THE TRACKS 
 WE TREAD 
 
 G.B. LANCASTER
 
 ; 
 
 UL 
 
 A 
 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD
 
 The Tracks We Tread 
 
 BY 
 
 G. B. LANCASTER 
 
 Author of "Sons o' Men" and "The Spur" 
 
 New York 
 
 Doubleday, Page & Company 
 1907
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1907, BY 
 DOUBLEDAY. PAGE * COMPANY 
 PUBLISHED. SEPTEMBER 1907 
 
 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
 INCLUDING THAT OP TRANSLATION INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES 
 INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN
 
 GLOSSARY OF NEW ZEALAND 
 TERMS 
 
 Biddy-bid a burr. 
 
 Brumbies wild horses. 
 
 Keas meat-eating mountain parrot. 
 
 Koradi-stick blossom stalk of flax. 
 
 Kowhai timber tree 
 
 Lawyer trailing thorny vine. (" Wait-a-bit.") 
 
 Makutu a wizard's curse. 
 
 Manuka small scrubby tree. (Scrub.) 
 
 Matai black pine. 
 
 Matakuri a thorny bush. 
 
 Mic-a-mic scrub . 
 
 Moko-moko bell-bird. 
 
 Mopok native owl. 
 
 Musterer's hut shepherd's out-station. 
 
 Mutton-bird species of petrel. 
 
 Nigger-head swamp loose tussock growing on steins in 
 swamp. 
 
 Pakeha white man. 
 
 Papa soft blue slaty rock. 
 
 Raupo bull-rush. 
 
 Rimu Timber tree. (Red pine.) 
 
 Tawhina resinous shrub. 
 
 Tiki a charm carved by Maori in shape of a grotesque 
 man. 
 
 Tohunga Maori wizard. 
 
 Toi-toi native pampas grass. 
 
 Totara very large tree. 
 
 Tussock rough bunch-grass, characteristic of New Zea- 
 land. 
 
 Tutu poisonous plant. 
 
 Whanae slender flowering tree. 
 
 Whare hut. 
 
 Wild Irishman thorny bush. (Matakuri.) 
 
 1482010
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 ROUND the New Zealand coast-lines lie the 
 towns, where men talk with their kind from 
 over-seas, and put their fingers, eagerly and 
 very ignorantly, on the throb of the great 
 world's pulse. Up the New Zealand mid-line 
 sheer into her vivid young heart lie the 
 townships where draw together the men she 
 breeds and holds; men whom the Salvation 
 Army lassies pray for on the dusty street 
 corners, and who go away many times to end- 
 ings unchronicled ; men who love, who con? 
 quer and serve, on the downs, the harsh moun- 
 tains, the unhandled plains, until they make 
 touch with the Men of To-Morrow upon her 
 shores. 
 
 Here they too feel the world's pulse for a 
 week, a year. Then the flutter and the drum- 
 beat sicken them, and their feet ache for the 
 spring of the tussock again. So the saddle 
 takes them back, and the pick, and the call of 
 the sheep, and the tin-roofed townships, whith- 
 er all roads set as wheel-spokes set to the hub. 
 
 i
 
 2 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 The roads round Argyle in Otago South 
 slept, in their dust or their mud, six nights in 
 the week. On Saturdays the boys from the 
 run came in to distract Murray, who was police 
 officer for thirty square miles of district, and 
 to turn the five hotels inside out, putting them 
 together again in the dawn-fog. 
 
 "Scannell's lot" held the foremost reputa- 
 tion, from Binnie away north to the Shark's 
 Tooth, and beyond it. For Mains was a cat- 
 tle station primarily, and Scannell was merci- 
 less to shirkers. And so, without any excep- 
 tion, were Scannell's men. 
 
 It was on a wet Thursday in August that 
 Mackerrow broke his leg and was sent to the 
 hospital fifty miles away. It was on the Fri- 
 day that Scannell's teams creaked down the 
 steep road to the township, unloaded sheep and 
 rabbit skins at the siding through a blue-cold 
 icy day, and filled up Blake's bar-parlour af- 
 terwards. Tod was angry with Mackerrow, 
 and he said so. 
 
 "I'm runnin' couples wid Randal, now," he 
 said. "An' Randal is not me pick at all. You 
 remember what I tould ye last musterin'?" 
 
 Last mustering Tod and Randal had found 
 a man long dead on the highest, cruellest 
 peak on Mains Run. Tod had whistled his 
 dogs off the bones, scraped a hole on the sunny 
 side of a slope where the snow lay soft, and 
 shoveled the ugly things in. Then he called
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 3 
 
 upon Randal to say a prayer. But Randal 
 said no more than "Rot," and went downhill 
 with his dogs abroad on the shingle behind him. 
 Tod dropped on one knee, and uncovered. 
 
 "May ye sleep swater than ye smell," he 
 said. "An* may your luck be better to ye 
 than that ould boyo shankin' away beyant 
 there." 
 
 Then he crossed himself, and followed down- 
 ward through the loneliness. 
 
 Gordon grunted through the smoke-reek. 
 
 "I knew Randal long afore that," he said. 
 "He got all the bowels of an empty churn, and 
 all the heart of a seeded cabbage. I cud tell 
 you things of Randal " 
 
 Randal was without in the bar. Mogger 
 saw the square of his shoulders beyond the 
 door- jamb, and kicked Gordon's stool in deli- 
 cate warning. For Gordon was only a sluic- 
 ing hand and did not know the weight of Ran- 
 dal's fist. 
 
 "Go an' tell it top o j Lonely Hill, then, you 
 chunk. We knows what Randal is." 
 
 Ted Douglas knocked out his pipe with a 
 chuckle. He was a long, well-knit boy, and 
 head-man to Scannell of Mains. For where 
 power to rule is in men, age and length of 
 tenour break before it. Besides he was strong, 
 body and brain, and clean as the snow hills that 
 bred him.
 
 4 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Do you?" he said, dryly. "You're clever! 
 Do you know what Randal is? Do you know 
 what any on us is?" 
 
 "Don't tell it," prayed Danny, pushing Con- 
 Ion off the accordeon, and slipping his own 
 hands into the slings. "It's a five-day sar- 
 mon, reekin' wi' samples, and berginnin' wi' 
 Lou " 
 
 "Who went down to Jerusalem and fell 
 among thieves," clicked in Lou's light, refined 
 voice from the corner where he took down an 
 outsider at Nap. 
 
 "Bedad, ye needn't go seekin' to Jerushlum 
 for thim," cried Tod "wid th' shirt stole off 
 the back of me to putt on Moody when he goes 
 to see his girl. Why don't ye buy wan of 
 your own wid the pennies ye take out of the 
 Church-plate, Sundays?" 
 
 'Twas nothin' more'n a necktie, anyways," 
 said Moody, unabashed. "Not ernuff ter pin 
 me collar to, an' dirty at that. Does they on'y 
 hev ha'pennies at Chapel then?" 
 
 "Buttons," said the Blacksmith, and Danny 
 chanted softly: 
 
 " *We are all brothers in this land o' dreamin.' * 
 
 The Packer woke with a snort. 
 
 "I knows what Randal is," he said sudden- 
 ly. "He's them sort as wants a 'ole pack-'oss 
 to hisself, and won't balance up into a decent
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 5 
 
 load wi' ornary men. There's lots o' them 
 knockin' round. Lou's another." 
 
 Lou shot a swift glance across the room. No 
 man ever saw behind the blue of his eyes or the 
 smile of his well-cut mouth. 
 
 "Who's going to balance up with us instead 
 of Mackerrow, Ted?" he said. 
 
 " Jimmie Elaine," said Ted Douglas, shortly. 
 
 All the township knew that Ted Douglas 
 and Jimmie were mates. And all the town- 
 ship knew the meaning of Lossin's remark: 
 
 "Are yer takin' him on a chain an' a collar 
 fur next time yer goes after cattle?" 
 
 When the Packer was sober he attempted 
 to shoulder every quarrel in Argyle. 
 
 "Jimmie's bin after cattle on Behar. He 
 won't carry the collar-galls on his neck as long 
 as you're doin'." 
 
 Randal swung through the room as Lossin 
 sprang to his feet with an oath. 
 
 "Stop that," he said, and struck Lossin's 
 arm down. "If you want to hit your grand- 
 father, go and nose round the work-houses till 
 you find him." 
 
 "One degeneration's enough fur any man," 
 said Danny peaceably. "Where would he find 
 a grand-dad? I ain't got one meself ." 
 
 "I'll sell you a brace fur ten-pence," offered 
 Mogger, who wore rags the year through that 
 he might feed his relations. "And a granny, 
 too, ter make it up to a bob."
 
 6 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 ^ "Thank ye," said Danny; "but I'm thinkin' 
 o* startin' at the other end. Shove 'em on ter 
 Moody. He'll never get a wife havin' on'y had 
 ten gels a'ready." 
 
 "Revoke," said Lou, from his corner, and 
 the outsider stammered in helpless innocence. 
 
 Conlon winked at Gordon as he cast more 
 wood on the fire. Lou's methods were known 
 in the township. 
 
 Randal dropped on the form beside Derrett, 
 and spread his long hands to the blaze. They 
 had been a gentleman's hands before the nails 
 broke and the joints coarsened by work. And 
 Randal had been a gentleman before the life 
 he chose had made his soul even as his hands. 
 But the blackened hands and soul had pulled 
 Mains out of more than one tight pinch when 
 the snow was down on the sheep-country. 
 
 The air without rang with frost, and the 
 eternal thump of the dredges a half-mile down 
 the river sounded close to each man as the beat- 
 ing of his heart. The bar-parlour was hot, 
 and gay with the fire-blaze. It smelt of the 
 stables, and rank tobacco, and beer. A man 
 who came quick-foot down the street to swing 
 the side-door open, halted on the sill to gasp 
 and to shout: 
 
 "Who's in there behind that reek? Any 
 chaps who can ride? 
 
 Derrett felt the quiver of the man beside 
 him, and saw it flick to one and another
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 7 
 
 throughout the room. It was the muscles of 
 the saddle-bred tightening unconsciously, to 
 strike them out from loafer, and dredge-hand, 
 and ganger. 
 
 ' 'Bout half on us," said Douglas. "What's 
 the row, Murray?" 
 
 Murray's blue uniform and clean-cut face 
 showed under the door-lamp. He had left an 
 English University for love of adventure ; and, 
 from cap-peak to spurred heel, all the district 
 knew him for the honourable plucky gentleman 
 the Old World breeds, and sometimes sends us. 
 
 "Young Scannell's gone up the Changing 
 and into the hills. I'll want all of you I can 
 get to find him." 
 
 Randal sprang up with an oath as Conlon 
 cried : 
 
 "Drunk again, is he?" 
 
 "I believe you! Rouse up, you fellows. 
 Who's coming?" 
 
 Tod scratched his nose, answering for them 
 all, dubiously. 
 
 "Ah, then, man dear, wouldn't it be bet- 
 ther for the boys to let him go streelin' away 
 to the ind of the world and beyant it, sure?" 
 
 "Come out of that, you lazy beggar, before 
 I bring you by the scruff." 
 
 Then, as the warmth held the men still in 
 idleness, Murray's voice changed, and cut with 
 a sudden incisiveness. "Is it a pack of cowards 
 I'm calling on in here?"
 
 8 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "By Gad! come along out of this, boys, 
 and we'll show him! Up the Changing, is it? 
 And I'll give you a lead. Have you got a 
 horse that'll stand up on this country, Mur- 
 ray?" 
 
 It was Lou Birot's clear voice above the 
 grate of turning feet, and of forms that fell 
 all ways. Lou had carried his swag into Mains 
 last year no man knew whence nor why, and 
 he did not tell. But the nerve which every- 
 where commands respect from men was in Lou 
 a balanced finely-tempered sword, and "Scan- 
 nell's lot" reverenced it, forgiving his other 
 sins. 
 
 "Hold on!" cried Ted Douglas. "Who'll 
 take the drays home?" 
 
 "You and Moody. Head and tail. That's 
 easy. WTiere's Blake? Can he let us have 
 horses? Get out there, Roddy " 
 
 "Bluff!" cried Scott. "It's the 'coward' 
 nicked you, Lou. But you ain't playing my 
 hand. I pass." 
 
 "One funk among Scannell's men," said 
 Randal, diving into his oilskins. 
 
 "Funk be hanged ! If young Art hadn't got 
 a sister you wouldn't 
 
 Douglas tripped Scott headlong as Ran- 
 dal's left shot out, and three more punted him 
 into the passage and slammed the door. Then, 
 as the tide of feet set to the stable, Steve said 
 with a gasp :
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 9 
 
 "Fust time ever I see Randal fleshed. Is 
 there truth in that yarn, after all?" 
 
 The boys charged out, sweeping Blake and 
 a lantern with them. A half-dozen seized such 
 horses and gear as he owned; more raided 
 Phelan's stables and Conroy's at the corner. 
 Jingle of steel, hoof clatter, and the volleys 
 of chaff brought the township to stare and ask 
 questions. A white face showed in a stray 
 lantern-flash. Douglas gripped the shoulder 
 below it, and said: 
 
 "Not you, Jimmie. You don't know the 
 country." 
 
 "They brought me, Ted. They said I was 
 one o' you now " 
 
 "You go back in the drays with Moody 
 take that scared look off before you show up 
 at Mains." 
 
 Douglas cast on his gear, and wheeled out, 
 two lines quick and deep on his forehead. For 
 that instinct beyond reason which joins or di- 
 vides men apart from their understanding had 
 knitted him to a mate weak in body and spirit, 
 and he knew the unbending code of ScannelTs 
 men. 
 
 Lou came over the fence, his feet seeking the 
 stirrups. He had borrowed a half-broken colt 
 from Jackson, and Jackson hobbled after, bab- 
 bling uncared-for warnings. 
 
 He flung the roll-call along as he raced up 
 where the street clanged like rock to the hoofs :
 
 10 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 and the answers came, crisp and gay, and 
 eager, for the tingling of frost and of fight 
 held the boys. 
 
 Murray's eyes were bright in the dark as he 
 rounded his troop. 
 
 "Fifteen! And all sorts of cattle and gear! 
 Good on you, boys! Take the running, Lou. 
 You've got a genius for this kind of thing." 
 
 Steve loosed a great oath on the night. 
 
 "There ain't no heel-taps when Lou's shout- 
 in* drinks. What's Art Scannell to pay over 
 this, Murray?" 
 
 Murray's brown face was suddenly hard as 
 his voice. 
 
 "The last inch I can grind out of him. He 
 gives more trouble than any man in the dis- 
 trict." 
 
 Randal caught Lou's stirrup. He said un- 
 derbreath : 
 
 "If you find him he's not Murray's meat." 
 
 Lou's laugh was blue flame in his eyes. Here 
 was a game to his hand; for Randal was a 
 rider also. 
 
 "If I find him, he is. Wake up there, boys. 
 Wheel out." 
 
 He settled home in the leather with the light 
 poise of one born to it, and slung the half- 
 mad colt forward, firm-handed and easy. 
 
 The sharp air bit faces and hands, sending 
 the blood in a gallop to the heart, and sway- 
 ing fear and reluctance aside. For each type
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 11 
 
 takes its pleasure in kind; and each man, the 
 world through, would at one time or other 
 uphold his private courage through payment 
 forced thereby from another. 
 
 "We has my sympathy," said Danny, plung- 
 ing into the dark. "All on us 'cept that blazin' 
 comic in the lead. Give Lou a little bit o* 
 Hell-fire ter play with, an' he'd feed himself 
 into the flame fer the fun of it." 
 
 "Get out," said Steve. "Father Denis calls 
 him the flower of the flock. I won't deny as 
 he's a pretty rank bloomer when he's set in a 
 soil that suits him Mogger, if that ole brok- 
 en-winder o' yours expects ter fin' oats in my 
 pocket " 
 
 "He was lookin' for suthin' green fur a 
 relish," explained Mogger. But he was not 
 there when Steve's fist shot out. 
 
 Derrett's shop rose at the corner, and Lou 
 swung to the left, up a side-street where the 
 young moon hung ahead. The creak of 
 leather and the anger of chilled horses under 
 the bit brought a bellow from a low cottage- 
 door. 
 
 "Hallo, bhoys! Liftin' cattle tu-noight?" 
 
 Murray turned in the saddle to answer, and 
 Lou cried : 
 
 "Father Denis say a mass for his soul if 
 we find him." 
 
 The hoofs passed, and the priest stood still, 
 his fat chin shut into his hand. He knew men ;
 
 12 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 by the hang of their coats, and the way they 
 have their hair cut, and by the things that 
 they do not do; and his religion was broad 
 as his brogue. 
 
 "The soul that sinneth," he said. "An* Lou 
 Birot afther it wid that voice tu him. Bedad ! 
 the divil will have a foine whipper-in when 
 Lou comes tu his own. Ah, me bhoys; we're 
 growin' intu men, bhut there's plenty of the 
 brute in us yit." 
 
 He went back to the still little room that 
 knew half the sin and the joy of the town- 
 ship; and far off, through the vivid clear 
 night, Lou led the chase for the soul that had 
 sinned. 
 
 Trees and clumped houses showed up and 
 passed; planking came under-foot with a 
 shiver; down stream and up blinked the red- 
 eyed dredges, and from the right came the 
 squeal of hydraulics. Beyond, tall cliffs slewed 
 the track at an angle, and Murray cried: 
 
 "You can get us up the Changing, Lou? 
 We'll lose hours if we follow the road." 
 
 Lou chuckled. For the animal instinct of 
 following a lead is stronger when other forces 
 are numb. 
 
 "Yes; and at top if you're game." 
 
 "Hear that!" cried Mogger. "At top up 
 the Changin' hear that " 
 
 "Stow it," said Danny savagely. "Think 
 we're all deaf if we ain't got ears the size o*
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 13 
 
 yourn? We got ter wipe that suckermantal 
 hint o' Murray's out on him, an' you can bet 
 all your fambly we're goin' ter do it." 
 
 Lou's colt was raw and too eager. But he 
 had been bred on the high country beyond 
 Changing Creek where Art Scannell's black 
 mare ran last year. 
 
 "And it's there she'll go back," said Murray. 
 "With young Art atop of her while there's 
 life in him. Drunk or sane, you can't shake 
 him off anything with hide on." 
 
 The air stank of mud and wet flax; the 
 grate of shingle came under the hoof, and 
 Tod's gelding slipped on smooth ice where 
 the star-reflection was faint. 
 
 Lou dropped his cheek to the mane, his blue 
 eyes sifting the night for the dark smudge that 
 would be the Glory's dam-line. They missed 
 contact by the width of a hand, and Carr said, 
 unmoved : 
 
 "Ten fut o* water the Glory has behind them 
 sand-bags, now. Good fur us Lou picked 'em 
 up." 
 
 Tussock made evil foot-hold again; then a 
 nigger-head swamp, sharp with ice, and foul 
 with water that splashed to the eye-brows. All 
 around rose black swan, wide-winged and cry- 
 ing to the night like spirits turned back from 
 the world beyond. The horses took their own 
 way, headlong; and with loose rein, Tod was 
 crossing himself. For ghost-lights played
 
 14 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 games in the water that was too sinfully black 
 to reflect God's own light. 
 
 On the hill-top they rose the Lion lamps, 
 and caught the air from mountains that the 
 breath of no living thing warmed. Lou came 
 of the breed that loves the asphalt-track on the 
 edge of the great world's grass-plot, and he 
 handled his men with cunning and delight. 
 Round the curved knolls over the Lion where 
 the nozzle-flash climbed to the stars ; slow- foot 
 through the running shingle beyond, and into 
 the place where the silence of all the world 
 lived. Here he turned in the saddle. 
 
 "You said Ormond saw him on the track?" 
 "Yes," said Murray; "he was going . " 
 The boys' deep-chested growl drowned the 
 words. The old crumbling track, beaten out 
 a lifetime ago by the feet of men seeking gold, 
 held the sky-line ten miles off as the bullet flies, 
 and well Scannell's men knew the land in be- 
 tween. For they drew cattle from it in the 
 season, and horses ; taking the underway care- 
 fully, with daylight to guide. 
 
 "Then we'll make a bee-line," said Lou. "It's 
 going to be rough." 
 
 Lou lied when it so pleased him, but he spoke 
 less than the truth this night. With hands 
 low and light on the rein, they charged down 
 the slope that was made of frozen creeklets 
 and stones, and rounded off by a brawling little 
 stream with soft bottom, Each man's breath
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 15 
 
 made a winding-sheet round him, and the sting 
 of frost was live in the air. The track rose 
 by twists and grades, with a great purple sky 
 widening as the earth dropped away. Flax- 
 leaves slashed their faces, blinding the paths 
 that the horses took with strong shoulder- 
 heaves and chest-breathing. The flung-out 
 breast of a hill above jagged the star-clusters. 
 They swung round the curve of it where late 
 snow lay yet in the hollows, and took clear 
 country again, with sparse tussock and slag. A 
 wire fence, like a dewed spider-web, cut the 
 black scarp beyond, and Murray cheered as a 
 schoolboy when it sung behind to the touch of 
 one hoof only. 
 
 Hands were numb on the rein; the breath 
 of the eternal snows was too near and too pure ; 
 the iron chill of the stirrup made the feet tingle 
 and throb. The smell of bush blew across them ; 
 caught and ripped them with a thousand damp 
 hands. It was blind and savage, and sensu- 
 ous with its rich heavy odours; and the ferny 
 rottenness was dank under-foot. 
 
 "How much more o' this is there?" growled 
 Carr, when the way tilted up a bare hill with 
 a sprinkling of snow on the flint. And Tod 
 answered : 
 
 "Divil knows an' Lou, if they're two. But, 
 be all things, I misdoubt it this night." 
 
 Talk dulled in the men; but the horses had 
 the great glad hearts that tire not, and
 
 16 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 colt strained the rein still. Then, as buckets 
 climb the dredge-ladder, they came one by one 
 to the broken hill-track and paused. Randal 
 dropped from the saddle, and slacked the 
 mare's girths. Murray's face was alight as 
 he followed. 
 
 "By Jingo, Lou," he cried, "you've given 
 me something to remember. And I've got my 
 own horse I How the devil do you fellows do 
 it!" 
 
 But Lou did not hear. He was watching 
 Randal, and his eyes were shining. Randal's 
 neck was bloody where branches had torn it, 
 and there was mud on his collar. His long 
 hands fumbled stiffly with the buckles, and his 
 pipe was dead between his teeth. But in the 
 clear starlight his lean body moved untired, 
 and his strong face showed hard and more reso- 
 lute. 
 
 "You're a man," said Lou, underbreath. 
 "But if it's you and I for him, Randal, I'll 
 make you sit up." 
 
 The men talked amid the clink of harness, 
 and Moody swore as he tried to strike a match. 
 But Murray stood aside with every nerve ting- 
 ling, and a sudden marvelling at these sons of 
 the hills who knew not exhaustion nor fear. 
 
 All God's world is wise and terrible by night. 
 But the hills, that through the centuries bare 
 their breasts to the secrets that the stars tell 
 them, receive an awful majesty which the
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 17 
 
 plains and the downs never know. For neither 
 beast nor bird break the eternal stillness, nor 
 mark the eternal snow. Flint and red granite, 
 the little grey cotton-plant and the swaying 
 snow-grass held the wastes for their own, and 
 at Murray's elbow one long-dead black pine 
 creaked in the frost-grip. The white spurs 
 were naked in the moonlight; but the gullies 
 were dark as waiting graves. Danny chuckled 
 as he climbed to the saddle again. 
 
 "The squad will now perceed ter investiga- 
 tin' on its own bloomin' 'ook," he said. "I hope 
 it ain't me ter find him, that's all. Young 
 Art's apt ter be lively." 
 
 Lou dropped away on Randal's quarter. 
 For him it was to stalk the stalker; and for 
 two fierce hours he played a waiting game, by 
 gully-top and shingle-slope and green spring- 
 heads that the frost had made into skating- 
 rinks. And ever, through the stern white si- 
 lences, he kept touch of the black shadow that 
 sought and called and sought for hoof -prints 
 again on the frozen snow. By a warm spring 
 in the toi-toi Randal found the hoof-prints. 
 They headed straight for the Big Bush be- 
 yond. His teeth shut with a snap, and the 
 mare sprang as the heels slapped her sides. 
 Rotten slag slid away from the hoof ; crisp tus- 
 sock and crackling white spray. The mare's 
 feet made fierce red writing on the flint, and 
 the underway was suddenly slippery with the
 
 18 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 little round leaves of loose birch-bush. Great 
 boles and tree-tops closed the earth into shad- 
 ows, and a sound woke that sent the blood to 
 Randal's throat. For it was the snickering 
 gasp of a winded horse, and a laugh that might 
 be a child's. 
 
 Randal sat down to ride ; with cunning that 
 swung him unhurt between the trees and the 
 snatching vines; with speed because ahead the 
 bush was cleft by a gully that would audit Art 
 Scannell's accounts for Eternity; and with a 
 brain that said: 
 
 "You brute! Oh, you brute! Why don't you 
 let him go! You've no right to hold her by 
 that or by anything else." 
 
 Scrub crashed at his shoulder, and Lou's 
 light figure rode as his shadow beside him. 
 Randal was blind for an instant. Then he 
 said: 
 
 "I want him myself." 
 
 "Of course," said Lou, gaily; "so do I." 
 
 Then the laugh ahead filled the night, and 
 words broke before it. 
 
 Tripping scrub and vines barred the way; 
 lawyer ripped flesh from faces and necks; 
 creeping lichens were moist on the branches 
 that hit them, and the thick wild smell of bush 
 clogged their breathing. The lust of capture 
 was heavy on horses and men, and Randal's 
 sweating hands slipped on the reins as he lifted 
 his mare forward by the spurs. The bush
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 19 
 
 thinned, showing the thing that they sought; 
 and beyond lay the gully. Randal caught the 
 frozen flash of a waterfall across it as Lou 
 said: 
 
 "Leave him. That will settle all things for 
 ever." 
 
 Three paces, and the black mare slung round 
 to the grip on her bit. Art Scannell's laugh 
 shut off with a shriek. 
 
 "Randal!" he cried, and his whip cut across 
 the face opposite. 
 
 Randal jerked the silver-set thing down to 
 the creek far below. 
 
 "You'll follow if you play up with me, Art," 
 he said. 
 
 Lou laughed. 
 
 "Go it, Art," he cried, and slapped the boy's 
 knee. 
 
 Art stooped with a snarl, meeting his teeth 
 in the thick of the hand; and Lou came out 
 of the saddle with the brute that lives in every 
 man quick on his face. 
 
 "Lou don't The girlish treble voice 
 was over-dear to Randal. He made peace by 
 such wit as he had, and Lou looked at him, 
 grinning. 
 
 "I think you've done more harm than you 
 know, to-night, Randal," he said. "Take the 
 young beggar where you like. I don't want 
 to be bothered with him." 
 
 No mood held Lou for long, and he was
 
 20 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 whistling cheerily when the keas on Lonely 
 Hill heard Art Scannell crying down the ways, 
 and answered with a long glad challenge. Lou 
 looked through the gloom at the red of Ran- 
 dal's pipe. 
 
 "Taking him down to the hut, then?" he 
 said. 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "Murray will come after him." 
 
 "Let him!" 
 
 "And the boys will say " 
 
 "What?" 
 
 The word hit like a bullet, and Lou laughed, 
 low and soft. 
 
 "More than Art ScannelTs sister would like 
 to hear," he muttered. 
 
 A musterer's hut squatted at foot of a sid- 
 ing. Randal led the horses down, hooked the 
 reins to a ring, and said sharply: 
 
 "Come off there, Art." 
 
 The boy's hands were helpless with cold, and 
 his tears were ice on the mane. But Lou lent 
 his lithe strength to Randal's before the door 
 shut on the three and Randal struck a match 
 to the slush-lamp. Then Art fell on the bunk 
 exhausted; and Lou grinned, dabbing a cut 
 on his lip. 
 
 "What are you going to do with him?" he 
 asked. 
 
 "Keep him here till he's through with it. You 
 can go down and tell Murray to-morrow. And
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 21 
 
 tell him he needn't come up. He won't get 
 Art." 
 
 Randal kicked some sticks together in the 
 open chimney, and set them ablaze. Then he 
 sat on the chopping-block, his chin in the heel 
 of his hands, and his strong muscles loosed. He 
 had given months of loneliness to this hut in 
 the last sheep-season, and his cast blankets 
 were in the bunk yet. Lou asked no ques- 
 tions. It was not needful. He yawned. Then 
 he grinned again. 
 
 "Oh, you fool," he said softly, and glanced 
 at the bunk. 
 
 Art Scannell lay across the grey blankets 
 with his smooth pretty face thrown back. The 
 small black head and short upper lip were too 
 like a girl's too like the girl for whom Ran- 
 dal would have paid away his soul, and who 
 was far above his reach, as men count things 
 in this world. The flames bobbed and flut- 
 tered in the chimney; outside the horses dozed 
 under warmth of the bag-covers, and a mopoke 
 called, once and again. 
 
 Art Scannell shot up in his bunk, and his 
 eyes were suddenly awful. 
 
 "Hear that chap crying," he said. "See him? 
 There . . . through the hole in the thatch!" 
 
 Lou leapt for him with his eternal light 
 laugh. 
 
 "Now we're in for it, Randal," he said, and 
 brought the boy down by the leg.
 
 22 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 When a man treads a track of his own free- 
 will he has no pity for those bruising their 
 feet alongside. Too many times had Lou 
 been down the path Art led them to find shame 
 therein. But, because of a girl, the boy's feet 
 trod through Randal's heart. 
 
 A scarlet morning was on the hill-tops, and 
 the dark of the gullies gave before it when 
 Randal cast wide the door, clearing his half- 
 blinded eyes with his shirt-sleeve. Behind him 
 Lou, unbroken still, sang in his careless tenor: 
 
 "Beloved! It is morn. 
 
 A redder berry on the thorn, a brighter yellow on the 
 
 corn, 
 For this good day, new-born . . ." 
 
 "Don't," said Randal with his heart in his 
 throat, and both men looked to the bunk where 
 Art Scannell lay bound with three towels and 
 a belt. 
 
 Lou lifted his eyebrows. Then he said light- 
 
 iy= 
 
 "It's a noble thing to save a man's life, isn't 
 it, Randal?"
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE long wooden eating-whare smelt of 
 onions and meat, and rang with the talk of 
 Scannell's men at breakfast. Red, frosty sun- 
 light struck the clattering tinware to mix there 
 with the red of the fire; and the slow peace of 
 Sunday lay over the men. Lou blocked the 
 door for an instant, causing Beckett and 
 Scott to shout wrath from their card-game 
 among the dirty plates. Then he swung his 
 legs over a form, and pushed out a place be- 
 tween Mogger and Buck. 
 
 "Send along the tea-pot," he said; "and that 
 pannikin. Where's the milk?" 
 
 Beyond Steve, Danny's freckled face bobbed 
 out of line. 
 
 "Mornin," he said politely. "Ter-morrer 
 mornin'. Did yer know it? We put in a de- 
 tail of a day's work while yer was etherealisin' 
 up in the hills." 
 
 "Never gettin' yer Sat'day night's spring- 
 cleanin', neither," shouted Beckett, whilst 
 Scott promptly revoked. 
 
 Tod spread himself on the battle of dispute 
 delightedly, and Buck said:
 
 24 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Slep' in yer boots, Lou, didn't yer?" 
 
 The last forty hours had been sufficiently 
 heavy to break another man. But Lou 
 grinned, dredging brown sugar into his panni- 
 kin. 
 
 "Who roped in Art Scannell?" he said. 
 
 "Give us another. The boss said you did it. 
 We runned till we was sick of it. Then we 
 corned back down the old track." 
 
 "That's a lie," said Danny, cheerfully. "We 
 was sick of it 'fore we started. Who was the 
 id jit as found him? You or Randal?" 
 
 "It was a close thing. But Randal claimed 
 the stakes which were Art." 
 
 "He'd sooner be claimin' the Miss-takes," 
 giggled the cook, tossing tin plates into the 
 sink, and Tod returned, wild-haired, to the 
 table. 
 
 "Well, now, but that's a pity," he said. "I'd 
 putt by two masses for the dirty sowl of him, 
 which I was takin* the money down to Father 
 Denis to-day." 
 
 "Hand it in fur Jimmie's soul," suggested 
 Danny. "He cud do wi' suthin' ter kip it from 
 drippin* out o' his boot-heels every time he runs 
 away." 
 
 Jimmie's life at Mains was a day old. But 
 half the boys on the station had made his nose 
 bleed at the district school in years past un- 
 less Ted Douglas were by. Now Douglas put 
 a leg over the narrow table, and followed it.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 25 
 
 "Are you goin' to take that back?" he asked. 
 
 Danny's freckled nose reefed in a grin. 
 
 "Deciduously, yer great lumberin' hipper- 
 otermus. Let it go fur Jimmie's boots, then. 
 Double 'eels, fur perfrontin' a leak." 
 
 Jimmie flung a scone to secure attention, 
 and his boy-face was unflushed. 
 
 "Don't spile him to-day, Ted," he said. 
 "He's goin' down ter see his girl, an' it tuk him 
 a half-hour oilin' his bang. Jes' take him ter 
 pieces pretty, an' put him tergether agin wi' 
 that face o' his turned inside ef yer can manage 
 it." 
 
 Lou blinked through the haze of breath and 
 steam. 
 
 "Mains has got a nut in you, Jimmie who- 
 ever-you-are," he murmured. 
 
 Then he went across the yard to his bunk 
 and slept until the noise of a boxing-skirmish, 
 conducted under strictly scientific rules, drew 
 him out to the gay sunshine of the sloping pad- 
 dock that ended in a rush-bound creek. 
 
 Danny was referee and umpire and general 
 promoter, and half the township were there by 
 special invitation. Scannell of Mains allowed 
 all things in reason; and once, when the vicar 
 objected, he said: 
 
 "What would you have the men do? Ride 
 through to the next township and demand 
 drinks as travellers? Too many do that sort 
 of thing already."
 
 26 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Scott sifted through the mob, laying bets. 
 It is quite certain that he would have done the 
 same in church, had the vicar ever haled him 
 there. Lou stopped him. 
 
 "Who's that girly-looking kid clapping Gor- 
 don?" he asked. 
 
 "One of Gordon's shift on the Lion Hy- 
 draulic Roddy Duncan. He's a chum of Art 
 Scannell's." 
 
 "Art Scannell!" breathed Lou. Then he 
 broke Roddy's treble laugh with a question. 
 You know Mr. Art Scannell, eh?" 
 
 "He's a pal of mine," said the boy, turn- 
 ing in a pride that he could not make care- 
 less. 
 
 "I congratulate you. Does he ever speak to 
 you of his sister?" 
 
 "Miss Effie? Often. An' I see her myself. 
 She comes up to the claim " 
 
 "Do you know anything of Randal?" 
 
 "I seen him a few times at Phelan's," said 
 Roddy. 
 
 "Ah! with Art Scannell, of course." Phelan's 
 was the lowest hotel in the township. "Well, I 
 hope you'll drop into Blake's some evenings 
 when Art doesn't want you. I'll be very glad 
 to see you, you know." 
 
 Lou strolled off from Roddy's flushed 
 thanks. The dead-level of indifference had no 
 favour for him, and Randal would make a 
 good enemy. Mogger asked what he was grin-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 27 
 
 ning for, and Lou answered, jerking his head 
 toward the distant black spur : 
 
 "Ted Douglas has just taken Jimmie up 
 there to vow to love, cherish and protect him, 
 I suppose. It's a great thing to have a mate 
 for the mate." 
 
 Here Lou spoke raw truth. Because seven 
 kinds of love out of eight are one-sided, and the 
 world knows that the eighth is the same. 
 
 Beyond the black spur Douglas lay on the 
 dead bracken, and smoked in a silence that 
 hurt him. Jimmie drew his thin little knees 
 under the clasp of his hands, and stared down 
 the tussock gully where sheep fed on the snow- 
 loosened slopes. Presently he said : 
 
 "Don't see as it's a thing to get in a sweat 
 about, anyways." 
 
 "Don't you?" Ted Douglas sat up, and his 
 strong unlined face was tender. "Ah, but you 
 knows that you does! You can't come that 
 over me, Jimmie. I'm 'feared this is too tough 
 a place for you, lad. Cattle-work puts grit into 
 a man ; but it puts the devil into him too. Our 
 chaps have got it proper. They won't stand 
 any sort o' funkin', an' you " 
 
 "I got a tongue ter skin 'em with. That's 
 more'n you hev." 
 
 Douglas felt his great muscles where the 
 sleeves fell away from the forearm. 
 
 "I wonder what it feels like to feel afraid," 
 he said slowly.
 
 28 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Hell," said Jimmie, laconically. 
 
 Douglas punched holes in the turf, and his 
 lips tightened. He said: 
 
 "I tolt you not to come to Mains. We got 
 to go back after cattle next week. I was up 
 with the boss this mornin'. He guv me the 
 
 names." 
 
 "An ?" 
 
 "An' you're one to go, Jimmie." 
 
 Then Jimmie pivotted swiftly, speaking 
 words that Ted Douglas would never have for- 
 given in another man. But he loved Jimmie. 
 
 "I couldn't stop it," he said, gravely. "If 
 you're scared, you must hook it. You'll have 
 to do your whack of graft here, Jimmie." 
 
 "I don't mind the ridin*. But if the brutes 
 come chargin' .Ted oh, Ted " 
 
 Douglas put his arm round the thin shoul- 
 ders, and his grave young eyes were dark with 
 pity. 
 
 "There's a bit o' a mutton-bird's egg as 
 won't harden though you boil 'em for a year," 
 he said. "You've had some firm' is there 
 nothin' won't bile the funk out of you, Jim- 
 mie?" 
 
 But Jimmie looked across the low hills to 
 the smoke-wreaths of the unseen township, and 
 he gave no answer. 
 
 The township ran two cemeteries; but the 
 one on the manuka-hill overlooking the river
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 29 
 
 knew best who "kept company" and who were 
 only "walking out" in Argyle. For the young 
 have no fear in making love among the dead. 
 And these had been dead so very long that the 
 ever-lasting pea and the clematis and the fox- 
 glove had taken railings and headstones for 
 their own, and wedded with the gorse and briar 
 to give birth to new life. 
 
 "But that makes no odds," said Steve. 
 "Bein' miners, it's ten ter one these ain't their 
 right names at all. There was lots ran under 
 false colours in the early days an' some do it 
 now." 
 
 He knelt on a wooden slab, scratching the 
 green moss from it with his finger-nail, and his 
 Sunday coat was tight on his shoulders. The 
 girl who had ordered this spoke with a catch 
 in her throat: 
 
 "Don't! Oh, don't say that! Poor things! 
 Here's 'Of your mercy pray for the soul' 
 suppose it was the wrong soul, after 
 all?" 
 
 Steve sat back on his heels, and looked up. 
 No other man on Mains had his reach of arm 
 or his power in a fight. But his heart was as 
 big as his body, and as tender as that was 
 tough. 
 
 "There ain't any souls as *ud be the worse 
 for a prayer from you, Maiden," he said. 
 
 Maiden was slim and sweet and supple as 
 a manuka-slip. Her hat was pushed back to a
 
 30 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 halo on the fine soft hair, and the half -smile 
 on her mouth was wistful. 
 
 "If yer was thinkin' o' my soul, 
 Maiden " ventured Steve. 
 
 "I wasn't. I was thinkin' of Lou Birot's." 
 
 "Lou Birot!" Steve came to his feet, and 
 his voice grated. "Lou! Why?" 
 
 "Why not?" said Maiden. 
 
 "I won't deny as he'd be the better for some 
 prayin' over," said Steve, dryly. "But I'd 
 ruther 'tweren't you did it." 
 
 "I don't know as I asked you what you'd 
 rather," said Maiden, with dignity. "Lou 
 wanted me to go walkin' with him to-day; but 
 I'd promised you. I mean to go with him 
 next " 
 
 "Yer won't," said Steve, hi sudden fierce- 
 ness. "Not with Lou ever. Maiden, yer 
 don't know him. He's a bad lot. A rotten 
 bad " 
 
 "He's got prettier ways'n you have " 
 
 "Yes," said Steve with a grin. "The boys'll 
 tell yer that. Sweet pretty ways he's got. But 
 they're not ways fur a gel like you, Maiden." 
 
 "You're cowards, the lot of you," cried 
 Maiden, gripping a half-fallen grave-stone in 
 both little hands. "You're allers passing back- 
 talk about Lou. You're all jealous of him 
 'cause he's good-lookin' an' clever what's he 
 done, then, that you're so much better than he 
 is?"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 31 
 
 No man could cow Steve. But he stam- 
 mered before the child-eyed thing in the print 
 frock. 
 
 "I I couldn't tell it yer, my girlie. There's 
 lots o' ways a chap has. . . . Looky here, 
 Maiden: if yer'll lump him inter yer prayers 
 wi' Art Scannell an' Jimmie Elaine, I don't 
 mind." 
 
 "And with you?" 
 
 Steve looked over the peaceful graves to 
 the flood of sunlight down the peaceful gully, 
 and the half -crescent of the township at end 
 of it. 
 
 "If yer like so long as you remembers me 
 anyways, my girlie," he said. 
 
 Fifteen miles off Randal was not exactly 
 praying over Art Scannell. He stood in the 
 hut door-way with Murray, and Murray 
 frowned with bitten lips. 
 
 "He's weak as a baby," said Randal. "He 
 needs home and bed, and feeding up. What 
 are you going to do about it? Well?" 
 
 "Bring up a trap from the township and 
 drive him home, I suppose. You can ride 
 that black devil of his. But if ever I wanted 
 to put the handcuffs on a man and he'll do 
 more harm yet. It shakes a fellow's belief 
 look out. He's waking." 
 
 But it was two days before Murray brought 
 Art Scannell home. Randal rode in at the
 
 32 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 sunset; rubbed down the mare, fed her, and 
 walked up the track to the house. Tod was 
 sluicing his head in a bucket; but he brought 
 it out with a chuckle as Randal passed by the 
 whare. 
 
 "Bedad, thin, me foine boyo," he murmured, 
 "there's apt to be the big throuble for ye di- 
 rectly." 
 
 "Where?" demanded Moody, opening an 
 eye. He was lying on his stomach, waiting 
 for the tea-bell. 
 
 "Och; it's jist hersilf comin' wid wan 
 Randal wud sooner be afther meeting wid a 
 chopper than wid her, if Scott shpoke the 
 truth." 
 
 "Scott can't speak truth," said Moody, blink- 
 ing up the track. "Miss Effie and Kiliat! 
 That skunk's allers here." 
 
 "Ye've said it. And Randal is apt to know 
 of it, too." 
 
 The path was narrow, with wet grass on each 
 side. Randal made way, touching his cap. 
 And the girl nodded carelessly, listening to 
 Kiliat. Randal tramped on up the track, and 
 Moody turned with a grunt. 
 
 "Told yer Scott lied. They never put eyes 
 on each other." 
 
 "Ye're the wise man, entoirely," said Tod, 
 and his voice nettled Moody. 
 
 "More'n you are then! Go and drip on 
 somebody else fur a spell, can't ye? Here's
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 33 
 
 Cookie. He ain't had a wash this week. Or 
 Kiliat cud do wi' some drownin'." 
 
 Kiliat was manager of the Lion Hydraulic 
 Sluicing Company, with Ormond to do the 
 work. He was known through the land as a 
 fool, and the Packer, who owned his own pri- 
 vate one-horse claim next door, wept when he 
 told of Ormond's patient mending of pipes 
 and patching up of trestles. 
 
 "That Comp'ny's suckin' the Lion dry," he 
 said. "With Kiliat to show 'em the 
 way. An' cuttin' down wages too, ain't they, 
 Gordon?" 
 
 "You mind yer bloomin' business," said 
 Gordon, suddenly hostile. 
 
 The Packer scratched his throat with a dirty 
 finger-nail. 
 
 "Never 'ave I called a man my master," he 
 said, in the pride of the free. 
 
 Randal crossed the flagged verandah, and 
 knocked on the door of the man he called mas- 
 ter. 
 
 "Jack told me at the stable that you wanted 
 to see me," he said. 
 
 Scannell pushed his chair back from the 
 desk, and looked at Randal straightly. Few 
 could tell when the knife was in his flesh, for 
 he did not flinch from it. 
 
 "They tell me you have saved my son's life. 
 I thank you, Randal." 
 
 Randal was yet gentleman enough to flush
 
 34 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 under the true eyes. Scannell of Mains had 
 small reason to give thanks there. 
 
 "You needn't. Murray did as much. What? 
 Yes, sir. Very well." 
 
 The bellow of the tea-bell caught him at the 
 little gate, and he stopped in a sudden sick- 
 ness. For it was all the strait years of work- 
 life that called from the whare. Then his 
 eyes changed ; he laid his hand on the side-rail, 
 leapt it, and ran with long strides to the stables. 
 For Kiliat rode up the pine avenue, and above 
 the fences a little dark head showed alone. 
 She sprang at his tread; her hands out; her 
 face glowing. 
 
 "Oh, I'm glad glad. I wanted to tell 
 you- 
 
 'Effie dearest I'm too dirty- 
 
 But the earth gave three clipped moments of 
 Heaven. Then Randal stood back. 
 
 "You'd no right to let me touch you," he 
 said. "Out here! And in daylight! You 
 make me a brute to you, Effie. I must go " 
 
 "Wait! Ah! it shouldn't be me to say that! 
 Are you so hungry, then?" 
 
 "Yes," said Randal; and his eyes brought 
 the colour swiftly. 
 
 "I I never meant I want to thank you for 
 Art r " 
 
 "Please don't," said Randal dryly. "Your 
 father has done that." 
 
 "Oh! And my thanks don't count? Np
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 35 
 
 you said I wasn't to let you touch me. Well, 
 but you deserve punishing " 
 
 "Let me earn my forgiveness then, dear." 
 
 The mischief left her face. 
 
 "There is something I wanted you know 
 Roddy Duncan from the Lion? He's such a 
 nice little boy, and I've often seen him up 
 there. But but he is always with Art; and 
 dear old Art, he I can't speak to Mr. Ormond 
 myself but you know " 
 
 They were the same fine-cut features and 
 long-lashed eyes that Randal had followed into 
 deeps that shook his soul at the remembering. 
 
 "I know, dear. I'll go down and see Ormond 
 to-night. He can put a check-strap on Rod- 
 dy, if you wish it. I'll do what I can to-night. 
 We go out to camp at day-break, you see." 
 
 He had a twenty-mile ride behind him, and 
 four nights that he did not speak of behind 
 that. But he took saddle again that evening 
 under a wet sky, with Danny's blessing chas- 
 ing him out. 
 
 "We're evolutin' teetotalers up at the camp, 
 you'll remember; an' you're not ter bring back 
 more'n a bottle o' lavender water fur Ike " 
 
 Randal ducked from Ike's quick-flung pan- 
 nikin, and went out on a crest of laughter. It 
 was Danny who last week had discovered Ike 
 behind the brick oven, blue in the face, and 
 spitting "Jockey Club" emphatically. 
 
 "Wot's the little game?" demanded Danny.
 
 36 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Ike rubbed himself, and leaned on the wall. 
 
 "Nellie up at the 'ouse told me I'd fair come 
 over any gal if I scented meself. But I'm 
 blamed ef I'll drink all that bottle fur any gal 
 livin'. She'll hev to take me smellin', or leave 
 
 me." 
 
 Danny carried the bottle back to the whare, 
 and told things. And Ike had taken little 
 joy in life since. For the Mains boys knew 
 what to do with a joke when they saw one. 
 
 The night was cold with grey blankets over 
 the hills, and a soft mist rolling along the 
 river. By the blaze of Phelan's one door-lamp 
 Randal caught sight of Art's back in the bar, 
 with Roddy Duncan's bright face beside it. 
 
 He slung through the township full-speed, 
 took the track past the Creek to the Lion, and 
 learnt from Fysh that Ormond was three miles 
 off with Father Denis. He turned then, with 
 wrath on his mouth; rode back, and flushed 
 Ormond in the smoke of the priest's little 
 room. 
 
