Mary Gaunt

“ The blacks had not gone far, but they could not follow them up that day. They spent it in the shade down by the waterhole, and Turner did not try to break his companion's silent reverie. Then when their horses were recruited they set out for the head-station of Nilpe Nilpe. There they told their tale. It was not much of a tale after all. Only a half-caste girl murdered, and a hut burnt. Such things happen every day. But the blacks must be punished, nevertheless, and half-a-dozen men rode out to do it, Stanesby at their head. ”

“ A beautiful girl's face too, the like of which he had not seen for many a year, if indeed, he had ever seen one like it before; a face with oval, liquid dark eyes in whose depths a light lay hidden, with full red pouting lips, and a broad low brow half hidden by heavy masses of dark, untidy hair, which fell in picturesque confusion over it. ”

“ He had come to warn the white man of the destruction of his dwelling, but he did not count the half-caste girl of any value one way or another. The blacks would attack the hut at sundown when they saw the coast clear. The white man would be angry at the destruction of his hut, he had ridden after him to tell him, and also because safety lay with the white man; but the girl—if there had been a horse in the little paddock, he might possibly have brought her out of danger, but even as a blackfellow he looked with contempt on a half-caste; and as a woman—well, a woman was worth nothing as a woman. ”

“ So they forced the reluctant Jimmy to mount the packhorse, and distributed his load between them, taking only what was absolutely necessary.
When they were quite ready Stanesby looked at his watch.
"Ten o'clock," he said. "We must be there before daylight if we want to do any good;" and Turner could not but note that there was a more hopeful ring in his voice. Evidently he thought that perhaps all would be well after all.
They rode in silence, each man busy with his own thoughts. They had to ride judiciously too, for their horses were poor, and they had done forty miles already that day. ”

“ DICK STANESBY'S HUTKEEPER "Hallo! Dick. You here! Why, I thought you were away up tea-planting in Assam."
"And I thought you were comfortably settled down on the ancestral acres by this time."
"No such luck. The ancient cousin is still very much to the fore. Has taken to himself a new wife in fact, and a new lease of life along with her. She has presented her doting husband with a very fine heir; and, well, of course, after that little Willie was nowhere, and departed for pastures new."
"Make your fortune, eh! Made it?"
"Of course. Money-making game riding tracks on Jinfalla! Made yours?" ”

“ There have been found men who were Goths enough to object to Mrs. Stanesby's innocent, loving prattle about her eldest boy and her third girl, and the terrible time they had when her second little boy had the measles, and they were so terrified for the first twenty-four hours lest it should turn to scarlet fever; there have been men, I say, who have objected to this as "nursery twaddle," but their womenkind have invariably crushed them. They believe in Mrs. Stanesby and in Dick Stanesby too. ”

“ After all, it was not likely Stanesby would have left if there was the slightest danger; he had lived among these blacks, he understood them thoroughly; it was an insult to the man he had known all his life to suppose anything else; and yet the thought of the girl's loneliness haunted him. The moon set, and by the starlight they saw looming up ahead some rocks, isolated rocks, roughly piled together by some giant hand.
"We 'll camp there," said Stanesby, "there 's a little water down under the rocks—about enough to keep life in the horses; there 's some grass and a bush or two to make a fire. ”

“ And Jimmy led the way down towards the waterhole.
They followed him in silence.
The tall reeds looked green and fresh after the hot dry plain, but they also suggested another idea to Turner, and he tried to check his companion's headlong career.
"Look out! You don't know. They might be in those reed beds."
"All gone blackfellow," said Jimmy, and stolidly went ahead.
Then at last he brought them to what they sought. Dead, of course. Long before they started on that mad ride back her sufferings had been over. Dead! and Turner dared not look his companion in the face. ”

“ For she was only a half-caste, beautiful as a dream, or he who had not seen a woman for many a long day—he never counted the black gins women—thought so, but only a despised half-caste, outcast both from father's and mother's race. ”

“ A child that's very well able to take care of herself. I haven't been beating her, if that 's what you 're thinking. I suppose I may be allowed to go into the head-station occasionally without asking my hutkeeper's leave."
"Oh! that 's the trouble, is it? Depends upon your hutkeeper, I should say. I don't ask mine, but then——"
Turner paused, and Stanesby answered the unspoken thoughts with an oath.
"Oh, if you feel that way," began Turner, but his companion flung himself out of the hut angrily. ”

“ Stanesby checked his horses, and they rode on slowly as men who have a long journey before them. The sun climbed up and up to the zenith, but there was no shelter, no place for the noonday rest. Then away in the distance arose a line of trees raised up above the horizon, and Stanesby pointed it out to his companion.
"We can spell there a bit," he said. "It 's only that beastly prickly bush, for all it looks like a forest of red gum at the very least from here, but there 'll be a scrap of shade, and I 'm getting tired. ”

“ He was in no mind to take his old chum's pleasantry kindly, and the other saw it, and drew his own conclusions therefrom.
"Chucked him over, poor beggar, I suppose. Hang it all! Women are all alike; once a man's down, he 's forgotten," but he did not speak his thoughts aloud. He looked away across the sweltering plain, and said casually,
"Where do you hang out, old man?"
Stanesby pointed east in a vague sort of manner, that might indicate South Australia, or far distant New South Wales.
"Got a shanty on the creek there," he said laconically.
"Creek, is there a creek? ”

“ They 're only beasts, and as beasts you must treat 'em. Look here, there was a young fellow on our run, as nice a boy as you 'd wish to see—his people were something decent at home, I believe, but the lad had got into some scrape and cleared out, and drifted along into the heart of Western Australia here. He was riding tracks for old Anderson about two hundred miles to the west there. He didn't come in last week for his tucker, so they sent word for me to look him up."
"Well?" for Turner paused, and drew a long breath. ”

“ Turner thought of the poor girl alone in the hut miles behind them, and wondered if his companion too were thinking of her. After all, surely the very loneliness gave safety. At any rate, she was safe at night. If the blacks did not attack at dusk they would leave her alone for the night. ”

“ Just a little in the hole opposite the hut. The niggers say its permanent. Springs, or something of that sort."
"Niggers! That's what I 've come over about. They 've worried the life out of us on Jinfalla. Taken to spearing the cattle, and the men too if they get a chance. Old Anderson thinks we ought to have some 'concerted action,' and settle the matter once for all."
"H'm. Wipe 'em out, I suppose he means?"
"It 's what a squatter generally means, isn't it, when he talks about the blacks? Sounds brutal, but hang it all, man, what the devil is a fellow to do? ”

“ She knows very well how to take care of herself, I can tell you."
"But those myalls. On Jinfalla we—— Well, it really seems to me risky to leave her all alone. Even if there isn't any danger—the very fact of being alone——." ”

“ There was that other one, who loved him after her fashion too, but—pah, it was an insult to Gladys to name her in the same breath—she—she——The country was not habitable—a doghole unfit for a European; what was Turner making such a song over the niggers for?
"Old man," said Turner, he had been telling to unlistening ears the tale of how the blacks had speared, in wanton mischief, a mob of two hundred cattle on Jinfalla, not fifteen miles from the home station, "old man, you see it would be just ruination to let this go on. Either they or we must clear out. ”

“ That 's all very well, but you didn't find a mate too ghastly a corpse to look at, or you wouldn't take the matter so coolly. You 'd have done just as I did. Something must be done, old man, or the country won't be habitable. ”