglers, and the mob absorbed them inits sweep; then Moya made a sortie to the right, and Ives lost sight of her through the cloud of dust in which she rode, till the beat of hoofs came back with a scuttle of trotters, and the mob was swollen by a score at least, and the thickening cloud pierced by Moya radiant with success. Her habit was powdered as with sullen gold, and the brown gold streamed in strands from her adorable head. Ives worshipped her across the yellow gulf between their horses.
"Where's the dog?" she asked. "I'm certain that I heard one barking."
He turned his head and she heard it again, while the lagging rearguard broke into a run.
"Yet you say you are no bushman!" remonstrated Moya. "No wonder you can do without a four-wheeled dog!"
"It's my one worthy accomplishment," said the barker, modestly; "picked it up in that other paddock; simply dumb with it, sometimes, when I strike the covered-in well I was telling you about. But here we are at the corner; there's a seven-mile fenceto travel now, and then as much again as we've done already. Sure you can stand it, Miss Bethune?"
"Is there any water on the way, if we run short?" queried Moya.
Ives considered.
"Well, there's an abandoned whim in the far corner, at the end of this fence; the hut's a ruin, but the four-hundred-gallon tank belonging to it was left good for the sake of anybody who might turn up thirsty. Of course it may be empty, but we'll see."
"We'll chance it, Mr. Ives, and have another drink now!"
For it was nearing noon, and beyond the reek of the travelling mob, now some couple of hundred strong, the lower air quivered as though molten metal lay cooling in the sand. Moya had long since peeled off her riding gloves, and already the backs of her hands were dreadfully inflamed. But the day would be her first and last in the real bush; she would see it through. She never felt inclined to turn back but once, and that was when a sheep fell gaspingby the way, its eyes glazed and the rattle in its neck. Moya insisted on the remnant of water being poured down its throat and the tears were on her cheeks when they rounded up the mob once more, leaving a carcass behind them after all, and the blue crows settling on the fence.
Otherwise the seven miles were uneventful travelling; for even Moya's eyes discerned few more sheep on their side of the wires; and beyond these, to the left, was the long and ragged edge of a forest so dense (though low) that Moya, riding with Ives at the tail of the mob, said it was no wonder there were no sheep at all on the other side.
"Oh, but that's not Eureka over there," explained Ives; "that's the worst bit of country in the whole of Riverina. No one will take it up; it's simply fenced in by the fences of the blocks all round."
Moya asked what it was called. The name seemed familiar to her. It was Blind Man's Block.
"Ah! I know," she said presently, suppressinga sigh. "I heard them speaking of it on the verandah last night."
"Yes, Spicer was advising your brother to sample it if he wanted an adventure; but don't you let him, Miss Bethune. I wouldn't lose sight of the fence in Blind Man's Block for all I'm ever likely to be worth: there was a man's skeleton found there just before I came, and goodness knows how many there are that never will be found. Aha! there's the whim at last. I'm jolly glad!"
"So am I," said Moya, with a little shudder; and she fixed her eyes upon some bold black timbers that cut the sky like a scaffold a mile or two ahead; yet more than once her eyes returned to the line of dingy scrub across the fence to the left, as if fascinated by its sinister repute.
"We must bustle them along, by Jove!" exclaimed Ives, and he yelped and barked with immediate effect. "You can't do more than a couple of miles an hour with sheep; and at that rate we shan't be at the gate much before three o'clock; for I see that it's already close upon one."
"But how do you see it?" asked Moya curiously. "I've never seen you look at a watch."
Ives smiled, for he had led up to the question, and was about to show off in yet another branch of the bushman's craft which even he had succeeded in mastering.
"The fences are my watch," said he; "they happen to run due east and west and north and south on this station. This one is north and south. So at noon the shadows of the posts lie exactly under the wires: put your head between 'em, and when the bottom wire bisects the shadow it's as near noon as you would make it with a quadrant and sextant. The rest comes by practice. Another dodge is to put a stick plumb in the ground and watch when the shadow is shortest; that's your meridian."
"Yet you say you are no good in the bush!"
"I have two of the unnecessary qualifications, Miss Bethune, and I've taken care to let you see them both," laughed the open youth. "My only other merit as a bushman is a good rule which I am sorry to sayI've broken through talking to you. I always have my lunch at twelve under the biggest tree in sight. And I think we shall find something in that pine-ridge within a cooee on the right."