 "That young box-man of yours is with Art 
 Scannell in Phelan's bar," he said. "I've 
 learnt something of Art this last week, and I 
 know he'll mess Roddy up pretty quick. Bet- 
 ter put a spoke in his wheel, hadn't you?" 
 
 Ormond knew Randal as a gentleman may 
 know a station-hand. He put down his pipe. 
 
 "Who sent you down to tell me that?" he 
 demanded.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 37 
 
 "That's my business. Your business is to 
 look after your men that is, if you consider 
 your responsibilities at all." 
 
 "Please don't apologise for teaching me my 
 responsibilities," said Ormond. 
 
 "Don't mean to. Are you going to rope in 
 Roddy, or are you not?" 
 
 Ormond blinked across at the other as he 
 stood, straight and lean, in the door, with the 
 rain on his yellow oil-skins, and his hard face 
 grey with cold. Then he got up and spoke as 
 no man of Randal's birth had spoken to him 
 these fifteen years. Father Denis clapped his 
 fat hands on his knees. 
 
 "An* ye're all right, then, the pair ov ye. 
 Thrust ye tu know a man when ye sees 
 him, Ormond. Bring him along tu the 
 fire; an' shut the dure, for it's cowld enough 
 to freeze tin regimints on us. There's a 
 chair goin' beggin' ye'll have whisky, Mr. 
 Randal?" 
 
 Randal's nerve forsook him. In the colonies 
 no work is derogatory to a man unless he 
 makes it so. He may clean pig-sties, and the 
 friends of his college days will not forsake him; 
 but to take the first step down the ladder which 
 few climb again, must and does lose him touch 
 with his class. This is the inexorable law. 
 Randal was half-way down that ladder long 
 since, and the fierce passion which swept Effie 
 Scannell on its tide might never bear him up-
 
 38 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 ward in this world. But the taste of the old 
 years dried his mouth and blinded his eyes as 
 Ormond brought Navy-cut, and decanters that 
 sparkled, and pushed a cushioned chair where 
 the firelight shone. He sloughed his pride with 
 his oil-skins, and sat down. But his tongue 
 was dumb, and Ormond guessed why, with a 
 sudden pity and shame. Father Denis sailed 
 down-wind breezily. 
 
 "Bedad; ye're jist the man I'm wantin' the 
 handlin' ov this long while," he said. 
 
 "How so?" Randal's voice showed sus- 
 picion on the undertow. 
 
 "Ye're strong. That boy there's another." 
 He jerked a fat thumb at Ormond. "Ye're 
 both good men in yer hand " 
 
 "You mistake," said Randal, sharply. "I'm 
 a hand myself." 
 
 "Blathers! A strong man houlds men all 
 over the worrld an' back agin. An' ye can git 
 where I can't git, Randal. Intu Blake's bar- 
 parlour " 
 
 "You'd not find much you cared for there." 
 
 "I'd find men." He blew smoke from his 
 nostrils, and his big heart shone in his eyes. 
 "I'm wantin' men," he said. 
 
 Ormond's grin showed the white teeth 
 gripped on the pipe-stem. 
 
 "Men like Lou Birot and Jimmie Blaine 
 and Rogers?" he suggested. 
 
 "I'm wid ye, entoirely. Them most ov all.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 39 
 
 Ye'll not heal a wound wid the splinter stayin* 
 in it." 
 
 "The wound has bred the splinter." 
 
 The priest looked at Randal quickly. 
 
 "Begorra; that's the ould riddle ov the hin 
 an' the egg. We'll not ask which came fust, 
 then. Bhut we'll thry tu get the splinter 
 out." 
 
 "You never will," said Randal, as one who 
 knew. 
 
 "Import a few more chuckers-out made on 
 Murray's last," murmured Ormond. 
 
 This pricked Randal's flesh, and roused him. 
 
 "You can trust most communities to sift the 
 sound from the rotten. We require a man to 
 ride straight, and to hit straight, and to live 
 straight " 
 
 "Ye measure the last distance wid a mighty 
 crooked shtick, then," said Father Denis, dryly. 
 
 Randal reddened. 
 
 "We don't ask religion or sobriety or the 
 outward graces of speech. But a man who 
 rides and hits out straight can't live very 
 crooked." 
 
 "By Jove," cried Ormond, "you've nailed 
 him there! Didn't I tell you, Father? When 
 we see a man's hand shake on the rifle-stock or 
 the rein we mark him down at once. For we 
 knew him in his youth. But the tourists who 
 belt through New Zealand, giving tongue, and 
 picking up stuff as they run they go back and
 
 40 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 use this man for a text, not knowing that he 
 is outside the pale already." 
 
 "An' which ov us have the right tu put up 
 the pale?" said the priest, gravely. 
 
 "The men do it. The rotters and the oth- 
 ers the chaps who are going to help cook the 
 world's pie in the future. But the tourist 
 doesn't know anything about them." 
 
 "It's a hot fire many ov thim will use for the 
 bakin'," said Father Denis, his eyes on Ran- 
 dal's shut hand and mouth. 
 
 "I believe you. They will be the men who 
 have learnt first-hand. And you can't learn 
 anything without sweating some of the green- 
 ness out of you first. The men who learn first- 
 hand aren't generally sappy." 
 
 "If that pie has no taste ov burrn tu it, 
 'twill be because ye're dead fust, Ormond. 
 Crow away on yer dung hill, me young 
 cock. It is not the worrld will be throubled 
 by ye." 
 
 Ormond stood up, straddling before the fire. 
 His shadow fell across the room to a girl's face 
 on the wall. That face was Father Denis' 
 story. It had taught him all he knew. 
 
 "This is a populous farmyard, and it's going 
 to be noisier than you think. In this way. It 
 is the People who make the Colonies. It is the 
 Aristocracy who make the Old World and 
 the Laws. Well, the People stand flat-foot 
 upon the earth, and you can't upset them, be-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 41 
 
 cause they've nothing to fall off. Can't you 
 see the pull it gives them?" 
 
 Randal glanced up at the virile face and the 
 square set of the shoulders. 
 
 "What the devil does it matter, anyway?" 
 he said. "They upset themselves into their 
 six feet of soil at the end. Then the Aristoc- 
 racy have the pull with a well-dried family 
 vault." 
 
 "We do something toward making a New 
 World first, though. The kind of world that 
 doesn't think so much of three languages and 
 blue blood as it does of muscle and endurance 
 and the old, old dogma that a man works for 
 himself and a woman one woman." 
 
 "It will be a stupider world," said Randal, 
 frankly. 
 
 "It will be cleaner " 
 
 Father Denis exploded, flinging back his 
 head in a great gust of laughter. 
 
 "Ah, git away wid ye an' yer politics, Or- 
 mond. Ye'd talk the head off the Lion's lift- 
 poipe. Faith, ye've got in wan from the shoul- 
 dher that toime, Randal, for all ye've bin sook- 
 in' silence so long." 
 
 It was sight of Ormond leaning against the 
 mantel-shelf with its old china and heavy 
 bronze candle-sticks that suddenly flicked Ran- 
 dal back into realisation. Far away in town 
 Ormond was yet free of the clubs and of 
 ladies' drawing-rooms. His own feet were on
 
 42 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the track up which there is no returning. And 
 only the man who has been there knows what 
 it means to see his equal above him. 
 
 He stood up stiff with the hardness back on 
 his face. He called Ormond "Sir" in a sud- 
 den defiance, and went out to the night with 
 his shoulders bowed under the old weight. 
 Father Denis drew at his pipe in a long silence. 
 Ormond said blankly: 
 
 "What scared him?" 
 
 "Himsilf an* you." The priest's eyes fell 
 on the length and breadth of the other man. 
 "He'll hate ye wan ov these days or love ye. 
 Bhut I'll never git hould of him. A man who 
 has fed wid the beasts ov the shtable will not 
 come back tu the banquetin'-hall. For why? 
 Because it wud be tu 'come back/ "
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 "RAININ'. B'Gosh! Rainin' barrers an' 
 pitchforks." 
 
 Tod pulled the blankets over his head with 
 a sleepy mutter, and another blue roll three 
 men off said something vivid and very dis- 
 tinct. Buck sprang upright, his goggle eyes 
 staring. 
 
 "Rainin'. Who said rainin'?" He stuck 
 a leg under the tent-flap and drew it back with 
 a yell. "My daisy ; it's torrantin' ! And them 
 bosses in the yard. We can't leave them bos- 
 ses in the yard." 
 
 Buck loved horses better than himself or 
 any other man. According to popular super- 
 stition he had been one at the beginning of 
 things. There are certain men whom the ani- 
 mals take into fellowship; and these are the 
 only men who do not attempt to explain why. 
 
 "Shut yer head," growled Scott, reaching a 
 boot, and loosing it with insufficient aim. " Jes' 
 yer lie down an' see ef we can't leave 'em." 
 
 It was Moody who caught the boot, and re- 
 turned it emphatically; but Buck's speech over- 
 rode all complaint. 
 
 43
 
 44 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "I ain't goin' to hev my boss harrered. I'll 
 take him up ter the bush - " 
 
 "By the Lord Harry here scrag him, 
 somebody - " 
 
 Came a quick rustle among the blankets and 
 chopped tussock, and a spurt of rain across 
 Danny's face where he lay by the flap. Then 
 the unbelieving silence of the men. Lou broke 
 it. He leapt for the opening. 
 
 "Come on, you fools. He'll do it, sure 
 
 Steve was shouting for his boots, and five 
 pairs of feet battered Danny as they passed 
 him. He grabbed the last ankle, and came 
 out with it, sending a wild shout before him 
 into the night. In the eight-by-twelve whare 
 that made breakwind for the tent slept Ted 
 Douglas, with Randal and Mogger. Douglas 
 had the special comprehensive understanding 
 of the ruler, and the bunk next the door as 
 well. He cast on coat and boots with his senses 
 half-waked, passed Conlon at the first creek, 
 and learned essentials by one curt sentence 
 flung piece-meal. 
 
 A wild half -lit sky was over the hills, with 
 straight slivers of rain pelting through it, and 
 a giddy dance of storm-clouds red above the 
 bush. With the shout of the wind came the 
 grunt of flying Paradise duck and the peculiar 
 whish of blown birch-leaves. A tossing cab- 
 bage-tree marked out the yard-gate; and, head
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 45 
 
 down, the boys swung for it, unspeaking as a 
 pack of hounds in sight of the kill. Sleet mixed 
 with the sleep in their eyes, and Danny lost 
 both boots in the moss of a spring-head. They 
 were stiff, each and each, with the saddle and 
 with bruises ; for in rough country a stockman 
 takes falls in the work of most days; and well 
 they know that not one man, though that man 
 should be Buck, would hold thirteen horses 
 when Nature was angry. 
 
 Down the acre-wide yard swept the horses, 
 like ghosts without sound or shape. Be- 
 hind, Buck was mad as the grey mare he 
 straddled. The swing of her body and the 
 smell of wet hair made him drunk with the 
 joy of it, and he brought his mob to the 
 gate with the longing for freedom clutch- 
 ing him too. 
 
 The gate swung in the wind, and Lou caught 
 it as Ike's cob struck it full with his chest. The 
 rebound cast Lou three yards down the track 
 where the pack-horse pinched his arm with a 
 hind-shoe as it jumped him. Lou twisted; 
 snatched at a mane that blew in his face, 
 gripped the nostril ; the mane ; forced the bridle 
 he carried between the teeth and over the ears, 
 and came up astride, with the check-strap flap- 
 ping. The men were gasping and giddy as 
 they saw, and Tod spoke for them all when he 
 said: 
 
 "Sure the divil is a swate kind frind to Lou.
 
 46 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 A or'nary good man wud Vgot the neck broke 
 off of him." 
 
 Lou loosed his belt, and brought it down on 
 the rump. He slung past them as a bullet 
 from the rifle, and headed the rush on 
 the lip of the bush. Then the grey dawn 
 was pin-pricked by shouts and waving 
 arms and the hiss and crackle of whips. 
 The roar and the rain-beat dazed and cowed 
 the mob. The corners were turned in, 
 each on each, and Lou belted the last- 
 comer into the yard with his strap. Then 
 he came over the fence with his voice 
 too soft. 
 
 "Where is Buck?" he said. 
 
 Danny sniggered, carrying a drowned boot 
 in either hand. 
 
 "Where wud he be like ter be but promen- 
 adin' inter the bush, an' stayin' there? He's 
 permiskious enough ter see as we ain't pleased 
 wi' him, if he is dotty." 
 
 Douglas swept up an armful of dead manu- 
 ka and led the way to the hut. Here, while 
 the water ran off them, the boys turned about 
 and about before the fire that raged up the tin 
 chimney to the dawn-sky, and Randal extract- 
 ed a mic-a-mic thorn from Danny's big toe to 
 the tune of a half -hundred cheerful jokes. Lou 
 fed the fire just below the swinging billy, and 
 once he said : 
 
 "Buck will go home, I suppose. He knows
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 47 
 
 we're clearing Black Hill to-day; but he won't 
 come along to the party." 
 
 "Yes, he will," said Mogger suddenly. 
 "Buck's all sorts of a fool but a funk. He'll 
 carry his swag in all right an' what are we 
 goin' ter do ter him?" 
 
 Lou sat back on his heels, whistling softly. 
 Ted Douglas turned on him. 
 
 "You'll not mess wi' the boy on yer own, 
 Lou," he said. 
 
 "You'll mind your own business, perhaps," 
 suggested Lou, sweetly. 
 
 "I am. Buck's ter my charge. He's a 
 id jit clean through; but he'll come up ter his 
 whippin' like a good sheep-pup. And it ain't 
 you ter give it " 
 
 "Want to kill him yourself?" asked Lou 
 with a delicate sneer. 
 
 "We all wants ter kill him," explained 
 Moody. "And we're all goin' ter. But not 
 the same way as yer'd do it." 
 
 "Perhaps not," said Lou, lightly. 
 
 Ted Douglas thrust his hands deep in his 
 pockets. 
 
 "If you goes hurtin' Buck, I'll sack you," he 
 said slowly. 
 
 Lou's lip upturned from his even teeth; but 
 no man saw his eyes. He stooped to the fire 
 again. 
 
 "It sounds so well to write a big cheque, 
 doesn't it? But it's better to remember that it
 
 48 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 might possibly be dishonoured at headquar- 
 ters." 
 
 "It's you as is more likely ter be dishon- 
 oured," said Douglas in sudden wrath. 
 
 Lou came to his feet with a face that brought 
 three men between him and the other. Danny 
 laughed, rocking on the bunk. 
 
 "Can't yer stand chiackin' yet, Lou? Wi* 
 all the efforts I've taken to substantiate yer in 
 it, too! Ike, put some tea inter that billy, and 
 guv me a drink, for I'm fair climaxed wi my- 
 self." 
 
 But a half -hour later, when they got to sad- 
 dle with wet oilskins abroad in the wind, 
 Danny muttered to Mogger: 
 
 "Ted'll pay for that. Pay through the nose, 
 he will. Lou is darnation clever." 
 
 Mogger glanced at a little cramped figure 
 atop of a big bony roan. He hoped that Lou 
 would hit there when the chance came. For 
 saving always Ted Douglas no man on 
 Mains had any love for Jimmie. 
 
 When man first put foot on her the Back- 
 Country made some rules and she had kept 
 them. They that serve her shall love her, for 
 she will have no divided tribute. In their strong 
 youth they must take her yoke gladly; nor 
 may they bend under it nor break. And in 
 return she gives them little rest and much dan- 
 ger, and many times death. She gives too 
 the power to be steadfast against self which
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 49 
 
 is the greatest power of all; and the child- 
 wisdom that finds joy in the Little Things that 
 lie along every track. And that is why the 
 hills-men can play with the rocks and the big 
 bush and the mountain rivers, and then go 
 down and take the townships to pieces in a 
 gaiety of heart which an occasional night in 
 the lock-up does not dim. 
 
 A savage day's work rode with the boys over 
 the downs and up cutting by cutting. From 
 the receiving paddocks, two round miles from 
 the hut, the cry of already pent cattle blew 
 down wind, and the throb of impatient hoofs 
 below it was over-like the beat of far-distant 
 surf. On the down-top Ted Douglas slung 
 the chase clear for the snows where they blank- 
 etted the gnarled ranges and peaks. Tod and 
 Jimmie swept in the van, flinging coarse jokes 
 which Lou tossed back tipped with venom that 
 no man but Randal had wit to see. And Ran- 
 dal's mind was on sharper things. A man may 
 walk blind where the scent of roses pull his 
 senses, until a chance thorn-prick opens his 
 eyes to the knowledge that he is on forbidden 
 ground. But Randal had broken into the gar- 
 den wilfully, and well he knew the smart of the 
 thorns among the roses. He lifted his head 
 to the free wind beating down from God's own 
 snows, and the sting of it eased him. For Na- 
 ture in storm knows how to comfort her son 
 when his soul is in storm also.
 
 50 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Through manuka-scrub and savage mata- 
 kuri the track lay to Black Hill, where it rose 
 behind the rain ; stark with bare rock, and rot- 
 ten with papa, and slippery with blue tussock 
 that lay flat to the wind. One by one the boys 
 swarmed it, as white ants swarm a wall; rid- 
 ing headlong up the dried water-courses, 
 swinging aside from the sky-flung bluffs, and 
 taking each man his separate beat, with the 
 rain spurting off his oil-skins, and the wet gear 
 harsh in his hands. 
 
 Above the cry of startled duck and the oc- 
 casional anger of a kea, rocketted the stock- 
 whip talk as the lashes licked after the heav- 
 ing flanks. From the sheltered lea of great 
 bluffs they started the cattle; from age-hol- 
 lowed limestone caves ; from deep guts ripped 
 out by water-spouts and yet pallid with snow 
 in the meadows, and from little gully-bottoms 
 where the drowned scrub baptised them into 
 new pains and sorrows. Scott strained his 
 colt's stifle on a shingle slip where he tried to 
 prevent a stampede, and Mogger put out his 
 elbow when he left the saddle in a blind creek. 
 But he pulled it in again by aid of a stirrup- 
 leather, and collared his bolting mob on the 
 slope below. 
 
 Beyond a patch of mic-a-mic Ted Douglas 
 saw a horseman whom he had not sent. He 
 stood in the stirrups with the rain blowing 
 across him.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 51 
 
 "Buck," he shouted. 
 
 Buck came, his blank face more blank than 
 before. 
 
 "I got a cow and a calf over there," he said. 
 
 Douglas grinned. No man argued with 
 Buck. As a horsebreaker he was the pride of 
 both Islands. Beyond that he was a child, and 
 all true men gave him gentleness therefor. 
 
 "Whale away at 'em then, an' kip clear o' 
 Lou. He'll get his knife into you if he can." 
 
 "I jes wanted ter take the bosses out'r the 
 rain," explained Buck, and rode on. 
 
 But Lou was looking for stronger meat that 
 day. There was Douglas to pay for words 
 said some hours back. And, by the nature of 
 a man, he cannot forgive evil truth, though the 
 evil of lies may not touch him. 
 
 To the heel of the day they worked ; soaked 
 and rain-beat; riding each man with his life 
 in the hand that carried his rein, and watch- 
 ing eternally for the spear-glint of horns and 
 the skin-flash through loose bush and crowd- 
 ing manuka. 
 
 Near sunset, when the storm gave to a scar- 
 let evening of blown clouds and clucking wind, 
 Lou found his chance and took it. Where a 
 humped spur ran clear into the western sky 
 Jimmie cautiously wheeled his mob, bringing 
 them back, slow-paced. Lou, on the breast of 
 the hill above, looked down to see deep gullies 
 either side the spur and the gleam of rock-
 
 52 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 bound water at bottom. The blue glint that all 
 men hated shot into his eyes as he rounded his 
 own haul with haste. They were a mixed haul : 
 two-year-olds, poddies and pikers; a half- 
 dozen moth-eaten mothers, and a scrub bull of 
 ten years which had never been branded. Lou 
 had played with him all down the hill, putting 
 a blind deviltry into him with the lash, and the 
 sweat and foam mixed with the blood on his 
 quarters. Skilfully, and unseen, Lou switched 
 the drive on to Jimmie's spur, and drew in to 
 watch developments. And in all the hush of 
 sky washing round the bare scrubby spur, and 
 the jutting breast of the hill, there was only 
 the dry clack of hoofs, and the great bell-note 
 of the red piker as he shouldered through the 
 young bulls and the cows. 
 
 With dust to guard and cover them the 
 frightened mob broke down the tussock for the 
 spur-tip. Above Lou four men came into 
 sight on the hill-top. Lou laughed. The 
 game was not then for him only. A choice lay 
 with Jimmie. Had it been another man there 
 would have been no choice; but Lou, sitting 
 easy in the saddle, knew the fall of the die be- 
 fore it was thrown. 
 
 The roar and crackle of broken scrub blew 
 out on the wind. A dead rimu jarred when 
 the crush struck it. The toss of glinting horns 
 and white spume made foam above the billow- 
 ing backs. Stray cabbage-trees and low
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 53 
 
 whanae-clumps sifted and parted them; and 
 here the determination of a twelve-foot whip 
 could block and swing a hundred two hun- 
 dred with the coming army to help. 
 
 Mogger was roaring from the scarp above. 
 Ike, standing in his stirrups, whistled frantic 
 appeals. Then Ted Douglas pelted past head- 
 long. Lou took some payment at sight of his 
 face. 
 
 Nakedly in sight of his fellows, the coward 
 in Jimmie fought with his training. He fell 
 back from his own mob where it stopped, paw- 
 ing earth uneasily. He pulled the reins this 
 way and the other; beat his mare; wrenched 
 her back. Once he swung out his whip, but 
 it dropped unspeaking. 
 
 Lives out-back are run on the army lines, 
 and a man who fears his enemy -be it bucking 
 horse or charging cattle or a plough in stony 
 ground takes something of the grade of a 
 deserter in battle. Ted Douglas knew it. He 
 had seen men out-casts on the cattle-camp be- 
 fore this day. Jimmie knew it. But his 
 tongue was dried leather in his mouth, and his 
 hands turned clammy on the reins. Down the 
 hog-backed spur he saw Douglas coming, and 
 the chill air bore a shout with a prayer in it. 
 The charging mob crashed into the loafers, 
 bunched and turned them, and the red, roaring 
 thunder swerved away to the right. Along 
 the very lip of the gully Douglas was coming,
 
 54 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 his old bay full-extended. His spurs dripped 
 blood, and his bitten lip was blood-spotted. On 
 the brink the red piker pulled up with a jerk 
 and a bellow that broke to a scream as the mob 
 behind swamped him and pitched over with 
 him. 
 
 On the hill-side Scott was left in charge of 
 ninety head, whilst six men tore down the spur, 
 slung their reins to the scrub on the rim, and 
 went over to the cold dusk made awful by the 
 rage of mad brutes in the hand of death. For 
 a full hour they strove in the slippery rock- 
 bottoms ; giving the keen knife to those beyond 
 help, gentling and beating the rest up to the 
 gathering night on the ranges. Then came 
 the wet saddles again, and the fierce alert ring- 
 ing and wheeling and flogging that brought 
 all at last to the jaws of the paddocks far down 
 on the flat. Jimmie said once to Douglas: 
 
 "I I couldn't help it." And Douglas made 
 answer: 
 
 "You'll have the chanst to say that to-night, 
 I reckon. Git down to your work now." 
 
 Scannell's boys knew how to give and how 
 to take. They usually did both crisply; 
 rounding off the episode, and casting it behind 
 them as a thing past. But first was the day's 
 work to hold up to the end; and the boys were 
 saddle-stiff and weary and sweating before 
 the gates swung close and the last weaner cried 
 inside the bars.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 55 
 
 Jimmie's punishment had gathered in inten- 
 sity as the sting of a black icy night folded 
 round, to find each man unresting yet, and 
 empty with hunger. And through the dark 
 and the aching exhaustion more than shame 
 dogged Ted Douglas. 
 
 For every head of stock and every inch of 
 brown earth on Mains was dear to him, and 
 this night he doubted for the first time whether 
 or no Jimmie was dearer still. 
 
 The boys rode back to camp unspeaking. 
 They fed in silence until Lou gave the lead 
 from where he lay in a bunk, his eyes eager, his 
 long lithe limbs at ease. The sternness of com- 
 ing judgment was on the other men to make 
 them awkward and dumb, and into the tense- 
 ness Lou slid his cool voice. 
 
 "Any fellow going to ask Jimmie ques- 
 tions?" 
 
 "There's lots of men can't " began 
 
 Douglas ; but Randal's speech cut the words. 
 
 "You're out of this, I think, Douglas. Jim- 
 mie has lost Mains twenty head of cattle, and 
 it's he who has to answer for it." 
 
 Danny was a Heaven-built peacemaker. 
 He took his teeth from a hunk of bread, 
 saying: 
 
 "Leave it till ter-morrer, yer peripatetics, 
 can't yer? We ain't none on us up ter ancient 
 hist'ry ter-night." 
 
 Jimmie spoke from the candle-box near the
 
 56 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 fire. His unhallowed wit had given him a cer- 
 tain holding among the boys, but they had no 
 ears for it to-night. There was no loop-hole 
 in this disgrace which had come upon Mains, 
 and no flicker of fun on any face beside Lou's. 
 Lou sat up and flung the stone. 
 
 "I'll lend my blanket for thirty pitches," he 
 said. 
 
 Ted Douglas gasped where he stood behind 
 Jimmie, his strong bony face white under 
 sweat that had not been wiped away. Buck 
 shivered. 
 
 "Thirty'd tear the inside out'r him," he said. 
 "I had it done ter me wonst up North an' that 
 was on'y twenty. But I didn't hev no stum- 
 mick fur a week." 
 
 Jimmie was using talk that brought all the 
 men to their feet. Lou sprang up. 
 
 "That's enough," he said. "Bring him out- 
 side. It's starlight." 
 
 "Ted Ted stop them " 
 
 Steve gathered Jimmie in his great arms. 
 
 "He can't answer fur yer no more, Jim- 
 mie," he said. "Yer playin' off yer own bat 
 ter-night." 
 
 Ted Douglas ruled his life by the ethics of 
 fairplay. But it was needful for Randal to 
 block him at this moment. | 
 
 "You can't stop it, Douglas," he said. "Stay 
 in here, if you like; but they're going to take 
 it out of Jimmie to-night. If Lou had
 
 brought along his whip they'd have used 
 it." 
 
 Then he went out and shut the door. 
 
 Randal had neither hate nor pity for his 
 kind. He saw the justice in this, and stood 
 by in the cold bright-starred night; but he 
 gave no help, nor yet any hindrance. Sheer 
 behind the whare the bush rose up to the sky. 
 The babble of a creek two yards off mixed with 
 the distant roar of the shingle river and the 
 low brush of horses cropping long grass. The 
 little sod whare was sallow in the faint light. 
 Each step and word rang in the frosty air. 
 But there was no mercy for Jimmie in the 
 night, nor in the faces and the quick hands 
 about him. 
 
 Within, Ted Douglas stood against the nar- 
 row chimney-shelf, his head down on his arms. 
 Originally, blanket-tossing is a school-boy 
 trick; but the fun goes out of it very swiftly 
 when a man is delivered to the punishment. 
 Each soul is made dual that it may under- 
 stand other souls if it will; and if the man ki 
 Ted Douglas stood firm for the honour 
 of Mains, the woman in him shook at 
 foreknowledge of Jimmie's pain. Through 
 the shut door came the shout of the old- 
 time furmula. First Scott's voice, loud 
 and clear: 
 
 "Who lost twenty head o' cattle fur Scan- 
 nell?"
 
 58 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Then a full-bodied shout of "Jimmie!" a 
 gasping wait, a thud, and Scott's voice again. 
 
 Lou sat on a dead tree, watching the hard 
 faces in the starshine. And, having more than 
 ordinary perceptions, he knew that in the 
 dumbness of the whare someone suffered 
 more than Jimmie. At the second pitch 
 Jimmie was cursing. By the sixteenth sobs 
 and prayers galloped together, and Danny 
 said: 
 
 "A lot of sense there is in takin* the use out 
 o' him, isn't there? Give him one more fur 
 luck, yer galapods, an' be done with it." 
 
 "Nineteen," said Mogger, and Scott took up 
 the burden again. 
 
 It was a scream of agony that brought 
 Douglas out with a face that the boys did not 
 know. 
 
 "For God's sake stop it stop it! Or 
 chuck me ef you want to kill someone." 
 
 Mogger grinned with his hard hands gripped 
 on the blanket. 
 
 "He's takin' his gruel alone ter-night, Ted," 
 he said. "There ain't no use in yer comin' 
 along wi' the spoon. We'll give him every bit 
 he kin carry there's more blankets ef this one 
 don't hold." 
 
 All was done with in time, and Jimmie lay 
 on the frosty earth, helplessly sea-sick. Lou 
 chased the pitiful Danny before him to the 
 tent.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 59 
 
 "Don't you fret," he said. "Jimmie'll sleep 
 in Ted's bunk to-night." 
 
 And Jimmie did. But Ted Douglas sat 
 staring at the dead fire-ash until dawn-break, 
 and twice a man roused in the night to hear 
 Lou laughing like a child in his sleep.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 "DAYLIGHT, boys! Day-li-ight 
 
 "Ut is Moody this toime," cried Tod, and 
 he waked with a snort. "Will ye be afther 
 givin' him to me, then, for I'm wantin' to kill 
 the ould head off him, sure?" 
 
 But it was Ted Douglas who roused them 
 out headlong; who chased them with their gear 
 to the yard, and clipped their feeding-time 
 close at each end. At no hour was there give 
 or take in Ted Douglas when work lay to 
 hand. The boys knew and accepted this, and 
 themselves gave tongue with him against a 
 shirker. By this knowledge they read Ted's 
 curt words when Jimmie hauled his cob 
 through the gate. 
 
 "You're not wantin' yer boss this mornin', 
 Jimmie. Go an' rake up sticks fur the fires." 
 
 Then he flung himself into the leather, and 
 gave the lead through the long dewy tussock 
 that wiped the dried blood from the spur. 
 
 Scott took on six bets before the crowd had 
 homed to the saddles. He believed indubit- 
 ably that Ted would shield Jimmie this day 
 and the next and all the other days to come. 
 
 60
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 61 
 
 "But he'll sweat for it if he do," he said, 
 combing his matted whip-lash through his fin- 
 gers. "Playin' low-down on Mains, that is." 
 
 "An* what fur you?" cried Danny in wrath. 
 "What fur you as is on'y sober when yer's card 
 playin', an' on'y workin' when Ted's got his 
 toe inter the back of yer? You ter talk o' low- 
 down!" 
 
 Steve split the waking quarrel with the 
 wedge of body and tongue. 
 
 "It's a tough knot fur Ted ter chop through 
 anyways," he said. "He's got ter tell Scan- 
 nell as Jimmie's a rotter an' he does love Jim- 
 mie as some chaps loves a gel or he's got ter 
 guv Mains a chanst o' more muckin' when 
 there comes a tight corner again. But Ted'll 
 tell Scannell." 
 
 "Bein' Ted I won't say you're wrong," said 
 Conlon. "But it'll cut the heart out of 
 him. And nine men out of ten wouldn't do 
 it." 
 
 Conlon had come to this work for sheer love 
 of it, as many another has done and will do. 
 He knew every head of stock was sacred to 
 Ted Douglas, for he too had given all that he 
 had in payment for the serving of it. 
 
 "Bedad, ut's ter'ble onplaisant to be the tinth 
 man," remarked Tod, fighting with his young 
 filly as she twisted head-and-tail. "He's apt 
 to have all the sentiments an' set-ups as belong 
 be rights to the others too. An* ut's a quare
 
 62 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 old stomach-ache they do be gettin* in their 
 conscience o' toimes!" 
 
 Then his filly took charge and raced with 
 him into the puffs of mist that lay on the 
 heights. 
 
 Scannell's receiving paddocks lay over 
 three spurs and a rock-ridge and two gullies. 
 Danny explained this once in the township. 
 
 "The arcumtect as was given the job o' 
 makin* Mains had a high 'pinion o' hisself," he 
 said. "An' he was allers tryin' ter git ter the top 
 o' it. That's why there ain't as much flat on 
 Mains as yer cud iron yer tombstone shirt on." 
 
 Lossin suggested that the flat had got into 
 the Mains men instead, and Tod, who assisted 
 at the after-result, gave Danny all the praise 
 that was due to science and wind. 
 
 Through the dark shadows and the white 
 mist and the shapeless grey clumps of manu- 
 ka and tutu the cattle heard the sharp-spoken 
 whip-talk, and the crack of branches as the 
 horses crashed through. Uneasy mutters 
 pricked each little group ; the bulls stood apart, 
 great heads low, eyes and ears alert, and a 
 swift fore-foot pawing the earth. Then wean- 
 er, cow, and scrubber broke all ways, taking 
 shingle slip and riven flint and tussock un- 
 erringly, and sending their bellowing fury 
 down the wind to drown the gay mock of the 
 stock-whips. 
 
 The white starshine gave to pale amber,
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 63 
 
 to pink, to the first blue of the sky. On the 
 naked spurs that sprang out from the hill, 
 leading straight down to the branding-yard 
 square, red, white, black dots were cast out, 
 as a child flings beads that roll apart, and to- 
 gether, and mix, and tear ever toward the bot- 
 tom. Scannell saw them come, with sheen of 
 hides and of horns, and all sounds faint and 
 blended as the changes of the dawn. By the 
 yards Scannell sat his cob stiffly. He had 
 grown grey at this game for the love of it, and 
 the old lust drew him out to each muster with 
 an ache in the arm that would wheel no more 
 scrubbers by the swing of a twelve-foot lash. 
 It was a new generation and new blood; but 
 they played the same old game, and only the 
 man who has trod that track knows the joy 
 of it. He passes; and if the clay under 
 the feet of the next man is knit by blood- 
 cement, none ask questions. For the wind 
 keeps the records, and the sunshine, and 
 the old, old grey bitterns that cry from the 
 flax-swamps. 
 
 Down the spurs Scannell saw them coming, 
 and sounds swelled to crackling thunder, and 
 the tossing wild river took shape. Between 
 two unjoined mobs rode Lou; his rein loose 
 as he swung his colt with the knees, and the 
 long lash licking full length right and left, 
 drawing sullen ones in until the parallels met. 
 The boys fed more streams to the main, and
 
 64 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the whole hulk took the slope together in a 
 grand wild break that stirred Scannell's 
 blood. 
 
 By the yards Jimmie's fires burnt blue in 
 the sunlight. The branding-muster was heavy 
 work on Mains, with three sets of irons going 
 at once, and the scrub-land to clean up when 
 all was done. The wings of the yard stretched 
 wide, high, and unbending. Unthinkingly 
 Scannell's fingers closed for a short whip-han- 
 dle that was not there. Then he pulled his 
 cob back, and the taste of his years was in- 
 sipid on the tongue, for there was no salt left 
 in them. 
 
 The very air sang with life and wide sound, 
 and the smell of new blood, and sweat and cow- 
 breath. Conlon was mad with the delight of 
 it, and Ted Douglas turned reckless Tod from 
 certain death by a well-delivered cut on his 
 mare's quarter. The quickness of eye and 
 limb on a foot-ball field falls before the swift 
 craft of the stockman. Scannell drew in his 
 breath as he saw the boys handle the run, block- 
 ing them, ringing them, wheeling them ever 
 nearer and nearer with swaying bodies and 
 lashes that spun dripping red in the light, and 
 cunning horses that raced and swung to the 
 knee-grip. 
 
 An angry mother chased Moody thrice 
 round the yards. He brought her back with 
 some sleeve and flesh gone, and rode in the first
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 65 
 
 flight thereafter with his shirt-tail bound round 
 his forearm. 
 
 The leading rush struck the wing, and the 
 jar of posts sent Jimmie's heart to his throat. 
 The boys fastened on the sweating flanks as 
 flies fasten ; relentless, unafraid ; giving no inch 
 when a piker turned at charge, or a silly wean- 
 er dodged between a hack's forelegs. And 
 above the wild talk and the hoof -beats and the 
 snarl of unresting whips, Ted Douglas held 
 sway yet: assigning place by the crook of his 
 arm; hustling, steadying, leading a rush; tell- 
 ing a man off to ring in an outcast, and draw- 
 ing tighter the unbroken rope that was vivid, 
 alert, eager life. Steve had said once that 
 Ted Douglas was made up of nerves and that 
 each nerve had a separate eye, and Tod an- 
 swered, smarting under deserved chastisement : 
 
 "Bedad; some of thim nerves have quare 
 ould muscles to them, thin." 
 
 Scannell saw his head-man's face just once, 
 as the bay mare shot past with Ted stooped 
 over the wither and the threat of his long whip 
 slung out. And it startled him for the pain 
 that under-lay the work-look. Each man who 
 engages to rule over men takes more than their 
 bodies under his power. By the strength of 
 the personality which makes the ruler, his men 
 grow to dress their consciences by him, and 
 their ideals, and many things that go to make 
 up their manhood. Ted Douglas had learned
 
 66 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 it all in his youth, and he paid for it this day, 
 full tale. And there lay no side-track for his 
 feet if he would keep Mains' honour un- 
 smirched in the eyes of the boys. 
 
 No man on Mains could ride the bay mare 
 save Ted Douglas only. The boys of that day 
 had slung him on her back when she was raw, 
 young and untamed as himself. They had 
 broken each other to cattle-work, and taken 
 their falls together when ways were rough ; and 
 not a stockman from Riverton north to the 
 Stour could wheel a breaking piker against the 
 pair. 
 
 The echoes were mad among the black spurs 
 and the naked scarps and the long slopes where 
 the toi-toi shook. The mid-day pressed its 
 hot hands down on the yards ; and through the 
 dust and the weary crying of weaners, and the 
 bellow and stampede of furious scrubbers, the 
 Mains boys yarded their muster, slacked girths, 
 and squatted straightway on the grass with 
 damper and floods of hot tea. They were 
 sweat-marked and blood-marked, burnt black 
 to the shirt-line, and cheerful as the moko- 
 mokos in the bush-corner by the waterfall. 
 Scannell fed them; and winks flickered the 
 round of rough faces as Ted Douglas talked 
 technicalities with nothing behind. 
 
 "Hand over that five bob you owe me," said 
 Scott, suddenly. 
 
 Tod knocked aside the stretched hand.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 67 
 
 "Well, I niver, an* set you up ! Do ye think 
 Ted won't be backin' up to the brandin'-iron 
 wid the divil a there! Did I not say it?" 
 
 Ted Douglas was on his feet before Scan- 
 nell. He did not see Jimmie's start, and 
 quick- whitened face; nor Lou's steady gaze; 
 nor the pulsing of the pale flames beyond Scan- 
 nell's head. But he knew all these things, and 
 he toed the mark with his head up. 
 
 "We lost twenty beasts on Black Hill yes'- 
 day," he said. "They pitched over inter a 
 creek-bottom. Near all young steers an* 
 calves, they was." 
 
 Scannell's face set to a look that his son knew 
 well. 
 
 "Any special man's fault?" he demanded. 
 
 Scott nudged Ike where they lay arm by arm 
 on their stomachs. 
 
 "Doubles er quits?" he muttered. 
 
 Ike hit out at him loosely, unlooking. For 
 the whole tide of his half-baked lumpish youth 
 set with reverence and puzzlement toward 
 Douglas. 
 
 "They broke out o* hand on the hill," said 
 Ted Douglas, "from Lou's lot; but 'tweren't 
 his fault. I tried to head them, an' I couldn't. 
 An' I was nearer down than Lou." 
 
 "Then no man was to blame?" asked Scan- 
 nell. 
 
 Ted answered slowly; and the shake of his 
 voice ran through each man that he governed.
 
 -. 68 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Yes. There was a chap down on the spur. 
 He orter turned them; but he funked it." 
 
 Lou smiled a very little, blinking round at 
 the tense faces. He recognised the bitter, un- 
 bending tenets of duty whereby Ted Douglas 
 scourged himself and his men. Scannell's eyes 
 were not good to see. Always he had ridden 
 in the first flight in the old days. 
 
 "And the man who funked was ?" 
 
 "Jimmie Blaine," said Ted Douglas, and 
 stood unmoving, his hard hands shot up at his 
 sides, and the whole bright earth smudgy be- 
 fore him. 
 
 "Was he out with you this morning?" 
 
 "No. I couldn't let him ride for Mains 
 again." 
 
 Scannell's keen eyes met Ted's for one in- 
 stant of understanding. 
 
 "You've done more for Mains than that," 
 he said. "That'll do. Jimmie Blaine! Come 
 over here a minute." 
 
 Scannell sacked Jimmie in three pointed sen- 
 tences that sent the boys to the branding with 
 new grit to bite on, and amaze in their souls. 
 
 "I believe Ted thinks more o' Mains then he 
 do o' Jimmie," cried Moody, goggle-eyed, and 
 scruffing a kicking calf for the iron. "Thinks 
 more o' Mains then he do o' us! He'd tell on 
 us if he reckoned he orter ! Us !" 
 
 Lou pressed on the sizzling iron, and the 
 laugh danced up in his eyes.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 69 
 
 "Ted's got Scannell's ear to the tether's end 
 now," he said. "You didn't happen to remark 
 that Ted Douglas thought more of Mains than 
 he did of himself, did you?"
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 "IT'S about time you came down for them," 
 said Murray. "I ran in three of 'em Thurs- 
 day night, and the whole gang has been play- 
 ing Old Harry to-day." 
 
 Murray had been making particular inves- 
 tigation in the township ; but this told no more 
 than Purdey knew already. 
 
 "What the merry springtime can you ex- 
 pect?" he said. "They've had a savage seven 
 months of it up in the hills, and they were just 
 sick for the smell of the township again. 
 They'll work up to the knocker once I rope 'em 
 back to camp. But you must give a man one 
 chance in the year to blue his cheque. And if 
 you'll just shut your eyes to a bit of lark- 
 ing" 
 
 "Faith! I've had to shut more than my eyes 
 already, my innocent! They have been paint- 
 ing the town red this week-end, and shouting 
 drinks for every mother's son that can stand 
 up to it. There's a big hairy brute with one 
 ear gone " 
 
 "Pug Chancy? Yes; I don't think he would 
 be quite your style. But he's a first-flight axe-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 71 
 
 man, Murray. If you want to make an ex- 
 ample of some of 'em leave me him. I can't 
 do without Pug." 
 
 Beyond Lonely Hill and beyond North-of- 
 Sunday, Purdey contracted the working of the 
 saw-mill in the Big Bush for Scannell. The 
 strait years through he ruled near a hundred 
 men, all told; and it was only when the frost 
 struck the heavy snow to flint for perhaps a 
 clipped week in the winter, or again when 
 spring floods swamped them out, that Purdey's 
 camp ran wild; taking payment in the town- 
 ship bars for lean labour-filled days, and grind- 
 ing Murray down to the bed-rock of despera- 
 tion and profanity. 
 
 "For not all Mains and Behar on an elec- 
 tion-night no, nor on a race-night, either 
 can see the way your men go when they fore- 
 gather down here, Purdey. Though I will 
 say you make 'em sweat for it once you've got 
 them into the chains." 
 
 Purdey grinned slowly. He was young and 
 soft-voiced and quiet. But the wills of 
 eighteen men out of twenty broke before his 
 when they followed him over the severing tide- 
 way of two worlds, and came under the domin- 
 ion of the bush. 
 
 "I take delivery up at camp," he said. 
 "They're to your interest down here not 
 mine." 
 
 A blast of sound rolled down the street,
 
 mixed with the rattle of wheels. A handful 
 of Purdey's men were driving round the fifteen 
 corners of the township with six beaten kero- 
 sene-tins and a couple of concertinas. 
 
 Murray moved in his chair uneasily, and 
 shook out his pipe. 
 
 "I'll have to go out and kick up a shine di- 
 rectly, you know," he said. "Where d'you 
 rake 'em up from, Purdey? They are quite 
 the hardest filings I ever broke a knife over." 
 
 Purdey sleeked his little fair moustache with 
 slow fingers. 
 
 "A man's not a man without a splash of the 
 brute in him," he said. "They are not pretty; 
 but they're tough. The bush won't have weak- 
 lings. I bully-dam them from the jump, and 
 if they play up they know it. But, bless you, 
 if I kick them out they come back the next 
 year with their tails down. It's like to like, 
 and no other job can hold them for long. When 
 the bush calls they've got to answer, if it strips 
 half their life off 'em." 
 
 "I know. You see it in every caste. They 
 must run with their own mob; for their ear- 
 mark is struck, and the brand of the wild is 
 
 on their shoulders. Now, by all the there 
 
 go the Salvation Army lassies. Three of 'em. 
 I made sure they'd have the sense to lie low 
 to-night. Purdey, those pet lambs of yours 
 will be raising Cain directly. Come on." 
 
 Murray was in plain clothes; but he carried
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 73 
 
 a revolver. Tact would be needed this night; 
 with perhaps straight hitting, and the threat 
 of a shot sent wide. The side-street, with its 
 one lamp at the corner, was given over to a 
 cow cropping grass by the foot-path; but the 
 next flickered with lanterns and roared with 
 sound as the two ran into it. The bleared red 
 eye above Phelan's door rocked where someone 
 struck the lamp-edge with a stick, chanting a 
 song that made Murray's ears flame. Purdey's 
 grip held his arm. 
 
 "You'll get kiboshed if you jump into that," 
 he said. "They're drunk as lords. Let him 
 sing. There's no one at Phelan's but the old 
 man; and Cox is a pretty muddy puddle if he 
 can harm Phelan. Oh, by Jove! Ring those 
 lassies off " 
 
 The three girls paused on the curb, and lift- 
 ed a hymn, sweet and clear. By order of the 
 belief which they serve, it is the lassies who 
 pray on the street corners; standing pitiful 
 and unafraid, among the rinsings that wash 
 through all townships, and out again into the 
 unknown. And there is no man so sinful but 
 he will respect the lassies unless the hand of 
 drink is too heavy on him. From Blake's bar- 
 parlour Randal heard the first notes of the 
 hymn, and the shout of coarse laughter that 
 followed. 
 
 "Come on," he said, and no more. But 
 eight men pelted after him over the street.
 
 74 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 It was to Tod's eternal sorrow that he was 
 not in Blake's parlour that night. Lou told 
 all in unblemished vividness later, with the 
 Packer to grunt the burden; and the middle 
 piece came once from Steve when his great 
 blundering heart ached for the unburdening. 
 
 "I was mad," he said. (This was up a dried 
 water-course under the stars, with no one to 
 hear but Tod.) "I was blind, blazin' mad. 
 What sense had Maiden ter go takin' up wi' 
 the Army, an' ter go singin' in the street? An' 
 she innercent as a little soft-breasted bush- 
 wren, an' them Army lassies hevin' ter wade 
 roun' in all the devil's evil o' the world. It 
 was Randal cut us out a way through the ruck, 
 wi' his head under his arms same as we does in 
 a football rush near got squished too, he did. 
 I hed holt on her ter carry her out 'fore I knew 
 who it was. There was Pug Chancy wi' his 
 arm roun' her . " Steve looked down at his 
 knuckles. "Tuk near as much skin offen him 
 as offen them," he said. 
 
 "I was fancyin' as it was Lou brart her out," 
 said Tod. "It was Lou she was walkin' wid 
 up to the cemet'ry lasht avenin'." 
 
 "Was she?" Steve's voice roughened. "I 
 didn't think but she ain't spoke to me sence 
 last night, an' Lou he caught her hand when 
 I was lightin' out wi' her, an' he kissed it. 
 'You're brave, Maiden,' he said, an' was inter 
 the thick of it agin 'fore I could lash him. An'
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 75 
 
 I I was blind mad when I set her down at 
 the corner she was cryin', an' I was sick wi' 
 thinkin' o' what she'd heard. So I messed it 
 up straight. ' 'Take shame ter yerself,' I said, 
 'ter go listenin* ter foulness not fit fur men. 
 Git yer home an' ter bed, an' furgit it.' An' 
 she run from me; up an' in at the door, an' I 
 went back " 
 
 "Well then?" asked Tod after a pause. 
 
