Mary Gaunt

“ Ben Fisher passed and paused.
“Pretty, ain’t she?” said the old woman; “a dainty mossel for any man.”
“Ay,” said Fisher quietly, “ay,” and passed on, wondering to himself, as many another man has done before him—why this girl was so priceless in his eyes—and why, seeing that she was so, he might not have her rather than this reckless outlaw, who would make her the toy of his idle hours, and when she became a burden to him throw her aside, like a worn-out horse or a dog he had no further use for. ”

“ What he had been once no man knew, though evidently he was a man of some little culture and education; what he was now was patent to every man—escaped convict, bushranger, cattle-duffer—even a murder now and again, it was whispered, came not amiss to Gentleman Jim. It was an evil face, with the handsome dark eyes set too closely together, and when there is evil in a man’s face at forty, there is surely little hope for him; but bad as it was, to Nellie Durham it was the one face in the world. ”

“ Ben Harper was feverish in his desire for life now. He must live; he must see Susy once again, he must—he must! And eagerly he watched for the dawn.
So long the night, so long, so long. Is it a truth that our hours of gladness and our hours of pain are all of a length? Surely not. The night wore on, and it seemed to those waiting men that the longed-for morning would never come. But gradually the moon sank behind the dark mass of the land to leeward, and in the east came the first faint streaks of dawn. ”

“ My father was not a man whose whims could be lightly crossed, and she would not let me even try. Ashamed! oh, child! I was never so ashamed in my life! I hung my head all day and was afraid even to look the servant maid in the face. I felt she must despise a girl whose own father held her so lightly, And Paul, there ‘s where the hardest part of all came. How was I to tell my lover what my father had done? And how was I not to tell him, for I knew that Dick Stanton was not the man to keep such a wager to himself; he would bruit it abroad, if it were only for the sake of angering his rival. ”

“ It was a dreary, hopeless waking, the salt lake was behind them now, and all around was the plain, bare hard earth in some places, patches of grass in others, not a living thing visible, even the crows had gone, and, though the foul birds had filled Helm with a shrinking horror, their absence was still more terrible, for did it not show that they were plunging farther and farther into the desert, farther and farther from the water without which they could not live out another day. ”

“ Down the creek, men of every rank were gathered together from all quarters of the globe; the diggers’ camp was untidy, frowsy, and unkempt, but here on the hill the Commissioner reigned, and law and order ruled supreme.
There was a blaze of light from the Miners’ Arms—the tumbledown shanty, half of bark and half of canvas, where the diggers assembled every night—and a crowd of men were at the door lustily shouting the chorus of a sea-song. ”

“ What could he say, this man who had lived in the bush all his life? What hope could he give, when practically his experience told him there was no hope—that if they would save themselves from needless pain they would turn their pistols against themselves and die there and at once. But the love of life is strong in us all, and the hope of life is as strong. How could they die, these strong men with life in every vein? No, no, surely it was impossible. An iguana scuttled across in front of them and Helm started up eagerly. ”

“ And Nellie Durham was a pretty girl, a little simple perhaps, but still sweetly pretty, with those wistful blue eyes, fringed with dark lashes, that looked out at you so earnestly, and the wealth of fair hair. So dainty and so pretty—the coarse cotton gown was quite forgotten, and in those times, when women of any sort were scarce, many a man turned out of his way just to speak a word or two to Mother Durham’s granddaughter. ”

“ An hour or two, and the moon rose, a full moon, red and fiery, and as she rose slowly to the zenith, silvering as she rose, the plain grew light as day. Every little stick and stone, every little grass blade, was clearly outlined, the low ridge which they were leaving behind, the ridge where they had found their worst fears realized, loomed large behind them, while the salt-pan to their left stretched away one great lake of glittering white, which it seemed to Helm they could never round. ”

“ Then the sun went down, and the colour faded out of the sky as the stars, bright points of light, came out one by one. The new moon was a silver rim clear cut in the west, and not a sound broke the stillness. How lonely it was, how intensely lonely! 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. ”

“ He had lost nothing, nothing; he told himself so over and over again, as he drew his oilskins close round him, and yet there was a sense of loss in his life, a great and terrible loss. She would be nothing to him, the girl he loved so well, she would marry Clement Scott, she had as good as told him so—because—because he was the better man. The better man—the better man—the words formed themselves into a sort of rhythm that his steps kept time to—“the better man, the better man.” ”

“ It was very dark at first coming in out of the brilliant sunshine, but as Turner’s eyes grew accustomed to the light, he saw that the interior was just exactly what he should have expected it to be. The floor was hard earth, the walls were unlined, the meagre household goods were scattered about in a way that did not say much for his friend’s hutkeeper, a shelf with a few old books and papers on it, was the only sign of culture, and a rough curtain of sacking dividing the place in two, was the only thing that was not common to every hut in all that part of Western Australia. ”

“ Anderson had heard it told hundreds of times over the camp fire, one man will lie down to die quietly, and the other will go raving mad. So Helm had gone mad, poor chap; and then he remembered his passionate prayer to him, not to let him go mad, to shoot him if he saw he was going mad, and he lay and looked up at the hard blue sky through the leaves, and at the watching crows, and knew that he was only waiting for death, knew that he was too utterly weary to aid in any way his mate. ”