But they could not find shade for two, and Moya voted the pine-tree a poor parasol; whereupon her companion showed off still further by squatting under the very girths of his horse, but once more spoilt his own effect by confessing that they gave him the quietest horse on the station. So the two of them divided bread and meat and "browny" for one, of which last Moya expressed approval; but not until she was asked; for she was not herself during this interval of inaction, or rather she was herself once more. Care indeed had ridden behind her all the morning; but now the black imp was back before her troubled eyes, and for the moment they saw nothing else. But Ives began to see and to wonder what in the world it could be. She was engaged to one of the best of good fellows. She took to the bush as to her proper element, and but now had seemed enchanted with herforetaste of the life. Why then the grim contour of so sweet a face, the indignant defiance in the brooding eyes? Ives thought and thought until his youthful egoism assumed the blame, and shot him from his precarious shelter, all anxiety and remorse.
"What a brute I am! You're simply perishing of thirst!"
Moya coloured, but had the wit to accept his construction.
"Well, it isn't your fault, at any rate, Mr. Ives."
"But I might have ridden on and filled the bag; there's certain to be something in the tank at the hut."
"Then let's ride on together."
"No, you ride ahead and fill the water-bag. It'll save time, Miss Bethune, because I can be cutting off the corner with the mob."
But the mob had first to be rounded up, for it had split and scattered, and over a square mile every inch of shade was covered by a crouching fleece. The mounted Ives made a circuit with his patent yelp, andeach tuft and bush shook out its pure merino. It was harder work to head them off the fence at an angle of forty-five, and to aim for the other fence before a post of it was discernible by near-sighted eyes. Ives was too busy to follow Moya's excursion, but was not less delighted than amazed at the speed with which she returned from the hut.
"Good riding, Miss Bethune! A drink, a drink, my kingdom——"
Moya's face stopped him.
"I'm sorry to say I've got nothing for you to drink, Mr. Ives."
Ives licked the roof of his mouth, but tried to be heroic.
"Well, have you had some yourself?"
"No. I—the fact is I couldn't see the tank."
"Not see the tank! Why, you ought to be able to see it from here; no, it's on the other side; give me the bag!"
"What for?" asked Moya, more startled than he saw.
"I'll go this time. You stay with the sheep."
"But what's the good of going if the tank has been removed? If I couldn't see it I'm sure you can't," said Moya bluntly.
"Did you ride right up?"
"Of course I did."
And Moya smiled.
"Well, at all events there's the whim-water. It's rather brackish——"
"Thank you," said Moya, smiling still.
"But I thought you were knocked up with thirst? I am, I can tell you. And it's only rather salt—that's why we've given up using that whim—but it's not salt enough to make you dotty!"
Moya maintained the kindly demeanour which she had put on with her smile; it cost her an effort, however.
"Go on your own account, by all means," said she; "but not on mine, for I shan't touch a drop. I'm really not so thirsty as you suppose; let me set you an example of endurance, Mr. Ives!"
That was enough for him. He was spurring and yelping round his mob next moment. But Moya did not watch him; she had turned in her saddle to take a lastlook at the black hieroglyph of a whim, with the little iron roof blazing beside it in the sun. She even shaded her eyes with one sunburnt hand, as if to assure herself that she had made no mistake.
"So the whim is abandoned, and the hut unoccupied?"
"Yes, ever since Mr. Rigden has been manager. I hear it was one of his first improvements."
They had struck the farther fence, and the mob was well in hand along the wires. Moya and the jackeroo were ambling leisurely behind, and nothing could have been more natural than Moya's questions.
"And the hut is unoccupied?" was her next.
"Quite; as a matter of fact, it's unfit for occupation."
"Yet you wanted me to drink the water!"
"That might have been all right; besides any water's better than none when you're as thirsty as I thought you were."
Moya said no more about her thirst; it was intolerable; but they must be gettingnear the gate at last. She was silent for a time, a time of imaginative torment, for her mind ran on the latter end of such sufferings as she was only beginning to endure. She was just uncomfortable enough to have a dreadful inkling of the stages between discomfort and death.
"It's a pity not to use the hut," she said at length.
"I believe it was more bother than the class of water was worth," returned Ives. "Yes, now I think of it, I remember hearing that they couldn't get men to stay there. Blind Man's Block used to give them the creeps. They're frightfully superstitious, these back-blockers!"
"I'm not surprised," said Moya, with a shudder. "I never want to see Blind Man's Block again, or the hut either."
"But you will, you know!" the jackeroo reminded her. And that put an end to the conversation.