 Steve's fingers gripped the tussock-tufts 
 until the life flew from them in spurted earth. 
 
 "I reckon I did some good work fur Mur- 
 ray." Then he sat upright, his voice shaken 
 with passion. "Tod did you ever want ter 
 kill? Ter git on a man, an' break the back of 
 him, an' ter see him dyin' under yer hands " 
 
 "Bedad, I disremimber if iver I did," said 
 Tod, startled. "Ye're not afther feelin' that 
 away wid me, Steve; are ye now?" 
 
 "I would hev killed Lou ef I'd had him under 
 me boots in that mix-up," said Steve slowly. 
 "Maybe I'll kill him yet." 
 
 "There's more than wan wud kill Lou with 
 delight," said Tod, ruminating. "What does 
 he bring Roddy Duncan tu Blake's for but to 
 git Randal woild wid his gab of Art Scannell 
 an' Miss Effie? I seen Randal wid murder in 
 the black face of him more than wanst." 
 
 "Art and Roddy were in Phelan's wi' the 
 rest," said Steve, coming to his feet clumsily. 
 "I saw Roddy cryin' like the girl-baby he is."
 
 76 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Randal had seen more than that when he 
 burst through the welter of men. In the red 
 of the bar and the lamp Art Scannell stood, 
 capless and coatless, drumming the tambourine 
 snatched from Maiden, and shouting words 
 that brought Randal's clapped hand over his 
 mouth. Art struck him without delay. Then 
 the surge of the struggle swung them apart. 
 The black night rocked with shouts and curs- 
 ing and ribald laughter. On a wave-crest 
 Steve's face gleamed white, with drops of 
 sweat on the forehead, and Randal heard the 
 crack of his shut fist once and again. Came a 
 flash of Roddy's scared boy- face where great 
 hands forced him down on his knee-bones. Into 
 the tossed wrath and fury, and the stench of 
 spirits and heated men, Murray's voice clanged 
 like struck iron. Purdey was laughing on the 
 outskirts. It was for Murray to handle these 
 men down here. He would wring out his own 
 payment beyond North-of- Sunday. 
 
 Somewhere out of the blaring sounds reared 
 Pug Chaney's challenging war-note, and Lou 
 answered with his light glad laugh, and the 
 lithe spring of a seeking tiger. The two went 
 down beneath the turning boots, and Randal 
 baulked Murray's charge with his shoulder. 
 Murray staggered sideways, and Randal saw 
 Ormond's strong clean-cut face behind. His 
 teeth caught on his lip as he wrenched Mur- 
 ray's hands from Art's sleeve.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 77 
 
 "Take Pug if you want someone for your 
 credit's sake," he said. "But I'm hanged if 
 you'll touch Art Scannell." 
 
 Ormond had Roddy Duncan upright and 
 half-sheltered by his arm. He paused one in- 
 stant before buffetting out a track through the 
 locked and reeking bodies. 
 
 "Randal don't be a fool," he cried. "Mur- 
 ray has the law ." 
 
 Then the crowd surged in, and Randal un- 
 derstood through the whirl of blood-hot haste 
 that Murray was struggling with swinging 
 handcuffs. He heard the clink as they brushed 
 Art's arm. He struck straight from the shoul- 
 der, and Murray dropped without remark. 
 Then Randal beat a way out to the dark, and 
 the far pure stars, and silence. 
 
 The unholy excitement that calls up the 
 beast in man was abroad in the air, and Lou 
 rode on the blast of it; gay, quick-fisted, and 
 undistressed. The Packer, who nursed a 
 twisted arm for a full three weeks, averred 
 that it was Lou who brought peace at the 
 dawning when he turned the mob into Phelan's 
 bar for another round of nips, and helped 
 Murray and two more to select the ringleaders 
 where they lay in an unmoving slumber. 
 
 Randal came to Murray in the red morning. 
 His lip was swelled, and he was not otherwise 
 good to look on. 
 
 "It was I who floored you last night," he
 
 78 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 said. "Shall I show up at the court with the 
 others?" 
 
 Murray walked with a stick, and his hand 
 was skinned. He met Randal's eyes. 
 
 "No," he said. 
 
 Randal flushed. 
 
 "I'm not asking your confounded mercy," 
 he said savagely. 
 
 "You wouldn't get it if you were. Took 
 young Art home all right, did you?" 
 
 "Yes," said Randal, and turned on his heel. 
 "Tell Ormond I came to give myself up," he 
 added.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 "You see, I'm only a station-hand, Effie." 
 
 "Well, that's all you were when I first loved 
 you, silly boy." 
 
 "It didn't matter then. Nothing mattered. 
 Now it matters more than all the world be- 
 sides." 
 
 "It doesn't! How can it? I like things to 
 be just the same. The sunshine, and all the 
 slope of yellow down to the creek, and you sit- 
 ting up here just with me alone. I am I, and 
 you are you; and we've got all the sun and the 
 breezes to ourselves. And that is enough." 
 
 "Is it? My little Effie you don't 
 know " 
 
 "Oh, look! There's a butterfly! The first 
 one of spring! Ah!" 
 
 Kundul came to his feet as she sprang past 
 him with the gladness of a child in her limbs 
 and in her face. The spring air was blowing 
 warm across the hill-top and the veined slopes 
 to the westing, and the smell of young grass 
 and brown earth came up from the paddock- 
 flat where Moody and Lou were ploughing. 
 The hog-backed range to the rightward was 
 
 79
 
 80 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 puce and opal and blood-crimson, and on the 
 spears of sunlight between the cabbage-trees 
 the Red Admiral flickered like an elusive 
 thought. Randal laughed when the little 
 ringed fingers snatched for it, missed, and 
 glanced in light again. Then he flung his cap, 
 and brought the red-and-black flash to 
 earth. 
 
 "What a baby you are, Effie! he said. 
 "There's your plaything." 
 
 She cast herself on the tussock, slipping deli- 
 cate fingers under the old soiled tweed. 
 
 "Stupid boy what made you do that?" 
 
 "I thought you wanted it." 
 
 "Not like this with a broken wing. You've 
 spoilt it!" 
 
 She shook it off into the yellow spines, with 
 a childish pout, and Randal's face was sud- 
 denly hard. 
 
 "Not the only broken thing I've given you, 
 is it? You had better shake me off, too, Effie." 
 
 The sweet dark eyes were full of puzzlement, 
 and the lip dropped. 
 
 "Guy I never can understand you. I didn't 
 mean anything " 
 
 Randal kicked aside his gorse-knif e he had 
 been cutting brush in the gully beyond and 
 dropped down beside her. 
 
 "Dearest dear little girl, I know you 
 didn't. I sometimes wish you did. Effie, 
 you are such a child, and I oh, my little, lit-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 81 
 
 tie Effie, what are we doing! What are we 
 doing I" 
 
 "Being happy! That's enough for to-day, 
 isn't it? Don't be such a dear old duffer, 
 Guy." 
 
 She laid the drawn sword of a flax-leaf 
 across his mouth, laughing. Randal caught her 
 hand, gripping it fast. 
 
 "Listen," he said. "You are Life and Death 
 and Heaven and Hell to me. And I Heaven 
 knows what I am to you. For I think that 
 you don't know the meaning of those words 
 yet, Effie." 
 
 "I don't know. It doesn't matter, does it? 
 I do love you, Guy." 
 
 Her sweet breath was on his cheek, and her 
 soft troubled face was very close. Randal 
 nearly laughed. Just so would she have spoken 
 to her grandmother. 
 
 For an instant the mad longing was in him 
 to teach her, somehow, some way, that passion 
 which, once lit, burns to eternity on the very 
 core of life itself. Already she had taught him 
 all the unrest that is beyond a name. Already 
 she had taught him such desire as will purge 
 all dross from a man, or will kill him, body 
 and soul. She touched his neck gently. 
 
 "Do do you know what love really means, 
 Guy?" 
 
 Unseen, below the forehead of the hill Lou 
 was whistling as the plough wore round, and
 
 82 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the clank of tightening chains came up sharp- 
 ly. Randal moved. 
 
 "Do I know what love is? Yes; I know. 
 Though you were long years dead, and just 
 dust blown along the hills, I would feel you 
 pass by on the wind. I would love you then 
 as now " 
 
 She ruffled up his hair with both upstretched 
 hands, and her eyes were laughing. 
 
 "And how do you love me now?" she said. 
 
 And then Randal cast the honour that he 
 had been rivetting behind him for a space ; and 
 it broke, as it had broken many times before, 
 to be patched again through bitter nights of 
 wakefulness. 
 
 A wedge of swan passed dumbly overhead, 
 black on the daffodil sky. Along the crystal 
 of the snow-hills the sunset poured, red as 
 strong wine. The sharpness of it was in the 
 air, and in Randal's heart. He heard Lou's 
 laugh below as the leading-chains fell ; and the 
 tramp of the horses turning homeward. 
 
 "I work for your father," he said. "And I 
 can't look him in the face. I meet Murray and 
 Ormond, and others who are no better than I 
 -was. And I can't look them in the face. 
 For they know what I ought to be, and what I 
 am. And do you think I don't know what they 
 would call me if they knew this?" 
 
 His arms were very close round her, and she 
 smiled at him wonderingly.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 83 
 
 "I don't understand," she said. "It doesn't 
 make any difference really if they are in the 
 house while you are in the whare. For you 
 are a gentleman too, Guy." 
 
 "Effie, I think that I am not or I would 
 not be here. I am just drifting." 
 
 "Well, keep on drifting! I like you much 
 better that way than when you want to stand 
 on the other side of the road and touch your 
 cap. And please, please don't bother about all 
 the others days, Guy. There's just now noth- 
 ing else ever matters. And can't you fancy that 
 the broom and manuka in the gully are butter- 
 cups and daisies, and we are just children home 
 from school? And there's a wee, wee rabbit 
 over on the sand-ridge! Come and we'll chase 
 him home! Come!" 
 
 She darted across the tussock slope; and 
 Randal picked up his gorse-knife and followed, 
 the after-glow dark on his face. 
 
 Tod was hoarse with delight when Randal 
 came into the whare at the dusk. 
 
 "Begorra; it's the fat luck laid thick ontu 
 us this toime," he crowed. "Git to your pack- 
 in' then, Randal, me boyo. Wirrasthrew, that 
 niver a blackthorn grows woild in this bush at 
 all! Cud I break Pug Chaney's head wid the 
 fisht of me, du ye think now?" 
 
 "What is it?" demanded Randal. 
 
 Steve explained briefly.
 
 84 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "North-o'- Sunday. Four on us wi' drays ter 
 git the totara fur the noo drawin'-room; 
 Scannell wants it sharp. We're to give a hand 
 if Purdey is pushed. Reckon it'll take all o' 
 a week ter git it out." 
 
 "Who's to go?" asked Randal, with Effie's 
 good-night yet warm on his lips. 
 
 "Me," cried Tod, swinging his legs from the 
 table-edge. "An' yersilf. An' Steve an' Lou 
 an' me. Och ! Ye'd a right to be lookin' plazed, 
 me hayro of war in the corner there ! Throth 1 
 we'll be straightenin' Purdey's Camp till the 
 mother of it wud pass it widout good-day. Ay, 
 will we!" 
 
 "Purdey's Camp fights best when it's pure 
 drunk," remarked Lou, biting an end of waxed 
 thread from his half-mended saddle strap. 
 "You'll find them slogging in up to the knock- 
 er, Tod, or Purdey's eye-teeth tell lies." 
 
 "Won't they be stoppin' for males, thin, at 
 all, at all? Plaze the pigs I'll learn them to 
 foight whin sober. Ah! bad luck to it! Why 
 was not mesilf in the township that noight?" 
 
 The cook chuckled, dredging flour into a 
 stew. 
 
 "There was a few there as is wishin' they 
 wasn't, I'm thinkin'. Does Maiden run wi' the 
 Lassie pack still, Steve?" 
 
 Steve was cobbling a patch in the shoulder- 
 blade of his best waistcoat. A small darn 
 Maiden had once made for him lay next it.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 85 
 
 He jumped at her name, spearing his thumb 
 with the big needle. 
 
 "Dunno," he said, in savage defiance. "Ask 
 Lou. He sees more o' her than I does." 
 
 Lou drew a new thread through the wax with 
 a rasping squeal. 
 
 "Tod's gone across to pack," he said. "If 
 you fellows want to keep any of your belong- 
 ings you'd best overhaul his swag. He was 
 making off with my dungarees 
 
 "He's jest torn all ways wi* excitement," 
 said Ted Douglas. "Keep an eye on him, 
 Steve, or Purdey's Camp'll make him into 
 paper pulp." 
 
 Tod had looked for battle since his petti- 
 coat days, and the joy of two fists put up op- 
 posite his own was greater to him than the love 
 of woman and home. These are the men who 
 tread out the ways, alone and reckless, that 
 another man may build thereon. He descend- 
 ed on Purdey's Camp with challenge in his 
 eye and in his shoulder-swing, and not all the 
 long aching hours since sun-up had stiffened 
 the clatter of his tongue. 
 
 Purdey met them at the door of his slab hut; 
 read over ScannelTs note, and gave verdict on 
 the instant. 
 
 "Can't possibly get it all out this week," he 
 said. "We only tapped the spur yesterday. 
 You men will have to put your backs into it. 
 Lou, you're good at team work. You and
 
 86 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Steve can go to the logging, and I'll put Pug 
 and Webber on felling. Tod, you'd best take 
 the cross-out. Mair will be your mate. He 
 can wind any man in camp." 
 
 "Sure then there's a bloomin* knock-out 
 waitin' for him, the gossoon," said Tod joy- 
 ously. "For there is no toight-lacin' wid Scan- 
 nell's men at all, at all." 
 
 Then Purdey glanced at Randal's sullen 
 jaws and eyes, and swallowed a smile. Ran- 
 dal would work like a demon while this mood 
 held him. 
 
 "Felling for you, too," he said. "And you'll 
 find some tough stuff to bite on." He slid his 
 hands in his trousers-pockets, looking on them 
 with the bland grin of a child. 
 
 "I believe I saw some of you in that row 
 in the township last month," he said. "You 
 take your chances here, you know. I sack the 
 first man who complains." 
 
 He turned into his hut, and Tod wriggled 
 with thankful joy. 
 
 "Did I not tell ye we wud turn the Camp 
 insoide out?" he cried. "Four of us, wid fishts 
 all, and Lou havin' science to top up wid. 
 Come on wid ye, now, whoile we give thim 
 good-mornin'." 
 
 But the belt-rope of work ran rapid and 
 unbroken on Purdey's Camp. Purdey's hand 
 swayed each separate lever. At the tram-head 
 the gangs felt it, where they wrought with the
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 87 
 
 lean rails and sleepers, driving Purdey's will 
 through the bush-heart; where they served the 
 double saws and the axe-blades, and fed sticks 
 to the grips that gaped ever from the tail of the 
 logging-tracks. The bench sawyers felt it, and 
 the trolley-men ; and each tailer-out and engine 
 driver down to the least and clumsiest slabby 
 that lumped in the mill. 
 
 One and all, they had no time to play with 
 Tod, until the engine called time, and the mill- 
 men slouched across to the huts set in the strag- 
 gle of raped bush, and the cooking-smell rose 
 on the blue keen air, Then the crowd came 
 down from the tram-head; and the gum from 
 bleeding timber was on hairy chests and hands, 
 and the good sappy scents strong on their 
 clothes. 
 
 Then Steve's heart leapt in him at sound of 
 the bush-talk, which is a language all its own ; 
 and Lou sifted through the trampling vivid- 
 voiced mob, picking sharpers and fools in an 
 eye-blink; and Tod arranged three set-to's to 
 come after the meal, and a double with Steve 
 as partner. 
 
 "But you'd best not be servin' writs on 
 Purdey," warned Chessin. "He's got the 
 devil's own science, an' a little more o' his own. 
 Saw him put Pug to sleep wonst for cheekin* 
 him." 
 
 There was the grate of pride in Chessin's 
 tone. For the bushmen are men, and they;
 
 88 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 will not serve less than a man. And, one and 
 altogether, they will choose a beating in fair 
 ding-dong fight before the easy handling a 
 weak soul may give. 
 
 Tod blinked round the clearing where a full 
 hundred men from the ends of earth struck the 
 great bass chord of virulent life above the ten- 
 der treble of the wind passing in the tree- 
 tops. 
 
 "Wid the four of us takin* come-an-go- 
 agin I think we can manage to howld up to 
 the week-indinY' he said. 
 
 From Purdey's Camp a twelve-mile tram- 
 line ran up to the terminus. The rails were of 
 wood, and warped by the frost. They were 
 hog-backed over the creeks and gullies, and 
 sinfully greasy in rain. But there, and in the 
 clashing mills, Purdey's men made few mis- 
 takes. For Purdey had the knack of rousing 
 their pride, and pride carries weight with all 
 men who are worthy the name. 
 
 Steve roused next morning to the scream 
 of the mill-engines, and the snarl of waking 
 saws. He fought in the man-choked rough- 
 slabbed hut for sea-pie and mutton through the 
 blank chill that goes before dawn, and took 
 the first jigger that sat on the line while the 
 sunrise was drowsy and faint on the tree-tops. 
 For already the bush was calling with the 
 witchery of shaken sunbeams on the laughing 
 brown-eyed cheeks, and the trembling sweet
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 89 
 
 silences of frail ferns that have not seen the 
 day. 
 
 No man bred in the streets and the sheltered 
 ways may know the glorious merciless joy that 
 follows the first sob of the blade into green 
 unhandled timber. And though an axeman be 
 past all but the blurred memory, he will turn 
 at that sound from all other music that earth 
 may hold. For the bush is the Eternal Artist 
 whose work no man makes sensuous or coarse, 
 and to them that love her she gives that intu- 
 ition which gets behind mystery and unbe- 
 lief to prove that God has made in His own 
 image the Almighty Peace which He lays on 
 Nature the round world through. 
 
 In the cook-hut someone was bawling for a 
 stolen crib. The clank of steel burred sharp 
 on the air as a tram-horse bucked in the traces. 
 Lou came over the beaten clearing with his 
 long whip in his arm-pit, and swung to the 
 jigger as Hoffman got it under way. His 
 knee brushed Steve's when he took the place 
 opposite, and his gay chaff flicked the man at 
 his side to haste. Steve lay to the handles in 
 dogged silence. True hate marches ever with 
 fear to goad it, and, for Maiden's sake, Steve 
 feared and hated Lou. 
 
 One by one the jiggers crawled out behind, 
 strung along the grey line like shifting beads 
 on a string. The utter peace of the morning 
 broke under the grate of wheels and the deep
 
 90 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 chest-breathing that carried light snatches of 
 song. The tinkle of frost- thinned creeks mur- 
 mured alongside, and shy tentative trills and 
 flutters in the deeps of the scented gullies told 
 to men that the birds were mating. 
 
 Lou swung forward, and his breath brushed 
 Steve's face. It was whiskey-tainted; but his 
 eyes were clear blue as the sky, and the white 
 skin that showed where the loose shirt gaped 
 was no whiter than his even teeth. 
 
 "It's nice to think we're good friends, isn't 
 it?" he said. "There's whips of places on a 
 logging-track where a man might come to 
 grief by accident." 
 
 The mockery of the light tone hit Steve. He 
 gripped at the handles. 
 
 "I never had nuthin' ter do wi' them kind o' 
 accidents," he answered. 
 
 "Nor I." Lou blinked up at the welter of 
 gold in the branches. "Hear that tui! He's 
 making love to his mate. D'you think he'll 
 ever get her, Steve? They are clumsy beggars, 
 you know." 
 
 "Id is nod dey is de only clumsy beggar," 
 growled Hoffman. "You did near haf us ofer 
 der culvert! Sit oop, man, und put your back 
 indo id." 
 
 The jigger rocked round a steep angle, and 
 Lou swung to balance with the ease of the sad- 
 dle-bred. Right and left the old logging- 
 tracks lay on the slopes. In years past they
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 91 
 
 too had waited; ripped, raw, and bleeding, in 
 the dews of the maiden bush, for the cleft hoofs 
 to beat them to barren clay. Now the jiggers 
 flashed from them to new life that called; 
 and to their nakedness and poverty of 
 rotting stumps the lawyer-thorn and vagrant 
 convolvulus gave pity and careless cover- 
 ing. 
 
 For a full hour, as the sun warmed and the 
 black gullies waked, the jiggers swarmed up- 
 ward; labouring along the steep grades, and 
 dipping with swallow-flight to the sturdy 
 bridges that spanned creek and gully and 
 swamp. And then the heart-hunger that 
 jagged Randal always gave before the joy of 
 the axe-helve cold in his hand, and the crackle 
 of underbrush as the men crashed through and 
 away from the life and the noise at the tram- 
 head. 
 
 With the instinct which Purdey called a 
 power of the devil, Punch Reynolds could nose 
 out the best timber through the bitterest coun- 
 try that ever broke a man's heart. He stormed 
 the totara spur, quick-glancing in the shadows 
 for each bole that would run a decent three 
 feet across. Randal and his squad crashed 
 after, obeying the sharp wood-pecker tap of 
 the blaze; and before the axe swung for the 
 scarf the clearers were under his feet, with long 
 knives for the vine and young sapling. Cox 
 ruled the next gang.
 
 92 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Scannell wants fifteen feets," he said. 
 "That stick'll cut two and that." 
 
 He scored the mark and passed, swearing 
 at the wide-branched tops. For these shouted 
 of second-class timber from each ruddy knot. 
 
 Lou swung his team where the great white 
 chips flew, and the blue flame lit his eyes as 
 Tod and Mair sprang back with the cross-cut. 
 For the tree stood one tense second, then leapt 
 on its stump; roaring headlong through the 
 lighter timber, and bringing Steve to earth 
 with a stray branch. 
 
 Steve picked himself up, wiped the blood 
 from his neck with his sleeve, and backed his 
 team to the stick Cox had marked. 
 
 "I'll come back fur the chap as floored me 
 when it's ready," he said. "What made yer 
 fell the sloven end that a-way, Tod, yer ani- 
 mal?" 
 
 Tod lent his weight to the grip where Steve 
 struggled with it. 
 
 "Begad; I cudn't git the thing to turn a 
 somersault, at all, at all," he declared. "Maybe 
 it's easier drawin' from the little ind, boy, 
 dear." 
 
 "Yer a fool," proclaimed Pug, lifting the 
 iron grip as he would have lifted a pair of 
 scissors, and casting it into place. "Git a move 
 on wi' them brutes there." 
 
 The chains shrieked as the strain fell on 
 them; the grip bit and held in the bleeding
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 93 
 
 wood, and the bullocks grunted with fore-bent 
 shoulders as the great bole drew slowly from its 
 port. 
 
 The logging-way was a cross between a 
 skittle-alley and the 'tween-deck promenade of 
 an ocean tramp. It was moist and chill as the 
 grave, and very nearly as dark. Steve wound 
 into it, where the dank smells and the utter 
 silence gave him creeps up his spine, and the 
 jar of the log on the iron earth and the creak 
 of the twisting yokes sounded hideously loud 
 and unfamiliar. Veil on veil of wide wet spider 
 webs broke before the slow horns, and under- 
 foot the young springs gave up their lives in 
 splintered glass. Far above, where the sun 
 was, a handful of moko-mokos made their 
 prayer to God. Then behind, from mouth of 
 the track, Lou's whistle soared up to catch the 
 falling notes: but to neither man was there 
 aught of hymn in it. The tune broke to words 
 that stung Steve with their rollicking derision. 
 
 "l know she likes me ! I know she likes me, 
 Because she says so " 
 
 Came a sudden clatter, hurried oaths, the 
 curse of the whip ; once and thrice. Then a full- 
 lunged shout of command: 
 
 "Steve ! Make way there ! Make out ! They've 
 bolted!" 
 
 Steve stood. And there was all of the devil in 
 his face. When that bolting team crashed
 
 94 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 full-speed into the great butt at his elbow, forty 
 pounds worth of bullocks would go twice 
 that, and perhaps more. For this was Purdey's 
 best team, and Purdey was a hard man. With- 
 out any doubt Lou would disappear before 
 
 payment was called, and Maiden The 
 
 thoughts ran with the swiftness of a main- 
 spring unloosed. Then the message of the 
 bush went home. Steve jumped for his team, 
 cut the whip on the rumps, on the quivering 
 flanks, on the nozzles that dripped and blew 
 wide with terror. The log canted and groaned 
 as the brutes sprang ; swayed to a clumsy trot ; 
 to a canter, and blundered down the steep 
 grade with the grip live-leaping behind. Steve 
 half -swung to the yoke, grimly beating a lag- 
 gard about the head. 
 
 "Ten ter one he'll git pinched ef they strike 
 comin' that pace, too. He must be hold- 
 in' ter 'em. Gosh! He kin swear!" 
 
 The off-leader pecked, and Steve's whip 
 snarled under the wrist-work that had peeled 
 skin in straight lines from more than one bolt- 
 ing piker. The sidling was greasy in clay. 
 Now again it was corduroy that jarred Steve's 
 spine, and rough-rolling stones giving no foot- 
 hold. Steve's breath came in groans, and 
 sweat ran down his face. Yet because of 
 that something in man which forces him to be 
 true against his will he flung all power of 
 body and mind to his labour.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 95 
 
 The leaders took a corner too fine. The log 
 grunted, swung, and grounded across the 
 track, jamming between stiff tuke-tuke sap- 
 lings. Steve's heart leapt in his throat as he 
 sent a glance up the track. For down the 
 greasy sidling Lou's team was coming at a 
 swinging gallop, and the grip bounded in the 
 air, unsteadied by any weight whatever. 
 
 "Lost 'is log, has he? Grip slipped my 
 soul! he'll pay for't in a minute." 
 
 Then Steve stood aside, helpless, while the 
 other man gave payment. 
 
 Lou's right hand was as a twitch on the 
 foremost red nostril, and the brute had its head 
 up, bellowing with pain. Two chains; one; 
 then the charge hit the four-foot totara fair, 
 and crumbled. 
 
 Lou found foothold, cat-like, diving in 
 where the fallen leaders writhed, and the eight 
 behind bunched upon them. The flurry of 
 sweat-caked bodies and tossing horns and red- 
 dened strained eyes made the very gateway of 
 the Pit, and that gate fell half -open for Lou 
 as he struggled, cursing, with the chains. 
 Quite clearly Steve saw him go down where 
 the hoofs beat. Quite clearly he remembered 
 Lou's face as he kissed Maiden's hand in the 
 crush. 
 
 "Curse him," he said, "now an' always!" 
 Then he went in and brought the man out. 
 
 Lou's left sleeve was ripped to the shoulder,
 
 96 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 and a stray horn had run out a trench up the 
 flesh beneath. His face was curd-white under 
 the bloody spume that flecked it, and he stag- 
 gered, half-blind and sick. 
 
 "Get out," he said, when Steve would have 
 strapped the torn flesh. "Lend a hand with 
 these brutes before they kick themselves into 
 blazes." 
 
 They took the danger shoulder to shoulder, 
 without speech and without hesitation. But 
 the sweat of pain ran down Lou's face, and 
 Steve's grip on the hooks was unsteady. 
 
 When the log was freed and Steve's team 
 under way again, Lou spoke with tight lips, 
 and the red dripping from his cuff-band to 
 the dust. 
 
 "I'm taking all that can walk back for my 
 log. But you needn't try to trap me again, 
 for I'll be coming too slow next time." 
 
 Steve straightened as under a whip-cut. The 
 savage showed for a flash in his honest broad 
 face. 
 
 "By ! you'll pay for that when yer got 
 
 two hands agin, Lou Birot! Don't go thinkm' 
 as I'll furgit " 
 
 "I don't mean you to forget," said Lou; but 
 his light defiance crumbled, and he steadied 
 with an effort. 
 
 Something fought with the hate in Steve. 
 
 "Yer can't go back, Lou. Yer ain't fit. 
 Yer can't swing a whip "
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 97 
 
 "Do you want to feel if I can't?" demanded 
 Lou, and his eyes were wicked absolutely. 
 
 Steve went, never looking back. Lou turned 
 to his team. The leaders were dying where 
 they stood, brought to their feet only by the 
 point of the knife. The power of it goaded 
 them into the under-scrub at the track-side, 
 where they pitched sideways among soft-head- 
 ed moss and maiden-hair and the flower of the 
 wild strawberry to meet death with wrath and 
 black pain. 
 
 Three hours later Lou brought his shrunk 
 team down to the tram-head. There was a 
 heathenish bandage round his arm, and a tour- 
 niquet hugging the thick of it. He crawled 
 up the logging-bank, cast off the grip opposite 
 the waiting trolley, stumbled into a ganger's 
 hands, and lay there. 
 
 Purdey bound the wound that night with the 
 tenderness of a woman. Then he tongue- 
 lashed Lou into white fury before all the 
 Camp. For carelessness was the unforgivable 
 sin beyond TsTorth-of- Sunday, and without 
 doubt, Lou's grip had never been properly set. 
 Tod carried the truth back to Mains with a 
 couple of black eyes as a voucher. 
 
 "Be aisy till I tell you, thin," he said. "Sure, 
 it's the unnathural ugly objic' Pug Chancy is 
 when he comes out of the ind of a mill wid 
 Steve to do the clappin' on him. Bedad, it's 
 Steve is the quare ould slogger an' all of it!
 
 98 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Clane and clever he is, and Lou'll have to be 
 takin' afther the devil what owns him to turn 
 Steve over whin they putt up their hands. An' 
 that'll be all to watch! It is not Lou takes the 
 whip-cut widout lookin' for the hand what 
 gives it. No sorra a fear will Lou do that!" 
 
 "But it was Purdey rowed him," said Ike. 
 "Even Lou must see that." 
 
 Tod looked at him pityingly. 
 
 "May ye git your health till ye grow sinse," 
 he said. "Musha! Ye've a right to live to a 
 quare ould age, I'm thinkinV
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE dust was bone-white on the road that 
 boot, hoof and wheel had scored over. The hot 
 day held a taint of Nor'west, and the new- 
 clothed poplars along the sale-yard fence 
 propped a sky blue and vivid as sapphire. The 
 yards were without shade; breathless, clogged 
 by panting sheep and restless-eyed cattle, and 
 broken and unbroken horses. The air was 
 rank with the smell of them, and with the 
 smell of cheap tobacco and beer and mole- 
 skins and leather: for the township lay just 
 round the corner, and the drovers sat along 
 the rails with the give-and-take talk of a month 
 in their mouths, and the high-pitched clatter 
 of the auctioneers to deaden it. 
 
 Danny detached himself from a knot of 
 women by the poultry-crates and climbed the 
 rail beside Hynes, the Behar cook who had 
 come down from the hills to get a tooth pulled. 
 With Lou, Danny had brought over a draught 
 of steers at daybreak, and the stockwhip 
 round his arm showed wet hairs on it yet. 
 
 "Pic-nics they was ter land, too," explained 
 Danny, ramming twist into his half-bitten
 
 100 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 pipe. "See me talkin' ter Mrs. Elaine over 
 there? Two on 'em got waltzin' round her 
 back-yard, an' I'm goffered ef she didn't go fur 
 'em proper wi' the fryin'-pan. Clouted 'em 
 over the head all seraphic, she did." 
 
 "Jimmie cud 'a' done well wi' some o' his 
 mother's spare pluck," said Hynes. "An' 
 what'll he be sayin' 'bout old Buggy, I won- 
 der?" 
 
 Danny sucked fire into his pipe, and killed 
 the match between slow fingers. 
 
 "Devil knows," he said soberly. "I'm con- 
 ducin' as Jimmie don't ner won't yet a bit. 
 He's been cleanin' up the last o' the rabbitin' 
 fur Robertson back o' All Alone sence Scan- 
 nell sacked him. 'Tain't much news he'll be 
 gittin' there 'cept what the wekas an' keas has 
 on tap." 
 
 "Rum thing o' Ted Douglas ter git his mate 
 sacked that a-way," said Pavit. "I can't un- 
 derstand it myself." 
 
 Pavit was a muddy dredge-hand from the 
 Glory, and he sat the rail with his long hip- 
 boots swinging, and the yellow clay caked on 
 his cap. Danny turned on him fiercely. 
 
 "Never s'posed yer cud ! It takes a man ter 
 understan' a man. What'd Ted hev done wi' 
 Lou and Scott an' them rotters ef he hadn't 
 played the game? Can ye consplain that, 
 now?" 
 
 "Jimmie was the wust rotter o' the lot, any-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 101 
 
 ways," said Lossin, comfortably, and Hynes 
 added : 
 
 "Same here. I'll eat me false teeth if it 
 weren't Jimniie as sucked poor old Buggy dry 
 an' lef him ter starve " 
 
 "Ted's runner-up fur them stakes " be- 
 gan Garron, and staggered back as Danny 
 leapt for him. 
 
 "Tell him that ter his face, will yer, ye ? 
 
 An' if he leaves the two jaws on yer it'll be 
 so as yer kin beg his pardon the way he kin 
 onnerstan' it! Ted! Ted Douglas! Doesn't 
 we know " 
 
 "As he an' Jimmie was the on'y two old 
 Buggy'd ever hev inside his door," ended Gar- 
 ron, holding the little man off. "And there's 
 one on 'em wheedled all his rhino outer him, 
 poor old fool. An' 'Dun't you throw it up ter 
 the lad,' says he. 'He was kind ter the old 
 man,' says he." 
 
 "Old ass, he should have said," amended 
 Hynes. "But Murray ain't sure, else why is 
 he grubbin' high and low fur inflamation 'fore 
 he knows if it's wuth while ter bring Ted 
 in from his musterin' er Jimmie from All 
 Alone?" 
 
 "Old Buggy knowed it was Ted, or would 
 he have died with his mouth shut?" said Gar- 
 ron departing; and Lossin came into the talk. 
 
 "What d'yer expect ter git fur them steers, 
 Danny?"
 
 102 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Danny showed a rip in his trouser-leg, and 
 spat emphatically. 
 
 "Some more o' that if we got ter deliver 'em. 
 Scannell expects four-ten, and Pike don't 
 elucidate to it. He's givin' Art the wet side 
 of his tongue over it, I guess." 
 
 Two yards off was Art Scannell with his 
 dogs at heel and a red-whiskered man opposite. 
 Art was booted and breeched, and his dark 
 delicate face and small head carried the charm 
 and the grace of his sister. But his walk and 
 his speech were uncertain, and the pupil of 
 his eye too dull. Danny watched the rising 
 storm cheerfully, and he chuckled as Art 
 kicked his dogs apart and moved off with a 
 curt-flung sentence. 
 
 "Sell 'em himself, will he? I seen him do 
 that wonst. I seen him balustradin' on the 
 rails sellin' pigs. 'One-four/ he yells out; 
 'one-four one-four,' and smack! over he 
 pitches atop of the pigs, an' old Backrip, he 
 yells out 'Darn it, Art, but it's one for 
 you this time.' Then Randal being allers 
 superflous goes in an' yanks him out an' 
 cleans him down. That's young Art doin' 
 sellin'." 
 
 The Packer stuck his lean eagle-face over 
 Hynes' shoulder. 
 
 "There ain't no men these days," he said. 
 "We cud drink proper when I was young. 
 Big Jos Creer you know Jos?"
 
 Danny nodded. Jos Creer's name was 
 green up in the shut miners' cemetery on the 
 hill, with the date 1869 against it. 
 
 "He was a man," said Packer. "I seen him 
 knock down a twenty-cheque in Mullin's bar 
 wot stood where the Crescent dredge is now 
 an' go straight away out an' carry a sack 
 o' flour two mile over the hill ter Chinaman's 
 Gully fur a bet. An' the hills reekin' wi' shafts 
 and scrub in those days, not to be speakin' o* 
 cows strayed off of the commonage. That's 
 what I calls a man." 
 
 "That's what I calls a fool," said Danny, 
 politely, and cast himself headlong through six 
 wedges of men to drag a fox-terrier off the 
 ear of his blue Smithfield. The fox-terrier be- 
 longed to Roddy Duncan, who had come up 
 from the township with Art, and it was Mur- 
 ray's crisp tones that cut the wrangle in half. 
 Roddy was more flushed and excited than he 
 should have been; but he straightened before 
 the keen eyes, for they wore the look of the 
 hunter of men. 
 
 "What yer after?" said Danny, recovering 
 his temper. 
 
 "Dick Wepeha. Sheep-stealing again. 
 Danny, can you tell me the brands and ear- 
 marks of Jackson's new draught an' any- 
 thing about Behar or Mackay's?" 
 
 Danny knew the signs of all sheep within 
 fifty miles. Each holder in the distance de-
 
 104 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 sired him for a day or an hour at branding- 
 time, and came the sheep in a mixed draught 
 from Westland or Wairarapa or Nelson 
 Danny laid his finger unerringly on each, and 
 told off the present owner. Every man has 
 his own gift to cultivate. Danny had culti- 
 vated his into genius. It was polyglot jabber 
 to Roddy; but Murray jotted it down, quick- 
 fingered. 
 
 "Thanks," he said, snapping his note-book. 
 "I might find some stray skins round Dick's 
 paddocks." 
 
 "Yer keep yer eyebrows shiftin' for Pipi 
 Wepeha," said Danny, wisely. "He curses 
 chaps as he don't like." 
 
 "We all do that," said Murray, and laughed. 
 
 "Yer conspirin' enough ter know the differ 
 when a old Maori tohunga starts that game, 
 ain't yer?" demanded Danny, tartly. "If Pipi 
 puts his foolery on ter you, Murray, yer'll 
 smart fur it." 
 
 "Bah!" said Murray, and swung off, clean- 
 limbed and alert. 
 
 Roddy, having fear of all things which he 
 did not understand, fed that fear on all possible 
 occasions. 
 
 "W-what would Pipi do?" he asked ner- 
 vously. 
 
 Lou's clear laugh sounded behind him. 
 
 "Do? He'd put makutu on him for a start. 
 Then Murray "
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 105 
 
 "Shut it, Lou, an' don't go swabbin' what 
 brains he's got out o' him 
 
 But Lou backed to the fence, crossed his 
 legs, and began to speak slowly, his hands in 
 his pockets, and a half-score men listening. 
 And he did not guess he was loosening the 
 sod for more graves than one. Lou came from 
 the North, where the pakeha learns the be- 
 liefs and the hates of the Maori, on land soaked 
 in the blood of both races ; and what he had to 
 tell he told cleverly, to trouble the wide-eyed 
 boy before him. So that in the end Roddy 
 went away, sick and shaken; and giddy with 
 the unfolding of a horror too vivid for his sen- 
 sitive brain. 
 
 "Brute yer are, Lou," said Danny, fiercely; 
 and Lou grinned, filling his pipe. 
 
 "Tell you, it's a real joke to rattle that kid. 
 He gathers up every egg you chuck at him, 
 and sits on it." 
 
 "He'll hatch trouble out o' that one, belike," 
 said Hall. " 'Tain't right " 
 
 "Bah! Those steers are sold, Danny, so we're 
 right ; and that's all I care about. Let the kid 
 go to blazes if he likes." 
 
 Roddy chased his shadow swiftly up the 
 white road. At the corner Gordon's wife 
 stood at a cottage-door, merry-eyed and clean- 
 ly, with children tumbling at her feet. The 
 scent of hawthorn came over the gate with her 
 voice.
 
 106 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Roddy ! Tell Gordon to hurry up home. I 
 got a bit o' chicken for his tea." 
 
 Roddy grunted reply without looking up, 
 and tramped on. Over the tussock hill the sun- 
 set lay red, and the cool of the spring evening 
 grew as the Nor'west died. Roddy climbed 
 the stiff slope with its needly spines, beat 
 through gorse and broom until the thunder of 
 the dredges in Changing Creek filled the air, 
 and the tent that he shared with Fysh showed 
 in the shingle gully at his feet. By the fire 
 Fysh was feeding already. He paused with 
 his knife at his mouth to say: 
 
 "Yer ain't got much time ter go wastin', 
 kid." 
 
 Roddy poured strong tea from the billy; 
 drank again and again; clawed oilskins and 
 long boots from beneath the bunk, and fixed 
 on a loose button with wire. Fysh ate with 
 noise and cheerful haste, and Roddy's nerves 
 twitched in irritation and disgust. 
 
 "Did yer tell Ormond 'bout that shovel 
 yer broke the 'andle off of?" demanded Fysh, 
 licking the sugar out of his pannikin audibly. 
 
 "Curse the shovel," said Roddy. 
 
 Fysh stared. Then he rose and boxed 
 Roddy's ears. 
 
 "I got 'nother 'and for the other side if you 
 give me any back-talk," he said. "Come up 
 out o' that, an' get to yer work." 
 
 Roddy followed over the hill uncaring;
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 107 
 
 jumped the five-foot tail-race with a stagger; 
 dragged on the hip-boots and the oilskins, and 
 stood by the boxes until the moment when Gor- 
 don should toss him the shovel. The Lion had 
 been ground-sluicing these seven months, and 
 Roddy loathed box-work above all things in- 
 vented. He turned his back on the jet and 
 the great sullen pipes, and stared downhill 
 at the yellow of the tail-race where it touched 
 the zinc-blue of the Creek. In the manuka 
 below he heard the complaining voice of Kil- 
 iat, and Ormond's quick virile answers. Then 
 the wet shovel met his hands, and his eyes fell 
 on the boxes mechanically. 
 
 There was heavy stuff coming down, and 
 the shake of the trestles and the spume of the 
 water made him giddy. Twice the race ran 
 abrim, choking. Once she slopped over with 
 a roar that brought Kiliat up to see. He 
 said that to Roddy which set the boy's fingers 
 itching on the shovel and his eyes drawing to 
 the sleek head under the check cap. Ormond 
 guessed the desire for connection, and sympa- 
 thised. 
 
 "Sheer clumsiness and inattention," wound 
 up Kiliat. "I've had my eye on you for some 
 time; and ah I could do your work better 
 myself." 
 
 "Do it, then," said Roddy, and cast down the 
 shovel. 
 
 Ormond was weary and irritated himself;
 
 108 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 but there was that in Roddy's face which made 
 him anxious. 
 
 ''Pick that up and go on with your work," 
 he said, sharply. "Leave him alone, Kiliat, 
 and go an' spring your little jokes on some- 
 one else. Roddy hasn't any sense of humour." 
 
 "He has insulted me," raved Kiliat. 
 
 "You'd better go and handle a slave-gang 
 if you want soft answers to your lip. Roddy 
 won't offend again. I'll vouch for him. Good- 
 night." 
 
 But Ormond had stern words for the boy 
 when Kiliat had gone. 
 
 "If you play up with your work and your 
 masters as you are doing, you'll find yourself 
 fired out very shortly," he said. "Art Scan- 
 nell's to blame for this, I suppose " 
 
 "He's my mate," said Roddy, sullenly. 
 
 "Then your mate will have to find you an- 
 other billet before long, if you're not careful. 
 Remember what I say, Roddy. If I sweat 
 myself I make my men sweat too, and you 
 haven't tightened your traces this fortnight." 
 
 He left Roddy alone in the darkening night, 
 with the work that took toll of the boy's body 
 and freed his mind to search in morbid terror 
 through Lou's words. Down in the desolate 
 creek-bed each clump of flax and slender cab- 
 bage-tree was alive with its Maori birthright 
 of mystery and gloom, and the roar of the 
 water shut him in on himself relentlessly.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 109 
 
 The pale saffron of the after-glow called 
 Ormond from his hut to the power-house. Here 
 he switched on the electric light, locked the 
 door, and went over to Fysh at the jet. The 
 spark of light jumped before him from lamp 
 to lamp, shutting out the wild hills of dead 
 manuka and distance with a solid wall of black. 
 Under the near lamp-post the jet spouted from 
 a four-inch nozzle, scoring up the rock and 
 down as Fysh's hand swayed it. Ormond 
 watched for two minutes with keen eyes and 
 tight lips. He had been up at the penstock all 
 day, and that was an eighteen-mile walk all 
 told. The clipped hour since his return had 
 been crowded with Kiliat's complaints; and 
 Ormond steadied himself under the light be- 
 fore he trusted his voice to speak. 
 
 The rock shivered where the jet struck it, 
 and sunk forward in a puddle of yellowish 
 wash. Fysh dipped his wrist a fraction, and 
 the water dug out a big manuka bush, tossing 
 it over into the night beyond. Then the steady 
 roar blattered on rock again, sending a comb 
 of white smoke above the light-arc. 
 
 "What's all that waste water doing round 
 the junction?" demanded Ormond, bringing 
 his mouth to the other's ear. 
 
 "She's leakin'," explained Fysh. 
 
 "Leaking! The ! Why, you're using 
 
 the second head, you eternal !" Ormond 
 
 jumped for the two-way cock. "Get up to the
 
 110 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 other nozzle, I tell you." He swung the 
 handles round with a jerk, and at the ceasing 
 of the thunder Fysh spoke. 
 
 "Kiliat said as we was to use this beast;" 
 he shook the dribbling nozzle: "said as how 
 it was bigger." 
 
 "Kiliat be oh, all right. He didn't know 
 it was leaking, I suppose. Change over. Keep 
 her at that, and I'll overhaul this in the morn- 
 ing. Just the bolts worked loose, I expect." 
 
 Fysh sniggered as he turned, and Ormond's 
 hands came out of his pockets in a flash. But 
 he dropped them, swung on his heel, and 
 tramped through clayey mullock until the tail 
 of light flickered out over yellow wash in the 
 boxes and the white of Roddy's face. The un- 
 derstanding of Fysh's half-laugh sung through 
 Ormond's head, and brought a roughness to 
 his voice. 
 
 "Roddy! There's heavy stuff in the corner. 
 Watch it below the half-way, for one ripple is 
 cracked." 
 
 "Yes," said Roddy, and hopped into the 
 boxes, loosing a block with one masterly kick 
 of the shovel. 
 
 Ormond dropped his head on his chest, and 
 went down-hill with a sure swift foot among 
 the raffle of dead scrub and fallen-in shafts 
 and stones. The grate of wash and the snarl 
 of the jet passed out behind, and down on the 
 level of tjie Changing Creek was pale star-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 111 
 
 light and a muggy chill dampness. He slung 
 along the half -yard track under the bank, and 
 came to the two dredges that sat at the corner, 
 glaring electric light, and pouring out muddy 
 water unendingly. Ormond cursed their fat 
 squat prosperity, swung himself up to the 
 gorse and broom of the hill-top, took the town- 
 ship street at its lower end, and hammered on 
 Father Denis' door. A candle glimmered in 
 the dark passage, and Ormond spoke to the 
 glint of it. 
 
 "Anyone here, Father? I'm coming in to 
 talk." 
 
 The priest's quick ear caught the tension in 
 Ormond's tone. He laid a fat hand on the 
 door, and shut it. 
 
 "There is not, then. I'm just after finish- 
 ing me tea you'll wait for a pipe, Ormond? 
 Sure, you've let me smoke alone these ten 
 nights. Busy? Uh-h! When were ye any- 
 thing else? Not that chair. Ye cracked it 
 last toime wid yer fooleries there's tobacco be- 
 hind ye, man. Aye; that tin's the brand ov 
 yer own." 
 
 Ormond lit up with unsteady hands, draw- 
 ing the life in broken, impatient puffs. Father 
 Denis lowered his bulk into the worn leathern 
 chair opposite, and made a blue veil of smoke 
 between the two. For a good pipe loosens the 
 tongue and shelters the face: and these are the 
 two essentials for an unburdening of the
 
 112 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 The little bee-clock on the mantel-shelf made 
 troubled conversation, and once in every few 
 minutes a cart rattled an answer from the 
 street. The fire-light was on Father Denis' 
 treasures; and the face of the girl on the wall 
 laughed once, as though, from across the Great 
 Space, she saw and approved the shaping of 
 the lives before her. But the two men smoked 
 silently. 
 
 The priest moved first; grunted; heaved 
 himself forward in his chair. 
 