“ Helm sprang to his feet, and swore an oath.
“We’re not going to die,” he cried, “not as easily as all that. Come on, we have wasted enough precious time.
“Not till it’s a little cooler. It’s no good, I tell you, wearing ourselves out in the heat.”
And Helm, seeing the advice was good, lay down again. Lay down and tried not to listen to the cawing of the crows, the only sound that broke the stillness—tried not to think of cool waters; not to think of a household down south; not to think of the girl who, notwithstanding his mate’s cynical warning, filled all his thoughts. ”

“ There was another thing too, a fair-haired, blue-eyed girl, as different—as different as the North Pole from the Equator—each had loved her, to each she had been the embodiment of all earthly virtues, and each thought of her as well, too—the one man bitterly. Why should this man, this whilom friend of his, have everything? And the other man read his thoughts, and unreasoning anger grew up in his heart against his old chum. It has nothing whatever to do with Dick Stanesby’s hutkeeper, of course, nothing whatever ”

“ I have tried to do my best, but somehow my life has been a failure all round; I ‘m not much use to anybody. They say love doesn’t last, but I think they are wrong; I know it has lasted me all these years, and the thought of seeing him again—well, well, you will think an old woman foolish, dear, but it makes my heart beat like a young girl’s. ”

“ And when they arrived at what had been Dick Stanesby’s hut, an out-station of Nilpe Nilpe, there was nothing to mark it from the surrounding plain but a handful of ashes; even the hard earth showed no sign of trampling feet.
Stanesby flung himself off his horse like a madman.
“She may be all right. She must be all right. It may have been an accident. She is hidden down by the creek.”
Turner said nothing. What could he say? His thoughts flew back to the lonely hut, and the girl lying there on the hard ground in her dusky red dress, alone, cast off, a thing of use to no one. ”

“ 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. ”

“ My father—well you know pretty well what kind of a man your grandfather was, so it’s no use my trying to gloss over his character—and your grandmother, ah, my poor mother, I was always fond of my mother, but she had a hard life, and it made her fretful and not much of a companion for a young girl. She thought the world was a hard place for a woman to live in, and the sooner I found it out and indulged in no vain hopes the better for me. ”

“ Five-and-twenty years ago now, Angus Mackie and his wife had emigrated from the cold and stormy western isles of Scotland to this sunny South land, and they had brought with them to their new home the stern faith of the old Puritan, the rigid adherence to the old rules, the hard, straitlaced life, and so had they brought up the children that grew up around their hearth. And Susy was the eldest, Susy with the blue eyes and rose-leaf complexion, and waving chestnut hair. ”

“ One morning, a few days after Paul and I had settled matters so very much to our own satisfaction, the boy who brought up the milkers fell sick, and Ben, who took his place, failed to find them. It was a thing of not infrequent occurrence, and I turned out as usual to help him. As usual, too, those wretched cows had turned up the creek and lost themselves in the gullies among the ranges to the south. As the grass grew dry-on the plains they would wander along the sheltered creek, where in patches it was still fresh and green. ”

“ Gradually the ship paid off, slowly her nose came round, and Harper, looking at the foaming line of breakers, thought how perilously close they were. But—but—surely after all she would come through scot free, a moment more—only a moment more. The moon came from behind the heavy clouds paling the light ashore before her bright rays, and showing them just for a second the seething white water all around. So close was the danger, every man held his breath. ”

“ And the light broadened in the east, the rosy light grew deeper and deeper, then it paled to bright gold, and behind, and all around, the world looked dark against that glowing light. Up came the rim of the sun, and Stanesby, urging his tired horse forward, said, “We ought to see the hut now. The confounded sun ‘s in my eyes.”
Turner rubbed his own. But no, against the golden glowing rising sun the horizon was clean cut as ever, only the boundless plain, nothing more. ”

“ He could not help thinking of it, and contrasting it, that lovely summer’s afternoon, and this bitter winter’s night, with just ten days in between them. He looked at the fire on shore, now dying down, now blazing up brightly, replenished by willing hands, and between it and him came Susy Mackie’s fair face. So sweet and dainty and fair, all that a man might long for, and yet she would give no thought to him. ”

“ She was evidently terribly hurried, and hardly seemed to notice the men and cattle as she passed. In truth Nellie did not, for her grandmother had kept so careful an eye on her, she had been unable to leave the hut until she was asleep, and now it was so late, she dared not take the longer and safer way round by the windings of the creek, lest her lover should have already started on his perilous ride. Whether she thought the men would not notice her or whether she hardly cared if they did, Fisher never knew. ”

“ Nellie with an inarticulate cry freed herself and ran towards the hut, and Fisher flung himself face downwards on the crisp dry salt-bush. He had lost everything now he realised, she would not even accord him pity.
And Nellie up at the hut was trying to make her grandmother understand that all chance of the ghost trick being played again with success was out of the question. Not only would it be a failure, but the man who rode through the cattle rode at the risk of his life. But the old woman could not or would not see it. ”

“ Nellie stood in the doorway, but when she saw who it was, mindful of her lover’s fierce warning of the night before, she drew back into the hut, and the sadness on the man’s face deepened, for Nellie Durham, the cattle-duffer’s granddaughter, was the desire of his heart, and the light of his eyes, and Murwidgee Waterhole, when he had charge of the cattle, was on the main road to everywhere. ”

“ 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. There were plenty more to be got. He lay down on the ground, and lazily stretched himself out at full length. There was nothing more to be got out of him.
Stanesby kicked him, and went for his horse. ”