Over a thousand sheep were at the gate waiting for them, with half a dozen horses and as many men. Of course Ives was the last to arrive with his mob, but the goodlynumbers of the latter combined with the amazing apparition of Moya to save her friend from the reprimand he seldom failed to earn. Rigden came galloping to meet them, and for both men's sake Moya treated him prettily enough in front of Ives. Even through that day's coat of red, Rigden glowed, and told Ives that he should make something of him yet. His water-bag was not quite empty, and Moya had enough to make her long for more as she cantered with the bag to Ives, who had forged discreetly ahead.
"Don't let him know we went so long without, Mr. Ives!"
And his cracked lips were sealed upon the subject.
"Of course you cut off the corner, and didn't go right round by the hut?" said Rigden, riding up; and the jackeroo felt justified in speaking strictly for himself; and thought it so like Miss Bethune not to compromise him by saying how near to the hut they had been: for Moya said nothing at all.
"And now you shall see a count-out,"cried Rigden, in better spirits than ever, "as soon as we've boxed the mobs."
"Boxed them!" cried Moya. "Where?"
"Joined them, I mean. To think of your coming mustering of your own accord, Moya!"
His voice had fallen; she did not lower hers.
"It's one of the most interesting days I ever had," she informed all within hearing; "now let me see the end of it, and I'll go back happy."
The adjective was not convincing, but Rigden would not let it dishearten him. The very fact of her presence was the end of his despair.
"I met one of our rabbiters, and arranged for tea at his tent," he said. "He little expects a lady, but you'll have to come."
The prospect had material attractions which Moya was much too honest to deny. "Then make haste and count!" was what she said.
And that followed which appealed to Moya more than all that had gone before. The gate gaped wide, and Rigden on footput his back to one post. The rest kept their saddles, and began gently rounding up the mob, till it formed a pear-shaped island of consolidated wool, with the headland stretching almost to Rigden's feet. He turned and beckoned to the jackeroo.
"Tally, Ives!"
"Tally, sir," the jackeroo rejoined, and urged his horse to the front. He had managed to drift back to Moya's side, to ensure her complete appreciation of a manoeuvre he delighted in, but at the word of command he was gone without a glance, and visible responsibility settled on his rigid shoulders.
Real dogs kept the mob together, but the head stood stubborn at the gate, with none to lead the way till Rigden touched the foremost fleece with his toe and the race began. Slowly and singly at the start, as the first grains slip through the hour-glass; by wondering twos and threes, as the reluctant leaders were seen alive and well in the farther paddock; thereafter by the dozen abreast, so far as the ordinary eye could judge; but Rigden was the only one thatknew, as he stood in the gateway, beating time to the stampede with raised forefinger, and nodding it with bent head.
"Hundred!" he called after the first half-minute, and "hundred!" in quarter of a minute more, while Ives raised a hand each time and played five-finger exercises with the other hand upon his thigh. At the same time Rigden vanished in a yellow cloud, whence his voice came quicker and thicker, crying hundred after hundred above the dull din of a scuffling and scuttling as of a myriad mice heard through a microphone. And the dusty fleeces disappeared on one side of the cloud to reappear on the other until all were through.
"And seventy-two!" concluded Rigden hoarsely. "How many, Ives?"
"Two thousand one hundred and seventy-two," replied the jackeroo promptly.
"Sure?"
"Certain, sir."
"And so am I," said Moya, riding forward, "for I kept tally too. Yes, the hundreds are all right; but nothing will convince me that they were hundreds; youmight as well count the falling drops in a shower!"
Rigden smiled as he wiped the yellow deposit from his scarlet face.
"I may be one per cent. out," said he; "but if I'm more I deserve the sack."
So Moya allowed that it was the most marvellous performance her own eyes had ever seen; and these were full of an unconscious admiration for Rigden and his prowess; but Rigden was conscious of it, and his chin lifted, and his jaw set, and his burnt face glowed again.
Two of the musterers were told off to take the sheep to their new tank, for their own dust had set them bleating for a drink; the rest lit their pipes and turned their horses' heads for home; but Ives was instructed to stop at the rabbiter's camp and tell him whom to expect.
"It would be unfair to spring you on the poor chap," said Rigden to Moya.
Ives also had a last word to say to her, though he had to say it before the boss.
"That was something to see, wasn't it, Miss Bethune? Doesn't it make you keenerthan ever on the bush? Or isn't that possible?"
And he took off his wideawake as he shot ahead; but Rigden and Moya rode on together without speaking.