 "If I were behind the gratin', Ormond, I'd 
 have ye up tu the confessional in less toime 
 than this. Have ye killed a directhor, then?" 
 
 Ormond started. Then he recrossed his legs 
 and lay back. 
 
 "Oh, it's only the same old thing;" his voice 
 was carefully careless. "Don't you know 
 what I've come to you for? You can't do 
 anything." 
 
 "I don't mean tu thry, sure. The sowls ov 
 men take all the tinkerin' I can give widout 
 goin' sakin' tu the dredges an' sluices." 
 
 "You'd find j^our work cut out if you came 
 seeking to the Lion," said Ormond, bitterly. 
 "She's going to pieces. To pieces, poor old 
 girl! Just for want of a little of the money 
 those confounded directors are sucking out of 
 her. I've written to them;" he sat up, and his 
 words came with a rush. "I've written and 
 written. And I've laced Bert Kiliat till I mar-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 113 
 
 vel that he doesn't try to stoush me. I some- 
 times wish he would." 
 
 "I believe ye," said Father Denis dryly. 
 
 "Heaven knows how he has the face to call 
 himself a manager. Manager! Taking it all 
 through, he doesn't put in more than one half- 
 day a week at the claim. One half -day! Then 
 he goes back to the hotel, or up to the Scan- 
 nells', and writes up reports. Manager! 
 There's not a sluicing-hand in all Otago knows 
 less about hydraulics than he does." 
 
 O' coorse. Every man wud like tu be the 
 handle ov the spade. It's niver that easy 
 worrking wid a f ut on yer shoulder all the day. 
 But there's betther men than yersilf done ut, 
 Ormond." 
 
 "I don't want to be the handle. D'you 
 think I'm minding what it is to me? Kiliat 
 can call me a digger instead of working over- 
 seer, if it pleases him. I don't care. But it's 
 the old Lion herself the claim and all the 
 shareholders who will suffer for this rotting. 
 That's what's driving me wild!" 
 
 He flung through the half-lighted room 
 restlessly. The priest bit his thumb-nail and 
 frowned. He was a worker himself, and he 
 understood. 
 
 "Can't ye git howld on the bhoys anyways? 
 A man in his sinses wud see ye can't worrk a 
 claim widout money, sure." 
 
 ".They are not in their senses, then I sup-
 
 114 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 pose. They are idiots. Blind, deaf idiots 
 and I wish to Heaven they were dumb too. 
 They stew away in their own juice down in 
 town, an' put all my letters in the waste-paper 
 basket. What? Bert Kiliat's the only one of 
 'em all who has been up to see it, and he's about 
 as much good as a sick-headache. His father 
 has told him that expenses must be kept down. 
 That's all he can say when I show him a leaky 
 pipe spitting like a cat. Curse him!" 
 
 "Tut-t-t!" 
 
 "I beg your pardon, Father. But you 
 don't see the futile puerility of it all. Twenty- 
 three miles of race, and two and three quarters 
 of pipes, and a twelve-inch plant. I tell you, it 
 needs constant outlay to keep it in order. And 
 this has had nothing spent on it for a year. I'm 
 sick of asking " 
 
 Ormond came back to the mantel-shelf, 
 crossed his arms on it, and dropped his head. 
 His nerves were strung to the tightness which 
 in a woman would be hysteria. Father Denis 
 got up heavily, and put his hands on the 
 stooped shoulders. 
 
 "There's no credit owin* ye in takin' yer 
 whippin', Ormond. We all have tu du that wan 
 toime or another. Bhut ye can boite on the 
 bullet, can't ye? Or there's nothin' of a man 
 tu ye bhut the clothes." 
 
 Ormond did not move. He was squarely 
 and strongly built, with the spade fingers and
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 115 
 
 lean set jaw of the practical engineer. But 
 to-night he was weak as a little child. Just the 
 half-laugh of one of the men that he ruled had 
 overset his strength for the time. 
 
 "It's a great thing to be a man, isn't it?" he 
 said, indistinctly. "And to slave out your soul 
 to do your work honestly and to get no credit 
 -no help- 
 
 "This isn't the talk ye gave Randal an' me 
 once, Ormond. Where's yer belief in yersilf 
 gone tu, bhoy?" 
 
 Ormond laughed hysterically. 
 
 "Oh, go on! Go on! Tell me how much 
 we've got to thank God for!" 
 
 "Ut's yersilf hasn't much, if that's all 
 the spirit that's in ye. Let it go, then. 
 Ut's a man's worrk, an' not yours at all, 
 at all." 
 
 Father Denis knew when to use the whip. 
 But it did not rouse Ormond. 
 
 "I can't," he said. "I've given her so much 
 that I I can't go back on her. She's had 
 seven years of my life, and I believe she knows 
 it. I could never work for another claim as 
 I've worked for her. You don't know what it 
 is to fight for her back in the hills when the 
 rains are stripping the faces, and there's an 
 even chance of losing half the race in a few min- 
 utes. I've done that six times this year. And 
 the flume up near the pent-stock is getting 
 shaky I was up to my middle in it most of to-
 
 116 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 day. That accounts for the drivel I'm talking. 
 Why don't you kick me out, Father?" 
 
 "Faith! there's niver an inch of ye softer 
 than the toe of me boot unless ut's yer head. 
 Ye've got somethin' out of servin' the Lion, 
 Ormond." 
 
 "Yes," said Ormond. He picked up his 
 pipe, and sat down again, laughing half- 
 ashamed. "For a chap has no right to kick up 
 a shine over his daily work," he said. 
 
 Then as the light caught the priest's face, he 
 added quickly: "You've a trouble of your own 
 to-night, Father?" 
 
 "I have, then. Did ye hear ov ut? A sob 
 blows news quicker than ahl the laughs of the 
 worrld will du aye; ye foight for yer iron 
 scrapin's an' driftwud wid Nature, Ormond. 
 I'm foightin' worse down here wid the divil 
 thrippin' sowls be the heels, an' ahl the evil ov 
 the earth tu give power tu his elbow when ut's 
 needed." 
 
 "What is it?" asked Ormond, blowing the 
 smoke aside. 
 
 "Ould Buggy was found dyin' in his bed this 
 mornin', along ye know the lonely road where 
 he lived? Clane starved tu a shtick he was, wid 
 niver a penny an' niver a crust tu bless him. 
 An' he that kep a servant an' was rowlin' in 
 money." 
 
 "Poor old beggar! What'd he done? Sunk 
 it in mines?"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 117 
 
 "Ut is Jimmie Elaine or Ted Douglas sunk 
 ut for him. Niver a man he let into his dure 
 bhut they two an' his body-servant. An' sorra 
 a truth cud they git out ov him. 'Niver scowld 
 the lad,' he says. Bhut which lad he niver said. 
 Sapped him dhry, and left him tu starve. Ut's 
 Jimmie they're blamin' I had the ould mother 
 ov him down on me just now. He's the only, 
 choild she iver had saints help her!" 
 
 "Which does Murray think it was?" 
 
 "Sure did ye iver know Murray say what he 
 did not want tu? He is on the thrack ov some- 
 thin' an' Jimmie is wan ov me own bhoys. If 
 ut is him, I'll break his head on him though he 
 comes tellin' me at the Confessional God for- 
 give me. And yit if ut's because I've failed 
 somewhere in me duty " 
 
 "That's rot," said Ormond promptly. 
 "You've got the heart of every Roman in the 
 district and of half the other denominations 
 too. You just spend yourself for them, 
 Father ," 
 
 "And wudn't I du ut twice over for ivery 
 mother's son ov thim?" The yearning tender- 
 ness of his face shook his voice, and Ormond's 
 eyes drew unthinkingly to the picture on the 
 wall. "Aye, luve shpells bigger worrds than 
 the four letthers ov ut's name how's that bhoy 
 ov yours that Randal shpoke tu ye about?" 
 
 "I've switched him on to night-duty, and he 
 doesn't like it. And I've rowed him, and he
 
 118 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 doesn't like that. I can't do more. A chap 
 isn't responsible for his men when they're not 
 under his eye." 
 
 "Bedad! if more ov ye were ut'd be a dif- 
 ferent worrld from wan round corner tu the 
 other! Du ye iver see Randal these days?" 
 
 "Sometimes. He's granite. I'll never get 
 any hold on him, Father." 
 
 "He's been hoeing a shtiff row of his own if 
 there's anything in township talk. Ormond, 
 if iver he comes tu ye for help, give ut. He 
 will not be comin' tu many, that same bhoy." 
 
 "All right. It's not likely, though." Or- 
 mond got up, and shook himself. "I must 
 scoot, Father. And I wish I hadn't worried 
 you to-night." 
 
 The priest looked round the low room with 
 the dance of the fire in its corners. 
 
 "It'll be a bad day for me when I turrn me 
 face from a man wantin' annythin' that I can 
 give tu him," he answered.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 BLAKE'S bar-parlour was empty, with fire- 
 light cloaking the grease-stains on the walls, 
 and the rings that the glasses and jugs had 
 scored on the table. It was Lou who strolled 
 in, unobserved, through the side-door, picked 
 an accordeon out of the wood-box, and began 
 to make music in the shadows. Strictly speak- 
 ing, the accordeon belongs to hot evenings out- 
 side the whares, and the smoke and talk of 
 loafing shearers, with the murmur of penned 
 sheep to help out the halt of stiffened fingers. 
 Or to black nights round the camp-fires, where 
 the "honk, honk" of wild swan and the sudden 
 slow roar of a landslip far up in the ranges are 
 familiar as the old simple tunes. Or to dances 
 in the Town Hall, with a girl to laugh back 
 when Danny or Trefusis bang at "Daisy Ball" 
 from the platform, and the throb of feet covers 
 the bass. But the accordeon in Lou's hands 
 was a vivid restless something that roused 
 strange unnameable desires and longings, such 
 as no plain working man had any right to. 
 For, everything having its compensations, evil 
 done may teach a man the way to the heart- 
 
 119
 
 120 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 strings of his kind when a better duller soul 
 draws blank. 
 
 Lossin came in from the bar, and blattered 
 the fire into blaze with his heel. 
 
 "Yer too bloomin' uncanny fur the dark, 
 Lou," he said. "Sing us somethin' rousin', 
 can't yer?" 
 
 Lou flung out "Nazareth" in a rollicking 
 waltz with the double bass, and, Murray, on his 
 way up to bed, came in to expostulate. For he 
 had not quite forgot the reverence of his child- 
 hood. But instead, he stared at Lou in the 
 light, saying: 
 
 "Heavens above, man! What old shaft have 
 you been falling into?" 
 
 Lou's forehead carried six colours, and his 
 jaw was cut. Moreover, his clean-shaped nose 
 looked lumpy. Ten voices gave virile explan- 
 ation, and Murray picked up understanding 
 piecemeal. 
 
 "What does Steve look like?" he asked. 
 
 "Faix, the divil'll mend Lou fust," cried 
 Tod. "Did I not tell ye we wud git somethin' 
 out of North-o'- Sunday? Throth an' bedad, 
 Scannell will be like to putt you both out of 
 that supposin' there's anny more of it." 
 
 "And where do I come in?" demanded Mur- 
 ray, sizzling a wet boot-sole on the bars. 
 
 The laughing mock of the music caught 
 Lou's voice as he answered: 
 
 "Next time. There'll be one of us to run
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 121 
 
 to earth then, Murray and a pop-gun or two 
 at the end of it." 
 
 "My lad, you're a rip," muttered Murray 
 underbreath. "And Father Denis wants the 
 handling of you! He'll need gloves for it!" 
 
 Guise pushed open the side-door, and blinked 
 round the room uncertainly. He was a "re- 
 mittance man," and that carries its own stig- 
 ma in the Colonies. 
 
 "Blanky Revivalist Meeting?" he inquired 
 politely. "Who's doin' the prayin'?" 
 
 "I am," said Mogger. "Me dad's talkin' o' 
 marryin' agin, an' I'm prayin' fur suthin' as'll 
 stop him. Two granddads an' a granny! I 
 got the up-keep o' them a'reddy. I can't stand 
 any more." 
 
 Guise crossed to Roddy's corner, and his 
 blaring voice rose. 
 
 "I'll show yer suthin' as I can't stand any 
 more. Git out o' this, you flappin' box-man! 
 Think I sat wi' my head agin that wall for six 
 years ter be turned out by you!" He caught 
 Roddy by the collar, forcing his startled face 
 to the grease-smudge on the wall. "Think I 
 hall-marked it that way fur you?" 
 
 Tod received Roddy as Guise punted him 
 across the room, and gave him the space on the 
 floor between his own boots and Murray's. 
 There was neither authority nor conversation 
 in Murray this night. He was dog-tired after 
 a bitter ten days' chase which had brought Dick
 
 122 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Wepeha to justice, and the warmth of the fire 
 was grateful. Tod's soft brogue cut the 
 smoke-reek. 
 
 "It is not wid elber-grease ye wud be after 
 makin' a mark annywhere, Guise, me bos- 
 thoon," he remarked. 
 
 Lou grinned above the low-breathed accor- 
 deon. 
 
 "Truth is a good thing to have on tap," he 
 said. "But you need to draw it into the jug of 
 tact. Ye'll get kiboshed for 
 
 Here Guise knocked out his pipe on Tod's 
 head, and Blake came in from the bar to sort 
 out disputants with an unsparing hand. 
 
 "Who's looking for trouble?" he demanded, 
 jerking Roddy out of the ruck with the de- 
 cision of long practice. There was red pipe- 
 ash inside Roddy's collar; but his fear of au- 
 thority was hotter. 
 
 "I never did I didn't mean to make a 
 
 row " 
 
 'Tain't necessary to unload excuses on the 
 market till we tell you we're asking for un- 
 adulterated lies," said Blake. "You get away 
 home, Roddy " 
 
 "You let Roddy alone," struck in Lou, "un- 
 less you want to chuck me too, Blake. 
 Roddy's my guest " 
 
 "Which is why Randal ain't bin down these 
 ten nights," explained Ike. "Why ain't yer 
 on night-shift, Roddy?"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 123 
 
 "Fluming's broke in Paddy's Gully," said 
 the Packer. "Yer could hear Ormond swear- 
 in' from here till day before yest'd'y if yer 
 stood out in the wind. 'Sides, it's Guise's 
 blame an' Tod's." 
 
 "Bedad, if it's foight ye're spilin' for, come 
 here," cried Tod. "I'll be afther aitin* ye up 
 wan be wan, an' niver knowin' it." 
 
 "Go an' hit somethin' yer own size, little 
 man. Where's Danny?" 
 
 "Where should he be but tellin' Suse 'bout 
 his ballotin' ? He's in for land what they say'll 
 carry three sheep to the acre, an' p'raps a 
 can 
 
 "Sure then, he's a sheep-farmer a'ready," 
 crowed Tod. "Catched a tick on to himself 
 yesterday an' sint clane away for his wool- 
 sacks. Nothin' loike takin' toime be the tail 
 an' hangin' on if ye want to git there." 
 
 The amble of hoofs came down the street, 
 and Rogers spoke with the certainty of obser- 
 vation. 
 
 "That's Pipi Wepeha's old boss. Bring him 
 along in, Blake. He's a three-act comic hopra 
 when he gits goin'." 
 
 The Packer blinked over to Murray. 
 
 "He's come along ter thank yer fur givin* 
 his son free lodgin', Murray," he wheezed. 
 
 Murray yawned, his head against the chim- 
 ney-piece. 
 
 "Let him," he said wearily. His shield was
 
 124 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 down for the time, and he did not care who 
 knew it. For there was nothing more shame- 
 ful than body-ache behind. But this was the 
 last day that Murray laid aside his armour be- 
 fore man. 
 
 "He's thursty be the sound of corks," said 
 Tod. "Lou ye're all koinds of a villain." 
 
 The accordeon crept slowly, mysteriously 
 into one of the old, old Maori chants that few 
 Europeans dare meddle with. Above it Lou 
 was singing softly in the liquid Maori tongue. 
 To the pakeha who did not understand, the 
 tune carried a quiver and throb that hurried the 
 blood in the veins. To him who knew, it was 
 a call to strip the clothes of civilisation off his 
 senses. And this call comes more often than 
 the world guesses. Ted Douglas frowned. 
 
 "You're going to give Murray a tough bone 
 to chew, Lou," he said. 
 
 "Well, it's a free show. You can watch him 
 chew it," said Lou, cheerfully. 
 
 Ike shivered, and Mogger noticed the ten- 
 sion of his body with a puzzled contempt. To 
 three Colonials in ten the great Things that 
 God has made, and that man cannot conquer, 
 send their souls awash with secret gropings 
 and beliefs in more than can be lathered into 
 shape by the tongue. The remainder take 
 their schooling because the State orders it, and 
 their wetting on the wild ranges because 
 Nature orders it, and gain just so much knowl-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 125 
 
 edge from both Teachers as enables them to 
 be treated with parallel indifference. This 
 nails the understanding flat on the bed-rock 
 of fact; and, although a new country can de- 
 sire no better foundation, it is the touch of 
 mystery and the forward-flung desire to make 
 out to the unknown to the Back of Beyond, 
 that will shape the battlements and the cor- 
 nices in a new free strength that has no 
 copy. 
 
 "Begorra," cried Tod, promptly, "if he's 
 clane an' clever enough to shmack that smoile 
 of yersilf's into another shape, me boyo, I'll 
 take him out, an' trate him till he'll niver be 
 foindin' his way to the saddle at all, at all." 
 
 Someone sniggered approval; then the door 
 swung wide, and Pipi Wepeha came through. 
 
 To Murray all Maoris were a beastly nui- 
 sance, and Pipi was a dirty one as well. But 
 he cut his nails and his hair thrice yearly, and 
 his slop-made clothes were knotted together 
 with flax. He squatted by the fire with soft 
 words and coarse cunning jokes; and Lou, 
 playing tenderly, guessed well what was to 
 come of it all. 
 
 Pipi's speech held the halt of a tongue learnt 
 over-late, and he helped it forward with the 
 dumb vivid talk of brown lean arms and fin- 
 gers. Wild stories he told ; and Lou gave the 
 keynotes unerringly; and the crowd round the 
 fire fell silent, drew closer, flinched, or shut up
 
 126 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 their hands as the red fire of sin and courage 
 and lust and mystery flicked round them to 
 Pipi's swift words. When the brain is over- 
 wrought, the body is more fitted to touch that 
 universe of meaning which lies behind speech 
 and movement. A man bears this learning 
 alone and unshowing, as Murray bore it now 
 in his corner, with one booted leg crossed on 
 his knee, and a numb dread sliding down on 
 the thickening shadows and the tightening 
 silence of the men. 
 
 Above the accordeon Lou's face alone was 
 bright in the flame-light. It was beautiful 
 and wicked as the stories that Pipi told. Stor- 
 ies of centuries on centuries of uncleansed lives 
 with their desire and their strength and their 
 elusive horror which slips between words as 
 sand between the fingers. Pipi's white hair 
 twitched on his scalp. He leaned where the 
 light on the shrunken skin struck the tattoo- 
 spirals to the likeness of fibres from whence 
 the leaf -greenness has rotted. His eyes were as 
 the yolk of a stale egg blotched, blood- 
 flecked, and smurred, and his speech plaited 
 coarse white-man talk with the delicate imagery 
 of the Maori. 
 
 They were things new to Murray that he 
 told. Things that no Englishman has yet 
 learnt nor will learn while English soil gives 
 him birth. For they are the breath of New 
 Zealand. They come in the glad winds, and
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 127 
 
 the long sweep of tussock over billowed downs, 
 and the awful purity of the snow-ranges, and 
 the evil derision of the keas, and the gay reck- 
 lessness of the gallopping winds. All this is in 
 the blood of a Colonial. But an outsider can- 
 not tabulate it when he comes to the handling 
 of the man. 
 
 The fire fell, and out along the street noises 
 lessened and died. And yet Pipi held the men 
 while the stillness ran prickly on each spine, 
 and stared, horror-wide, in Roddy's eyes. Lou 
 laughed, drawing a great double-chord from 
 the keys. 
 
 "You're an immoral old devil, Pipi," he said. 
 "And Roddy will have a fit very shortly if you 
 feed him any more of that stuff." 
 
 "He aha " began Pipi, clutching a dirty 
 
 claw on Roddy's collar. 
 
 Murray slung the boy aside. 
 
 "Don't you play up with him, you old 
 heathen," he said. "The kid has never done 
 you any harm. I'm your meat if you want to 
 sharpen your teeth." 
 
 The easy defiance of the man showed in the 
 back-swing of his shoulders, and the smile on 
 his lips. But every nerve in him was awake. 
 
 Pipi's hands went out in quick gesture. 
 Then he turned. 
 
 "For you apopo," he said. "E noho ra." 
 
 "Haere ra," said Murray cheerfully, and 
 went up the passage, drawn by the click of bil-
 
 128 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 liard balls where Danny was fighting the 
 marker on level ground. 
 
 In the dark by the door when the men had 
 passed Pipi caught Roddy's sleeve. 
 
 "You know te room te place where Murray 
 sleep?" he demanded, underbreath. 
 
 "Ye-es," said Roddy. 
 
 "Ah! Kapai. You go then. Kia tupato 
 koe. Bring me Murray's sock his handker- 
 chief his necktie. Haere. Bring one thing. 
 Anything. Go, then." 
 
 The ground was heaving under Roddy's 
 feet, and he knew that his voice was uncertain. 
 So did the tohungas of old take a half-worn 
 thing from the man whom they meant to de- 
 stroy. 
 
 "I can't," he said, his words bobbing in his 
 throat. 
 
 Pipi whipped a handkerchief from the boy's 
 side-pocket. 
 
 "No? Kore rawa? Then I have this." 
 
 "I will go," said Roddy, and ran upstairs, 
 and snatched a red necktie from the hook by 
 Murray's looking-glass. The sweat was cold 
 on his face when he received his handkerchief 
 again and went out alone into the night. 
 
 Fysh reported next day that Roddy had 
 come into camp with eyes blank as a tea-cup, 
 and a tongue that could not join two words 
 straightly. He further remarked that if Rod- 
 dy was going to get the horrors from seeing
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 129 
 
 other mpn drink his own breath being sweet 
 as a baby's the matter would be delivered into 
 Ormond's hands very promptly. 
 
 "Ask Murray if Roddy is the only fellow 
 likely to get the horrors without drink," sug- 
 gested Lou; but he gave no explanation what- 
 ever when Fysh demanded it. 
 
 It was in the next week that Murray deter- 
 mined to go up to the All Alone and call on 
 Jimmie quite privately and artlessly to 
 elicit information. He had drawn blank on 
 forty-two counts already, and only the last ex- 
 tremity would have made him insult Ted 
 Douglas by questions where he mustered with 
 his fellows out back on the ranges. 
 
 Night caught Murray in the flax-gully 
 where the first blink of Jimmie's light showed 
 on the spur, and he stumbled up through 
 scratching matakuri and Wild Irishman, 
 jerked the door-latch, and cast his swag on the 
 mud floor. 
 
 "I'm wanting a feed and a shakedown, Jim- 
 mie," he said, "for I can't make Lachlan's 
 camp to-night." 
 
 Jimmie was squatted by the fire with his lit- 
 tle pinched face solemn. But he kicked the 
 sticks together in haste, slung the billy, swept 
 packages of rabbit-skins out of the half -cask 
 chair, and set Murray in it. And there was no 
 hint of fear in his welcome. 
 
 "Took in over this job, I was," he said, sway-
 
 130 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 ing on his heels, and thumping more crackling 
 skins into a square. "Rafferty contracted from 
 Robertson fur the season, an' I tuk the tail- 
 end over from Raff. He telled me there was 
 good pickin's in it." 
 
 "And aren't there?" Murray was watching 
 him keenly. 
 
 "Aren't there?" Jimmie spat on the grey fur 
 contemptuously. "No, there ain't! An' me 
 sweatin' wi' trappin' an' shootin' an' phos- 
 phorus mixin' me own bloomin' stuff, too. 
 Look at me hands." 
 
 Murray looked at the deep burns that the 
 frost had turned to living sores, and he looked 
 at the narrow peaked face above. Then he 
 glanced round the little whare. For the place 
 where a man lives tells his character, let his 
 face and speech lie as they will. 
 
 There were holes in the sod walls through 
 which past legions of rabbiters had let the 
 moon poke her fingers, uncaring. Jimmie 
 had stuffed each crack with tussock, and cut a 
 wedge for the cranky door. The hut was deso- 
 late, dirty and empty. There were sacks in 
 the bunk with the blankets, and no reading 
 anywhere save a newspaper that had been used 
 to wrap fat. All these things were explained 
 by the darkness back of Jimmie's eyes, and the 
 restlessness of his fingers. 
 
 Murray was tender as a woman, for all the 
 stern life that held him. But he balanced the
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 131 
 
 two finely; and just now, against knowledge of 
 the loneliness that eats to the core of a man, 
 stood the belief that the death and starvation 
 of the old proud-hearted Buggy was Jimmie's 
 sin alone. 
 
 "What's troubling you, Jimmie?" he de- 
 manded suddenly. 
 
 Jimmie hesitated. Then he kicked out the 
 wedge, and the door fell open to the night. 
 
 "Wouldn't them blanky ole mountings 
 trouble Ole Nick hisself ?" he said. 
 
 It was not a world for a man to handle. It 
 was alive with its own strong desolation and 
 its unbroken pride. Peak on glistening peak 
 of everlasting snow; black rugged ridges; 
 slopes pallid with the rain-death that had 
 stripped the earth from them, and reefs of sul- 
 len cloud smudging the cold stars. The snarl 
 of the river fighting through its boulders came 
 over the shingle that sloped from the door, and 
 a couple of Paradise duck showed for an in- 
 stant against the grey breadth of it as they fled 
 down to the lower country for nesting. 
 
 "I'd sooner hear silence than that river," 
 said Murray, and shivered. "It's ghastly to 
 think you're the first living man who's heard 
 its waters go by. I don't like being so near the 
 beginning of things myself." 
 
 "You're generally nearer the end," said Jim- 
 mie, tartly. Then his voice changed. "It's 
 runnin' past the township thirty-odd mile
 
 132 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 down, yer know. An' it's bin makin' me dream 
 o' nights. There there ain't any bad news 
 down ter the township, o' course?" 
 
 The keenness of the tracker ran into Mur- 
 ray's eyes. He shaded them, watching the lit- 
 tle man folding the rabbit-skins. 
 
 "Bad news? Let's see. The Corin girl has 
 hooked Pat Armstrong from the Glory, and 
 the keas are rough on the Mains ewes all along 
 the river downs. Scannell has squads out 
 shooting every night, and Ted Douglas is near- 
 ly off his head " 
 
 Jimmie spilt the tea that he was shaking into 
 the sputtering billy. 
 
 "Let him go off his head," he said. "I 'ope 
 he will, an' die of it. He got me the chuck- 
 out from Mains. He as allers called hisself 
 my mate." 
 
 "There are folk who say that he'll get him- 
 self the chuck-out before long." Murray's 
 every nerve was set to observe the man oppo- 
 site. "Old Buggy is dead. Died alone of 
 starvation. He sent away the woman who 
 looked after him because he couldn't pay her 
 wages, and he starved, the proud old fool, be- 
 cause he wouldn't ask for help. He kept all 
 his money in the house, and some men 
 say that Ted Douglas took it." 
 
 Jimmie thumped a skin very flat, and he did 
 not look up. At last he said : 
 
 "Ain't they 'cusing me too?"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 133 
 
 For the first time in memory Murray's brain 
 was knocked flat. 
 
 "Yes," he said, weakly. 
 
 "An' that's what yer here fur? Roped in 
 Ted yet?" 
 
 "No." 
 
 "Well, Ted done it. You put Ted and me 
 face ter face an' I'll tell you how. I'm through 
 wi' my contrac' next week, an' I'll be along 
 then, if that's soon enough. Are it?" 
 
 "How am I to know that you won't run?" 
 said Murray, lightly. 
 
 Jimmie stood upright, and his uneven 
 breaths shook the loose shirt. 
 
 "Ted Douglas put shame on me 'fore all the 
 fellers," he said. "D'yer think as I'll ever fur- 
 give him fur that? I'd kill him ef I was big 
 enough. D'yer think I'd lose this chanst? 
 Murray, I'd walk my feet raw but I'd git the 
 nick on him ef I had ter go down ter the town- 
 ship barefoot." 
 
 Murray got up and flung the door open. 
 
 "I call for you this day week," he said. "Ted 
 Douglas will be down from the mustering then. 
 And now, I am going on to Lachlan's. There's 
 not room in this place for you and me."
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 IN the deep gully six miles from the home- 
 stead Randal and Moggers were stumping. It 
 was three years since Randal had helped there 
 at the felling of slim birch and great totara 
 and matai, and afterwards put a firestick 
 through the raffle of broken tree-ferns and 
 earth-laid branches. A few dead writhed 
 spars lay over the gully-sides yet, although the 
 most had been drawn for the fencing; and all 
 along the bottom, stumps raised their venom- 
 ous heads in derision for the men who wrought 
 with them. 
 
 Mogger had worked on a dredge once. He 
 came out of the six-foot hole round a birch- 
 root and made comparisons. 
 
 . . . which it carried the old complicated 
 'and machinery, too. But it was a fool ter this 
 bloomin' kind o' organ'sm. An' sech a waste 
 of a hole, when as the brute is out," he added, 
 spitting into it thoughtfully. "Cud bury lots 
 o' folk in there. Yer cud so." 
 
 "Two grandads and a granny?" suggested 
 Randal, changing his hands on the axe-shaft, 
 and descending with a slide into the pit again. 
 
 134
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 135 
 
 "An' a step-mother," agreed Mogger, tuck- 
 ing the tatters of his shirt inside his waist-belt ; 
 "an' here's Buck wi' the tackle at last. Think 
 she's loose enough, Randal?" 
 
 "There's one yet look out!" 
 
 Mogger stood back while the chips flew, 
 whirring out of the depths with a nasty hum. 
 Randal was stripped to singlet and gungarees, 
 and the muscles ran on his hairy arms and 
 bared chest. The dust of the earth was thick 
 on him before his time, and the sweat dripped 
 down his lean face. Above the bark of the 
 blade his breaths sounded distinct as the throb 
 from an engine-room, and Mogger guessed in 
 some dim way that the whole strength of the 
 man was meeting something beyond the sing- 
 ing creaking root. But because, to his belief, 
 Randal had no relatives the wide world 
 through, his guesswork could carry him no fur- 
 ther. 
 
 The last root snapped with an upward curl. 
 Randal climbed out of the open grave and 
 lay flat whilst his breath came back. And the 
 roar of quick blood through his ears and his 
 heart beat out one tune as it had beat it these 
 three days past : "Eflie and Kiliat. Effie and 
 Kiliat."' 
 
 All the station was saying it. All the sta- 
 tion looked at Randal to hear what he was say- 
 ing. And Randal kept shut lips, and believed 
 and disbelieved and believed again, and could
 
 136 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 get no speech with her day by day, nor any an- 
 swer to his letter, posted, as of old, in the dead 
 laurel beside her window. 
 
 Down the gully-side, among the white 
 naked bones of dead bush Buck was coming 
 with his team and his cheerful unmusical 
 song. The sky was ruled hard along the 
 gully- top; green-black, with angry red to 
 westward, and Randal came to his feet in 
 weary haste. 
 
 "Pass along the hauling- tackle, Mogger. 
 Back 'em, Buck. Back 'em, you idiot. We're 
 going to get a storm out of this directly- 
 Then he swore as a cast chain flicked skin from 
 his ear in its spinning, caught the hook at end 
 of it, and forced it into the horse-shoe driven 
 deep into the stump. Mogger wrestled on the 
 far side shouting directions as Buck brought 
 his team up to the collar. 
 
 "Get the bar," said Randal, sliding the jack 
 under the root in the only possible place, and 
 Mogger took up position with the unerring ex- 
 actness of one who has done the same thing 
 many, many times. 
 
 With soft voice and hands Buck drew from 
 the horses each last inch they could give. But 
 always, not being built on ratchet lines, the 
 purchase broke under struggle of straining 
 hoofs, and the stump jammed on the nose of 
 the jack, flaying Randal's hands until he cast 
 the thing aside in disgust.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 137 
 
 "Where are those extra pulleys?" he de- 
 manded. "And I want the reins." 
 
 He squeezed the thick rope through the 
 sheave, took the side-strain with a rooted matai 
 and two pulleys added, and began the game 
 anew with the fall-rope shrieking above the 
 tense hum of quivering chains. The stump 
 rocked and groaned, moved an inch, settled 
 back. Mogger beat out a place for his bar 
 and stood on the end of it for leverage. He 
 escaped a broken neck by methods best known 
 to himself when he came up headlong from the 
 pit to grasp Buck about the middle and bring 
 him to earth. Randal was tired to his heart, 
 and the argument that scattered in sputtering 
 laughter did not interest him. He sat on the 
 jack, staring down the grey length of the gully 
 where a thousand little fires from the root- 
 piles built through the weeks fluttered and 
 winked wicked eyes. They were telling Ran- 
 dal that there were a thousand more fires to 
 make before his work was done, and that, until 
 that day, there would be no peace for him. Be- 
 cause it is required of every man that he bring 
 his duties full tale to the Judgment Seat. 
 
 Then Art Scannell came break-neck down 
 the gully, sitting loose and graceful as the 
 black mare took the burning raffle with little 
 sideway jumps and flirtings and great full- 
 extended leaps. Beside the team Art wrench- 
 ed her back on her haunches, and the very
 
 138 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 poise of his head hurt Randal in its dear famil- 
 iarity. 
 
 "That the stump you started last week, Ran- 
 dal? Don't wonder my father's complaining 
 about the work here if this is the way you go 
 at it ! Pick up that jack and shove it in, Buck ; 
 get those brutes going and look sharp. Get 
 them going, I tell you." 
 
 Randal's bleeding hands shut on the grip 
 of the jack. Mogger handled the bar in a 
 new carefulness. Up in the closing night 
 sounded the chain-clank, and the thunder of 
 beating hoofs, and of labouring breaths. And 
 just so easily might three horses have pulled 
 the earth out of position in the sky. Art 
 Scannell came down from his mare. 
 
 "What are you doing with all that foolery? 
 Get a straight pull, I tell " 
 
 Randal climbed up to explain the value of 
 the side-pull. 
 
 "It gives you a sixty-horse power 'stead of 
 three " 
 
 Art Scannell turned on his heel. Some- 
 where in his sodden brain he connected Randal 
 with that week of horror in the whare by Lone- 
 ly Hill, and he did not love him therefor. 
 
 "Take that rigging off now, make 'em 
 pull. Make them pull, will you? Here; let 
 me get at them " 
 
 He came with a stirrup-iron, and Buck 
 blocked him desperately.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 139 
 
 "Don't! Don't go ter touch 'em. I'll git 
 every sweatin' drop o' pull outer them I kin 
 do it. Oh, darn ye ! if they won't do it fur me, 
 d'yer think as you kin " 
 
 At the thud of the iron on her flank the off- 
 sider sprang, and staggered back, half -choked 
 by the collar. Randal held Buck by the grip 
 on his shoulder. 
 
 "You'll get fired if you hammer your boss," 
 he said contemptuously. "Let him kill the 
 brutes if he's fool enough. They're his own." 
 
 "They're mine," sobbed Buck. "Mine! 
 Aren't I looked arter them oh!" 
 
 It was the cry of a mother for her first-born. 
 But the writhing shoulder was still under Ran- 
 dal's hands. 
 
 "Don't look then. Oh, by Jingo, he'll muck 
 things directly. Mogger " 
 
 Mogger's great body was stiff with a new 
 sternness. He was weighing the chances of 
 providing for his relatives on any new billet 
 that might fall to him after he had slain Art 
 Scannell with the fist. He glanced at Randal. 
 Randal's dark face was unmoving, and his 
 eyes told nothing at all. 
 
 "He cud do it," said Mogger in hisf throat. 
 "He ain't got a fambly same as I got. He 
 cud do it. But he ain't got the feelings o' a 
 dead black-beetle, Randal ain't." 
 
 Some passion unknown to the other held 
 Art. He beat the team from end to end and
 
 140 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 back again. The stump rocked forward in 
 obedience to the maddened force, and rocked 
 back, smashing the lever and Buck's foot, and 
 bringing the black colt over in the chains with 
 the other two atop. Buck twisted free with a 
 cry thin with pain, and mixed himself up in the 
 tackle and the great heaving bodies and the 
 flurry of beating hoofs. 
 
 "Come out of that," shouted Art. "Come 
 out, you ! I'll get the brutes up." 
 
 "I never," yelled Buck in defiance. "You 
 leave me 'lone. G-get out." 
 
 His white desperate face showed an instant 
 in the raw flame of a little fire near by. Then 
 a straining head with wild eyes blocked it out. 
 Mogger hesitated. He had all the courage 
 of an ordinary man; but none could tell what 
 might be in the half -seen hell of iron hoofs and 
 chains if Art Scannell struck again. And Art 
 Scannell did strike. 
 
 Mogger saw Randal's long-armed swoop 
 into the ruck. He saw him again in the fire- 
 light with a face unknown, and Buck carried 
 by the nape exactly as a man holds a rabbit. 
 Then he saw Art Scannell go down before a 
 straight cut between the eyebrows, and heard 
 Randal's voice, sharp-edged. 
 
 "Get round and uncouple the off-sider if 
 you can. I'll see to the others." 
 
 Swiftly, cunningly, Randal cast off hooks, 
 and gentled and raised the struggling bulks.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 141 
 
 Buck wept over the bleeding flanks, and for- 
 got that his own foot swung helpless. Randal 
 bound it with all the rags at command, and 
 knotted the bandage with flax-strips. But his 
 hands and his heart were numbed by more than 
 the chill of the night, and the crash of his 
 knuckles on the young smooth forehead was 
 loud yet in his ears. 
 
 "Best wallop some water over that chap, I 
 reckon," remarked Mogger, making investi- 
 gation, and he brought a capful from the first 
 spring. 
 
 Art Scannell had been half -killed too often 
 to submit to unconsciousness long. At the 
 third repeat he sat up, came to his feet, and 
 said just one sentence: 
 
 "You'll come up to the house for your 
 cheque to-night, Randal." 
 
 Randal said nothing. He was wondering 
 what comes after the end of all things, and he 
 walked out into the dark of the gully as a man 
 walks in an unknown land. 
 
 "Does he mean it?" cried Mogger, as the 
 black mare tore past him with Art Scannell 
 kicking for the stirrups. "Does he mean ter 
 sack yer true, Randal? Why didn't yer kill 
 him, then, an* hev done with it?" 
 
 Randal's boots brushed the little flames bat- 
 tening on the dug-out stumps, and each red eye 
 brought back memory of that which he would 
 not see any more. The boys marvelled that
 
 142 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Randal took always the end bunk in the whare, 
 no matter how many lay to his choice. For 
 the end bunk headed to the sou' west and the 
 fierce sleet and rain that sifted through un- 
 f ound cracks and thundered on the wall. And 
 Randal did not tell that through one crack 
 whereof he alone knew showed a faint fleck of 
 light beyond the pine avenue which had its be- 
 ginning in Effie Scannell's window. On that 
 light he had fed love and desire and hope for 
 a year past. But he would not do it any more. 
 
 At the gully-top he turned and looked back. 
 A cold wind soughed restlessly in the dead 
 branches and the flax, striking the flames to 
 passing gleams, and spinning little whirls of 
 smoke to the empty sky. Pale afterglow held 
 up the dark to show the gathering clouds rush- 
 ing down wind, and Randal dropped his head, 
 tramping on unspeaking. 
 
 Buck, perched on the black colt, talked in 
 undertone to his team, and Mogger whistled 
 fitfully until the fury of pelting rain caught 
 them in the length of the sullen miles. Randal 
 turned up his collar and cared not though the 
 clay underfoot squelched to mud and to run- 
 ning water; but Mogger spoke unkindly to 
 the black thing that rose up at the wool-shed 
 gate. 
 
 "Git out of the tide-way, yer lumpin' gal- 
 loot! Think we come home ter stan' here an' 
 watch you?"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 143 
 
 "Boss was jes' sendin' out a search party," 
 said Moody, creaking the gates back on the 
 hinges. "Young Art's bin lettin' some queer 
 kind o' yarns fly " 
 
 "Shouldn't wonder. Did he come in, then?" 
 
 "Did he come in? Did he come like a bloom- 
 in' torn Ida wi' no frills lef ter him? Yes ; he's 
 corned in. An* what guv him the emu's egg 
 fresh laid atween his eyes?" 
 
 "Randal," said Buck, stooping his head as 
 the colt passed to its stall. Moody whistled in 
 three-tiered admiration. 
 
 "Must 'a' put some body-weight inter that," 
 he remarked. Then the flash of the lantern 
 across the faces gave him sudden wisdom. 
 "Don't git tellin' the boss too much about it, 
 Randal, fur yer like ter be tellin' him wi' the 
 aidge o' yer fist too, be the look o' yer." 
 
 Randal's feet crunched the gravel on the 
 house-track, and Megger's voice rang after 
 him: 
 
 "Randal shall I come along an' lend a 
 hand?" 
 
 "No, thanks," said Randal, speaking for the 
 first time. And the dark dripping shadows 
 of the pines took him. 
 
 Though a strong man must draw on him- 
 self only; now and again, slicing away the 
 Present with the knife of the Years Between, 
 comes the sharp over-mastering longing to 
 take his trouble with child-hands back to his
 
 144 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 mother's knee, and to leave it there. Randal 
 was weaker than he knew when the blink from 
 the office-window called him over the verandah 
 to the door. Art flung it open at his knock, 
 and Randal noticed, with a workman's merci- 
 less pride, that both eyes were swelling under 
 the bandage. 
 
 Scannell looked up from his desk, and Ran- 
 dal straightened, meeting the look defiantly. 
 But neither man spoke. From the chair 
 where he lay with both legs flung over the arm, 
 Art Scannell was laughing. 
 
 "Go on, pater. Pitch it straight then I 
 will " 
 
 "Hold your tongue," said Scannell, unmov- 
 ing, and his eyes ran, keen-searching, over the 
 length of the man before him. 
 
 Randal's coat and shirt were open in the 
 cold night, and rain had beat the dust of them 
 to mud. His dark hair was rough on the 
 tanned forehead, and sweat and earth grimed 
 each hard line that coarse living and soul-suf- 
 fering had scored on the flesh. But, apart from 
 the knotted hands drawn with corns, apart 
 from the shoulder-stoop of the yoke-bound, 
 and the restless-eyed sullenness that will take 
 neither pity nor help, was the race-mark that 
 no man may lose. Scannell felt for it, saying : 
 
 "You are not a liar, I think, Randal?" 
 
 "I never heard a man call me so," said Ran- 
 dal, suggestively, and his hands shut up.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 145 
 
 "Then," said Scannell slowly, "I ask you 
 what is my daughter to you?" 
 
 All the blood in Randal's body was leaping 
 in his throat. That was surely why his head 
 felt so very cold, and why his hand was numb 
 and dead on the unseen thing that he was grip- 
 ping. Somewhere Art Scannell was laughing; 
 and, without doubt, it was the laugh of a demon 
 sent straight from the Pit. 
 
 "You've taken him on the hop, pater, and 
 he hasn't got his lies ready. Let me wake him 
 up. See here, you Randal; half the station's 
 betting it's Kiliat, and the other half's betting 
 it's you. The odds are on Kiliat down on the 
 township, and I'm sweet on him myself. But 
 if Effie's sweet on you " 
 
 Scannell's voice broke the laugh, and Ran- 
 dal raised his head to meet it. 
 
 "Will you answer me? What is my daugh- 
 ter my daughter to you?" 
 
 It did not need the emphasis that cut like a 
 whip-lash over the face. 
 
 "She is more to me than I will tell you," 
 said Randal, deliberately. "And I am to her 
 just as any other station-hand might be." 
 
 "That's a lie, anyway," cried Art, beating 
 his pipe-bowl on his knee. "Effie is a little 
 fool, and she's all school-girly sentiment yet. 
 And you've taken advantage of it. Look at 
 him, pater. Ask him if he ever kissed her!" 
 
 "Arthur " Then Scannell's eye caught
 
 146 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Randal's, and he stood up ; and the silence be- 
 tween the two men was tense and dangerous 
 as a drawn wire-rope. 
 
 "Well?" said Scannell at last. 
 
 Randal would not lie for himself. 
 
 "I have kissed her against her will." 
 
 "By Jove, but we'll have to have her in to 
 settle that," cried Art, springing up. 
 
 Randal's back was to the shut door, and his 
 drawn face flamed. 
 
 "Haven't you insulted your sister enough 
 already, you young brute?" he said. 
 
 Scannell looked on the two, and the man in 
 him felt sudden strong pity for the other man. 
 
 "Go back to your seat, Arthur," he said. 
 "You at least do not know what is due to your 
 sister. Randal, you leave Mains to-night, and 
 the district to-morrow. I think I can expect 
 so much of you. You were a gentleman once." 
 
 "Once," said Randal, and laughed. "That's 
 a thing a man can't get back, you know." 
 
 "It depends on the man. You can prove the 
 contrary now." 
 
 Randal knew his limitations. He had beaten 
 them out through too many nights and days. 
 
 "I can't," he said. 
 
 "That means ?" 
 
 "It means that I will not leave the district," 
 said Randal. 
 
 Scannell sat down and wrote a cheque with 
 hands that shook. He ripped out the leaf, and
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 147 
 
 tossed it across the table. "If I see you on 
 Mains again I'll set the dogs on you," he said. 
 "You may go." 
 
 Art pushed back the bandage as Randal 
 passed to the outer door. 
 
 "Think I've got good interest for this, Ran- 
 dal," he cried. "Randal you've forgotten 
 your cheque." 
 
 But only a spatter of wet wind and torn 
 leaves licked over the verandah in answer. 
 
 "And that's done with," said Art Scannell 
 then. "Ship Effie down to town for a month 
 or two, pater, and give her plenty of rope, and 
 I'll guarantee Randal will find his hash set- 
 tled for keeps." 
 
 "You will hold your tongue about this mat- 
 ter, Arthur," said Scannell, looking straightly 
 at his son. 
 
 Art paused with his hand on the door-knob. 
 
 "My dear pater," he said cheerfully, "don't 
 you fret. I know a thing or two."
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 "SHE wants me to give it up," said Maiden. 
 
 In a little back bedroom at Blake's, Suse 
 had been whispering to the other girl of Danny, 
 and showing, half -shyly, the trousseau made 
 with such anxious labour. She smoothed a 
 white frill with rough fingers, speaking 
 absently. 
 
 "Why, dear?" 
 
 "Well she says do you think the bonnet's 
 so awful unbecoming, Suse?" 
 
 Suse shut a little smile into the drawer with 
 the white frill. 
 
 "Trust a mother ter find out jest where ter 
 tackle a gel," she murmured. Then she looked 
 over at Maiden's face closed in the curve of 
 her hands as a flower is closed in its sheath. 
 
 "Didn't nobuddy ever tell yer as more than 
 the Lassie bonnet weren't becoming ter yer, 
 Maiden?" 
 
 "Only Steve Derral an' he don't count." 
 
 "Don't he? Since when?" 
 
 "Since always," said Maiden, untruthfully. 
 
 "I ain't seen him this month past. He's up 
 musterin' somewheres out back, Danny says." 
 
 148
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 149 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 "I ain't seed him since he an' Lou had that 
 turn-up what near laid 'em both out. It was 
 a awful fight, Danny said!" Suse came to 
 Maiden's side; her hands on her broad hips, 
 her plain kindly face something envious. 
 "Chaps say as they fought about you, Maid- 
 en," she said. 
 
 Maiden's head went up, and the scarlet 
 flamed to her ear-tips. 
 
 "What give him the right to fight 'bout me, 
 I'd like ter know!" 
 
 "Which is he?" 
 
 Maiden wheeled to the window, confused. 
 Then the red ran to her forehead, and Suse be- 
 hind her grunted in sudden disapproving. 
 For Lou passed on his way to the ranges 
 where the mustering had cut half the Mains 
 boys from their kind for a full fortnight. 
 He pulled under the window with a quick 
 swerve. 
 
 "Good-bye for five days, Maiden," he called; 
 then swayed to the mare's impatient bound, 
 and tore up the street, leaving the swift flash 
 of laughing eyes and bared fair head, and a 
 sudden silence to the two in the room. 
 
 "I'd sooner hev Steve than Lou Birot," said 
 Suse, with meaning. 
 
 "You don't want either, do you? You've 
 got Danny." 
 
 Suse bit her lip. Then she tried again.
 
 150 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "I'd sooner plough my furror wi' Steve's 
 steady old team than wi' the other." 
 
 "I'm not wantin' ter plough any furrows," 
 said Maiden, indifferently. 
 
 Suse looked on womanhood as she saw it in 
 the hard patient, loving lives about her. 
 
 "Reckon as we've all got some furrors, 
 dear. But you kin take yer chance whether 
 yer'll have a man as'll plough it along the 
 ground wi' yer fur yer bread an' meat, or one 
 as'll " 
 
 "What?" 
 
 "One as'll plough it there, Maiden." 
 
 The rough finger just touched the smooth 
 girl-forehead, and Maiden straightened, flush- 
 ing. 
 
 "Danny can't plough a furrow anywhere. I 
 saw him turning down the hem of a paddock 
 the other day, and he made an awful mess of 
 it. He said so himself. Is that Randal goin' 
 down the street?" 
 
 "Yes. Come in an hour ago lookin' like he'd 
 bin shelterin' from the wet under a wire-fence. 
 Father says he's bin shot out o' Mains." 
 
 "He's got the bullet lef ' in somewheres," 
 said Maiden, in pity. "They do say as he cares 
 fur Miss Effie, Suse." 
 
 "I know. But he won't find her up at the 
 Lion if that's where he's goin'." 
 
 Randal was going to the Lion. He heard 
 the high snarl of the jet before he breasted
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 151 
 
 the hill, and he heard the clang of Ormond's 
 hammer. For Ormond was making ripples for 
 the boxes. By his foot the steady snore of the 
 hose drove the Pelton wheel, and the blast of 
 the forge made heat-quivers in the air. He had 
 all a strong man's content in work dear to him, 
 and he wrought the red iron with the undis- 
 tressed power of one who has played no games 
 with constitution or with conscience. The 
 grate of a foot on the shingle caught his ear. 
 Then he dropped the hammer and came for- 
 ward, rubbing his forearm across his wet fore- 
 head. 
 
 Randal put aside the frank welcome curtly. 
 
 "I've come to ask you more than you'll like 
 to give. Miss Scannell is often up here, isn't 
 she? Do you know when she is coming 
 again?" 
 
 Ormond stopped the hose, and the Pelton 
 wheel dribbled to silence. He looked at Ran- 
 dal, remembering Father Denis' words: "If 
 ever Randal comes to you for help, give it. He 
 will not be coming to many." 
 
 "Miss Scannell and Kiliat are riding up here 
 this afternoon," he said. 
 
 "I want to see her alone," said Randal. 
 "I want you to arrange for me to see her alone, 
 to-day."' 
 
 Ormond pushed back his cap and his voice 
 was suddenly stern. 
 
 "You must tell me more than that. Why
 
 152 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the devil should I arrange anything of that 
 sort?" 
 
 "Because I will see her somewhere and 
 somehow. I will see her alone. Scannell 
 has sacked me from Mains; but I'll go 
 back byjiight if they kick me out by day 
 if you won't give me the chance here. 
 You had better give me the chance, Ormond, 
 or I may do more harm than I have done 
 already." 
 
 The steady grey eyes flashed on Randal's 
 face; then dropped. It is not right that one 
 man should look on another man's heart when 
 desperate pain has stripped it naked. Ormond 
 kicked out a broken bolt lying in the dried 
 wash ; kicked it again, and it dropped the fifty 
 feet into the creek-bed where a dottrell was 
 piping across the sand-pit to her frightened 
 youngsters. 
 
 "Does Miss Scannell wish to see you?" he 
 asked at length. 
 
 "I don't know." 
 
 "Then you want me to do this against Scan- 
 nell's express desire, and possibly against hers 
 too?" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "You are asking a great deal." 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 Ormond hesitated. He acknowledged the 
 pride that cut all explanations; and, very cer- 
 tainly, pity hurt him for the man who could
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 153 
 
 never speak with such as Effie Scannell before 
 other men. 
 
 "Poor devil!" he said in his throat. Then he 
 put his finger on the one pulse which he could 
 trust to beat true in Randal. 
 
 "Can you shake on it ? That's all right, then. 
 You won't go back on that, Randal. I'll man- 
 age it somehow." 
 
 "Thanks," said Randal only. 
 
 He turned and tramped over the little dip 
 to the Packer's claim. From the tussock top 
 of it he could see the first wind in the bridle- 
 track beyond the dredges. The Packer, wad- 
 ing up to his middle in wash, was gay as a 
 boy with a holiday nearing. 
 
 "Murray's away beyond the All Alone after 
 Jule Harrison," he said, climbing into the tip- 
 head; "so I'm goin' ter take ter-morrer an' all 
 the rest I kin get before he comes back. Onst 
 in five months I Time was when I cud stan' it 
 ev'ry Sat'day. But it ain't a gift wi' me like 
 it was wi' Jos Greer. A good drunk every five 
 months is all as I kin manage now an* that 
 with Blake's stuff, too. Phelan's would burn 
 the copper-bottom outer a dredge-biler in 
 twict." 
 
 He crawled in under the fall, and Randal 
 sat in the manuka, breaking the white petals 
 away from the brown hearts, and staring down 
 into the next gully where Roddy Duncan and 
 Fysh were having a washing-day. Every
 
 154 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 nerve in him listened for the far clack of hoofs 
 that would mean Erne Scannell and Kiliat rid- 
 ing up the Lion. 
 
 "Fellers say why don't I work more'n three 
 days a week," said the Packer, coming into 
 daylight again with the water shining on his 
 tattered oilskins. "I says what's the sense o' 
 it when I can't hev a drunk more'n onst in five 
 months? What'd I want wi' the money? What 
 do any single man want wi' money 'cept ter 
 git drunk on it?" 
 
 Randal looked down on the lean old man 
 bent double in the narrow race. 
 
 "By Jove," he said, "I believe you're right, 
 Packer." 
 
 Then he sprang up, and went back to Or- 
 mond hastily. For, far down on the level of 
 the Creek, two horses swerved into the bridle- 
 track as one. 
 
 It was a quarter-hour later when Effie Scan- 
 nell came to Ormond's little hut behind the 
 power-house ; pushing the door wide, and grop- 
 ing in the gloom for photographs that Or- 
 mond had left on the table. Randal spoke 
 across it gently, that he might not frighten her ; 
 and the blood left his heart to see the light flash 
 on her face. 
 
 "Guy dearest! Oh, I haven't seen you for 
 so long! Guy what ?" 
 
 Randal kept the table between them. 
 
 "I came here to beg your pardon. But I
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 155 
 
 think I won't. You would never understand 
 that you couldn't give it, Effie." 
 
 "Why couldn't I ? Guy, you always call me 
 a child ; but but perhaps I could understand, 
 dear. What have you done, Guy?" 
 
 "Oh, a very little thing," said Randal, rough- 
 ly. "I have made you the common talk of the 
 district, Effie. That is all. You my little 
 white flower! Do you know what men will 
 say of me and of you, Effie, because we love 
 each other?" 
 
 "No," she said, with wide eyes. 
 
 "No. Of course not." His voice broke. 
 "But I know, dear. I came here with 
 a bad name, Effie, and I never troubled 
 to deny it. Well there was some truth in 
 it. But since I have known you Effie, 
 Effie, if you loved me as I love you, you 
 could make of me what you liked. I'd take 
 you away " 
 
 She shrank from the passion of face and 
 voice, and he saw it.' 
 
 "Forgive me, dear. I'm sorry. But it is 
 all ended now, Effie. Your father has sacked 
 me. He knows." 
 
 "Guy! Guy! You're not going away?" 
 
 "I can't," said Randal, speaking with diffi- 
 culty. 
 
 "Then it isn't ended! It need never be end- 
 ed. There are still the hills and the dear old 
 lonely gullies for us. Guy ."
 
 156 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Randal did not come near. He was holding 
 the bond given to Ormond. 
 
 "It is ended, I think. People speak of Kiliat, 
 Effie. Will you tell me if there is any truth 
 in what they say?" 
 
 Effie spread her little bare hands on Or- 
 mond's old table-cloth with the tobacco-burns 
 in it. 
 
 "When you see a ring there it will be time 
 enough to ask me of Mr. Kiliat," she said, 
 with a quaint dignity. "Your letter made me 
 very angry, Guy. I have never doubted you." 
 
 Randal looked at her steadily at the white 
 fur round throat and wrists; at the delicate 
 flushed face with the wide sweet eyes; at the 
 dainty figure and hands. His skin burnt sud- 
 denly. 
 
 "The cases are hardly parallel," he said, 
 dryly. 
 
 "Oh, Guy, Guy! I wish I could understand 
 you! You say you love me, and when we're 
 together you don't seem to like it a little bit, 
 you dear old silly boy! I never bother about 
 the future a scrap, Guy. It mightn't ever 
 come, you know. And when we're together 
 it's just the now, dear " 
 
 "Effie don't " 
 
 The thrown-back face was laughing between 
 the out-held curved arms. 
 
 "Guy, dear Guy it's just the now that 
 matters, isn't it?"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 157 
 
 And then Randal forgot the pledge that he 
 had given to Ormond with his hand-grip. 
 
 It was dusk when Ormond came into the 
 hut. Randal lay on the bunk with his face on 
 his arms; but the tension of his body showed 
 no rest. He rose as Ormond struck a light. 
 
 "Thanks," he said, vaguely. "I've made my- 
 self pretty much at home, haven't I? Good- 
 night." 
 
 Ormond's hand was on the latch first. 
 
 "Where are you going?" 
 
 "Down to the township to get drunk, I 
 think. Phelan's is the best place, if you'd like 
 to know. Kerosene and painkiller. But it 
 knocks the senses out of you quicker than any- 
 thing else." 
 
 "You'll have tea with me first," said Or- 
 mond, unmoving. 
 
 "No let me go, Ormond." 
 
 "I am not going to ask questions. But you 
 are safer here than in Phelan's bar to-night, 
 Randal." 
 
 "I have broken my word to you," said Ran- 
 dal. 
 
 The steady grey eyes met his straightly. 
 Then Ormond came over with his hand out. 
 
 "I had no business to ask it, I think. Will 
 you shake again, Randal? And now we'll have 
 some tea."
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 MAINS was mustering for shearing, and only 
 the man who has tramped a month through on 
 a hundred-thousand-acre hill-run begins to un- 
 derstand what that means. And his explana- 
 tions, though entirely vivid, are not always 
 clear to the lay mind. It was Ted Douglas 
 alone who knew absolutely the value of the 
 work done and to do, and who drove the boys 
 through the days on a straight bit, with a spe- 
 cial wire-whip for the man who balked. 
 
 Through cold days and hot muggy days, and 
 days of sudden tempers of sleet on the bare 
 tops, and days of close-wrapping fog that 
 made distance very blind and foothold un- 
 stable, and that brought clinging wet to soak 
 each man to the chilled skin. And by the long 
 hours that began and ended under the stars 
 that stern mother that bred them tested and 
 tortured and tempted them, and the slow 
 brown mobs drew in to the low country and 
 the gaping yards on the homestead block. 
 
 Moody said openly that Ted Douglas was 
 a devil this muster. For he had no mercy 
 where country was bad and sheep were slug- 
 
 158
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 159 
 
 gish and a hot wind blasted the earth. Scott 
 agreed, with the additional assertion that he 
 was sick of graft and meant to take it easy 
 thereafter. And it was on the following morn- 
 ing that Ted's hand fell heavier yet. This 
 was when the cut tussock, bared to the star- 
 light by the drawn tents, was yet warm with 
 the weight of their bodies, and when the cook- 
 ing-fire held flame to the chill that goes before 
 dawn. Round the fire the boys gathered, suck- 
 ing life into their pipes, and Ted Douglas came 
 up with the roster. 
 
 "We're takin' the Brothers country to-day," 
 he said, "and out to the head of the Dome. It'll 
 be a brutal long day, an' you chaps'll have to 
 put your backs into it. We got to get back to 
 the station Friday, an' it'll take us all we know 
 to do it." 
 
 The shearers were booked for Mains in the 
 week following, and all the draughting was yet 
 to do. The boys knew it. But a sudden ten- 
 sion ran into the group round the fire, and talk 
 and laughter died on their mouths. The Broth- 
 ers country made the cruellest muster on 
 Mains. It was slippery tussock and running 
 shingle and rotten slag where no sane goat 
 would climb. But the Mains sheep loved it 
 with all their demon souls, and the Mains boys 
 drew many thousands from it; climbing, hour 
 after hour, hand over hand, through places 
 where no dog would follow.
 
 160 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "It's sinful country," said Conlon at length. 
 "Better break it into two days, Ted. We can't 
 do more than we can, you know." 
 
 "Bein' that near the sky it orter hev larned 
 better," added Ike. "But it seemin'ly ain't. 
 You'll hev ter give us two days fur the Broth- 
 ers, Ted." 
 
 Ted Douglas' hands were in his pockets, and 
 his quiet eyes sifting round the group. 
 
 "We're takin' the Brothers an' the Dome 
 to-day," he said. "Anybody got anythin' more 
 to say?" 
 
 A month's hill-mustering will weed weak- 
 lings out of any camp under heaven. In- 
 dubitably, the boys were toughened, lung, 
 sinew, and muscle, to any strain that might 
 fall. But they were growing stale, and more 
 than one was foot-sore, and the flame of mutiny 
 was just a new-born flicker in the camp. 
 
 Three yards off Buck was strapping the last 
 pack, and casting the great saddles athwart 
 the horses with a jangle of chains. Mogger 
 muttered underbreath, and through the smoke 
 of his half -lit pipe Lou Birot was watching 
 Ted Douglas. 
 
 "We can't do it in a day," said Scott, sulk- 
 
 ay- 
 
 "Do you mean that you won't?" 
 Scott looked round for support. He made 
 no answer. 
 
 "Come on," said Ted, kindly. "Don't be
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 161 
 
 shy. I got time to thump some sense into you 
 'fore we make a start. What way did they 
 gene'ly get you goin' in the war, Scott? Or 
 was you runnin' down to Capetown all the 
 time?" 
 
 Somebody sniggered. Then Steve laughed, 
 and the queer eager look went out of Lou's 
 eyes. 
 
 "Arrah! what's the matter wid it, then?" 
 cried Tod, jerking a match up his trouser-leg. 
 "Jabberin' here won't mend the hours for us. 
 An' sure if the day's long we'll git home the 
 sooner. An' where will ye be puttin' me at all, 
 Ted, me boyo?" 
 
 Ted Douglas carried the whole map of 
 Mains in his head, and no man need get his 
 sheep into an impassable pocket or be blocked 
 by a ten-foot gut if he laid his course by Ted's 
 words. He struck into the half -defiant silence 
 with the decision of one who understands and 
 handles men in all moods; gave place and po- 
 sition to each, ordered a squad out to load the 
 packs on the saddles, and thereafter swept 
 them over the raupo-rimmed creek with their 
 lunches rammed in their side-pockets, and a 
 half-hundred dogs of sorts at their heels. 
 
 Right, left, and straight forward, the rough 
 spurs of the Brothers received them, and baf- 
 fled them as they set their faces ever to the 
 North and to the long harsh hours that waited. 
 Down on the dead camp Buck took a last hole
 
 162 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 in a pack-strap, clambered into his saddle, and 
 chirruped an order to the unreined pack-horses. 
 They answered with the quick lift of feet to 
 a trot, and passed down the creek-bed, to take, 
 by low and winding ways, the desolate track to 
 the Dome where it sat on the edge of the world 
 with a scarlet wreath of sun-rays over its 
 snow. 
 
 It is not every man who dares be alone with 
 Nature. For Nature is God, and man, very 
 often, is of himself and the devil. Lou Birot 
 knew this with the absolute certainty of a man 
 who discovers a thing first-hand; and because 
 he knew it he loathed the great merciless 
 silences, and the dark secret gullies, and the 
 terrible purity of the uplifted snow-mountains 
 that no touch of man could subdue nor smirch. 
 
 The smell of heat was in the air before dawn. 
 The burden of it was on the shelterless hills 
 ere ever the fog was torn from the crests. 
 Across the broken miles of shingle-tops it made 
 mirage of cabbage-tree and swaying toi-toi be- 
 side still water ; and more than one man halted 
 with his stick on the grating shingle to curse 
 it, and to curse the sheep pelting by above him, 
 and to trudge steadily on with lips that cracked 
 when he whistled his dogs. 
 
 To the lay understanding a man's conscience 
 is his only goal on the hills. The expert knows 
 that he no more dare burk his fair labour there 
 than in the branding-yards with the full sta-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 163 
 
 tion at gaze. But thrice was Lou tempted 
 far up on the naked shoulder of the Brothers. 
 For the sun burnt on the black rotten rocks 
 and the stiff tufts of heather and the savage 
 brown thistle between; and the sparkle of a 
 creek in cool fern, seven miles off as the foot 
 must go, was a torment that dried his tongue in 
 his mouth. His flask was empty long since. 
 But he up-ended it again before putting it 
 away with his untasted lunch. Then he 
 dropped under shelter of a bull-nosed scarp, 
 and lay there. 
 
 "And if the sheep get back on me I won't 
 be the only one who mucks things this day," 
 he said. 
 
 Below and before him his dogs ranged wide, 
 harrying little mobs that ran together and 
 trickled forward like spilt coffee from a cup. 
 Very far down a trained eye might pick up oc- 
 casional flickers of life on the heat-run flanges. 
 There lay Conlon's beat where he kept touch 
 with the man below, even as, on terrace and 
 jagged terrace above, Mogger and nine more 
 held the linked chain unbroken until it touched 
 down to the bush-gully on the farther side. 
 The heat turned Lou's bones to water; and all 
 the wonder of heliotrope and violent purple in 
 the gullies, and saffron on the spurs, and flash- 
 ing diamond where distant waterfalls leapt in 
 fern, were things of emptiness and derision. 
 He lay on his face with his eyes shut, and cared
 
 164 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 not for the strenuous life beating above and 
 below. 
 
 Over the near vivid crests cutting the sky- 
 line, quick black clouds came reefing up. Sun- 
 light struck them to the glistening green of a 
 starling's wing. Into the wide-spaced silence 
 volleyed the sudden roar of musketry; snatch- 
 ing echoes from the splintered rocks; tossed 
 back and out again by the gullies, and live- 
 leaping down the length of the ranges with a 
 broken handful of lightning to chase it. Lou 
 came to his feet with quick hands seeking the 
 rifle-butt, and lust red in his eyes. No man 
 on Mains knew ever that Lou had ridden the 
 Boer war through, there earning praise and 
 secret shame and open disgrace. No man 
 knew that, because each soul must love some- 
 thing or it will die .Lou loved, with all the 
 wild godless heart of him, the ring of the rifle 
 and the gobble of the field-guns growing near- 
 er. He was shouting straight-flung command 
 as in years past, when the next thunder-rattle 
 brought explanation and black disgust. Then 
 a quick snicker of lightning laughed with him. 
 
 "Does Ted think he will muster the Broth- 
 ers to-day?" he said. 
 
 Strung across the great head and shoulders 
 of the Brothers the boys saw the storm coming, 
 and each and each, after their own kind, they 
 denounced it, and hesitated, or took action 
 promptly. For there is no man in the Back-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 165 
 
 country who does not know what may be when 
 a water-spout bursts on a range-top, and, with- 
 out any possible doubt, there was water in these 
 black low-bellied clouds. Ted Douglas was 
 on the high shingle faces, where a man carries 
 a stick and places his feet with cunning. Here 
 were a score little flowering heaths to mark 
 danger, for the hillsman knows that they grow 
 only on running shingle. Below, tussock lived 
 on two inches of earth. Below that sprang 
 rocks that sank to tussock and shingle again. 
 But the Mains sheep grew fat on it, and the 
 merciless heat had wearied them; so that they 
 strung along the slim tracks in a slowness that 
 no dog could hasten. One moment Ted stood 
 drawing sharp breath. 
 
 "If any of them boys goes back on me 
 Mains'll limp nex' lambin*," he said. Then his 
 up-flung arm sent his dogs forward to nose out 
 stragglers from behind rocking boulders. 
 
 A tense hum sounded over the tops, as 
 though someone plucked the strings of a bass- 
 viol. A sudden jolt of thunder came sheer 
 underfoot before the whistle of the lightning 
 was past. Then, deliberate and separate, and 
 so solid that Ted looked to see them roll down 
 hill, followed the rain-drops. 
 
 On the hog-backed top beyond all men Tod 
 quailed for an instant and covered his eyes. 
 For the thunder walked the ranges with shak- 
 ing feet, and each flash of the lightning sang
 
 166 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 like a sword-cut on the air. All the great 
 tops were sinking, crumbling under the black- 
 ness of cloud ; and to the men on the Brothers 
 came a sudden giddiness and horror, as though 
 this sucking sea would draw them under also 
 for Eternity. 
 
 "Bedad," said Tod, pulling up his waist- 
 strap, "it's mesilf wud be sooner befure the 
 whare foire than aitin' me meat wid this knife 
 an fork. An' what will come of us at all when 
 the rain gits in behint of the shingle?" 
 
 There was no man on the Brothers was not 
 thinking of this. There was no man was not 
 hurrying his sheep by sharp command to his 
 dogs, and cast stones, and quick-stumbling feet 
 on the rough underway. The ridges lay across 
 the Brothers like the bones of a cat's tail, and 
 very swiftly the gutters filled with dribbling 
 streams that baulked and held the sheep. The 
 straining dogs hounded them over, and down 
 the slopes, and forward, with the storm roaring 
 on their quarter and the thunder charging 
 through the wild bluffs and gullies as mobs of 
 wild brumbies charge headlong. On the far 
 side one of Steve's worn boots gave from the 
 sole. He had brought two new pairs for this 
 muster ; but he was a heavy man, and shingle is 
 more strong than calf -hide. Thereafter he 
 blundered on bare-foot, and watching, with the 
 keen-trained sight that is the property of every 
 musterer, for the weak-hearted falter that
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 167 
 
 would bring him down through flint and 
 thistles to slay Scott. 
 
 The rain pelted to hail that came after the 
 manner of shingle poured from a sack. Ted 
 Douglas stopped one instant; blind, and sick, 
 and with a lump in his throat that meant tears 
 in a woman. Well he knew the men who would 
 flinch before this, and before the certain dan- 
 ger that gathered. Every fibre in him ached for 
 power to take the slack of that unseen chain 
 in his hands, and to wrench it tight, and to 
 sweep it forward by weight of his own savage 
 strength for the good of Mains. 
 
 "I must trust 'em. But the Lord only knows 
 if I can trust 'em. Scott '11 burk if he thinks 
 the faces are goin' to start ; an' there's Raplin, 
 an' Lou 'nless the whole thing takes his fan- 
 cy; an' oh, God! Can't I do no more than 
 jest walk?" 
 
 But over near twenty miles of high bitter 
 hill-country the boys were running true; and, 
 although they did not know it, the glory of this 
 lay to Ted Douglas' charge. 
 
 The hail shut off with the suddenness of a 
 beaten stick dropped from a kerosene tin ; and 
 the boys gasped, stood upright, shook the blood 
 from battered faces and hands, and took hold 
 of the mobs again. Round and underfoot 
 thumped the thunder with the earnestness of 
 a steam-hammer in full work, until the throb 
 was cut now and again by the sharp crackle
 
 168 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 that made the boys jump, and the outflung 
 anger of lightning. Far over on an unseen 
 face came the roar that was neither thunder nor 
 wind nor the roll of balls down a skittle alley. 
 The top of a big tree sliced the mist for an in- 
 stant as it pitched forward. Then the mighty 
 groan of the parted slip filled earth, and rang 
 against the sky until it settled to silence far 
 down in a gully-bottom. 
 
 "There'll be jes' the naked skull o' that hill 
 grinnin' at us in the morninV said Moody, 
 startled to speech. Then he shivered in the 
 soaked rags that clung to him. For it was 
 quite possible that the Brothers might also 
 stand up skull-bare, and grin over the death 
 that lay hid at the bottom. 
 
 The shingle tread where four men worked 
 was sloppy as the wash in a dredge-bucket ; and 
 the sheep stumbled on it, weighted with water, 
 and crying against the unwearied menace of 
 the dogs. And still the chain dragged for- 
 ward, pulling all life with it ; and still the rain 
 pelted straightly, settling in behind the earth; 
 loosening, loosening ; and still the boys counted 
 the ridges yet to be won before the easy slope 
 of the Dome shoulder gave clean foothold of 
 tussock and broom. 
 
 It was Tod who heard first from the tops 
 where the wind blew the sound gustily. First 
 the groan as of a calving iceberg; then the 
 quick snarl of shingle, and the following roar
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 169 
 
 that widened and grew faint and died out in 
 the river below. 
 
 "Now sorra a bit of sheep will we be takin* 
 off of that shoulder this great while," he said. 
 "An 5 it's bad it'll be for army misfort'nit crath- 
 ur what we left there. But will we git off 
 out of that befure another will be comin', I 
 wonder?" 
 
 Scott heard it, and fear caught him by the 
 nape of the neck. He wheeled, saw the tail- 
 end of it, and began to run. A straight-flung 
 stone fleshed his ear, and he blinked up at 
 Steve, blocked out on the scarp above. Then 
 a greater fear caught Scott. For payment for 
 all things would be required in camp this night, 
 and there would be Ted Douglas to face after. 
 He dropped back sullenly, swarming up the 
 lean ridge before him with the wet wind cut- 
 ting his eyes and chilled hands. 
 
 Among the rotten rock and the flint and 
 mica where the lightning zipped and the rain 
 gallopped down in deep channels, Lou was 
 finding purer joy than had been his since the 
 day that broke him in open square before two 
 troops of Irregulars and one Home regiment. 
 For always a brave man loves to stand up to a 
 force that is greater than he. Ted Douglas 
 heard the slip, and a pain beyond body-weari- 
 ness set in his face. Quite certainly he knew 
 that the sheep must have got back on them, 
 again and yet again, though each man did his
 
 170 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 utmost. And who could know until the hour 
 was past whether or no each man had done his 
 utmost ? 
 
 "I jes' got to trust 'em," he said, over and 
 
 many times over. "But, by , I'll kill the 
 
 man what don't bring in his mob, I will. I 
 will." 
 
 The wind plucked their skins with wet sharp- 
 ened fingers; it spread the gutters into froth, 
 and spun shingle abroad, and flattened the tus- 
 socks where straining hands grasped at it. The 
 boys' eyes stung and blinded in the sockets, and 
 the whistle fell dumb on their lips. But the 
 dogs worked by the arm-swing and the jerked 
 stone, and by their own stout-hearted wisdom; 
 and slowly and very heavily, the line drew 
 forward and together, and ran, stream by 
 stream, to the slope of the Dome's western 
 flank. 
 
 Night was very near, and the wind blew by 
 in great scuds of rain. Perhaps none but Ted 
 Douglas could have picked each separate lot 
 and the man in charge, and he said little as the 
 sodden mobs tailed in. But Danny, tripping 
 on the first mouthful of speech to his fellows 
 since daybreak, declared : 
 
 "Ted's feelin' good down ter the bottom of 
 his spines, he is. An' so is we feelin' good, an' 
 why not? 'Tain't every periodic set o' fellers 
 as cud 'a' mustered on the Brothers ter-day." 
 
 "Well, now, an' cock you up," cried Tod,
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 171 
 
 stumbling, exhausted and lame, through the 
 snow-grass. "It's illigant hayros we are an' 
 all not to be runnin' from the work cut out on 
 us wid our tails down betune our legs more 
 be chance that Ted wud be afther us wid the 
 big fisht of him, too." 
 
 'Twouldn't hev taken him long ter hev 
 catched me," said Steve, going by with his 
 waistcoat strapped round his bare foot by flax- 
 withes. "Is that Buck wi' the tents over by the 
 whare, or is it the top of the Dome come down 
 for an airin'?" 
 
 It was the tents glimmering like moths on 
 the dark, and Buck came from the sod hut at 
 the shout, leaving three billies sputtering on the 
 leaping flames, and a damped turning black in 
 the ashes. With the fear of all things in his 
 mouth he cast himself upon the van, demand- 
 ing how many were killed in the slip, how many 
 sheep they had brought down, how many 
 hours 
 
 Here Mogger took him by the collar. 
 
 "Rouse up all the feed an' drink yer kin fin' 
 while we gits the sheep inter the gully," he said. 
 "An' jes' be rememberin' as we wants fillin' 
 from our toe-nails up ter our back-teeth." 
 
 The gully-mouth was stoppered by tied 
 dogs, spent and foot-sore, but unconquered yet. 
 Then the boys stormed the whare; stripping 
 their soaked clothes to the heat, and singing 
 the song of the Homeward Bound when the
 
 172 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 last great fight is won. And without doubt, 
 it is a song to make the pulses gallop. 
 
 No man thought to thump Buck because he 
 had packed candles, butter and cutlery loose 
 in one sack. 
 
 "Sure, it's all good aitin' when ye shut ye're 
 eyes fast enough," said Tod, and was forthwith 
 pitched into a corner for stepping on Conlon's 
 new-made damper. The content of all the 
 world was in Ted Douglas' face and in his 
 voice. And this was quite to be understood; 
 for the boys had proved themselves, one and 
 all, for the honour and good of Mains and of 
 their manhood. Steve muttered four words to 
 him that made his eyes flame. 
 
 "It's you helt 'em," he said. 
 
 Then someone kicked the door open, crying: 
 
 "Can you chaps put up three more to-night? 
 We're out o' our reckoning an* it's brutal 
 dark." 
 
 "Ach, come in be all manes," cried Tod; "if 
 so be ye'll excuse as we ain't dressed for call- 
 ers." 
 
 His coat and shirt smoked before the fire; 
 but Lou wore a blanket only, and Raplin was 
 still wringing the water out of his trousers. A 
 couple of swags rolled inside the door, and 
 Steve bounced across the hut promptly. 
 
 "Ain't got a spare pair o' boots in there, are 
 yer?" he demanded. "Big ones?" 
 
 "You be blowed, Steve Derral," said the first
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 173 
 
 man. "I didn't was a ellerfunt ever. But per- 
 haps Jimmie " 
 
 Then the boys gasped. For two men were 
 musterers from Glenhula, and the third man 
 was Jimmie Elaine. 
 
 Danny rescued from the flame the shirt that 
 Ted Douglas dropped as he jumped for- 
 ward. 
 
 "Jimmie! Hello, Jimmie, old boy " 
 
 Jimmie swung his back to the eager hand. 
 
 "I ain't talkin' wi' you," he said. 
 
 Silence cut sheer down through talk and 
 movement, so that the shudder of the tent-flaps 
 out in the wind sounded loudly. Murray had 
 sworn secrecy on the boys who had come up 
 from the township in the last week to bring the 
 sheep in to Mains. But Scott broke his oath 
 with deliberation. It was Danny's unshaken 
 opinion that Scott would cause dissension even 
 among the worms that should eat him. 
 
 "Per'aps Ted ain't any too keen hisself ter 
 be speakin' ter a liar an' a thief," he said. 
 
 Jimmie slid out of his oilskins, and his 
 peaked face flamed. 
 
 "Who you callin' names?" he demanded. 
 
 "You," said Scott, in simple explanation; 
 and Lou, propped against the wall in his grey 
 blanket, grinned on the pipe-stem. He had 
 seen a court-martial before, with himself on 
 the drum-head. Then Mogger paid in his 
 contribution:
 
 174 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Did yer tell Murray as it was Ted lifted 
 all Buggy's rhino, an' let the old chap peg out 
 wi' his ribs stickin' together? Did yer, you 
 Spit it out, or we'll make yer." 
 
 Ted was staring, the colour gone from his 
 face, his hand shut on Megger's shoulder. 
 Steve saw only that the shock of this had 
 caught him full-flood and unprepared. 
 
 "Ted," he cried. "Ted, old man, yer needn't 
 think there's one o' us believes it! If it was 
 twenty thousand gone 'stead o' two, we'd not 
 think as you took it, Ted.' 
 
 Ted put him aside. 
 
 "Jimmie," he said. "What are they savin', 
 Jimmie?" 
 
 "We're tellin' him as he stole it himself 
 
 "That's a lie," said Ted, speaking through 
 his teeth. "Are you going to take it back, 
 Raplin?" 
 
 "Ask Jimmie will he plaze tell Raplin that 
 same," suggested Tod, and Scott laughed. 
 
 "Jimmie's got other fish to fry," he said. 
 "How yer goin' ter prove in Court as Ted 
 tuk it, Jimmie? Yer telled Murray yer would, 
 yer know." 
 
 Lou put aside the smoke-wreath gently, 
 looking over at Jimmie. And Jimmie stood 
 with loose hands, and a brain that would tell 
 him nothing. Once before the boys had had the 
 handling of him in their wrath, and he had been 
 very much afraid'. But there was that in the
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 175 
 
 faces now clogged his blood, and made his 
 tongue dumb. 
 
 " Jimmie," said Ted, "y u near what they're 
 sayin' of yer? Give them the lie, lad, an' I'll 
 take it through fur you. I'll take it through 
 on them all if you'll tell 'em, Jimmie." 
 
 "What would you have him tell?" said Con- 
 Ion in contempt. "He fleeced the poor old 
 beggar right and left, and then tried to put the 
 blame on you. D'you think we're fools that 
 we can't see that?" 
 
 "He never did! Jimmie, you must stand up 
 to it now! Tell 'em, lad. Tell 'em it's lies- 
 lies! We'll take it through together, Jim!" 
 
 The firelight was full on Ted's drawn 
 anxious face, and flickering on the faces 
 around. To Lou it was very funny that un- 
 buttoned shirts and half-clothed bodies should 
 belong to those faces. For they were purely 
 savage in their just anger. Jimmie was glanc- 
 ing round with swift hunted eyes; but still he 
 did not speak. 
 
 "Musha, it's the foine hayro an' all he is," 
 said Tod. "Is it for a wake ould man only that 
 ye have an answer on ye, me boyo?" 
 
 "Jimmie, haven't yer a word in yer, man? 
 For God's sake give him that in his teeth!" 
 
 Jimmie opened his lips ; but no sound came, 
 and only Lou was beating a little tune on the 
 back of his hand with his pipe-bowl. 
 
 "Jimmie!"
 
 176 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 It was a cry that lifted even Lou's eyebrows 
 with the pain of it. Then Scott stood up. 
 
 "Reckon as he ain't got no back-talk fur 
 onst," he said. "An 5 reckon as we ain't chum- 
 min' wi' one o' his kidney what's not got the 
 pluck ter stan' up ter his words. Tie him up, 
 an* chuck him in a corner. We'll take him 
 along ter Murray in the mornin' !" 
 
 Ted Douglas put aside the eager hands. 
 
 "Holt on a minute," he said; and a thread 
 in his voice steadied them. " Jimmie told Mur- 
 ray under oath, I suppose; but he wouldn't 
 guv me away here. He'd sooner take what yer 
 said o' him than that. So I tells yer meself. I 
 tuk all old Buggy's cash, an' he wouldn't tell, 
 fur he knew as folks'd be offerin' him charity. 
 Fur his dyin' like he did it's me to answer come 
 Settlin' Day. Me not Jimmie. But Jimmie 
 was the on'y one as knowed it. Now ye all 
 know." 
 
 Then he wheeled, and went out into the black 
 night where the wind raved. 
 
 "And that's the biggest lie Ted Douglas 
 ever told," said Steve. 
 
 But Lou answered for more than one when 
 he said: 
 
 "Where's your voucher for that, eh?"
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 "You know where he's gone," said Ted 
 Douglas, fiercely. "He corned down here last 
 night, an' he wi' every man's lyin' mouth agin 
 him. An' this mornin' he's lighted out some- 
 wheres. Where is he gone? What did yer do 
 ter him fur he'd be sure ter come ter you, 
 being a Carth'lic." 
 
 Father Denis reached a fat arm and clapped 
 the door to, swiftly. For without, in the pad- 
 dock that sloped to the creek, the school chil- 
 dren were playing cricket, and sound carried 
 far in the still air. 
 
 "I'm thinkin' we'd du foine wid no ears 
 stretchin' too close," he said. " Jimmie Blaine, 
 is ut? Yes, he came tu me. What then?" 
 
 "They put the lie on him up at the Iron 
 Hut," said Ted, speaking with stiff lips. "I 
 know as Jimmie don't know nothin' nor ain't 
 told Murray nothin'. But yer can't argue wi' 
 them boys, so I tuk the whole blame an' had 
 done wi' it. Most on 'em ain't spoke wi' me 
 since. That's easy righted. But I want ter 
 know does Jimmie think they'll put it on ter 
 him fur truth? I'd 'a' knocked their silly heads 
 
 177
 
 178 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 off of 'em straight-away ; but but he'd sooner 
 take all their lip than my help. He were 
 proper mad wi' me. An' now he's gone, an' I 
 don't know where. Is he 'feared, Father 
 Denis? He he ain't jus' got all the pluck a 
 feller needs these days, yer see." 
 
 "You know why he has gone," said Father 
 Denis, gravely. 
 
 "I don't," said Ted, bluntly. "Would I be 
 askin' if I did?" 
 
 "Is there wan ov us does not know from 
 what the ould man said that ut is your own 
 blame or his, Ted Douglas? An' yer own 
 heart tells ye that ut is not tu yersilf." 
 
 Ted's eyes darkened. Then he straightened, 
 speaking slowly. 
 
 "You're tongueing wi' the pack, too, are 
 you? All right. It was me as tuk it never 
 Jimmie. The boys know. I told them. An' 
 now I tell you." 
 
 Father Denis fumbled with his pipe, laid it 
 down, and spoke huskily. 
 
 "Throth! ye nade not thry that fulish game 
 on wid me, bhoy. Ut was wan or the other ov 
 ye, Ted, an' ut was him. I know ut ahl from 
 his own mouth. He did ut, an' he wud shift 
 the blame ontu yersilf because ye have shamed 
 him befure his mates, Ted Douglas." 
 
 The strong young face opposite was blank. 
 The big hard hands groped on the table cover. 
 Father Denis glanced toward the shadowed
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 179 
 
 blurr that was the girl on the wall, and his 
 mouth was dumb with pity. For he knew that 
 neither God nor devil calls man to more sacred 
 or sterner trusts than friendship demands. 
 Then Ted's words came with a rush. 
 
 "He never! He never! Oh, Heaven above 
 us, ye're lyin'! Not Jimmie! Not him!" 
 
 "Ut is thruth, bhoy, word and word. He 
 gave ut tu me at the Confessional wi' the fear 
 ov ould Buggy's death lyin' on his sowl tu 
 loose his tongue." 
 
 Ted caught his breath in a half sob, turned 
 suddenly ; bending his knee on a chair seat, and 
 bowing his head over his arms on the table. 
 Father Denis coughed, once and twice, and 
 walked over to the window. Through the 
 warm sweet gloaming the sound of laughter 
 and the crack of the bat came sharply. Along 
 the clay bank a merry row of girls clapped the 
 boy who caught the ball and fell on his back 
 with it. Time was when Father Denis had 
 watched Jimmie and Ted Douglas run be- 
 tween the sticks, and had thrown bull's-eyes 
 as reward. 
 
 "If ut had not been Confessional!" he mut- 
 tered. "Begorra! whoy cud I not take the 
 kickin' little beast be the scruff ov the neck an' 
 hand him over tu Murray straight at once?" 
 
 The breast of Ted's coat brushed his shoul- 
 der. Ted had come straight from a full day's 
 draughting on Mains, and the taint and dust of
 
 180 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the yards was on him yet. But neither noticed 
 it. 
 
 "Do you know where he has gone, Father 
 Denis?" 
 
 "Whisht now! Take ut aisy, man." The 
 light tone did not run true. "There is over- 
 much throuble in the worrld for us tu be tuckin' 
 up our trousers an' wadin' into ahl we see. 
 Jimmie was mate tu ye. Now he will not be 
 mate anny more. Ye must shmoke yer poipe 
 on that, bhoy an' ut is not entoirely cowld 
 comfort, ayther!" 
 
 "You don't mean for Heaven's sake he 
 hasn't " 
 
 "Ye mean did he kill himself because there 
 is blood laid tu his dure?" asked the priest, 
 dryly. "I will answer for ut that he has not! 
 He will be nursin' his loife if I know anything 
 ov Jimmie Elaine. For he has gone wid no ab- 
 solution tu the dhirty sowl ov him. I cud not 
 du much, him comin' tu me in Confession ; bhut 
 I did what I cud. Ye will be cleared in a week, 
 Ted, when he is over the say, or I cud not be 
 tellin' ye this much. An' he will be havin' a 
 parcel ov careful years tu chew on his sins, for 
 I did not lift the curse that was throublin' him. 
 Bhut I was near afther givin' him another 
 wan tu set down besoide ut fur company 
 
 "Yer didn't! Oh, yer didn't do that ter 
 Jimmie. You brute! Oh, you brute !" 
 
 "Tut-t-t! I wud not be takin' that from ye
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 181 
 
 another toime, Ted Douglas ! He is not wuth 
 the mindin', bhoy. He is a clattherin' koradi 
 shtick what will break over the fust knee that 
 strains tu ut. He had not the pluck tu damn 
 ye as he meant to du in the hate ov him. He 
 was 'feared ov the bhoys and good sinse tu 
 him, tu ! So he just run away out ov ut, leavin* 
 ye tu bear ut till he is safe. Ye're on bail, Ted ? 
 Yes ; of course. An' Jimmie would have been 
 that same if Murray had been an hour earlier. 
 By the Howly Powers! nivir did I want tu 
 break the Confessional harrder than I did whin 
 he came tu me. Ut is broken tu you, Ted. 
 Bhut even he trusted ye, the mane little 
 snoipe!" Then the big hand came on Ted's 
 shoulder. "Ye must face it, bhoy. Ut is 
 not the present disgrace ye're moindin*. Bhut 
 there were men before this day poured ahl the 
 luve ov their hearrts intu dhirty little cans that 
 wud howld bhut the half. Bedad! ut's the 
 dhirty little can an' ahl that Jimmie is, Ted, 
 bhoy." 
 
 "Wait a bit," said Ted. He was breathing 
 heavily, and through the twilight Father Denis 
 could but guess at the force controlling voice 
 and body. "Jimmie's my mate. If he telled 
 you he done all this, then he done it. He 
 wouldn't stick to it before the boys." 
 
 Father Denis remembered the pitiless ques- 
 tioning which had drawn the bald truth from 
 Jimmie.
 
 182 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Ted, bhoy, he hates ye. Wud he have come 
 down tu the township bhut tu forswear him- 
 silf aginst ye? He meant that; bhut he had 
 not the pluck tu du ut. Aye; let him go, an* 
 be done wi' it, Ted. Ut is the shtick that the 
 worrld will be breakin' acrost his back is the 
 wan thing will du Jimmie good this side the 
 Punishment Day. Wud I have sint him un- 
 shriven if I did not know ut? Bhoy, bhoy; 
 ye're dear tu me, wan an' ahl. Bhut softness 
 is not mercy tu a sowl ivery toime, Ted 
 Douglas." 
 
 "I must go and find him," said Ted Douglas, 
 staring straight before him. 
 
 "Ye will not be that ov a fule!" 
 
 "I must find him. He's that nervous, an' 
 alone, an' weak. I'm strong." 
 
 "What wud Mains do widout ye?" 
 
 This knife went home as Father Denis 
 meant it to do. For Mains was as dear to Ted 
 Douglas as himself. But Jimmie was dearer. 
 
 "I can't help it. I wouldn't leave Mains fur 
 nothin' else, an* if the boys go makin' mis- 
 takes, an' me not there But I can't help it. 
 
 Jimmie has got ter come first. Father Denis, 
 if ever you loved anybody, you'd know!" 
 
 The ring of his voice through the dark room 
 left silence. Father Denis' heart was bared 
 to the girl on the wall. For, of a surety, she 
 understood now, as she had not understood in 
 life.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 183 
 
 "I du know. I had tu cut it out ov me, 
 bhoy. Bhut I hov no right tu counsel ye that 
 same. Ye will go if ye will, Ted Douglas. 
 An* if ye bring him back I'll give him that 
 trouncin* me fingers was achin' tu give tu him 
 lasht week. Good-night, thin. Ye'll see me 
 agin befure ye go?" 
 
 "I can't leave Mains till shearin's done," 
 said Ted, heavily. "There ain't nobody kin 
 take my place through shearin'. That'll be a 
 month if the weather holds up, an' God 
 only knows where he'll be gone to. But 
 I ain't got the right to leave Mains in the 
 shearin'." 
 
 He went out without more words, and took 
 the beaten track home through the warm dewy 
 evening. At close of the fourth mile, with the 
 smoke of the whares rising soft grey from the 
 rise beyond, he met with Maiden, and halted 
 for the gay meeting all the township took from 
 her. 
 
 "Did you see Crellin's cart across the Flat, 
 Ted? No? Then I'll have my wits to cool a 
 half -hour at the river. Ted, I been helpin* 
 Miss Effie pack. She's goin' down to town to- 
 morrow, you know, an' I been takin' her up 
 some sewin'. I'll come round and lend Buck 
 a hand next time you're goin' campin'. Shall 
 I?" 
 
 "You'll be welcome," said Ted, absently, 
 and tramped on.
 
 184 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Maiden's laugh lilted after him. 
 
 "You'll be sorry you promised me that, Ted 
 Douglas," she called. 
 
 The burring of stones under quicker, heavier 
 feet broke up the silence that hung with the 
 long twilight of the south over rounded hills 
 and gold-washed high road. Steve's voice 
 came in her ear, diffidently: 
 
 "Cud cud I be walkin' beside yer, 
 Maiden?" 
 
 Maiden's eyes dropped swiftly. There was 
 coquetry in them too subtle for Steve to see. 
 
 "The road's more'n a chain wide, isn't it? I 
 think as there might be room for two beside 
 me, Steve." 
 
 "That depends on how close yer let me come, 
 Maiden." 
 
 Maiden laughed. For a masterful note was 
 in the words suddenly. 
 
 Then she gave him permission to walk in the 
 wheel-rut which his own drays had scored five 
 inches deep; and she took the crown of the 
 road, stepping daintily, with the quick step 
 that Steve rejoiced to watch. 
 
 "I'm glad ter see as yer ain't got on that 
 Army rig ter-night," he ventured presently, 
 with his eyes approving the slim length of the 
 print-frocked figure. 
 
 "There's some folks as is glad to see me in 
 any dress," remarked Maiden. 
 
 "Oh! so'm I, o' course "
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 185 
 
 "Then you're glad to see me in the Army 
 dress?" 
 
 "I'ilbeblowediflare!" 
 
 "You said you were, just now." 
 
 "I didn't mean " 
 
 "What you said? Oh, thank you. I don't 
 much care for talkin' with men as keeps all 
 their truth for other men, Steve Derral." 
 
 "Yer don't know a man what does that." 
 
 Maiden was visibly disappointed. 
 
 "I thought you'd have said as Lou does," she 
 said carelessly. 
 
 "He's pretty sparin' with it all round." 
 
 "Oh! there you are! You can never leave 
 Lou alone! You daren't say that in front of 
 him!" 
 
 Steve's great muscles tightened unbidden. 
 He had been in the draughting yards since day- 
 break ; but there was no weariness in him. 
 
 'Twouldn't be the fust time, anyhow," he 
 said composedly. "D'yer want me ter tell him 
 agin, Maiden?" 
 
 Maiden glanced across at the wheel-rut. 
 Steve was outside size, and a layman would 
 have called him clumsily built. But they that 
 saw him stripped for fight on North-of- Sun- 
 day testified to the brawn and muscle that no 
 tallow had overlaid. 
 
 "Steve!" it was almost a whisper. "I won- 
 der if you'd do somethin' I asked you to?" 
 
 "Near anythin' on God's earth, my girlie."
 
 186 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Well keep in the rut for a start, please 
 I don't want you to fight wi' Lou no more, 
 Steve." 
 
 Steve rubbed his nose. There was a lump on 
 the side of it yet. 
 
 ' 'Cos it spiles his beauty or mine?" he de- 
 manded tartly. 
 
 "Because because it's unmoral." 
 
 Steve bellowed a great laugh from his chest. 
 
 "Ye learned that from the Lassies, didn't 
 yer? Well, my girlie, I kin tell yer as there's 
 lots o' words a sight more moral when they're 
 said on yer fist than on the p'int o' yer tongue. 
 An' the or'nary man'd feel pretty sick if yer 
 wouldn't let him use neither, sometimes." 
 
 "It it must be wrong to fight, and not to 
 love everybody," said Maiden, fumbling round 
 the lesson that the Lassies had taught her. 
 
 "I'm content wi' lovin' one, anyways," said 
 Steve, tramping on unabashed. "Hev yer 
 asked Lou ter turn Sunday-school, too?" 
 
 "Ye yes." 
 
 "Good fur you! What did he say?" 
 
 Maiden's forehead burnt. All women and 
 many men knew that a promise must be bought 
 from Lou. 
 
 Steve grunted, and his great fist shut in his 
 pocket. 
 
 "Jes' come here a minute, Maiden, will yer?" 
 he said, and took three steps to the side of the 
 permanent way.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 187 
 
 Maiden looked down the steep trend of 
 bracken and flax to the tussock of the gully 
 where Lou was cutting out a beast with Moody 
 and Beckett to swing the mob. The lights 
 were soft and shining in violet and amber 
 and pale gold, and all the delicate sensuous 
 scents of flowering cabbage tree and crushed 
 raupo by the hoof -tramped creek rose up to 
 them. 
 
 "Lou's the cleverest chap I knows, in his 
 own place," said Steve. "His own place. An' 
 that's atop o' a horse, Maiden. When he gets 
 ter interferin' wi' another chap he's got ter 
 learn sense. See?" 
 
 Maiden rested her elbow on a kowhai stump, 
 tilting her chin with a delicate forefinger. 
 "No," she said deliberately. "I don't see." 
 "I thought yer wouldn't. That's why I got 
 ter larn him instead." 
 
 Maiden flashed upright, white with fury. 
 "How dare you, Steve! how dare you! I 
 
 don't know what you mean " 
 
 "Then I don't see no call to git waxy 'bout 
 it, is there?" 
 
 Maiden halted ; kicked at a bunch of nodding 
 evening primroses; then laughed. 
 
 "If you're comin' to the Oddfellows' dance 
 nex' Friday I got the first dance goin' begging, 
 Steve," she said. 
 
 "Thought as yer b'longed ter the Army 
 now."
 
 188 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "I I haven't joined yet. I'm not sure 
 but I'd like to do folks good some way, 
 Steve." 
 
 "My girlie, yer kin do it a better way than 
 by larnin' the evil fust yerself. It's a al- 
 mighty fine work them Lassies do, Maiden, 
 but it ain't fur the likes o' you. Can't yer be 
 content wi' doin' one man good?" 
 
 Maiden glanced down the gully where Lou 
 swung back in the saddle with the snake of the 
 lash hissing round his head. 
 
 "He do need it," she murmured. 
 
 Steve straightened, biting back a word on 
 his lips. 
 
 "Maiden, yer a little caution," he said. 
 "There ain't nuthin' a fellow knows 'bout yer 
 but as yer ain't never twice alike. Well yer 
 knowed as I wasn't meanin' Lou. But if so 
 be as you does, Maiden " 
 
 "There's Crellin's cart," said Maiden. "I'm 
 goin' to run. An' you needn't chase me down 
 to the bridge, 'cause it'd look undignified." 
 
 Steve said more than one thing under his 
 breath as Crellin's strong hand helped her up. 
 Then she turned on the high seat, and through 
 the dusk her little handkerchief flapped out at 
 him. He swung off his cap. 
 
 "Bless her!" he said. "She ain't meanin' all 
 her nonsense, my girlie." 
 
 As the cart rattled down the track by the 
 gully, Maiden's handkerchief blew out again.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 189 
 
 And this time it was Lou who made answer, 
 sending a long sweet whistle through the 
 gloom. 
 
 Steve saw from the top. But he did not 
 say anything of moment.
 
 FOB, a week there were men who said hard 
 things of Ted Douglas: men who suggested 
 that he had cause to know why Jimmie Elaine 
 had disappeared utterly and beyond power of 
 Murray's searching. But they did not know 
 that Murray was not searching very particu- 
 larly, although Lossin grumbled over it one 
 day, whilst Tod and two more from Mains sat 
 on the edge of Blake's horse trough and 
 watched the teams drink. Father Denis had 
 told Murray the truth that morning before 
 breakfast, and when the Court sat at midday, 
 Ted Douglas had been publicly cleared with 
 apology. Then he went to see Jimmie's 
 mother, with Father Denis at his side, and the 
 rest of the township sifted the story through 
 their fingers in the lunch hour. They called 
 Jimmie by some names that do not look well 
 in print; they shied from much talk of Ted, 
 because the prick of shame was on them that 
 had doubted him, and then they talked of 
 Murray. Tod gave his opinion first. 
 
 "If ut was Murray as he used to be he would 
 
 190
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 191 
 
 have found it out a long toime ago. Bhut do 
 we not know that somethin' has put the fear 
 an' all into him? An 'who wud it be but Pipi, 
 the ould omadhaun?" 
 
 "We-ell," said Steve, slowly, "where's the 
 sense o' goin' arter Jimmie, anyways? Old 
 Buggy hadn't a relation belongin' to him but 
 hisself , and who would be puttin' in a claim fur 
 the money?" 
 
 "Murray ain't got the heart fur his work, 
 though," said Danny, wisely; "an' ye kin bet 
 yer teeth it's Pipi's blame what? Sartinly, 
 yer kin call it rot, Jack Yates, but it's truth 
 fur all that. Didn't yer see it in the parlour 
 that night? Well, ef yer didn't see, I kin't 
 help it. There ain't been a machine invented 
 fur givin' a chap brains yet." 
 
 "It was Lou should 'a' footed that bill," said 
 Derrett, and Blake grinned. 
 
 "Lou's name won't hold good fur all the 
 bills he orter foot. But Murray's " 
 
 "Shut it!" Steve enforced command with 
 his elbow, and the men drew together to see 
 Murray go by with a face that had no right to 
 belong to that uniform. For it was the face 
 of blank fear. Thrice before the street-turning 
 he glanced back over his left shoulder, hasten- 
 ing speed at each glance. 
 
 Hynes whistled, and spat into the gutter. 
 
 "Shore 'miff, Murray has rats," he said; and 
 Lossin gave echo, with the addendum that he
 
 192 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 did not care to have the safety of Argyle de- 
 pending on a cop with rats. 
 
 Steve scowled, gathering up the lines, and 
 wearing his own team round. 
 
 "Don't you fret," he said; "Murray roped 
 the Packer in last night what has been goin' it 
 gay fur a week. He'll git you all right when 
 he comes wantin' yer." 
 
 Over the hill, on the Lion, Murray was 
 speaking of the Packer to Ormond. Ormond 
 had not seen Murray this month past, and the 
 sight shocked him. For the man was white- 
 lipped and nervous; his well-knit body had 
 fallen away, and his chin twitched. Ormond 
 made place on the dried warm tailings, and 
 tipped tea for the other out of his lunch-billy 
 the while he mined craftily for confidence. 
 
 "Yes, I'll send a man over to bring in the 
 Packer's tools," he said. "Not that I think 
 any one would sneak them. They're patched 
 with every imaginable thing under the sun. 
 And what the devil is the Packer patched with, 
 Murray? He's a wonder! At his age, too! 
 I couldn't stand it or you." 
 
 "We breed good men yet for more than 
 drink," said Murray, absently. 
 
 Ormond's eyes lit as he blinked downhill 
 through the run of sunshine to the creek bed 
 where Gordon and three more staggered under 
 weight of a twenty-one-foot pipe. 
 
 "We do so. There's every breath of four
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 193 
 
 ton in those pipes, and the fellows have been 
 lugging 'em downhill these six hours. We're 
 going back to paddock work again, you 
 know." 
 
 "There's one good man in Argyle who's been 
 bred for drink, I'm thinking," said Murray, 
 irrelevantly. 
 
 Ormond's palms ceased movement on the 
 half-rubbed Navy-cut. 
 
 "Randal?" 
 
 Murray nodded. 
 
 "He's driving Conroy's coach since Scannell 
 cleared him. But he won't last long at that. 
 If he'd only have the sense to cut the country 
 there might be a chance for him. But " 
 
 "There are two ways of going through the 
 world," said Ormond, dogmatically. "The one 
 is to know your own weakness and the other 
 man's strength. That gets you down every 
 time. The other is to know your strength, and 
 the other man's weakness; and that gives you 
 the pull as often as you want it. Unfortunate- 
 ly, Randal knows his weakness " 
 
 "And the other man's strength?" 
 
 "Precisely. The man in this case being " 
 
 "Kiliat ? Yes ; I thought so." 
 
 "Not that he has any strength of any kind," 
 explained Ormond, coming to his feet. "I 
 fancy his nurse must have put him under a 
 force-pump in his infancy, and drawn out all 
 his brains to make pap of. But he has a certain
 
 194 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 way with women that answers just as well, 
 under existing circumstances. Coming along 
 down, Murray? Or are you out on business?" 
 
 "No I'm off again to-morrow, though. 
 Plain-clothes job." He laughed unmirthfully. 
 "Chap hasn't a chance to grow fat in such an 
 infernally big district," he said. 
 
 The control of his voice was too careful. 
 Ormond had noted it all along, remembering 
 the life of the man before him. By day or 
 night, on saddle or on foot, Murray's work lay 
 in the hunting of men. He ran them down in 
 the township, in the bush "pubs," in the gold 
 country, where they fled to herd with odd thou- 
 sands of their fellows, in the lonely ranges 
 with none to come between the curt menace 
 of the revolver and the defiance of the cornered 
 one. He brought them to punishment such as 
 a prison holds for limited months. He brought 
 them to punishment such as the Argyle lock- 
 up afforded the Packer for two sleepy days, 
 and to punishment such as ends in six feet of 
 earth with no name atop. But eternally to 
 punishment ; seeking out the evil that is in man, 
 so that it might be hidden from other men. 
 
 Knowing all this, Ormond shivered a little 
 on the hot hill-top. 
 
 "You're looking seedy, Murray," he said. 
 "Can't you manage a holiday, eh?" 
 
 "There's no holiday will take a man away 
 from himself," said Murray, speaking sudden-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 195 
 
 ly. "Life can't do it. Nor Death. Nor 
 Eternity. Ormond, it is the cruellest thing 
 Divine power could do to decree that a man 
 can't get away from himself through all the 
 ages and ages and ages 
 
 "What the thunder do you want to get away 
 from yourself for?" demanded Ormond in 
 amaze. 
 
 "I don't know. If I did I might block it. 
 It's because I don't know because I can only 
 fear He glanced quickly over his left 
 
 shoulder and wheeled. And he did not see 
 Roddy Duncan staring through the broom, 
 with his half -eaten lunch on his knees. 
 
 "Ormond," he said, coming back, "you 
 heard about my roping in Pipi Wepeha's son, 
 and about the old chap coming into Blake's 
 one night and telling yarns that made more 
 than one fellow feel a bit sick?" 
 
 Ormond grunted curt assent. 
 
 "Since then," said Murray slowly, "I know 
 a man's soul can be sensitised to things that 
 his brain can't understand that his tongue 
 can't put into words. You see the sweat ooze 
 on the green scarf of a tree, and you know by 
 that how a part of it realises the death, though 
 it can make no sign. There is a part of a 
 man is as helpless as that, Ormond." 
 
 "Oh, don't be a blatant ass," said Ormond, 
 impatiently. "I'm as much a man as you, I 
 reckon, but I'll swear that my soul is a thing
 
 196 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 under command of my brain and my tonguf 
 as it should be. What else can rule it?" 
 
 "My God!" cried Murray. "Don't you see 
 that I don't know? I don't know what it is 
 that that has got hold of me. It is only that 
 I know that there is more on earth that there 
 is more in the day and night than there used 
 to be, Ormond; everything is so awfully alive. 
 If you listen you can hear the hills breathing." 
 
 Ormond came to his feet, and took Murray 
 by the shoulders. 
 
 "You go away down to Dunedin," he said. 
 "Get an exchange. Go and marry someone 
 anyone. Do something that'll get you run in 
 on your own account. Take a town-beat, and 
 go to music-halls every night. In a week 
 you'll find that your own life holds enough 
 interest for you to sharpen your teeth on." 
 
 Murray laughed, kicking loose stones down 
 to the stream with a clatter. 
 
 "Haven't you seen a tired kid crying its 
 heart out, with no one in all the house able to 
 give it what it wants, because it doesn't know, 
 itself? You can't help me, Ormond, because 
 I don't know what I want. I don't know." 
 
 Ormond tapped his pipe stem on his teeth, 
 looking round on his world as he knew it. The 
 tall straight cabbage trees on the slope were 
 familiar, and the rising terrace on yellow ter- 
 race to the ragged flint hills beyond. The 
 greys of sand and shingle down the Changing
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 197 
 
 Creek were familiar, and so were the bellows 
 of laughter from the men feeding in the gay 
 sunlight by the pipes. The pallor of the toi- 
 toi plumes meant nothing, nor the blood-red 
 biddy-bid spread over the scarp behind the 
 Glory which men called Fighting Hill. Or- 
 mond had never asked for the legend. 
 
 "Any fellow can scare himself dead in a 
 month if he lets imagination take grip enough. 
 But I didn't think you were quite such an ass, 
 Murray. So long as a man dresses by his 
 reason he does his work as he should do. But 
 once he loses step " 
 
 And then came something headlong from 
 the dead broom to clasp him about the knees, 
 and to pray him, for God's sake, to win Mur- 
 ray's forgiveness for this horror that walked in 
 broad day. Roddy's eyes were set with 
 despair, and his speech broke as Ormond 
 jerked him to his feet in a sudden spate of 
 anger. 
 
 "By the Lord Harry, but I've had enough 
 of this tommy-rot for one day! What the 
 devil do you mean by eavesdropping, you 
 young " 
 
 "Murray tell Murray I did it. Don't let 
 him touch me. Don't 
 
 "You needn't fret. I'll take as much out of 
 you as Murray could if I find you deserve it. 
 Stand up and speak when I tell you. Now 
 what have you got to do with this?"
 
 198 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Pipi I gave him Murray's red necktie. He 
 wanted to makutu him. I I couldn't help 
 it." 
 
 "If you're drunk at this hour," said Or- 
 mond, "I'll take you down and souse you in 
 our new paddock. If you think you're speak- 
 ing truth 
 
 Murray put him aside, grasping the boy's 
 arm in hot fingers. 
 
 "Don't be scared, Roddy. I won't hurt you. 
 Now tell me." 
 
 By patient questioning the two wrenched 
 from Roddy all that he knew. Then Ormond 
 looked at Murray standing blank-eyed in the 
 sun of the hill- top, and the sweat of unformed 
 dread sprang on him. 
 
 When a tohunga has hate for one of his 
 kind that man presently withers and dies as a 
 blown leaf on a tree. But this arrangement 
 is between Maori and Maori, when kindred 
 blood, and ignorance, and minds soaked in 
 generations of superstitions and in knowledge 
 of things that the white man does not know of 
 must come into account. By all the laws of 
 Heaven and Earth a white man has no right 
 to submit his soul to a brown man's curse. By 
 all the understanding that thirty-five years of 
 life had given Ormond knew that Murray had 
 done this thing, albeit unwittingly. He spoke 
 quickly. 
 
 "Murray! Don't look like that, man! It's
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 199 
 
 all rot. Rot! Go down an* strangle the old 
 brute with your necktie, and then you'll feel 
 better. There is no sense in it, I tell you. 
 Roddy's burbling." 
 
 Murray plucked at his waistcoat front. It 
 hung absurdly loose. 
 
 "You see," he said, very low, "I never 
 knew; but it's taking the flesh off my bones, 
 and the nerve out of my heart, all the same. 
 Have you got any answer for that?" 
 
 Ormond was trying to interpret things ac- 
 cording to his machine-trained understand- 
 ing. 
 
 "Pipi could curse my whole wardrobe till it 
 rotted for all I'd care. Murray, you're an 
 Englishman. Don't you know better than to 
 show funk before a Colonial?" 
 
 "Lou telled me," muttered Roddy, shaking 
 on his feet. "He said it meant things that 
 hadn't got any words to 'em. He said you'd 
 know it in the smells that come out o* the 
 swamps at night, an' in the birds never singin' 
 near you. Don't say as you does know it! Don't 
 say Pipi's killin* you 'cause of me! Murray! 
 Murray! I ain't done that! For the sake o' 
 God, don't say as I've done that!" 
 
 "Murray," said Ormond, and Murray an- 
 swered to the spur unhesitatingly. For the 
 knowledge of the irrevocable is a man's trouble 
 only. 
 
 "We all have spells of funk occasionally,
 
 200 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Roddy except the boss, here. I heard Pipi's 
 yarns that night, as you did; and I have let 
 them work on me also as you did. That's 
 all there is in it, of course; and it's the toe of 
 my boot that Pipi'll get instead of neckties 
 when I run across him again. But the next 
 time I catch you nosing into my private in- 
 sanities I'll give you a bigger licking than 
 ever your fears gave you, Roddy." 
 
 Ormond slipped his pipe into his pocket, and 
 settled his shoulders comfortably under the old 
 coat. 
 
 "Insanities," he said; "that's the truest 
 word you've spoken this day, Murray. Take 
 old Pipi round the township on your boot- 
 leather, and I'll guarantee you won't hear any- 
 thing worse than your own snoring at night. 
 You cut along down, Roddy. I'm just com- 
 ing." 
 
 But when Roddy had gone he put his hands 
 on the other man's shoulders. 
 
 "Murray, old chap," he said. 
 
 Murray's eyes did not lift. 
 
 "Don't!" he said in his throat. "Don't! I've 
 got to battle it out on my own. I can't under- 
 stand. But I've got to meet it alone, 
 Ormond." 
 
 "Murray " 
 
 "You can't help, old chap. Let me go. I 
 can't understand no, I won't go under if I 
 can help myself. So-long."
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 201 
 
 "I'd like to wring young Roddy's neck!" 
 said Ormond. 
 
 Then he went downhill to bolt the flanges of 
 twelve-inch pipes.
 
 CHAPTER XIV 
 
 "WAKE, you lumber'ead! wake I Jump 
 inter your clothes an' come down. There's a 
 suicide. Somebody's took pizen in Phelan's. 
 They says as he's prayin' an' repentin' on every 
 doormat in the 'ouse, an' requestin' a doctor. 
 Will you wake up ?" 
 
 This was the first watch of the night, and 
 Randal growled in his bed as Conroy shook 
 sleep from him with frantic hands. 
 
 "Sling it up. Who's the johnny? Oh I 
 don't care, anyway, Conroy. Let me sleep." 
 
 Conroy struck a match to the candle, and 
 his shock head and strained eyes sprang out 
 of the dark. He ran the whole coach service 
 of the district, and at this present he ran Ran- 
 dal as well. Incidentally, Randal was the 
 neatest driver he had known these six years. 
 
 "Didn't 'ear 'is name. Murray's bringin' 
 him round here. I've ordered a team inter the 
 old coach, an' you'll take the chap down to 
 Three Corners, eyes out. We ain't wantin' 
 no inques' held in Argyle." 
 
 Randal sat up and blinked where reflection 
 
 202
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 203 
 
 from a lantern below travelled round the bare 
 wall and was gone. Beyond the window the 
 still night was crazy with clatter of boots on 
 the flags, and grating of wheels and the ring of 
 iron on stone as startled horses plunged out of 
 the boxes. And the pelted talk of the stable- 
 man was virile and very real. He rolled out 
 on the floor. 
 
 "It'll take the all of two hours. Will we 
 catch the train? Is he bad yet?" 
 
 "There was too many tellin' fur me to know 
 anythin'. You got to be back in time to take 
 the reg'lar coach down. That's all I care. 
 An' as I had to guv yer a scratch team, you've 
 got the old coach, Randal. It don't matter if 
 you smash that up." 
 
 "D ," said Randal, and clawed round 
 
 the bedfoot for his clothes. 
 
 He took the steep back-stairs three at a 
 time, and raced round to the mews. The stir 
 of haste and disgust leavened all things. The 
 men showed half -clothed in the lantern flashes, 
 and from the moving rush of strenuous faces 
 and hairy glossed quarters a voice cursed, 
 copious and profound. Randal was utterly 
 weary, for he had been on the box all day. 
 Besides, he was robbed of the sleep which only 
 gave him forgetfulness. He dived in where 
 the jangle of steel sounded round the coach 
 bulk, and grabbed a stableman under the fore 
 carriage.
 
 204 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "What are you giving me? The Thunderer 
 mare ! Good Jupiter ! What else ?" 
 
 A couple of men step-danced with the mare 
 to her place on the off lead; from a wheeler 
 came the steady sound of practised kick- 
 ing, and three voices gave information as 
 one. 
 
 "Boss said not crawlers nor reg'lars, 
 
 so " "Ah, but it's all one to you, Randal. 
 
 You'll manage anythin' with hide on " 
 
 "So we guv yer goers, an' if yer larrup the 
 
 mare circumstantial at the offset " "Arrah, 
 
 phwhat matther annyways? Young Art's 
 neck is not wuth breakin' at all, an' Randal 
 cares just that much for himsilf, ivery inch." 
 
 "Art!" said Randal, and dropped the girth 
 he was handling. "Art Scannell?" 
 
 "That's him every time," said Lossin from 
 somewhere. "They're bringin' him now. 
 Crickey! He ain't dead yet." 
 
 Randal caught at a flange of the great 
 wedge of men that surged past. 
 
 "Derrett! Is he suffering?" 
 
 "Not pertic'lar. They've loaded him up wi' 
 whiskey what'd scupper any or'nary man, an* 
 he aint curlin' an' he ain't drunk. Jest pious! 
 An' that's a new line for Art. He's bin play- 
 in' wi' the Salvation Army o' late." 
 
 Murray's quick, alert tones cut the raffle of 
 sound, and Randal saw the flash of his strong 
 face above some dark struggling thing.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 205 
 
 "Make way there! Make way! Where's 
 the door? Now ." 
 
 Quick hands punted the struggling thing 
 into the coach bottom, and Murray leapt after. 
 Randal heard the door slam as Lossin yelled 
 cheerfully: 
 
 "Git the old hearse agoin', Randal. Make 
 her chirrup !" 
 
 Randal was overlooking traces and head- 
 stalls rapidly and with care; for instinct as- 
 serts itself above the senses. He took up a 
 hole in the mare's throat lash, and she reached 
 with the speed of a striking snake, so that the 
 front of his shirt and some flesh below came 
 away in her strong buck-teeth. 
 
 Randal buttoned his coat and climbed to the 
 box. The floodtide of fury will sweep out all 
 other sensations, and just now he wanted only 
 to be where he could kill the mare scientifically. 
 
 "Stand clear down below! Let 'em rip!" 
 
 Gentling hands dropped from four wild- 
 eyed heads, and the team canted all ways. For 
 they were unwarmed as yet, and in temper 
 pure devils. Murray jammed Art Scannell 
 in the coach corner with a stout leg, and clung 
 on by such power as he had. And a quiver of 
 excitement throbbed in the sluggish blood that 
 weeks of dread was beginning to chill. From 
 a loose box door Lossin was earnestly averring 
 that he did not envy any of those three who 
 were assuredly going to perdition inside of
 
 206 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 two minutes. Murray laughed to hear; and 
 to hear the steady talk of the long whip, 
 and the pulsing fire of hoofs as the four 
 mad beasts in the chains bucked and ran back 
 on each other and fought the weight of the 
 bit. 
 
 On the box-seat Randal was unerringly 
 gaining command. The team dropped back 
 on its haunches, took breath, and sprang with 
 a crash that made the old coach leap like a 
 landed fish. Randal swung then hard for the 
 alleyway, and Art Scannell thrust his head 
 through the window before Murray could block 
 him. 
 
 "I'm going to glory!" he cried. "I like it! 
 Fellow-sinners, take what's-his-name, and come 
 
 along to glor " Then the flash of lamps, 
 
 and the darting tongue of the long lash and 
 the blown foam from wide-set nostrils, passed 
 on to the unbroken thunder of hoofs that roared 
 into the night up the road. 
 
 Randal eased the pull, and settled his feet 
 in the irons. 
 
 "Go it, you serene cripples," he said. "But 
 if you're not blown in four miles, we'll be all 
 to glory with Art." 
 
 Then realisation struck down on him, 
 making him giddy for one moment of horror. 
 Erne! What would Erne say to him if he lost 
 Art for her? By her love for her twin Randal 
 had first caught her. By it he held her, fearing
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 207 
 
 ever lest the chord should break. And every 
 breath told him that it must break, soon or 
 late. 
 
 The team was half raw and purely mad. It 
 charged the heavy tree shadows blocked out on 
 the road as if they were fences, and took them 
 flying. The coach rocked and bucketted; the 
 lamp-light shook in speckles from the wild up- 
 flung head of the mare to the long straight 
 wither and neck behind her. Something ribbed 
 like a whaleboat was mate to the mare. It 
 bored with a steady sidelong persistence that 
 meant trouble. Straight ahead the road ran 
 into the stars, and the wind blown from their 
 far cold glow whistled up under Randal's coat 
 to numb the trickle of blood down his ribs. He 
 was twisted sideways that the strain of his arm 
 across his left side might deaden the pain, when 
 Murray's head came through the front window. 
 There was a ring in his voice that had not been 
 there these two months. 
 
 "By Jove, Randal, it's good! Oh, it's good, 
 man ! They are cutting it out. It takes a man 
 away from " 
 
 "How's Art?" said Randal, unmoving. 
 
 "Seems pretty right. He's praying down 
 there." Murray laughed easily. "By George, 
 Randal! I'm glad Saurian was away up the 
 Pass. I wouldn't have missed this what are 
 they going to do now?" 
 
 "Going to Hell, I think. Get back, and
 
 208 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 don't let Art out of the door. I've got to navi- 
 gate the cutting in two acts." 
 
 Murray disappeared. Randal wrapped the 
 reins twice round his wrists, and took hold with 
 fingers taut as Harveyised steel. With his 
 nerve in his hands and eyes he wrenched the 
 team sharp to the left, and braced himself be- 
 tween upright and foot guard as the coach 
 took the curve on one wheel. Great cliffs shot 
 up overhead. Beneath the- mare's feet spurned 
 shingle rattled down to far hurry of water. 
 The clay bottom was greasy with recent rains, 
 and the boat-ribbed demon lost footing, 
 floundering ten yards with his weight on the 
 man on the box. He recovered at a vein of 
 scoria, with his nose in the manuka edging the 
 cutting, and Randal felt his sinews crack as 
 he bore with both arms to the leftward still. 
 
 Curve and curve and curve ; with ever a nine- 
 foot track, and the grade of one in five; and 
 ever the unchecked gallop, and the sway of the 
 clumsy coach. The wash of the water talked 
 louder, swept up, and ran low through the 
 wheels. Across the half-dried river bed, foul 
 with broken trees and sand spits and sharp 
 rocks that struck back fire to fire, Randal fol- 
 lowed the ford as he might. Each day he took 
 it at a paced trot. He had not passed it be- 
 fore on a hurricane. The cutting beyond was 
 rotten and the underway patched. Randal 
 knew each of the white sign posts of warning
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 200 
 
 that reeled away like drunken men. He held 
 the path grimly; his eyes fastened on the 
 writhe of the grade under the quivering lamp- 
 light, and every sense answering in trained 
 skill to the need. 
 
 The team breasted the top; unbeaten, un- 
 distressed and game. The macadam rolled 
 through a green tableland where waked sheep 
 and cattle fed in the long vernal scented grass. 
 And here Randal dropped his hands and 
 crouched. For the strain had been very 
 cruel, and the blood-letting had weakened his 
 
 grip- 
 Murray's voice came through the window. 
 "Are you in charge yet, Randal?" 
 "Yes^-think I've got them under. How's 
 
 Art?" 
 
 "Blest if I can make him out. I believe the 
 
 young beggar is kidding us. He's absolutely 
 
 happy down there, singing Army hymns " 
 
 "What! Do you think he's all right, 
 
 Murray? Do you think he's all right?" 
 
 The ring in the voice called many things to 
 
 Murray's memory. 
 
 "I'd lay good long odds on it," he said. 
 "Then I wish to goodness you could get him 
 
 through there, and hang on to the strings while 
 
 I come in and wallop him, Murray." 
 Murray grinned. 
 
 "Pity to disturb him listen " 
 
 Above the uneven nervous gait whereby
 
 210 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Randal held the four together with delicate 
 touch, Art Scannell was talking in a virile 
 Saxon speech that brought laughter to both 
 who heard. 
 
 "Randal, he's standing up going to de- 
 liver his testimony. Go steady pity to lose 
 this." 
 
 The two giggled with an hysterical clutch at 
 their throats. For pity and disgust marched 
 with laughter at the delirious ribaldry of the 
 boy's talk. The off-wheel lifted on a tussock, 
 and the babble broke with a snap. 
 
 "Short-circuited him that time," said Mur- 
 ray at the window. "He's under the seat " 
 
 The clap of the door came on the words, and 
 Murray's shout: 
 
 "Randal! He's out! Randal! Stop, for 
 the Lord's sake!" 
 
 Randal's start scared the team. It plunged, 
 reached on the reins, and in that instant some- 
 thing swarmed up the wheel as a gorilla might 
 have done, and fastened on Randal's shoulders, 
 jerking him back to meet hot breath on his 
 cheek. 
 
 "I've come up to drive," said Art Scannell, 
 with quick lissom fingers sliding to the reins. 
 "Give 'em to me, Randal. Curse you! Give 
 'em up " 
 
 By the cut of the wind past his ear, and the 
 spring that assuredly loosened his wrists in 
 iheir sockets, Randal guessed at the payment
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 211 
 
 that should be required for Murray's careless- 
 ness. 
 
 He jammed down the brake; gripped up the 
 reins in one hand, and fought for his own life 
 and the boy's as best he might. 
 
 And something in the back of his head was 
 saying: 
 
 "D Murray! I wish he was in behind 
 
 there to take it with us." 
 
 The team ripped over the saddle with the 
 coach rocking, and Randal guarding the reins, 
 half choked, and very nearly mad with pain 
 at the opening wound on his chest. Art Scan- 
 nell was kneeling on the box with his dark boy 
 face level with Randal's. The thick-lashed 
 eyes and straight features were cruelly like 
 Effie's, and the words on his mouth were such 
 as sickened Randal. The boy's hands shut 
 over Randal's, and the whole weight of his 
 body lay across the taut arms. Randal felt 
 the team check, swing to the strain, and heard 
 the sob of soft grass cut under the hoofs. His 
 hands slid, snatched, held again; and he came 
 to the box bottom with Art. Here they fought, 
 with Randal doubled sideways, and the hand- 
 ling of the reins his yet, though control had 
 gone this long time past. Art Scannell's arms 
 were warmly close about him, and the smooth 
 cheek rubbing Randal's was torture. He 
 crushed the boy down, kneeling on him, forcing 
 him with all his gasping strength; and round
 
 212 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 him, and overhead, rose up the ghost country, 
 haggard, void and unending. Under him Art 
 Scannell struggled, cursing, and scratching as 
 a weka scratches with spurred wings and feet. 
 Dead trees reeled past, white stripes on the 
 broad back of night, with long shaggy moss 
 blowing from them like a beard on the chin 
 of Death. 
 
 "That is a dead man calling me across the 
 distance," said Randal, speaking without voli- 
 tion, for sense told him that it was a mo-poke 
 frightened by the gallopping hoofs. 
 
 Beneath his knees Art Scannell was still, 
 and a fear colder than death took him by the 
 heart strings. He half rose. And then Art 
 Scannell caught him about the middle, and the 
 reins were gripped in his white young teeth. 
 The bleared trees drew in, right and left; 
 plunged at Randal, and held him fast. This 
 was Death, with a tearing pain in the sinews, 
 and that dead man calling as a bird calls in 
 the middle of the night. 
 
 A sentence struck him from no given place 
 as the leaders rammed a tree butt and turned 
 the coach over. It was curt, and very intense, 
 and it never came out of the Prayer Book. 
 But it brought Randal to his feet. 
 
 "By , Murray!" he said, "have you been 
 
 there aU the time? Where's Art?" 
 
 "I don't know where he is," said Murray, 
 watching the wheelers kick the fore-carriage
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 213 
 
 into excellent firewood. "But I very sincerely 
 hope he's had his neck broken. Didn't 
 you hear me trying to get through the 
 window?" 
 
 "This is a short cut into Three Corners," 
 said Art Scannell, coming out of a bank of 
 bracken with scratches blood-lined across his 
 cheek. "Come along down, you two, and have 
 a nip. I'll shout." 
 
 Murray fell on a white tree bole and rocked 
 with laughter. 
 
 "I'll bet you will, my innocent. Just wait 
 till Randal gets his hands on you " 
 
 "Just put your back into this, and shut up," 
 said Randal, in vivid command; and Murray 
 went where the noise of straining leather and 
 burst wood was calling. Randal loosed the 
 four, and slashed at the latest with a curse. 
 
 "They'll go home," he said, "and Conroy 
 will have to send an engine or firestick for 
 the coach. Come on. I've got to hunt up a 
 horse to get back with." 
 
 "Couldn't you have ridden " 
 
 "No, thanks. Nor could you. I know those 
 four. Besides " 
 
 He staggered a little, pulled himself up, and 
 trudged forward. Art Scannell followed, 
 singing after his kind, and Murray tailed in 
 the rear, marvelling that he did not slay young 
 Art and bury him in a decayed log. 
 
 The angels had strung all their diamond
 
 214 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 necklaces across the purple velvet of the sky; 
 and their pure breath was in the night air, and 
 the shadow of their wings on the far hills. 
 Randal stumbled between the shed pits of the 
 matai trunks and the long slivers of ribbon- 
 wood bark; climbed a wire fence; crossed a 
 paddock with bog and a smell of pigs, and 
 came to anchor before the Three Corners 
 Hotel. Murray, closing up, saw the horrible 
 white of his face under the kerosene lamp hung 
 out for the 2 a. m. train. He caught at the 
 shoulder that swayed, as Art Scannell passed 
 to the bar whistling. 
 
 "What have you done to yourself? Randal, 
 you owl, you're hurt " 
 
 Randal was assured that his words came 
 through a thick blanket. 
 
 "How how's Art?" he asked, for the third 
 time. 
 
 "Art," said Murray, distinctly, "was very 
 drunk to-night, and tried a game on. He's 
 gone into the bar to get drunk again; but if 
 he tries any more games, I'll know why. Now, 
 come in here, Randal, and let's see what is 
 wrong." 
 
 Within the two ends of a half-hour Randal 
 had quarrelled with Wallace of the hotel, with 
 Murray, and with the three men who had 
 turned up at the siding for the train. For he 
 sat on the horse-hair sofa with twenty-one
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 215 
 
 yards of bandage rolled round his body by 
 Murray, and defied them. 
 
 "You can talk till you're black," he said. 
 "I've got to get back by seven. I've got to 
 bring the coach down for the midday." 
 
 Art Scannell swung his legs from the table 
 edge where he was nursing a half -glass of 
 brandy. 
 
 "I'll drive you both back, and no questions 
 asked," he suggested. "Though mind you, I 
 do consider it jolly cheek of you both to 
 bring me down here just to watch Randal 
 bleed." 
 
 Murray felt in his pockets. 
 
 "My child," he said, "you had two emetics 
 before you left Argyle, and you'll have another 
 if you don't take a reef in that tongue of yours. 
 Can you keep him here till midday, Wallace, 
 and I'll drive Randal back if he's beyond per- 
 suasion?" 
 
 "I've got to take the seven coach down," said 
 Randal, and came to his feet to clinch the 
 matter. 
 
 Wallace provided his little trotter and a gig; 
 and Randal made no complaint when they 
 bumped over a broken culvert in the dark hour 
 that goes before all sunlight. For the second 
 time that night Murray forgot the creeping 
 things that dogged him. 
 
 "You'll be in a fine state by the time those 
 horses have pulled you about all to-day," he
 
 216 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 said. "Why don't you take it easy, man, and 
 let someone else have a buck at them?" 
 
 "I told Conroy I'd be back. I don't break 
 my word if if I can help it." 
 
 "Well, you can't help this. You- 
 
 "Don't talk rot," said Randal, roughly. "Do 
 you think I'd take it on if I thought I was 
 going to peter out and mess things up? A 
 man knows what he can do, and what he can't. 
 Or if he doesn't he ought to." 
 
 To the break in his voice Murray gave a 
 pitiful silence, and slowly the day came: not 
 flushing with girlish shyness as she comes to 
 dimpled valleys and homesteads, but standing 
 grave and beautiful on the mountains, to press 
 wreaths of blood-red thorns down on their 
 snow, and to fling her great javelins of light 
 from pinnacle to jagged scarp and bowed 
 bared shoulder of flint. 
 
 The tussock deeps either side the saddle lay 
 naked as an unseen hand swept the white mists 
 out of them, and the very faint sound of sheep 
 cropping grass came up through the new-made 
 air. And the sunlight burst up the gullies, 
 and along the hundred-foot river banks, strik- 
 ing their clay to beaten bronze, and chasing a 
 riot of onyx and jasper and hyacinth-blue 
 from bluff up to reaching bluff until all the 
 western sky was laughing with it. 
 
 Murray pulled slow for the ford, and a little 
 black-and-white stilt darted away from under
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 217 
 
 a niggerhead, its red legs flashing in the 
 light. 
 
 "A new day is as solemn a thing to see as a 
 new soul," said Murray, then. 
 
 Randal laughed in one syllable. 
 
 "The solemn thing, as I take it, is a soul 
 that will never be new any more. But you see 
 them every day." 
 
 "I don't," said Murray, taking his lungs full 
 of scent-flooded air, as they rose the cutting 
 beyond through gold and pearl of the flower- 
 ing broom. 
 
 "You could if you looked," said Randal, 
 carelessly. "How does time go?" 
 
 "Just six. Feeling very fagged, eh?" 
 
 "No, I'm all right, thanks. Lick him up a 
 bit along here, can't you?" 
 
 "Don't you fret. I'll be up to time." 
 
 But with the flat daylight on the familiar 
 things again Murray's torture woke and ran 
 behind him, and neither man was speaking 
 when the gig swung into the alleyway, and 
 Conroy came out and asked questions. 
 
 Murray explained seven things in one sen- 
 tence. Then Conroy said: 
 
 "You got ten minutes ter have a feed and 
 a nip in, Randal; and then for Heaven's sake, 
 take 'em if you can. I haven't got another man 
 can handle that team wi'out makin' a blamed 
 mess o' things." 
 
 "Keep your hair on. I'm going to take
 
 218 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 them. Did anyone send word up to 
 Mains?" 
 
 "No. We waited ter hear the end of it 
 knowin' young Art. He do have his own idea 
 of a joke." 
 
 Randal was on the box-seat as the men 
 brought the team out to the street. He was 
 crumpled, and tired tired until he could not 
 remember a time when he was not tired. Then 
 the jar of wheels was close on him; Effie Scan- 
 nell pulled in the bay cob with a turn of her 
 wrist, and tossed the reins to the groom be- 
 side her. There were boxes in the back of the 
 cart. Randal saw them in one swift eye-flash. 
 But he did not look again until it was necessary 
 to stoop over and bring her up to the seat by 
 the hand. The pressure in the meeting grip 
 was hers only, and she said underbreath: 
 
 "I want to speak to you." 
 
 Kiliat's voice sounded at the wheel. 
 
 "You going down too, Miss Effie? Oh, I 
 say! I don't deserve such luck, you know." 
 
 Effiie leant over, speaking with quick little 
 ripples of laughter as pole-straps and traces 
 met buckled, and the mail bags were flung up 
 to Randal. Behind, a heavy-footed woman 
 and two complaining children made the body 
 of the coach shake. The horses stirred im- 
 patiently with the freshness of the morning 
 blowing on them, and yet Kiliat talked by the 
 wheel to Effie.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 219 
 
 The quick twist of a grin was on Randal's 
 mouth. He caught the heavy reins where they 
 spun to him, and the brake flew up as the horses 
 leapt as one. 
 
 Kiliat passed behind with a shout and a 
 quick scramble that brought him to his knees 
 in the coach-bottom. Randal cut the leaders 
 with the lash, thanking Heaven that the coach 
 carried no window. 
 
 "Say what you want to before we get to the 
 bridge," he said. "I must walk over that. 
 The offsider is too skittish." 
 
 "You you haven't said you're glad to see 
 me, yet, Guy." 
 
 Randal's deep breath was very nearly a 
 groan. 
 
 "Does a man go about saying he is glad to 
 be alive? What can I tell you that you don't 
 know, Effie?" 
 
 Her hand was on his left arm, and her face 
 was close to his shoulder, as Art's had been 
 so few hours ago. 
 
 "Tell me that you're not forgetting me, 
 Guy." 
 
 "Effie don't! Dear, you don't know how 
 cruel you are to me sometimes. I wouldn't 
 ask you that." 
 
 "I'm going to test you, Guy. I'm going 
 away. For months ; I don't know how many." 
 
 "Where?" 
 
 "The North Island Sydney Melbourne.
 
 220 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 I'm going with Mr. Kiliat's mother and 
 sister." 
 
 Randal took the turn to the coach bridge 
 with absolute precision. Then he said : 
 
 "Have you anything else to tell me?" 
 
 Then the tears came, and she caught the 
 lapels of his coat with a little sob. 
 
 "Guy! Guy! I don't want to go! Oh 
 dearest, don't you understand that that they 
 are sending me away, Guy?" 
 
 "I understand. They are sending you away 
 from me, Effie. And it is better that you 
 should go." 
 
 "It won't make any difference. I shall come 
 back. You you'll wait here for me, Guy?" 
 
 Randal stooped over and kissed her on the 
 lips. 
 
 "I will wait," he said. 
 
 Then he drew rein on the bridge planking, 
 and apologised to Kiliat when he came round 
 to the wheel in white wrath.
 
 CHAPTER XV 
 
 "LOOKS like ole Joe Page ev'ry time," said 
 Moody. 
 
 Danny spanked a hogget forward by appli- 
 cation of the draughting gate, and smudged 
 the sweat from his forehead. 
 
 "It don't look like him, yer idjit," he said 
 explosively. "It is him. Now you just hook 
 it, Joe. I ain't goin' ter be done wi' these 
 pants 'fore shearin's over. An' there won't 
 be anythin' but the equivocating buttings lef ' 
 then." 
 
 Joe was a password in the district sheds. 
 He cadged a coat here, a pair of boots some- 
 where else, and cast dungarees and old hats 
 by the score. He hooked his arms over the 
 rail and smiled blandly. 
 
 "Yer '11 kip the buttons fur me, anyways, 
 Danny," he suggested. 
 
 "I'm makin' them inter a teething necklace 
 fur me sister's baby," said Danny, stolidly. 
 "Go an' ring yer little game onter Lou." 
 
 Further down the heat of the sun-swept race 
 Lou was hustling sheep with his cap, with a 
 
 manuka bough, with sharp whistles, and the 
 
 221
 
 power of his fore-bent knees. Above the noise 
 and hurry of the draughting yards, and above 
 the yap-yap of Danny's blue Smithfield by his 
 foot, he heard and gave answer. 
 
 "Cut along into the shed, Joe, and ask for 
 Mogger. You'll find him on the presses. He's 
 always got things to spare." 
 
 "Joe don't yer go ter do " But a ram 
 
 slewed the gate over with his horn, and Danny 
 plunged into the tideway, vivid-speeched and 
 alert, to turn the river that set awry to the 
 yards. 
 
 All the glory of summer was over Mains, 
 on the hills and the bush-dark gullies. All the 
 savage glare and heat of it was over the yards 
 where sheep cried and coughed, and shook the 
 rails with the soft weight of their bodies; and 
 where dogs were thick underfoot, noisy, clever 
 and keen; obedient ever to the quick whistle, 
 to the shout through the dust, and to the 
 swerve of an up-flung hand. The races roared 
 with choked life; the three draughting gates 
 throbbed back and forth under power of quick 
 eye and quick brain and quick hand. The dust 
 was dry in each man's throat, and the grit of 
 it between his teeth. And all the welter of 
 sound and ruled haste and heat did not shake 
 the compass point that he steered by. For a 
 Colonial learns by doing, and by doing again ; 
 and this is the only true way to get technical 
 skill.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 223 
 
 The last ram butted Danny on the hip, so 
 that he sent a kick after him as the gate swung 
 idle. Then he sat on the rail to charge his pipe 
 while Moody swept six more down the paddock 
 to round up another mob. 
 
 "Yer a fair skunk, Lou," he said. 
 
 Lou cut tobacco slowly. The grease and 
 dirt of sheep were on his bared arms and his 
 shirt, and his boots were burst at the toes. But 
 still there was something in the carriage of his 
 head that would turn women and not a few 
 men to look at him twice. 
 
 "Old Joe'll strike a snag in Mogger .unless 
 he's wanting ribbons," he said. 
 
 "I 'opes as Mogger'll do some strikin' 'fore 
 long," said Danny, with feeling, and took six 
 sets of rails and a gate in answer to Steve's 
 howl from the filling pens. 
 
 He snatched a gum stick from somewhere, 
 dived into the ruck, and hammered the 
 stumbling bodies up the grating to the bowels 
 of the shed. Here new sounds and new 
 stenches held sway: the rasp of the presses 
 forward, the mutter of the shears, the hundred 
 other noises pent in by the dark of iron roof 
 that creaked in the grasp of the sun rays. 
 
 There was smell of the tar-pot, and of sheep, 
 and of heated men ; and the strange oily scent 
 of a well-yoked fleece. Danny slammed the 
 gate behind the last straggler and made out 
 for air, past the length of the board where
 
 224 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the men stopped dripping, and the fleecies 
 swooped and circled like gulls. 
 
 "I've filled up wi' a entrancin' lot o' smell- 
 ers this go, Creash," he said. "Come off of the 
 Pinetop where we bin cultivatin' Calif ornian 
 thistle, they did." 
 
 Creash grinned, turning his sheep over. 
 
 "Takes the all of a sewin' needle to git 
 through my hide. Go an' tell Luttrell. He's 
 soft." 
 
 But Ted Douglas was telling Luttrell 
 things at that instant. And Danny paused, 
 smelling trouble. For he knew Luttrell's 
 tongue, and he knew that "back-talk" was no 
 tender to the shed boss on Mains. 
 
 "When I'm wantin' your biography I'll ask 
 fur it," said Ted, with his hands deep in his 
 coat pockets. "I don't care what you did in 
 Orstralyer. A man who can't shear his two 
 hundred there is a fool. But the man what 
 does more than his one hundred here on these 
 sheep he's goin' to git fired, an' don't you 
 forgit it. We ain't over-keen on seein' fancy 
 wool work under the Mains brand." 
 
 "Crewel work is the belligerent name fur it," 
 suggested Danny; and Scott shouted from the 
 loft: 
 
 "Are he wantin' a cork ter his shear p'ints, 
 Ted?" 
 
 "Not so much as you're wantin' it in your 
 mouth," returned Ted, sharply.
 
 Luttrell's great buck teeth showed under 
 the ragged moustache, and his hands shook 
 on the idle shears. But the steady eyes and 
 voice broke him down. He swerved sullenly 
 into the pen, dragged out his sheep, and 
 opened up with the clean clever blow of the 
 ringer. Danny grunted approval. 
 
 "The ole apostrophe!" he said. "He'd 
 'a' had the head off of anyone else as blocked 
 him. But there ain't much leakin' on Mains 
 wi' you at the sluices, Ted." 
 
 Ted gave no answer. He passed the tables 
 with quick commanding sight on the wool bins, 
 the branders, the hurrying fleecies, and the 
 men that wrought with the presses and bales. 
 At end of the south board he stood, and each 
 shearer felt him there on the instant. Ted 
 knew that they felt him, and the apple of his 
 throat ached in sudden pain. For not Steve 
 nor another was fitted to take his place in the 
 shed, on the cattle camps, on the ranges in 
 the mustering season. And yet, for Jimmie, 
 he would leave Mains to fall or to fight ac- 
 cording to the wisdom of Steve or another. 
 Because this much is true of men all the world 
 through: they give hand-and-lip service to 
 a superior; but only to a leader of their class 
 will they give thew-and-body service to the 
 utmost. Scannell knew this when he laid 
 power on Ted's shoulders ; and Ted knew. 
 
 "On'y fur Jimmie," he said underbreath.
 
 226 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "I can't help it if there ain't another chap fit 
 Baxter!" 
 
 Danny heard the shout where he was 
 draining a half-dozen pannikins by the big 
 doors. 
 
 "Ted ain't sweet ter-day," he remarked, rub- 
 bing against a new-branded bale. "Did Joe 
 come askin' him fur handkerchees an' hair-ile 
 an' things, Ike?" 
 
 "Joe ast me," said Mogger, with his weight 
 on the bale hook, and the muscles outsprung 
 on his forehead. "He said as Lou tole him 
 ter." 
 
 Scott grinned, jerking a thread from the 
 twine hank. 
 
 "The game ain't ter the dealer this time, 
 though," he said. 
 
 "What'd yer do, Mog?" Danny slung 
 down the last pannikin, and stood upright. 
 
 "Jes* guv him Lou's coat. He lef it here 
 last 'Spell-o,' " said Mogger, composedly, and 
 tumbled the bale into the brander's hands. 
 
 Danny fell over in abandonment of joy and 
 giggled until the brander who happened to 
 be Scott saw the smudged "First Combing," 
 and tracked the final "g" to Danny's left shoul- 
 der. Thereafter, Danny went out headlong 
 on the mass of sweepings drawn from the shed ; 
 picked himself up, and returned to the little 
 gates in a kindly tenderness that puzzled Lou 
 until he came for his coat after the night's cut-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 227 
 
 out. This was long past the meal hour, for 
 the work of the station hands does not snap 
 with the shearer's bell; and thirty-seven men 
 lay round the whares where the grass was 
 tramped dust, or scattered down the long pad- 
 dock in the dusk with the ring of quoits to 
 mark them. Lou satisfied his hunger. Then 
 he came out and satisfied Mogger, and, in- 
 cidentally, Tod and several more. Tod was 
 full fed with happiness, for a mixed crowd was 
 incense in his nostrils. He flung his vitriol 
 dispassionately, while Mogger sat with out- 
 stretched legs in the dust, and told passers-by 
 that "It was wuth it." 
 
 "Not as Lou's fists dun't git home quick as 
 his tongue most times," he explained; "but it 
 was wuth it. A reel good coat, an' no error. 
 Joe called me a pattron, too. That means a 
 banefactor ter Society." 
 
 "It don't," said Danny, whom Suse had 
 initiated in several mysteries. "It means a 
 thing as gels cuts their frocks on. Joe were 
 pullin' yer leg, Mogger." 
 
 "I'd be a good pattron fur a gel ter cut a 
 husbin' on, then," said Mogger, stretching 
 himself. "Yer tell that ter Suse, Danny, sup- 
 posin' she's wantin' ter change 'er mind 'fore 
 it's too late." 
 
 "Arrah, bedad, it's only colleens loike Miss 
 Effie has the sinse to do that," remarked Tod. 
 "It's on wid Kiliat, all roight, now, an' off wid
 
 228 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Randal more be token as he's shankin' down- 
 hill wid all the power lef ' to him." 
 
 "Randal was allers a fool," said Scott, fall- 
 ing out of a dispute that had been over-hot. 
 "He's workin' a hatter's claim up Chinaman's 
 Gully now, and gittin' his washups from the 
 Lion drainage. Makes a colour p'raps once 
 in four days, he does. A fine sort o' life, that." 
 
 Someone spoke above the murmur of voices 
 where the tobacco clouds hung on the dusk. 
 
 "Oh, go it! We're mighty ready to jump 
 on a man for goin' lame. Suppose you hunt 
 round for the last his boot was made on, next 
 time." 
 
 "It's wise ye are," said Tod, dryly. "We 
 buys thim ready-made, me bosthoon; an* wan 
 lasht does for the lot until it is worn out. 
 Bhut it does not pinch us all." 
 
 Ted Douglas smoked slowly. 
 
 "You allers talk clever when you're not 
 meanin' it, Tod," he said. "Till our feet is 
 all made on one last, too, I reckin there'll 
 gene'ly be some on us goin' lame." 
 
 A Queenslander sat up with a crackle of 
 the brushwood stack at his foot. 
 
 "There's a time comin' when we'll make our 
 own bloomin' lasts an' our own bloomin' laws," 
 he said. "No ready-made foolery. We won't 
 hev no corns then." 
 
 Danny rolled over, and pulled the accordeon 
 toward him.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 229 
 
 "Belike we won't hev no boots nayther, yer 
 contagious yard o' shingle! Paddy, cut along 
 in an' tell Lou as the audience is requestin' him 
 ter come an' oblige wi' 'The Ole Bullock 
 Dray.' ' 
 
 In the close dark of the eating-whare where 
 the cook and the slushy juggled with tin plates 
 and dirty water, Lou was drawing a three- 
 shed cheque from young Benson by power of 
 five cards and some science. He retired Paddy 
 with direct insult, and the quoit players came 
 back to raise choruses and to fling uncurbed 
 jokes that angered Ted Douglas. He got to 
 his feet, speaking curtly: 
 
 "I'm goin' out to the river downs arter keas. 
 Any on you comin' along?" 
 
 Ike stifled a yawn and raised himself by 
 sections. He was bone-weary, as every hand 
 on Mains had a right to be. But when a man 
 does not give jealousy he usually gives adora- 
 tion to the other of his own age and rank who 
 has distanced him. 
 
 "I am, Ted. Wait till I gits my gun." 
 
 Steve had seen Ike sluicing the rust out of 
 his old single-barrel the evening before, and he 
 growled distinct warning until the tread of feet 
 ceased to echo on the warm earth where he 
 lay. 
 
 Past the woolshed gates the two fell on 
 Scannell with his clever little 303 in his arm- 
 pit. Not age nor sorrow of soul could kill
 
 230 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the sportsman in Scannell, and he stepped it 
 alertly; through manuka and tawhina scrub, 
 round the swamp head, and up the tussock 
 terraces beyond. 
 
 The dew had loosed scent on the still air. 
 Scent of tussock and languid-sweet manuka 
 bloom; of bush in far-below gullies, and cow 
 breath and subtle smells from the flax and the 
 faint evening primrose. To the westing the 
 long, long afterglow quivered still in pale 
 gold, and the rush of the river round the 
 terrace foot sounded clear and serene. Ted 
 was not speaking, for the calm of the night 
 was steadying his soul against what should be. 
 Ike listened, sharp-eared, for the kea call, 
 and whistled out the answer gladly when 
 sound caught them on the lip of the first 
 slope. 
 
 They dropped over it as one, and unshorn 
 ewes blundered away at their coming. But a 
 dark heap lay on the breast of the tussock 
 with a picnic party atop. 
 
 The party cursed in parrot jabber; drew 
 off five paces, and cursed again. Guns spoke 
 thrice with red fire. Then Ted came on his 
 knee, feeling over the bloody wool for the kid- 
 neys that yet were warm. 
 
 "There's life enough in the blood to pull the 
 p'ison through it," he said, and proceeded to 
 work straightway. 
 
 Ike nosed his way forward carefully,
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 231 
 
 cuddling his old gun and walking the lean 
 sheep track in the half light with the snarl of 
 shingle on rocks straight below. Ted stood 
 up, cleansed his hands in the tussock spines, 
 and said: 
 
 "That makes the hundred, sir." 
 
 Scannell kicked at a fallen flutter of green 
 and red feathers. 
 
 "Brutes!" he said. "They're hanging about 
 late this year. We must work 'em systematic- 
 ally when shearing's done, Ted." 
 
 Ted's hand gripped on his rifle. He spoke 
 very low. 
 
 ' 'Fraid you'll hev to git someone else to 
 run that game. I want to leave arter 
 shearin's done." 
 
 "Leave! Leave! You don't know what 
 you're talking about. Leave Mains! You 
 couldn't do it, Ted." 
 
 "I wants ter leave after shearin'." Scannell 
 caught the shake in the tone. 
 
 "Are you tired of the old life, Ted?" 
 
 "No! You knows I ain't! But I wants 
 Iter go." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 There was a silence. The very far murmur 
 of sheep plucked at Ted's heart strings. The 
 mighty head of the Brothers across the river 
 and across the lower hills called him in every 
 grand curve of it against the stars. At his 
 feet the downs rolled away; dimpled, and lush
 
 232 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 with feed for the sheep that he might not con- 
 trol at next muster. 
 
 "Why, Ted?" 
 
 "It's just Jimmie. He might be wantin' 
 help somewhere, an' I can give it." 
 
 "Jimmie? Jimmie Elaine? Ted, I won't 
 believe that you are wanting to bring him to 
 justice!" 
 
 Ted laughed just a little, standing big and 
 still against the stars. 
 
 "Thanky, sir. No Jimmie's my mate. 
 He's easily 'feared, an' there's suthin' on his 
 mind- 
 
 "Quite likely," said Scannell, dryly. 
 
 . . . "An' bein' a Carth'lic he thinks a 
 powerful lot o' dyin' unshrived an' that sort 
 o' thing. It makes me sick o' times ter think 
 what might be happenin' ter the little chap." 
 
 "He tried to ruin you, Ted. He would have 
 perjured himself to do it if he had had the 
 pluck." 
 
 "I loves him," said Ted, slowly. "An* 
 love's the kind o' thing as yer can't let out 
 the slack o' or wind it up jes' as yer like. He's 
 weak as a girl, an' I loves him as I'll never 
 love a girl. I must find him, sir." 
 
 Scannell was angry for the space of five 
 minutes. Then he said something that hurt 
 Ted more than the anger. 
 
 "I thought you loved Mains, Ted." 
 
 "Don't! Don't! You knows as I I "
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 233 
 
 Scannell's hand sought the hard young one, 
 and gripped it. 
 
 "I'm sorry but it's hard on me, too. I'll 
 never get another headman like you, Ted. 
 Well you'll see us through shearing?" 
 
 "Wouldn't I have gone a month ago ef I 
 hadn't meant that? Yes, I'll wait till that is 
 done." 
 
 "Then," said Scannell, "we had better go 
 on. For there is no more to say,"
 
 CHAPTER XVI 
 
 "WELL! but I can't help it," said Kiliat. 
 
 Ormond looked at him. 
 
 "No," he said, "I didn't suppose you could. 
 You're not built that way. But you can back 
 me up when your father comes along to ask 
 questions. And I think that he will probably 
 come very soon. To-day most likely." 
 
 "What what the devil have you been 
 doing?" cried Kiliat, in wrath. 
 
 Ormond was patching a nine-inch pipe. The 
 pipe was red-hot in the sunshine ; the plate was 
 hot, and the tap turned stickily in his hands. 
 He grovelled for a dropped bolt in the half- 
 dried clay of the underway, picked it out, and 
 said: 
 
 "I wrote telling him that I meant to chuck 
 the whole thing if he is not here before Friday. 
 And as he knows you pretty well, I fancy that 
 he will be here before Friday." 
 
 "Chuck it! You can't chuck it! I I I 
 can't run this plant, Ormond." 
 
 Ormond raised himself, rubbing back the 
 rough hair on his forehead. 
 
 234
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 235 
 
 "Then you'd better not go back on me when 
 your father which is your father, Kiliat?" 
 
 They were two stocky bull-necked men who 
 stumbled over the heat-hazed shingle. From 
 top hat to patent leathers they wore the gear of 
 town life, and both were panting and purple 
 with the labour. Ormond jerked his trousers 
 higher through the belt strap, and straightened 
 the shoulders under the loose shirt. His whole 
 body was alive with fight. He had risked much 
 in bringing directors up here ; but all the rotten 
 length of the Lion had called him dumbly once 
 too often. He waited for Kiliat's casual in- 
 troductions; said just one thing in his throat 
 when the boy slid down into the paddock where 
 Gordon was working the second jet, and met 
 the two promptly. 
 
 "I am very pleased to see you," he said. 
 "You would like to look over the plant, of 
 course? And I presume that you got my 
 letter?" 
 
 The other man Ormond knew him for the 
 chief of the directors stared at the sullen net- 
 work of pipes ; at Ormond's one-roomed whare 
 behind the tin power-house; at white-faced 
 Roddy shovelling the wash at the box tail. 
 
 "My soul!" he said. "What a place! What 
 a ghastly place to live in!" 
 
 Ormond had lived on the Changing Creek 
 seven years. He had shot rabbits in every 
 shingle gully that fed it, from the penstock
 
 236 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 right into Argyle. He knew it by hot slug- 
 gish day, and by perfect evening, and by fierce 
 storm-racked night. And, beyond all places 
 in the wide earth, it was home to him. Just a 
 little he grinned, resting a foot on the main 
 pipe. These fat men would never know the 
 Lion. 
 
 "Did you get my letter?" he said again; and 
 the life of the Lion was throbbing under his 
 foot. 
 
 Then Kiliat the elder spoke. He told Or- 
 mond many things that Ormond knew far 
 better than he did ; he complained of Ormond's 
 contant demand for repairs; he desired ex- 
 planation full explanation. 
 
 "My son says that everything is in good 
 order. We were given to understand that 
 everything was in good order when we took the 
 claim over." 
 
 Ormond's temper was waking. 
 
 "I can't help what you were given to under- 
 stand. It was not in good order. If your 
 son were here as often as a manager should be 
 he might know what he's talking about. The 
 flumes and trestles are rotten. I'm eternally 
 patching them. If you'll kindly come round 
 here, and examine the pipes for the power- 
 house and the Pelton wheel you might see the 
 plugs in them. I have given a week's work to 
 each of those pipes this year. Then the 
 jets " Ormond wrenched an hydraulic jet
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 237 
 
 out of its elbow and rolled it forward. "We 
 are supposed to be doing hydraulic work now, 
 and the jet I'm using is the size of this one." 
 He pulled out a measure and laid it over the 
 lip. "Seven and three-quarter inches. It 
 should be five and a half. How much pres- 
 sure do you think we lose when the things are 
 worn to that size?" 
 
 Ormond's flannel shirt was dirty; it was 
 loose at the sunburnt neck, and his trousers 
 were tucked anyhow into the long boots. But 
 the two fat directors were nervous. The Lion 
 did not look at all the same, laid nakedly here 
 on the creek bed with a hard-eyed man stand- 
 ing over her to crush them with figures. Or- 
 mond had an unpleasantly virile grasp of his 
 subject. 
 
 "Well, well!" said the chief of the directors. 
 "I daresay we can manage a new jet for you. 
 But you are asking for pipes; a quarter-mile 
 of pipes; twenty-one foot pipes at six pounds 
 apiece! We can't let you have those, you 
 know. And you got some steel things without 
 consulting us 
 
 "I had to have them. The plate topping the 
 lift pipe was nearly worn through. I'd asked 
 you twice." 
 
 "My son said that you had the box too close 
 on the escape," said the elder Kiliat, wisely. 
 
 Ormond bit off the word that tingled his 
 tongue.
 
 238 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Your son says a good many things to 
 others," he said quietly. 
 
 "Well, you see, that was sheer carelessness. 
 We were told you were a fairly capable man 
 I beg your pardon?" 
 
 "I didn't speak. Yes?" 
 
 "A fairly capable man, and er a fairly 
 truthful one. You must give me leave to 
 doubt the fact of your being either the one or 
 the other, Mr. Ormond." 
 
 "Will you kindly teU me why?" 
 
 "Er -er you have no right to take that 
 tone with me, sir." 
 
 "I'll show you if I have in a minute. Why?" 
 
 "Kiliat, my dear fellow, perhaps you had 
 better let me speak 
 
 "I won't! Curse it! D'you think I can't 
 manage the man myself?" 
 
 If Ormond had been one whit less angry he 
 must have laughed. But he stood unmoving, 
 with a set to his body that caught Bert Kiliat's 
 idle attention and brought him up over the pad- 
 dock side to hear his father say: 
 
 . . . "And so it is not only your inces- 
 sant and puerile demands, annoying though 
 they are. We shall require you to give very 
 good reasons for the extraordinary falling off 
 in the returns 
 
 "Whew!" whistled young Kiliat, staring on 
 the three. "I say, pater, I told you to go a bit 
 slow with Ormond/'
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 239 
 
 "Hold your tongue! Well, Mr. Or- 
 mond?" 
 
 "I can give you several reasons," said Or- 
 mond, speaking very levelly. "In the first 
 place we have had bad weather in the hills. 
 That breaks the race and occasions a stoppage. 
 Twice since midwinter a flume has been washed 
 out in a spate. Each time we were near a week 
 mending it, for we can't work many hours in 
 the short days. A great many of the pipes 
 are worn out. I have to be constantly chan- 
 ging them for repairs. That all takes time. 
 Then we had to run out a tail race before we 
 could come down to work on the flat. The 
 dredges won't allow us to deflect the creek 
 behind them." 
 
 "The dredges can't stop you. You are on 
 your own ground." 
 
 "That's what I told him," said Bert Kiliat. 
 "But he wouldn't listen. Nobody listens to 
 me." 
 
 "The wash carries down into their pad- 
 docks," said Ormond, controlling his words. 
 "I think I have given sufficient reasons to sat- 
 isfy the ordinary intelligence. If you want to 
 know any more you can ask the men. Now, 
 Mr. Kiliat, I have just one thing to say to you. 
 If you were a younger man I'd have knocked 
 you down before now. As it is, you will please 
 take a week's notice from me dating from to- 
 day. And I should advise your son to give a
 
 240 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 little more of his time to the claim during that 
 week. For I shall do no more work than the 
 ordinary overseer. All orders must come from 
 him in future." 
 
 Bert Kiliat's face was blank in the merciless 
 light. 
 
 "Oh, I say!" he cried. "I told you so, paten 
 For Heaven's sake, hedge on what you've said, 
 can't you? I don't know how to manage the 
 beastly thing." 
 
 The elder Kiliat was giddy with rage. He 
 faced the stern-eyed man with the stern back- 
 ground of black pipes and wild hills, and he 
 said more than one thing that would not look 
 well on paper. Unequivocally he chopped a 
 week off Ormond's discharge, tendering coin 
 instead. He drew out a cheque to that effect 
 on the beating main pipe of the Lion, and Or- 
 mond tore it up. Then the chief of the direc- 
 tors spoke apologetically, and Bert Kiliat com- 
 plained, and the elder Kiliat said several things 
 more. 
 
 Ormond went away from it all, walking 
 blindly. From its covered box by the Pelton 
 wheel the telephone bell rang up from Adams, 
 twenty-two miles away at the intake. Or- 
 mond picked up the receiver mechanically ; then 
 dropped it and sent word to Kiliat by Mears. 
 Mears was carting over some ripples that Or- 
 mond had forged out yesterday. The sight of 
 them made the blood boil into his head and
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 241 
 
 throat. He turned into his whare and banged 
 the door. 
 
 Father Denis had been up the river for a 
 christening that day. Through the morning 
 heat his pony had crawled and sweated and 
 loitered by each clump of bush. But it came 
 home before a whipping wind and a rattle of 
 thunder that shook the hills. Then the house- 
 keeper she was the only human being to 
 whom Father Denis gave obedience ordered 
 dried clothes and a fire and warm food. So 
 the priest turned his back on the fury of the 
 swift night, and returned thanks for comfort. 
 
 "An' ut's all of a rough noight we'll be havin' 
 on us, sure," he said, with both slippers on the 
 fender. "Bedad, I'm hopin' as no wan will be 
 afther choosin' ut for dyin' in, and want me 
 out now, if that is a body come cryin' on me 
 begorra! Ormond, bhoyl I'm glad tu see ye. 
 Ut is not a buryin' or a christenin' ye'll be 
 wantin' out ov me the noight, eh?" 
 
 Ormond walked straight up to the fire, and 
 his eyes were strange. 
 
 "I've left her, v he said. "I've left her, 
 Father! I've left the Lion!" 
 
 Father Denis had loved a woman once. He 
 loved her better now. To the best of his be- 
 lief Ormond had loved the Lion instead. And 
 Ormond would love it more dearly now the 
 ways had parted them. Father Denis knew 
 all this even as he came to his feet in haste.
 
 242 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Bhoy, ye are soaked clane through! Will 
 ye have some duds ov mine? No, then? Be- 
 dad, there's a betther tu ahl things, will ye 
 bhut foind ut, Ormond. Sit ye down now, an' 
 talk ut out. Whose blame is ut, then?" 
 
 Ormond answered questions wearily and 
 without elaboration. He sat with his elbows 
 on his knees, propping his chin on his hands, 
 and staring at the fire. It was a plain face at 
 best, weather-marked and lined. But all the 
 endurance and the alert decision were gone 
 out of it. 
 
 "I'm tired," he said. "Tired! Tired! There 
 isn't much good in anything after all. A man 
 puts the best of himself into a thing, and 
 do you know what he feels like when he's told 
 that his best isn't worth a tinker's curse?" 
 
 "Ut is only a man's own sowl can tell him 
 that." 
 
 "Is it? Then my soul has told me, I sup- 
 pose. But Kiliat said it first." 
 
 When a man has had seven years of his 
 life and near thirty years of experience before 
 that assessed at rather less than nothing, 
 there are two dangers that lie under his feet. 
 Father Denis knew and faced them both, using 
 the straight unflinching speech that alone could 
 meet a straight man's needs. And the thun- 
 der cannoned round the hills, and the light- 
 ning snickered by the window as Argyle cow- 
 ered under the anger of a full-waked storm.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 243 
 
 Someone beat a mad tattoo on the knocker, 
 followed the sound down the passage and burst 
 into the dusky room, calling on Ormond. Or- 
 mond looked up without interest. 
 
 "Yes," he said. "What is it, Gordon?" 
 
 "Bert Kiliat says will yer come up wi' him 
 ter the penstock? Adams 'as bin ringin' an' 
 ringin' like he was dotty. It don't take much 
 ter put him off his onion. Will yer come 
 come now? The hills will be movin' wi' water 
 gittin' in behind them, an' he's scared fur the 
 race. Are yer comin'?" 
 
 "No!" said Ormond. "You can tell Mr. 
 Bert Kiliat that I have left the Lion." 
 
 "Oh, go on!" Amazement shook the last 
 shreds of respect from Gordon. "Yer can't 
 let the Lion go ter blazes. That rotter Kiliat's 
 no use. Come an' tell us what ter do. Come 
 on!" 
 
 Ormond battered a lump of coal down with 
 his heel. 
 
 "I am not coming," he said. "You can go 
 back and tell them that I'll see them in per- 
 dition first. Put it anyway you like. I don't 
 care." 
 
 A silence that was rigid restraint fell be- 
 tween the two men when Gordon was gone. 
 Father Denis only smoked in company. Or- 
 mond was not company to-night. He stood 
 staring at the fire with his hands sunk deep 
 in his pockets. Then he walked over to the
 
 244 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 window, and leaned his forehead on the 
 glass. 
 
 Father Denis used no more words. For it 
 is decreed that a man must fight his battles 
 alone and unaided. And the cruellest battle 
 of Ormond's life was upon him in the little 
 dark room where the tick of the clock beat off 
 the seconds. 
 
 Down the mountain sides the rain came in 
 eddies. A sudden lift struck out the full moon 
 riding in wrack above the crest that gave the 
 Lion life. Ormond watched with his lips 
 drawn in. Then he wheeled, and came back 
 to the still man at the fire. 
 
 "Good-night, Father. I'm off." 
 
 "Where then?" 
 
 "To get a horse that'll take me up the 
 Changing." 
 
 "Ail' ye're ahl roight," said Father Denis 
 gladly. "I knew ut, bhoj^." And then Or- 
 mond was gone into the night. 
 
 In Conroy's stables, Randal loafed in the 
 crowd that drew round the harness room door. 
 But he skulked into the shadow as Ormond 
 passed with quick alert speech and command. 
 Randal had done no full day's work since the 
 half -healed scar on his breast was raw. Yet 
 the shame of this had not jagged him before 
 now. Conroy's voice rumbled down between 
 the low-lit stalls. 
 
 "Luck nuthin'! It's the Devil's luck an*
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 245 
 
 all of it you'll want to-night, Ormond there's 
 the roan pony, then. He kin stand up ter it." 
 
 "Where is he? Chuck along some gear, 
 boys." 
 
 To the steel jangle and the swift clatter of 
 hoofs on the flags Conroy cast one injunction: 
 
 "Jes' remember that pony's worth fifty 
 notes, Ormond. An' the Lion won't be wuth 
 a rotten egg come mornin'." 
 
 Ormond was into the street as the stable 
 boys's hands left the girth, and the roan pony 
 raced with reefed rein for the bridge. Beside 
 the abutment Ormond swung for the shingle, 
 working up the creek and across, holding iris 
 bearings true to the foot. On the far side he 
 struck the track that swerved ever away to 
 the left, and gave the pony its head up the rain- 
 battered hill. 
 
 A clear plan had shaped in his mind ere ever 
 he crossed the leather. It gave the sense that 
 snatched a short-handled chopper from a shelf 
 in the mews, and that turned the pony's head 
 to Paddy's Gully, some twelve miles below 
 the penstock. Not Bert Kiliat nor any 
 living man could help the race if Adams had 
 not talked lies on the wire. Indubitably Or- 
 mond knew this. For the Lion race was of 
 all things difficult to guard. It doubled on 
 itself many times down the mountain; and 
 should a slip come, the whole race must go out, 
 swept before the torrent in the flumings be-
 
 246 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 low. The fluming straddled swamps and little 
 gullies and worked-out mining country. The 
 big two-mile flume was strong. Ormond had 
 given it all his spare time for a year past. And 
 Paddy's Gully flume was strong, for it had 
 been renewed in the last three months. Or- 
 mond could trust them to carry the first of the 
 rush the half possibly the whole. And this 
 meant more than his nerve dared face. It 
 meant the swamping and buckling of the 
 slighter fluming near the claim. It meant the 
 choking and wrenching apart of the two miles 
 of pipes, and the driving of them into the pad- 
 dock bottom with a welter of broken jets, 
 boxes, connections. It meant the death of the 
 Lion. 
 
 The sleet whipped Ormond's ears; the near 
 hills rocked and changed shape as the storm 
 lightened and rose again. He slewed from 
 the track to drive the roan pony into a mad 
 little mountain river that rolled boulders at 
 him and smelt of new- wet earth. This cut off 
 five miles, and bruised his shin badly on a sharp 
 rock. The rain pelted like steel knitting 
 needles, and the pony's steady scramble flagged 
 slightly. Here was no track, and the footway 
 spread cruelly uncertain. But the knobs and 
 spurs and gullies through which the Lion race 
 took its way down the mountain drew Ormond 
 forward, unswerving, where the windy wrack 
 drove.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 247 
 
 The Big Flume dribbled suddenly on his 
 head as he rode athwart the track nineteen feet 
 below. He heard her roar above the growling 
 thunder and the snap of the rain. Then he 
 brought the pony up the gully side with hooked 
 spurs. 
 
 "Three miles to Paddy's Gully, yet," he 
 said, and flogged the pony across the tussock 
 length of them. 
 
 Paddy's Gully flume received direct from 
 the race, and it was here that Ormond must 
 strike if he would do more than Kiliat, now 
 riding with his men from the penstock where 
 blind terror chased them. 
 
 The shored-up channel was running full and 
 angry by his knee when he passed out of the 
 tussock to the flax swamp. The end of the 
 world cut sheer off before him, and Ormond 
 left the saddle and slung the rein to a broom 
 root in two movements. He dropped down, 
 hand over hand, with the chopper buttoned in- 
 side his shirt. The floor of Paddy's Gully was 
 riddled with f alien-in shafts, and Ormond went 
 forward at a run, nosing among them by in- 
 stinct. Every foot of the gully was trodden 
 ground to him. 
 
 The roar of blood in his ears deadened the 
 roar of thunder along the night. The snicker 
 of lightning was against his cheek; and once, 
 far behind, he heard the roan pony scream in 
 fear. The moon swept out from the thick
 
 248 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 black for two breaths. Through sleet like the 
 bars of a cage Ormond saw the great hump 
 of the Lion Mountain stripped into naked lines 
 and sleek with streams. Below, and brought 
 forward to the eye, a thousand rivers gallopped 
 through scrub and round bluffs; spilling side- 
 ways into the bubbling gullies, and coasting 
 down the spurs with heads of foam. Some- 
 where in the midst of that hell the race was 
 going out. Somewhere, in or below it, Bert 
 Kiliat and a dozen more were racing for 
 life. 
 
 "And not one of them thought of Paddy's 
 Gully!" said Ormond in a high fierce pride. 
 "Not one! Oh, good God! Can't the dark 
 hold up? Just for ten minutes!" 
 
 Paddy's Gully flume was under a mile in 
 length, and the gully fell east to the river. A 
 break in the big flume would send the whole 
 torrent down Changing Creek. A break here 
 would save more than the Lion. 
 
 Ormond swarmed up the flume cat- wise, and 
 crawled out along the cross-ties. The wind 
 plucked his hands loose more than twice, and 
 the weight of his body as he snatched and 
 swung took the skin from his palms. At his ear 
 the flume was running full and steady, with no 
 grate of boulders to jar it. The wild strange 
 smell of flax blew up from the swamp to mix 
 with the air that stank of sulphur and new- 
 made mud. Ormond cast himself from tie to
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 249 
 
 tie, making sternly forward. There was no 
 shake on the flume yet; but neither was there 
 time for pause. When the flood struck it would 
 give short warning. 
 
 "I'll let her have a quarter-mile," said Or- 
 mond. "If she stands up to it that won't be 
 too much." 
 
 He came astraddle the fluming side, and 
 used the chopper with a free arm-swing, beat- 
 ing, cutting and splintering the wood into 
 wreck. He worked backwards, knocking off 
 the top board for a space of five feet. The 
 wind was ice to his chilled body, but the sweat 
 dropped from him. It was such a little chance, 
 and it meant so very much. In the beginning 
 the water had washed round his ankle. Before 
 the first board was off it clung cold to his shin. 
 He talked to it in quick broken words, while 
 the wild night raved over him, and the flume 
 shook on its skeleton trestles, and the 
 rivers tore downwards; flooding the broken 
 race, choking it again with rocks, leaping 
 over by bare bluff and spur to the bot- 
 tom. 
 
 Ormond sprang into the flume, came to one 
 knee, and beat in the lower boards savagely. 
 The water was under his armpits. It was 
 slobbering over the gap. It was deathly cold, 
 and the rush of it nailed him against the side 
 as he battered the wood, blind and desper- 
 ate.
 
 250 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Give me a little longer, old girl!" he cried. 
 "Only a little longer, and I can do it!" 
 
 The flume shivered as though a hundred 
 ton of rolling stock crossed it. 
 
 "By Heaven!' said Ormond; "she's struck! 
 But she's carrying; I knew she would!" And 
 he drove in the underwash with an insane pride 
 that his work should be so strong. 
 
 Something splashed in the water at his 
 shoulder. Something gripped him about the 
 neck, bearing him down sideways. Ormond 
 knew the man even as his clutching hands slid 
 over him. 
 
 "Randal! For God's sake let me up! 
 Ah-h!" 
 
 In that moment he would have killed Ran- 
 dal if he could. He tried, striking with the 
 chopper, which Randal caught by the blade, 
 wrenching it this way and that. There was no 
 more speech. Just the roar of the night, and 
 of the rising water and the hard-drawn breath- 
 ing of the men, and the crack of straining mus- 
 cles. Ormond swung free once, beating on 
 the board joint with a strength beyond his 
 own. But as the wood splintered Randal bore 
 him down. And along the ways he could hear 
 the flood coming. 
 
 There were stones in the flume now new- 
 torn flint that scarred them as the water power 
 rushed it by. Ormond clung to the bottom 
 board with the muddy; wetness round his ears.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 251 
 
 The board gave, gaped an inch. Then the 
 force of the water swept in behind, driving the 
 loose board out across the flume. 
 
 Ormond was beaten back with it, under the 
 cross-ties, with all the wrath of heaven upon 
 him. The roar overside jolted sense from his 
 brain, and death seemed a little thing that mat- 
 tered not. For the Lion was saved the 
 Lion 
 
 It was Randal who shook him into conscious- 
 ness with merciless hands. 
 
 "Come off! Curse it, will you come? Or- 
 mond 
 
 The mechanic in Ormond told him that the 
 water would very presently dig out the trestles, 
 pitch them forward, and part the flume. Ani- 
 mal instinct brought his numbed hands grop- 
 ing for the cross-ties. Randal was behind him, 
 goading him forward, hauling him up where 
 he stumbled in the lessening flood. The flume 
 dipped underfoot, rocked as though an earth- 
 quake had it by the muscles, fell out sideways 
 with a crashing thunder and a screech of tear- 
 ing wood that overrode the yell of the storm. 
 
 Somewhere on the edge of the wreck Randal 
 hung, gripping Ormond. Somewhere in the 
 black slippery staging he found foothold for 
 both, so that they crawled forward to fall on 
 the sand hollows and the manuka where the 
 rain beat, and to lie there until morning was 
 red.
 
 252 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 When Ormond roused, stiff and weary be- 
 yond caring, he saw Randal sitting with his 
 knees drawn up, and the sunshine harsh on his 
 face. The lines of his face hurt Ormond to 
 the quick. He walked across with legs that 
 refused to carry him straightly. 
 
 "It wouldn't make any difference, Randal," 
 he said pitifully. "Kiliat has won. You knew, 
 didn't you?" 
 
 Randal looked out before him across the 
 wreckage of the gully where the flood still gal- 
 lopped in spume. 
 
 "Kiliat had everything in the Lion," he said 
 levelly. "If the Lion was done he was done, 
 too. Do you think he would marry if he had 
 to work for her? I know better than that." 
 
 Ormond's hands fell on the bowed shoulders. 
 His palms were raw flesh, and the whole man 
 was cramped with pain. 
 
 "Come along back, old chap," he said. 
 
 "Come along back to Father Denis. For 
 we've both of us loved too well, Randal; and 
 we both know the punishment for that sin."
 
 CHAPTER XVII 
 
 THE full light had gone from the hills, and 
 the little whare up Chinaman's Gully was one 
 smudge with the manuka scrub, except where 
 a red finger of sunset marked the window 
 blood-colour. Ormond flattened his nose on 
 the six-by-eight window, walked round and 
 kicked in the door. The place was blank- 
 empty and dark; and Ormond hit his shin on 
 a nail keg and ran foul of a something that 
 smelt like green hide before he could make a 
 light. A half -burnt-out slush lamp was on the 
 ground, with the ash of last night's fire and 
 three dirty plates. Ormond lit it and set it 
 on the rough plank shelf. Then he reviled its 
 splutters and smell, and blinked round. 
 
 "Suppose the old chap will come along di- 
 rectly," he said, and tossed that which he car- 
 ried on the bunk that headed to the window. 
 
 A muddle of blankets was there already, and 
 a gun, and a cleaning rod. Ormond sucked in 
 his lips, reaching for the gun. He jerked open 
 the nipple and two bullet cartridges bobbed 
 into his palm. He held them up, frowning at 
 them.
 
 254 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Would you?" he said. "Would you? 
 Randal, my friend, I thought there was better 
 stuff in you than that! But after to-night 
 I think I'll take charge of these for the pres- 
 ent, anyway." 
 
 He raked six from the blanket heap, picked 
 up another on the floor, dropped them into his 
 trouser pocket, and set about making a fire. 
 A half -filled billy swung from the hook, and 
 it suggested something. Ormond grunted and 
 slipped his coat. 
 
 "You've washed up for me before now, Ran- 
 dal," he said. "Suppose it's up to me to do it 
 for you. And seeing that I've come to hurt 
 you pretty severely, I'll serve you a clean 
 feed, anyway." 
 
 He gathered greasy pannikins and dishes; 
 tipped them into a deep meat pan, and cleared 
 decks with a deft foot. . . . "And I think 
 you're not taking much pride in yourself just 
 now, old man, for you're not a pig by nature. 
 Now where the dickens is that smelling 
 hide?" 
 
 He went to work like a man accustomed; 
 while the afterglow on the hills ripened to pur- 
 ple and claret, and sank through mouse-colour 
 and canary to a windy black. Then the grate 
 of pick and shovel sounded as they fell together 
 by the door, and Randal came in, kicking the 
 clay of the wash from his hip boots. He had 
 grown older in the month that had brought
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 255 
 
 Effie Scannell's wedding very near, and a dull 
 reserve had grown on him. 
 
 "Thought the place was on fire," he said, 
 pulling the door to against the wind. 
 
 Ormond turned from the tins where he had 
 been tasting the difference between Navy-cut 
 and tea. 
 
 "Just been getting a surprise party ready 
 for you, Randal. Tea, eh? The billy is boil- 
 ing its head off." 
 
 "No, thanks." Randal slung his kit in a 
 corner and rubbed his hands over his fore- 
 head. "What is it, Ormond?" 
 
 "I have brought them. You you're 
 going to stand up to it all right, Randal? Yes 
 in the bunk." 
 
 Randal lifted the little shapeless packet. 
 
 "This?" 
 
 "Yes." Ormond laid a hand on the other 
 man's arm. "Old fellow have something to 
 eat first. You're clean played out." 
 
 Randal took his knife, and slashed through 
 the tightly bound string with fierce upward 
 cuts. Ormond understood that the trouble 
 was for now, and he moved into the shadow 
 with his head among the cross-ties. 
 
 "But you don't need a knife, Randal," he 
 muttered. "Granny knots, I'll bet my shirt! 
 When did a girl ever tie anything else?" 
 
 Randal's fingers were stiff. The slim shovel 
 handle cramped more than the reins of the past
 
 256 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 years. But he tore the paper away, and shook 
 the things out on the two-plank table. They 
 were very ordinary things. Seven letters in 
 Randal's straggling writing; a bunch of dried 
 cotton flowers and daisies gathered on the 
 Brothers last mustering season; a chipped 
 Maori axe found at the head of the river (he 
 had carried it in his shirt for safety and it had 
 rubbed a raw wound before he could give it to 
 her), and one or two birthday and Christmas 
 cards, with no more than the name "Effie" on 
 them in his handwriting. Randal touched 
 them softly with his fingertips, and Ormond 
 looked steadfastly on the crumbling sod wall 
 hung with the miner's things that were so 
 familiar. 
 
 In the dead silence the talk of little flames in 
 the chimney piece was eager and cruelly dis- 
 tinct. They called for food. Ormond heard 
 them. Then Randal passed him with a long 
 swift step, cast a double handful of the stuff 
 on the red, and ground it in with his heel. Or- 
 mond waited while the cotton-flower ash spun 
 up into the night with the paper, while the 
 green flint axe settled, strong and unflaking, 
 into the heart of the fire. Then he came across 
 and put a hand on the bowed shoulders. 
 He had learned to know Randal since 
 the night Death missed them both on the 
 Lion. 
 
 Randal twisted away from him.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 257 
 
 "See the axe?" he said. "We can't turn 
 everything into smoke and lies though we 
 try. Well I've done it! You can go back 
 and tell her I've done it!" 
 
 "You have only done half," said Ormond, 
 meeting his eyes straightly. "And you've got 
 to do the other half now. That was what 
 she asked, wasn't it ? And you gave your word. 
 Has that gone? For if so you've lost every- 
 thing, Randal." 
 
 "No," said Randal, "I remember." He 
 turned to the locker at the bunkfoot, and Or- 
 mond's keen eyes grew graver. When a horse 
 will not rouse to the whip the chances are that 
 the girth-gall sore is sapping him. 
 
 From the locker bottom Randal brought out 
 an old writing case worked in coloured silks 
 by a mother or a sister whom he had never 
 spoken of. It was burst at the sides and frayed 
 from constant handling. Ormond knew that it 
 held the core of Randal's life, and, at that 
 moment, he hated Effie Scannell. 
 
 "Shall I go outside, Randal?" 
 
 "No! I don't care chuck some more fat 
 into that slushlight." 
 
 There was that in his face which made Or- 
 mond try again. 
 
 "Dump 'em all in together, man. There's 
 no sense in twisting the knife." 
 
 But Randal did not hear. He stood by the 
 slushlight, where a lump of meat swam in the
 
 258 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 unstrained fat, smelling vilely. The billy spat 
 and dribbled on its hook, and the throb of the 
 flames cast the stern dark face in alternate 
 light and shadow. He shook the things out 
 on the table. Letters, and again letters tied 
 with ribbon, with string and with bootlace. A 
 painted tobacco pouch wrapped in tissue paper, 
 and scented with lavender water; and other 
 foolish little things such as a girl might give 
 to the man she loves. 
 
 Ormond turned his eyes away. 
 
 "Best be getting on with it, old chap," he 
 said softly. 
 
 Randal straightened and his words came 
 with a rush. 
 
 "What's the sense of burning them? D'you 
 think I can forget what she's said here? 
 D'you think I can ever forget what she has 
 said? D'you think there's any fire burns hot 
 enough for that? There isn't! I've been into 
 hell to look for it- 
 
 " Steady, old man! Steady! Randal 
 Randal oh, I am sorry!" 
 
 "D your sorrow! I don't want it! Did 
 
 she say she was sorry, too? Did she send me 
 a pretty proper little message to take the place 
 of these?" 
 
 He swept up a handful and slung them on 
 the fire. 
 
 "What the devil right have you to be sorry? 
 You loved the Lion, and you can go back to
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 259 
 
 her. Both the Kiliats are praying you on their 
 knees to go back to her. But I 
 
 Ormond's words struck with all the force 
 at his command: 
 
 "And do you know why I can go back to 
 her? It's because I've held myself clean and 
 fit to serve her all these years! It's because 
 I've never messed away my life and gone 
 downhill, without the courage or the deter- 
 mination to pull in. You're a strong man, 
 Randal! Father Denis told you that; and 
 you're young yet. How dare you ruin the 
 only life you've got! Go away and make 
 something of it something worthy of such a 
 man as you would be! Oh, Randal! you are 
 a slinking coward, and that's the best and the 
 worst word of you." 
 
 "If you were any other man," said Randal, 
 "I think I'd kill you for that! But I don't 
 suppose it would be worth it. Nothing is 
 worth anything much. Love and hate, and all 
 the other things a man lives for they're all 
 rotten." 
 
 He untied a blue ribbon that Effie's fingers 
 had tied, and shook the letters on the fire, 
 watching with unmoving eyes as they unrolled 
 and shivered into tinder. Ormond went back 
 to the dark corner. These tongues of flame 
 held Randal's ear to-night. 
 
 The wind was muttering very restlessly in 
 the tussock. The back log of totara fell in
 
 260 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 half and jammed the tobacco pouch. Randal 
 freed it with his foot. An envelope atop of 
 all curJed open, baring a quarter-plate photo- 
 graph, disgracefully toned by an amateur. 
 Randal dived after it with an oath, and the 
 hair was singed from his hand and arm in the 
 saving of it. 
 
 "Chuck that back!" said Ormond. 
 
 Randal cradled the indistinct little picture 
 in both hands. There was just the dainty pose 
 of the head and the sweet droop of the lip to 
 show. 
 
 "She need never know just this one thing, 
 Ormond." 
 
 "No! You've honour enough to carry you 
 through this business properly, haven't you? 
 And you have no right to that of all things, 
 Randal. You come of the breed that dies in 
 its boots, and if anyone found that on 
 
 you- 
 
 "I have a right to it! She gave it to me! 
 And I have a right to her to her! She gave 
 herself to me long ago " 
 
 Ormond secured the photograph with a dex- 
 terous twist, and spun it into the flame. 
 
 "You're talking piffle," he said, "and worse. 
 Stand up to it, can't you? And remember that 
 she is to be married in a week, while you" 
 Ormond grew suddenly angry "you'll go 
 down into the gutter and lie there, I suppose! 
 You've just about enough sense! Oh, Randal,
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 2G1 
 
 Randal! you silly old fool! why don't you 
 punch my head? It would do you heaps of 
 good!" 
 
 Randal did not answer. Ormond knew that 
 he did not hear. He stared down into the fire 
 until Ormond covered it with the frying pan, 
 dropping a cartridge from his pocket as 
 he stooped. Randal picked it up. Then 
 he went over to the bunk and snapped 
 open the breech of his gun. Lastly, he 
 looked at Ormond and grinned. It was not a 
 nice grin. 
 
 "Thanks," he said. "You're very consider- 
 ate, Ormond. But don't you think I'd have 
 done it long ago if I'd meant to take that 
 way?" 
 
 "I don't know," said Ormond; "for you do 
 not know yourself, Randal." 
 
 Randal slid his hand into his side pocket; 
 pulled out some cartridges and reloaded in 
 two movements. 
 
 "Wait a minute," he said to the face show- 
 ing faintly in the smoky shadows. "I want to 
 ask you something." His voice shook and 
 thickened. "If you can tell me that she has 
 not forgotten, I'll wait till the end of time to 
 help her if she wants me. If you can't I'll 
 blaze out my own track, and it's no business of 
 yours or of any other man's. Well? Tell me, 
 can't you? You know, for you have seen her. 
 She gave you the things."
 
 262 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "You have no longer any right to think of 
 her at all 
 
 "Tell me, will you?" 
 
 Ormond knew this Randal well enough. He 
 would kill if he did not get his answer. By 
 all a man's knowledge of man Ormond feared 
 the effect of either lie or truth. Then, for the 
 first time, he chose a lie: 
 
 "She has forgotten," he said slowly. 
 
 Randal stretched up, and laid the gun in its 
 slings. When he turned again his face was 
 blank as a slate with its troublesome lesson 
 wiped off. 
 
 "That is all, then," he said. "The thing is 
 out of your hands now. You understand?" 
 
 Ormond moved to the door ; but it was flung 
 wide in his face, and something ran past him, 
 swift and light, with sobbing breath and 
 broken laughing words. 
 
 "Guy! Guy! I've come back! I've come 
 back to you! Oh Guy " 
 
 From the door Ormond saw the flushed wet 
 dimpling face and the wonderful new light in 
 the eyes. He saw Randal, and went out, clos- 
 ing the door. Then Randal spoke, unmoving. 
 
 "Kiliat?"hesaid. 
 
 Effie Scannell tore a ring from her finger 
 and sent the opal spark to meet the green axe 
 lying heavy in the fire heart. 
 
 "And that is all there is of Mr. Kiliat!" she 
 cried. "I have told him so! I knew it when
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 263 
 
 your letters went away. Oh surely I have 
 known it always, though I didn't understand. 
 Oh, Guy! there was only you for me and me 
 for you since God made us. Guy my own 
 dear one!" 
 
 "No!" said Randal. "I can't; I am not 
 worthy!" 
 
 She came to him, standing with her hands 
 linked, and her grave dark eyes on his. 
 
 "You have no choice, Guy," she said simply. 
 "And I have not any, either. I have been a 
 child always. Now I am a woman, for I know 
 what love means. It is very terrible, Guy, 
 and it frightens me, because it has taken every- 
 thing out of the earth but God and you. Guy 
 help me! For love is too big for a girl to 
 bear it by herself!" 
 
 Her voice broke, and her hands came over 
 her face. And, by the loss of the child-frank- 
 ness of old, Randal understood. Effie had 
 come into her woman's heritage that was to be 
 his also.
 
 CHAPTER XVIII 
 
 "I AIN'T goin' ter hev no contagious best 
 man," said Danny, stolidly. "The boys'll 
 most on 'em be down ter see us spliced; but I 
 don't want 'em hoppin' round wi' me. We 
 got the stage ter ourselfs on Wednesday, 
 Suse." 
 
 Suse slid her arm round his neck. For 
 twilight was over the bridge spanning 
 Changing Creek, and there were none but the 
 red-eyed dredges upstream to see. 
 
 "I don't care about all the boys," she said. 
 "But Maiden is to be bridesmaid, an' so Steve 
 must be best man, Danny." 
 
 "She'd sooner hev Lou, I guess, old lady. 
 They've bin pretty thick lately." 
 
 Suse pulled the carefully twisted curl on 
 his forehead. 
 
 "I was beginnin' ter think as I'd taught you 
 somethin', lad," she said, "but you got a good 
 long way to go 'fore you pick up the common 
 sense as a gel has by nature." 
 
 "Then I'll pick up an armful now, while I 
 got the chanst! But, Suse Randal an' Miss 
 Effie didn't hev no best man or no bridesmaid." 
 
 264
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 265 
 
 Suse twisted a little in his hold and kissed 
 him. 
 
 "That weren't quite the same, you dear ole 
 chump. An' you'll ask Steve ter-morrow, 
 Danny?" 
 
 "We-ell," said Danny, resignedly; and then 
 puckered his forehead as a slim boy shape ran 
 past them in the dusk. 
 
 "Roddy Duncan," said Suse, flushing. 
 "Take yer arm away, Danny ! I " 
 
 "What's the odds? He's gone now, any- 
 ways. An' runnin' like ole Nick were arter 
 him, too." 
 
 There was that in Roddy's face confirmed 
 Danny's words. He was white-lipped, and a 
 desperate terror sat in the back of his eyes. 
 He ran fleetly with his head down, breasting 
 the tussock hill, swinging to the right, and 
 taking the little winding sheep track that led 
 the way to Pipi Wepeha's whare. The cab- 
 bage trees were moaning in the evening wind, 
 and the brushing flax at his feet seemed to 
 whisper words, tossing them on the night. 
 Pipi's whare was dark and very silent where it 
 sat by the track, and Roddy pulled up, shaking 
 with something that was not exhaustion. 
 
 Any man can overcome fear of all that may 
 be put into bald words that may be set down 
 clear to the understanding. But that fear 
 which is elusive, intangible ; which belongs only 
 to the winds and the untrod earth and the wide
 
 266 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 night with its throbbing stars, holds the soul 
 in a dread that cannot be crushed down, be- 
 cause it cannot be explained. That dread had 
 been with Roddy since Murray spoke to Or- 
 mond on the Lion hilltop. Six times he had 
 held his courage between his teeth and taken 
 the track to Pipi's whare. Six times it had 
 failed him, and sent him back. Last night he 
 had crept to the window and watched Pipi a 
 half -hour by the fire blaze. This night Pipi 
 had gone to the township, and Roddy had come 
 up in the added knowledge gained by that 
 watching. 
 
 Slowly he pushed the door open. It creaked, 
 and a smell of rancid fish came out. Roddy 
 struck a match, and went in and dropped the 
 latch behind him. The whare was low and 
 very dirty. It sloped from a ridge pole, and 
 roof and sides were of split twisted flax and 
 raupo. Pipi's sleeping mat lay by the fire- 
 place which he had built of kerosene tins, and a 
 carved Maori head with a greenstone tiki 
 slung round the neck stood on a pole. Round 
 the forehead where the tattoo lines were set 
 in spirals was bound Murray's red necktie. 
 
 Roddy stood still and looked at it. To tear 
 the thing off and run away home with it seemed 
 simple utterly when the township lights and 
 noise were round him. But the lonely Fight- 
 ing Hill with its traditions of blood and hate; 
 the rub of the flax leaves without the door; the
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 267 
 
 unexplainable sense of living and seeing that 
 crowded the dark silent whare, knit a power 
 too strong for the sensitive boy. Roddy's 
 match went out, burning his fingers, and in 
 the blackness something surely breathed. The 
 sweat was wet on his face as he made another 
 spurt of flame to flare over the grinning tiki 
 that writhed its limbs with the shake of the 
 match. 
 
 "I must do it!" said Roddy in his throat. 
 "I must I must!" 
 
 He pulled the red faded necktie away from 
 the wood, stuffed it in his breast pocket, 
 brought out another chosen from the same 
 stock at Derrett's shop, and worn to shabbi- 
 ness in haste, and twisted it on the head in 
 place of the first. Then he trod the match 
 underfoot, and groped for the door. 
 
 It pushed open suddenly, shutting him be- 
 hind it, and someone came in with heavy steps. 
 Roddy's breath died in his throat, and from 
 the raupo walls behind hands were surely 
 stretching to hold him. He could feel the man 
 searching, silently, yet with system and de- 
 termination. All that Lou had told him of 
 the tohunga power; all that the night had 
 taught him of mystery chilled his heart and 
 held him motionless. The moving hands came 
 nearer. Roddy knew that they would present- 
 ly touch his face. And the spirits of horror 
 and of evil were about him when a hand
 
 268 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 brushed his cheek, slid to his shoulder and 
 clenched there. 
 
 Then came the crackle of a match up a 
 trouser leg, and the hold loosed on the boy as 
 Murray said: 
 
 "Roddy! You young imp! What the devil 
 are you doing here?" 
 
 "Murray Murray Murray!" Roddy held 
 him tight. "I thought you was Pipi 
 
 "Pipi is down in the township. I saw him 
 as I was going over to Cardigan's. That is 
 why I was certain I was after a burglar when 
 I spotted the light up here. And I'm not sure 
 that I wasn't right, either, Roddy." 
 
 "You got pluck ter come up here," said 
 Roddy, very low. 
 
 Murray laughed shortly. 
 
 "There's very much in the world that we 
 don't understand, Roddy. But we can fight 
 it, all the same. Evil is a tangible thing, in 
 whatever form it comes tangible enough to 
 stand up to, anyway." 
 
 "But you believe that Pipi that Pipi- 
 
 Murray turned, lighting a tallow dip that 
 stood within three nails on a board. 
 
 "I was dog-tired that night Pipi started his 
 yarns," he said, "and I was afraid I was dead 
 afraid that he might do some foolery. That's 
 what gave him the hold, do you see? You take 
 my tip, Roddy: When a fellow begins to 
 funk, morally or physically, he is bound to
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 269 
 
 fall in somehow. He's melting the wax for 
 anything to cast the impression on. It's a 
 thing that is done more often than you know 
 in one way or another. But if you've got 
 pluck enough to stand the fire that will melt 
 the wax again you lose the impression, Roddy." 
 
 "I don't think I quite understand," said 
 Roddy. 
 
 "I don't think you understand at all. Never 
 mind. Just remember that neither Pipi nor 
 the Devil himself can get hold of you unless 
 you let him by Jove!" 
 
 Movement had brought him before the 
 carved head with the necktie bound on the 
 forehead. A new sternness came over the thin 
 face with the deep eyes. 
 
 "I'm not sure that you don't deserve smack- 
 ing, you immoral young imp!" he said. Then 
 he whipped the rag off, and tore it in half with 
 a twist such as is used to wring a chicken's 
 neck 
 
 "Don't!" cried Roddy. "Oh, I tried so hard 
 to make it like! Oh, Murray!" 
 
 "Well, I'll be hanged!" said Murray, and 
 took him by the shoulders. "Do you want me 
 to leave it there for the old brute to curse 
 over?" 
 
 "It's not yours. This is yours." Roddy 
 drew it out and Murray stared. 
 
 "Whose is this, then?" 
 
 "Mine! I I came to put it there."
 
 270 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Murray was silent a minute a long minute. 
 Then he said: 
 
 "Give it to me. Now, you just come along 
 home, young 'un. And please to understand 
 that the power of evil isn't the greatest power 
 in the world. You're proof positive to the con- 
 trary, if you only knew it." 
 
 "But if Pipi curses you still if he gets 
 something else?" whispered Roddy out in the 
 starlight, where the tussocks of Fighting Hill 
 muttered round their feet. 
 
 Murray tucked the boy's cold hand close to 
 the warmth of his own body and trudged for- 
 ward. 
 
 "Roddy," he said, "we're all of us ready to 
 remember that there is a Devil. Sometimes we 
 are so busy remembering it that we forget that 
 there is a God. If we inverted our beliefs 
 occasionally we'd get along better. I don't 
 understand this, and I never shall, I think. 
 It's sweated a good deal of nerve out of me. 
 But I've stuck my toes up against something 
 at last, and I'm not going out on the undertow 
 any more." 
 
 "W-what is it?" whispered Roddy. 
 
 "You young ass!" said Murray, looking 
 away to the stars. "Haven't I just told you?"
 
 CHAPTER XIX 
 
 "WELL, dear, it doesn't really matter. It's 
 only till to-morrow." 
 
 "But it's a brutally rough place, Effie. I 
 don't like your being here at afl, little girl." 
 
 Randal drew the flimsy window curtains to- 
 gether, pinned them, and came across to the 
 horsehair sofa. 
 
 "We'll shut out what we can," he said. "And 
 that's not much, I'm afraid. All these con- 
 founded township hotels are just a bar and a 
 lean-to and a drunken row 'specially in this 
 part of Queensland." 
 
 Effie pinched his cheek with soft fingers. 
 
 "Let's pretend we don't hear it. We used 
 to be so good at pretending. And now there 
 isn't any make-believe left " 
 
 "Too much solid fact, eh?" demanded 
 Randal, dropping on one knee to bring his 
 face close beside hers on the cushion. 
 
 "Too much solid happiness," she said softly. 
 
 "You are sure of that, Effie? Oh, are you 
 sure? I have taken you away from so much. 
 Remember that there will be hard work oq 
 
 271
 
 272 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 the station when we get out to it. Hard work 
 and loneliness. And there's a good deal of 
 the sinner left in me yet, Effie. I have hurt 
 you more than once already. I shall do it 
 again. And yet you know I could kill my- 
 self for being such a brute to you " 
 
 "Oh, silly boy! I am content with you 
 just as you are. And you are content with 
 me, Guy?" 
 
 "Shan't tell you, little Madame Vanity. 
 Effie, I think I'll go out and see what those 
 fellows are doing. The Chows are on to some 
 poor beggar, I'm afraid." 
 
 "Guy you'll be careful? They sound it's 
 like angry dogs snarling !" 
 
 "So it is! I'll just go out and find what 
 bone they're after. It's all right, dear. I can 
 take care of myself." 
 
 The wide, unmade street was breathless with 
 the heat and the dust of an afternoon sun. It 
 was wild with sound, and with the reek of 
 spirits, and the crowding of half -drunken men. 
 Boobyalla had been a notable mining township 
 once. Now the strong souls had gone; and 
 Chinamen and the riff-raff that they bring with 
 them swarmed on the mullock heaps and the 
 wornout claims, and made the little township 
 more hideous than of old. 
 
 Randal stepped from the verandah upon a 
 yellow group beating tom-toms ; swerved from 
 it, and asked questions of a drover leaning
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 273 
 
 against the half door. The drover spat a 
 chewed straw from his mouth and grinned. 
 
 "Jes' lookin' roun' fur suthin' ter worry," 
 he said. "It's a common enough caper when 
 they've been doin' 'emselves pretty well. 
 P'raps they'll quiet down; p'raps they'll hev 
 knives goin' direckly. We jes' keeps our eyes 
 skinned but it's best ter light out ef they gits 
 nasty." 
 
 There were some white men in the shouting 
 half-maddened crush. Randal's glance 
 dropped on a little thin face under a big- 
 brimmed hat hung round with bobbing corks, 
 and he started. 
 
 "Know who that little chap is?" he de- 
 manded. "The fellow with the corks to keep 
 the flies off. New to the country, eh ?" 
 
 "You'll be wearin' them yerself nex' month 
 what chap? No dun't know his name. 
 He's slabbin' in with the Chows. A rotter, by 
 the look o' him." 
 
 Randal agreed without hesitation. For the 
 little man was Jimmie Blaine. 
 
 Jimmie wore union shirting and dirty cor- 
 duroys. He was unkempt, and the shifty lines 
 on his face had deepened. Moreover, the side- 
 long look in his small eyes told of a dogging 
 fear. He stood with hands thrust in his pock- 
 ets on the rim of the crowd, and Randal 
 shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 "You're scum even of that lot, my friend
 
 Jimmie," he murmured; and then a man 
 pushed up from behind, and caught Jimmie 
 by the arm. 
 
 He was a big man, and the swag on his back 
 had not bowed him, nor cramped the free swing 
 of his limbs. Something in the carriage of 
 his head was familiar to Randal. Then the 
 face showed as Jimmie wrenched himself 
 free. 
 
 "Ted Douglas!" said Randal in amaze. 
 "Ted Douglas, by all that's crazy! Ted oh, 
 you fool! You silly fool! Did you think he 
 was going to be worth the finding?" 
 
 For one moment the pure joy of Ted's face 
 shone in the sunlight. Then Jimmie broke 
 from him, screaming in frenzy. Ted sprang 
 after. And then words came to Randal which 
 brought him across the street to struggle 
 through the heated massed bodies. 
 
 "Thief!" yelled Jimmie. "Murderer! 
 Thief! He'll Mil me! Catch him!" 
 
 The howl in answer put fear into Randal 
 for a breath. The yellow faces took on an- 
 other look; and somewhere, flashing across 
 Randal's sight came the glint of a knife. He 
 heard the drover shout warning from the 
 verandah, and he put his head down and beat 
 his way toward Ted. Then remembrance of 
 Effie caught him and sickened him, and he 
 would have slung free of them all but that 
 there was no longer any choice left. The mur-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 275 
 
 derous-working faces were close, pressing for- 
 ward; and he ran with them, shouting: 
 
 "Get the little one! The little one! He's 
 gamming you! He's the thief!" 
 
 Despite himself he chuckled at the yell that 
 followed. 
 
 "Jimmie's going to pay," he said. "The 
 little devil! He'll pay when they get him!" 
 
 In the red of the low sun he saw Jimmie 
 run up the street. He saw Ted Douglas burst 
 out through the press, flinging the men be- 
 hind, and heard the cry as of old: 
 
 "Jimmie! It's all right! I'll take care on 
 yer, lad! Come back Jimmie!" 
 
 A foot tripped Randal. He fell, jagging 
 his temple against a broken boarding; and 
 when sense and movement came back the quick 
 twilight had settled to night, and the noise 
 came fitfully, blown in gusts from the hotel 
 bars. 
 
 He went down the emptied street slowly; 
 met the drover at the corner, and sent him 
 back with word to Effie. Then he turned into 
 the first hotel and asked news of Ted Douglas 
 and Jimmie. Six men told him, while the 
 seventh bound his forehead skilfully. "... An* 
 it's well there weren't more murder done," 
 they said. "For them Chows is all on fur a 
 bun-worry o' sorts. It ain't all over yet, per- 
 haps. But the little one won't do no more 
 interferin'."
 
 276 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "And the other?" asked Randal. 
 
 "Don't know. He weren't talkin' o' hisself 
 yes, they're in there." 
 
 It was a dirty little wattle-and-daub shanty 
 set back in the dust of a section ; and the power 
 which had swept the rioters away from it, leav- 
 ing it still and silent to the two, was the Shadow 
 of Death. Randal went in, shutting the door 
 on the curious stretched faces. The light of 
 a tallow dip blinded his eyes after the soft 
 glow. Then he walked over to the far end of 
 the shanty. 
 
 There were two voices there. One mutter- 
 ing, sobbing, blaspheming in utter terror; the 
 other low and tender and patient. Randal 
 spoke : 
 
 "Ted," he said; "Ted Douglas. It's only 
 Randal. Are you hurt?" 
 
 "Randal oh, Randal! good enough! Tell 
 Jimmie as I never come meanin' ter git him 
 run in. Tell him as he kin trust me still 
 tell him, Randal!" 
 
 Randal dropped on one knee by the thing 
 that moaned and writhed. 
 
 "You needn't judge Ted by yourself, you 
 little brute," he said roughly. "I can swear 
 to it that Ted's never felt anything but love 
 for you though what makes him such a 
 blamed fool is more than I can tell you." 
 
 Jimmie's breath laboured and fluttered. He 
 twisted weak fingers in Randal's cuff.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 277 
 
 "He don't mean it!" he gasped. "He don't! 
 He's lyin'! Where's a priest fur ter confess 
 ter? He'd let me die wi'out it! Father Denis 
 said as there was blood on me!" His voice 
 thinned and rose, making Randal thrill with 
 the terror of it. "He's keepin' me here ter 
 die an' be damned! Randal- 
 Randal looked over at Ted in the dim light. 
 
 "There ain't a priest in the township," said 
 Ted, briefly. "I bin askin'." 
 
 "And a doctor?" 
 
 "He's jes' gone. Can't do nothin'. Chest's 
 crushed in." 
 
 There was a quiver over the strong tender 
 face, and Ted bent down again. 
 
 " Jimmie dear old lad ef yer'd let me holt 
 yer up a bit, p'raps ' 
 
 "Let me be! Let me be, you ! Ah-h!" 
 
 Then all the agony of an unforgiven soul 
 leapt upon Jimmie, and the two watched, sick 
 and shaken and helpless, save that Ted's heart 
 knelt in him with prayer. A truth told 
 Randal long years back came to him sud- 
 denly. 
 
 "Jimmie, the rule of your Church says that 
 when there is no priest one man can confess 
 to another, and receive absolution from him. 
 That's true, I know. So if that is what you 
 are afraid of " 
 
 Jimmie lay still, fighting for breath. 
 
 "Do you mean it?" he said slowly.
 
 278 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 my soul!" 
 
 "Then, Randal yer knows I stole that cash 
 an* sunk it all in minin'. An' I wanted Ted 
 killed jes' now 'cause he would 'a' given me up. 
 An' tell me God will furgive me fur all that." 
 
 There was blood on Ted's lip where he bit 
 it, and his strong hands were working. Even 
 in this hour Jimmie had no forgiveness for 
 that day on the Mains cattle camp. . 
 
 Randal was kneeling upright, and his face 
 was dark. There was nothing in him but dis- 
 gust, and a righteous anger. The heavy press- 
 ing dark of the shanty ; the drunken shouts up 
 the street, and the plop-plop of the guttering 
 candle flame filled up the measure of squalid 
 dread. 
 
 "I can't," said Randal, briefly. "Before 
 God I'd be lying if I told you that I thought 
 you deserved forgiveness, Jimmie." 
 
 Ted stopped with a little cry, pitiful as a 
 mother's. 
 
 "Jimmie Jimmie, lad. Will yer take it 
 from me? Oh, Jimmie, dear old chap! D'yer 
 think as anythin' cud change me, Jimmie?" 
 
 "Yer can't!" cried Jimmie. "Yer dun't 
 know! I never run when Murray tolt me 
 'bout Buggy, fur I saw as I cud get yer inter 
 trouble. I knew as yer'd take it 'fore yer 
 put it onter me an' yer did. But I funked 
 wi' the boys now yer know git out!" 
 
 "I knowed that long ago. I knowed yer'd
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 279 
 
 not any love fur me, now, lad. But if I loves 
 yer jes' the same, Jimmie " 
 
 "Yer can't!" 
 
 "Jim, d'yer remember when we wus jes' 
 little chaps " 
 
 Randal turned away from the murmur as 
 Ted's head went down on the bag pillow be- 
 side Jimmie's. He walked to the window, 
 looking out on the open bar across the street. 
 It was foul with drunken laughter and noise 
 of quarrelling, and vivid with the gleam of 
 angry white faces mixed with the yellow. Be- 
 yond lay God's own stars on the peaceful breast 
 of Heaven, and behind a soul was struggling 
 to bridge the gulf between. 
 
 Then Ted called sharply. Randal came 
 with swiftness, and did all that he could. But 
 Jimmie's arm was hooked round Ted's neck, 
 and nothing would loose it until the end came. 
 Then it was Randal who laid him back on the 
 bags. 
 
 "You did more for him than any priest could 
 have done, Ted," he said. "Now you'll let 
 me patch up that side of yours. D'you think 
 I didn't see blood on your shirt?" 
 
 Ted did not hear. He went through all that 
 was necessary with unshaking hands. Then he 
 stood up. 
 
 "It's nothing but a scratch," he said. "Good- 
 night, Randal, and thank yer. I'm goin' ter 
 stay wi' him."
 
 Randal looked round the smelling, dirty 
 shanty where the nine-inch draught space be- 
 tween wall and ceiling let in the red dust of 
 the street, and he looked down on the little 
 mean face in the quivering candle light. 
 
 "Don't, Ted!" he said. "We can lock the 
 place up. Come round to my " 
 
 Ted shook his head. 
 
 "He were always that nervous," he said. "I 
 
 I'd ruther stay wi' him ter-night. Per'aps 
 if I'd done differently that day on Black Hill 
 yards " 
 
 "You could not have done differently," said 
 Randal. "And you know it. Now you will 
 go back to Mains, and 
 
 "No!" Ted's eyes were fixed on the still 
 thing by his foot. "No! Never Mains an' the 
 township agin wi'out Jimmie now. I loved 
 him too dear fur that!" 
 
 "Then will you come out West with me?" 
 said Randal. 
 
 "I don't know. I don't know nothin' ter- 
 night, I think. I'll see yer ter-morrow. If 
 yer'd jes' go, Randal- 
 Then Randal went back. And Effie scolded 
 him, and cried and laughed at the set of the 
 bandage round his head; and crept into his 
 arms as they sat in the little dark parlour 
 where the horsehair sofa and the dust made 
 by the white ants did not show in the light that 
 was given by the wide stars only.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 281 
 
 "Who was it spoke of the 'Wine of Life'?" 
 she said. "Do you think he meant love, Guy?" 
 
 "I know he did," said Randal. Then he held 
 her closely. "Effie Erne I thought that our 
 love was the greatest thing in the world. But 
 it isn't! It isn't! I've seen a greater to-night, 
 little girl. It was a beautiful thing, and very 
 terrible, dear." 
 
 She pulled down his face and kissed him. 
 
 "All love is beautiful and terrible," she said. 
 "But we have worked out the terrible part of 
 ours, Guy." 
 
 And Randal's lips met hers for answer.
 
 CHAPTER XX 
 
 BLAKE'S hotel was upside down and inside 
 out. For all the boys from Mains and from 
 Behar were down to do honour to Danny's 
 wedding: and up and along the passages; in 
 the kitchen and the bar, violins were tuning and 
 stray voices whistling the "Bride's March." 
 On the side-path a dozen beat step, with gusts 
 of talk and laughter blown out with the to- 
 bacco wreaths. 
 
 Moody sat on the horse trough, dabbing his 
 forehead with a red handkerchief. For the 
 tenth time he had dragged Tod over the Town 
 Hall floor on a sack, and, by Tod's sworn word, 
 "There was not a bhoy in Argyle wud stand up 
 on ut the night, wid the shine of ut." 
 
 "On'y Dennis," said Ike, strong in the pride 
 of his new black flannel shirt and a white tie. 
 "He's havin' ter dance in socks, yer knows." 
 
 Dennis was Danny's elder brother, and un- 
 married, and the punishment thereof was an 
 ancient law in the township. 
 
 "Sure, then, who wud be lookin' at Dinnis 
 the night?" cried Tod. "An' here comes hersilf 
 
 282
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 283 
 
 wid the gossoon! Will ye stand by wid the 
 rice, then?" 
 
 Rice had lain thick from the church gates 
 to the hotel door these four hours past. But 
 the boys' pockets bulged with it yet; and their 
 fists were shut on it, and the air sung with the 
 grains as a girl ran out, flinging up a white 
 muslin arm as shield. Lou followed, with his 
 light gay laughter. 
 
 "Hit the wrong nail this time, you chaps," 
 he cried. "Danny and Suse have gone out the 
 back way. Come on, Maiden!" 
 
 In the light from the bar Maiden's delicate 
 face was flushed above the snow-white of her 
 dress. She stood an instant, half hesitating 
 among the men; her soft hair turned to gold 
 about her head, and her hand clinging to Lou's. 
 Excitement was throbbing in the very air of 
 the township, and something in her wild-rose 
 beauty tingled the men. Then Mogger lit the 
 spark : 
 
 "Three cheers fur the nex* bride!" he 
 shouted. 
 
 The roar startled Danny and Suse where 
 they hurried by a little side street to the Town 
 Hall, and Lou swung off his cap with daring 
 assurance. 
 
 "Thank you, boys!" he cried. "Make way 
 there! Maiden, here's your shawl." 
 
 He flung a soft white thing over her hair, 
 and the blank dark beyond the dazzle of light
 
 284 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 took them. Tod rubbed the grains of rice 
 from his damp hands. 
 
 "Begorra, bhoys, we'd betther be movin'," 
 he said. "Wud ye let Lou be havin' it all tu 
 himsilf down there?" 
 
 Steve followed slowly in the wake of eager 
 feet. Four hours agone he had stood up in 
 the church very near to Maiden and had heard 
 the great words whereby Danny and Suse had 
 pledged themselves. But he had looked at 
 none but Maiden, so that Danny might be 
 forgiven for calling him a "silly rotter" when 
 he forgot to hand over the ring, and finally 
 dropped it under the front seat where Lou 
 sat. Lou had picked it up, with a little sug- 
 gestive movement, and his bold eyes full on 
 Maiden's. And Maiden had grown red and 
 white, and spoken no word at all to Steve when 
 he took her out of the church, trying to tell 
 her that he envied, not Danny, but Danny's 
 state, and so mixing himself that Maiden's 
 wicked laughter called up Lou. It was since 
 that moment that Steve had been giddy with 
 fear and hate. For over-well he knew Lou 
 Birot. 
 
 There were cut cabbage trees about the 
 Town Hall, and tall sweet-scented koradis, 
 and little dark corners where Tod had planted 
 chairs. Tod was M.C. ; and there were three 
 violins and an accordeon and a long tableful of 
 supper on the platform. Danny was utterly
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 285 
 
 delirious with glee; and when he kissed the 
 bridesmaid in the quadrilles it was Lou called 
 shame on Steve that he had foregone his right 
 with Suse. Steve hung glowering in a corner, 
 and the Packer cried: 
 
 "Do it yerself, Lou, yer beggar!" 
 
 Lou's bold glancing eyes met Maiden's. 
 
 "The next best thing, Maiden," he said un- 
 derbreath; and kissed Suse on both hard red 
 cheeks, slid his arm round her waist, and 
 whirled her down the room. 
 
 Steve came across to Maiden. 
 
 "Are you sparin' any dances ter-night, 
 Maiden?" he said shortly. 
 
 The crimson Lou's words had called 
 there left Maiden's face. She flung up her 
 head. 
 
 "You've been in sech a mighty hurry to ask 
 me," she said. 
 
 "No, I ain't. I near didn't ask yer at all. 
 But yer'll spare me one now, Maiden, fur I've 
 suthin' ter say ter yer?" 
 
 Maiden turned on her heel. 
 
 "Thanks ! I don't want ter hear it," she said. 
 
 "Would yer ruther I said it ter Lou?" 
 
 Maiden glanced at him in sudden fear; at 
 his broad honest face set now in a savageness 
 that Lou had seen there before; at his great 
 height and solid breadth as against Lou's lithe 
 gracefulness. She shivered a little. Then she 
 put her hand on his arm.
 
 286 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "You can have this," she said. "It's Ike's, 
 but he don't count." 
 
 Steve pushed open a side-door with his el- 
 bow. 
 
 "It's hot 'miff out here," he said. "No- 
 there ain't any dew on the grass. Come down 
 ter the gate, Maiden." 
 
 Maiden stepped beside him, holding her mus- 
 lin dress daintily. The rollicking music behind 
 unsteadied Steve's nerves. There was a lilt 
 of defiance in it that brought Lou's laughter 
 very near. He gripped his hand on the gate. 
 
 "Are yer thinkin' o' marryin' Lou?" he de- 
 manded suddenly. 
 
 Maiden brushed a twig from her skirt. 
 
 "You said you wanted to tell me something," 
 she suggested. "Don't yer think yer ideas is 
 a bit upside down, Steve?" 
 
 "I'd ruther not tell yer till I knows that." 
 
 "Well," said Maiden, lightly, "you're not 
 goin' to know that. Anything else?" 
 
 "If yer sends me ter him, Maiden " 
 
 "What will you do?" 
 
 "I'll git the truth outen him." Steve's voice 
 had a rasp in it now. 
 
 "And what good will that do you?" 
 
 The distant curve of tussock hills against 
 the stars blurred in Steve's sight. 
 
 "D'yer think I'm carin' fur myself?" he said 
 fiercely. "If Lou were another man I'd say 
 nothin'. But him bein' what he is Maiden!
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 287 
 
 Maiden! yer don't know him, dearie. Not as 
 I knows him!" 
 
 "Likely 'nuff . You're a bit clumsy at know- 
 in' anybody." 
 
 "If you're carin' fur Lou " Steve 
 
 stopped, cutting his nails into the gate top. 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 "Maiden if yer'd tell me ! Oh, if yer'd only 
 tell me I Maiden " 
 
 Maiden yawned deliberately. 
 
 "Must be 'bout eleven, I should think," she 
 said. "We've bin out here an hour, haven't 
 we? Lou was goin' to take me in to supper." 
 
 "Maiden if yer expectin' Lou ter marry 
 yer he never will. He'll like as not be clearin* 
 out any day at all." 
 
 Maiden drew up her slim throat, and her 
 words came iced: 
 
 "I don't remember givin* you the right ter 
 be impertinent to me, Steve Derral," she said. 
 
 "I ain't askin' no right. I'm jes' warnin* 
 yer " 
 
 "I've heard folks say as yer ain't always 
 clever wi' the words you use. Insultin' is more 
 like it, I think." 
 
 "He'll insult yer worse ef you're engaged 
 ter him 'fore he goes. Maiden yer got ter 
 listen " 
 
 "Lou! Lou! Come!" 
 
 A dark bulk by the steps moved suddenly. 
 Then Lou's voice was in Steve's ear:
 
 288 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Hands off there, will you?" 
 
 Steve did not loose his hold on her arm. 
 
 "I'm not takin' orders from you," he said. 
 "Maiden, it's your choice, now. Are yer chuck- 
 in' him or me, Maiden?" 
 
 His voice was rough with pain, and all the 
 love that would ever be his was in his eyes. 
 Maiden looked on the two in the moonlight. 
 Then she laughed. 
 
 "I'm goin' into the dressin'-room to tidy my 
 hair. So I don't want either of yer. Let go, 
 Steve! P'raps that's my choice, and p'raps it 
 isn't." 
 
 Steve turned on the man when she had left 
 them. 
 
 'Twouldn't mean much ter me ter be hung 
 s'posin' yer was thinkin' o' breakin' her heart," 
 he said. "Yer'd be wise ter remember that. 
 Fur, sure's death, I'll never let her marry yer, 
 an' me livin'." 
 
 Lou's hands were thrust deep in his pockets, 
 and there was a slow smile on his mouth. 
 
 "I don't fancy you're going to have much 
 say in the matter, if you ask me," he said. "I've 
 got her name down four times more to-night. 
 Can you beat that?" 
 
 Steve's programme was a bit of blank white 
 paper. He tore it in half and flung it on the 
 gravel. 
 
 "I ain't goin' ter say anythin' more ter her." 
 He paid out his words separately. "It's you
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 289 
 
 ter reckon wi' nex' time. An' yer'd best jes' 
 remember she means a lump more ter me 
 than my life." 
 
 He went out of the gate abruptly and up the 
 street, meeting with Murray and Father Denis 
 at the corner. Murray called gaily: 
 "Going for the kerosene-tins, Steve?" 
 "We got 'em," said Steve, halting. "Fif- 
 teen, an' heavy sticks. It's goin' ter be the 
 biggest tin-kettlin' in the township; both par- 
 ties being sech fav'rits, yer see." 
 
 "Well, I don't want to have to run any of 
 you in if I can help it 
 
 "Bhut there is his duty comes furrst, he wud 
 say, bhoy what is it, Ormond?" 
 
 Ormond was breathless. He had a coat over 
 his pyjamas, and unlaced boots on his bare 
 feet: for he had come at the run from his bed 
 in the little tin hut behind the Lion that had 
 proven too strong for his wrath against Kiliat. 
 He was white-faced in the moonlight, and his 
 words were tumbled. 
 
 "Roddy has shot Art Scannell. Kiliat 
 sacked him last week, and he's been swearing 
 to pay Kiliat out. I saw him with a gun this 
 morning. He nicked the wrong man I found 
 him crying over Art. And now he's off after 
 Kiliat. I tried to get him, Murray- 
 Murray's clean-shaped ruddy face was sud- 
 denly drawn. 
 "Is Art dead?"
 
 290 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "Think so; pretty far gone, anyway. But 
 Murray if he finds Kiliat " 
 
 "Steve, you hop down to the hall and rope 
 in a few fellows. Don't spread an alarm. 
 Where was he going, Ormond?" 
 
 "Kiliat is up at Scannell's to-night. Roddy 
 was taking a short cut through the bush 
 
 "Come and get into some of my duds while 
 I rake out a couple of shooters. Father Denis, 
 you'll take somebody up to Art. He is 
 where, Ormond? Oh, in Ormond's hut, Father 
 Denis." 
 
 In Murray's room Ormond spoke with some 
 hesitation : 
 
 "It's tough work for you, Murray, old fel- 
 low." 
 
 Murray was loading his revolvers with quick 
 firm movements. 
 
 "That little chap faced what he feared more 
 than death to save me. And I've got to bring 
 him to the gallows, perhaps. Pipi's at the bot- 
 tom of it in some way, Ormond. Roddy has 
 never been the same since that foolery." 
 
 "You've got over it." 
 
 Murray buckled his belt, and wheeled to the 
 head of the stairs. 
 
 "He may be paying instead of me," he said, 
 very low. "I don't know. Come on, Ormond." 
 
 Where a crowd foregathered in the dark 
 street Murray took command, leading out to 
 the river track and the heavy bush on the hills.
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 291 
 
 Behind was music and the blushing laughter 
 of girls, and a new-made bride; before lay 
 death for themselves from an unseen bullet, or 
 death for the boy who was already a murderer. 
 
 Not Maiden nor another woman could hold 
 Lou when danger beckoned. Murray heard 
 his careless jokes, and the sputter of laughter 
 waked by them in the night, and his forehead 
 went hot with sudden wrath. 
 
 "He's the only one going for the fun of it," 
 he muttered to Ormond. "And, by Heaven I 
 if he hurts the poor little beggar I'll put a bul- 
 let into him myself." Then he sent his voice 
 out in command: "There's to be no rough 
 handling! Remember that, men! The boy's 
 off his head, and I won't have him messed 
 with." 
 
 There was a growl out of the dark. 
 
 "That's all very fine, Murray. How if 'e 
 goes plunkin' lead inter us, eh?" 
 
 On the breast of the hill the bush was heavy, 
 and vines tripped them, slashing faces with 
 their thorns, or whipping back with the smart- 
 ing sting of a supple-jack. The track Roddy 
 had taken lay higher, among the delicate red 
 birches and the straight-limbed matais ; and the 
 men climbed for it in haste, for they loved 
 Scannell well, and more than one life was in 
 danger this night. 
 
 The underway was rotten with long-fallen 
 boles where the golden and scarlet mosses
 
 292 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 grew. It was bogged by springs hidden in 
 ferns and in the little purple and red berries 
 that spurt out their juices to the tread. Once 
 a weka ran with a cry before the toe of 
 Ike's boot; but, for the rest, in all the mighty 
 length and height of the bush was no 
 sound save the crashing of men through the 
 branches. 
 
 "It's hot 'miff fur another place 'sides this," 
 said Mogger, wiping green slime from his eye- 
 brows; "an' dark 'nuff fur ter lose anybody yer 
 didn't want ter fin' agin, too. There's some 
 folk one cud do wi' losin' ef yer cud do it 
 wi'out hurtin' their feelin's." 
 
 "It's never wise to think of another man's 
 feelings," said Lou, beating the lawyer tangle 
 aside. "You get underfoot each time you do 
 it and that is where the heat is bred, 
 Mogger." 
 
 Through the bush-thickness he burst on to 
 the track; and the others following saw him 
 struck out in scarlet, like the demon in a panto- 
 mime. Below in the gully of pine and tree 
 fern, a welter of flame gallopped up to snatch 
 at the way that led to Mains, and red tongues 
 lapped the undergrowth, licking round the 
 great trunks that barred them. The splash of 
 raw scarlet was over the men with their startled 
 faces; over the low sky behind the far hill; 
 over the wild tracery of giant trees along the 
 gully-rim. The snarl of it was in the air; fill-
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 293 
 
 ing the night with the clashing of falling 
 branches, and the spitting of little springs, and 
 the howl of the tall boles as they pitched down- 
 hill where the flames rioted. Flakes of fire 
 blew up, settling softly in the darkness about 
 the boys, and searing out the beauty of fern 
 and creeper before they died. 
 
 A smother of smoke came on a sudden; 
 black, choking and acrid. Murray buttoned 
 his coat and turned his collar up. 
 
 "I'm only taking volunteers," he said, "for 
 we'll have to run for it. Who is coming?" 
 
 Tod was fighting the blackness that stank 
 of burning leaves and rottenness. 
 
 "Whisht, then!" he shouted. "Wud ye have 
 us ahl tu Purgatory befure our toime, Murray? 
 There's a way back, yet, glory be!" 
 
 "And there's Roddy ahead with a loaded 
 rifle," said Murray. "Are you going to let 
 him get to Mains first? He's taking death for 
 someone with him, by all accounts." 
 
 He tucked in his elbows, put his head down, 
 and disappeared in the smoke. Ormond ran 
 with him, step for step. Since the night in 
 Pipi's hut, Roddy had been rather dear to 
 Murray, and Ormond knew it, fearing what 
 might be when Murray faced the boy next. 
 
 "He may not do any harm, Murray," he 
 gasped. 
 
 "But he will," said Murray. "You know it 
 unless we're there first. And I'd give ten
 
 294 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 years of my life to be on any other errand than 
 this, Ormond." 
 
 Ormond made no answer. For the smoke 
 was tart on his eyes and on his lips, and his 
 breath came uneven and laboured. Behind the 
 boys fought, each according to his kind ; chok- 
 ing, blackened, sweating; with curses; with 
 Lou's light jokes, poison- tipped, to gall them; 
 with light lips and staggering unconquered 
 strength. The flames were very near. They 
 singed away Lou's shirt sleeve and the hair 
 of his arm. He ripped the burning thing 
 off and ran on. 
 
 A shout from Murray blew back to them, 
 and Steve interpreted it. 
 
 "He's sighted Roddy. Put yer back inter 
 it, yer wasters. We'll nab him yet." 
 
 The smoke whirled up into a solid column 
 that rammed the sky and seemed to split it. 
 The whole lurid world beneath was struck out 
 in reds; and Roddy ran down the narrow 
 cleared track with the semblance of blood on 
 his face and hands. Murray leapt after, with 
 long strides. And Ormond alone saw the pain 
 in his set grimed face. 
 
 The fire clawed at the track with long thin 
 fingers; shrivelled, then clawed again. The 
 sweat ran thick off each man, and ahead Roddy 
 was reeling. Murray heard the breath pump- 
 ing in his chest as he closed up. 
 
 "Roddy!" he shouted. "Roddy! Stop!"
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 295 
 
 Roddy wheeled suddenly, and the spit of a 
 bullet past Megger's cheek made him pause a 
 moment to consider things. Lou chuckled, and 
 Steve saw the reckless glee of his face. 
 
 "Shall we rush the young devil, Murray?" 
 he shouted. 
 
 "No! Hands up, Roddy! You haven't a 
 hope, you know!" 
 
 Roddy's hands moved over the stock un- 
 certainly. His clothes were torn, and his 
 young face was smudged with sweat and 
 grime, and scored with lines that were new. 
 
 "Are you goin' to hurt me, Murray?" he 
 said hoarsely. 
 
 For an instant Murray's strong face quiv- 
 ered. Then his will took command. 
 
 "Very probably if you don't sling that 
 thing down, Roddy." 
 
 His finger crooked on the revolver trigger; 
 but the rifle mouth covered him. 
 
 "Lie down behind there!" he shouted. 
 "Now, Roddy!" 
 
 "I killed Art Scannell," said Roddy, paying 
 out his words separately. "They will do some- 
 thing to me for that, won't they? Murray, 
 will I swing for it?" 
 
 "I don't know. Hands up, when I tell 
 you!" 
 
 "Murray, you wouldn't come arter me if I 
 was to swing? I I didn't mean it." 
 
 Ormond was biting his lips. His heart was
 
 296 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 very sore for Murray; but he did not forget 
 Art Scannell, limp as a new-killed chicken, in 
 his arms. 
 
 "Hands up, or I'll shoot you, Roddy 
 Duncan!" 
 
 Then Roddy's answer came in a right and 
 left that sent the boys to cover where the 
 smoke bellied and the young flames were 
 waking. Tod made just one remark. 
 
 "Be ahl things," he said, "I'll not be takin' 
 no penances from Father Denis this good while 
 at ahl. Sure, they're comin' now tu the lot of 
 us in a lump." 
 
 Ormond heard Murray's revolver crack in 
 the new-come smarting dark; and he sprang 
 with Murray to kneel on the thing that fought 
 and bit and scratched, unseen. 
 
 Murray was sobbing in his throat. 
 
 "His shoulder!" he said. "Be careful, Or- 
 mond! I had to get him there. Roddy it's 
 all right, old fellow." 
 
 "Are they goin' ter hurt me? Murray- 
 Murray! you're not goin' ter let them hurt 
 me?" 
 
 Ormond, reaching for the fallen rifle, saw 
 Murray stoop and kiss the piteous stammering 
 lips. And it was not smoke alone that smarted 
 in his eyes as he came to his feet. 
 
 "Come on, you there!" he shouted. "Who'll 
 help carry the boy out of this?" 
 
 A hot blast poured over the track; with
 
 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 297 
 
 flame in it, and raging smoke, and the roar of 
 a falling tree. It silenced all other sound as 
 half the boys swept forward down the road 
 to Mains. Steve and Tod were halted by the 
 tree and the man who was caught beneath it, 
 and Ike fled after his mates with a face of pure 
 wordless horror. 
 
 Little flames licked Steve's boot, and a puff 
 of scorching air touched his cheek. He stood 
 unmoving, while Tod, on his knees, tore at the 
 branches in haste. 
 
 "Lou! Arrah, then, Lou! git away out ov 
 that, befure the fire has us aiten up entoirely! 
 Lou! Is it dead ye are down there?" 
 
 Lou was pinned by the middle. He beat his 
 arms free, and the gay grin flashed in the blue 
 eyes, crushing down the mortal pain. 
 
 "Go an' chuck the earth out of its axis with 
 a crowbar, Tod," he said. "For you'll do it 
 before I'm out of this." 
 
 The tree was skeleton-white in a death of 
 long years. But no power save that of the fire 
 would move it where it lay athwart the track. 
 Steve came to his knees. 
 
 "Tell us what ter do," he said stupidly. 
 "We got ter git yer out, or the fire'll have us 
 all, Lou." 
 
 A whirl-devil of fire spun along the tree, 
 snatching at Lou's hair, and dropping sparks 
 on his face. Tod swept them off, his light eyes 
 wild with fear.
 
 298 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 "We'll pull ye," he cried. "Whisht, then, 
 bhoy git a howld of him, Steve!" 
 
 He wrenched the shoulders, and Lou struck 
 at him, cursing: 
 
 "Don't, you ! Let me alone! Ah-h!" 
 
 The sweat ran down his face, and Steve re- 
 peated, in a daze: 
 
 "Tell us what ter do. The fire's comin'." 
 
 The fire was on them; mocking, leaping, 
 flinging cords of burning vine; and its shout- 
 ing filled the night. Lou gripped Tod's sleeve. 
 
 "Have you got a knife?" he said. "Or a bit 
 of cord? Put an end to me somehow! Don't 
 leave me to be roasted alive!" 
 
 Tod shuddered down on the ground, stut- 
 tering. 
 
 "Ochone! Mary be good to us! Say yer 
 prayers, then, Lou, for it's the hand of God 
 howldin' ye, an' no other." 
 
 "Stop that blasted rot," said Lou, fiercely. 
 "Haven't you got anything? Steve " 
 
 His blue eyes were hard and bright and his 
 voice grated. Under the smoke that all but 
 smothered, Tod crept away, crazy with horror, 
 and muttering prayers without end or begin- 
 ning. Steve crushed out some burning leaves 
 with his arm, and stooped lower. 
 
 "If I cud do anything Lou; because as 
 Maiden loved yer " 
 
 Then Lou cursed him, in a fury of passion 
 and pain. But there was no fear.
 
 "Where's your knife? Your clasp-knife? 
 You had it, I know! Give it here, then, if 
 you've not got the mercy to help me out your- 
 self. Give it here!" 
 
 "Lou I I couldn't! Oh God- 
 Lou tried to raise himself; fell back with 
 oaths in his mouth, and twisted his liand in 
 Steve's trousers. 
 
 "You'll burn too if you won't give it up. 
 Steve you devil!" 
 
 Steve dragged his belt round and jerked 
 the knife out. He thrust it into the eager hand 
 as a blast of flame struck his face, blinding 
 him, scorching hair from eyebrows and eyelids, 
 and sending him, stupid and staggering, down 
 the track before the fire. 
 
 He found sense only by the post and rail 
 fence that led by way of a creek to Mains. Be- 
 hind the fire raged and tossed great arms, 
 crossing the hill to North-of- Sunday. Before 
 lay the peace of the night, and Mains home- 
 stead in the hollow. He stumbled down to the 
 whares that were full of light and noise. In 
 the door someone stopped him, exclaiming. 
 Steve looked down at his boots, yet dazed. A 
 spurt of half-dried blood crossed them both. 
 
 "Lou were quick," he said. "D quick!" 
 
 Then he staggered to the long table, laid his 
 head on it and cried helplessly. 
 
 An hour later he was back in the township 
 with Murray, knocking on the side door of the
 
 300 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 Hall and sending the gaping boy who came, 
 for Maiden. 
 
 "An' you'll not tell her nuthin'," commanded 
 Steve, standing gaunt and ragged without the 
 light shaft. "Jes' ask her ter come a minit. 
 Yer hear?" 
 
 The boy fled, and Murray spoke under the 
 throb of the music : 
 
 "Plunk it straight, Steve. Let her know 
 that you love her. It'll be all right, man." 
 
 "You think everything's all right 'cause 
 young Art ain't dead," said Steve bitterly. "I 
 got ter tell her 'cause I seed him last. An' 
 what will she say ter me?" 
 
 Murray went away swiftly as Maiden came 
 out to say it. The flowers on her white dress 
 were crushed; but the brightness was on her 
 cheeks yet, and in her eyes. Steve spoke out 
 of the dark, sick at remembering all that had 
 gone by in the few hours since he saw her last. 
 
 "There's bin a big fire," he said; "a big fire. 
 I corned back we ain't all on us corned back, 
 Maiden." 
 
 Maiden had stood in the door, panting, the 
 smile yet on her lips. At his voice she moved 
 suddenly, her hands shut close on each 
 other. 
 
 "Steve you're hurt! Steve, what are you 
 speakin' that way fur? Steve 
 
 "I'm bringin' yer bad news, Maiden," said 
 gteve, slowly.
 
 He came forward into the light. His shirt 
 was torn and charred and one singed arm lay 
 naked to the shoulder. His face was white and 
 drawn under the grime and the smudged 
 smoke, and trouble showed deep in his eyes. 
 
 "I couldn't help it, my girlie," he said. 
 "Maiden I did what I could." 
 
 "Steve oh, what is it? Yer not hurt bad? 
 Steve! Tell me!" 
 
 "He weren't fit fur yer, Maiden. But he 
 were game. Ter the very last he were game, 
 dear. He oh, why was I sech a blamed fool 
 as ter think I could tell yer! I can't! I 
 can't!" 
 
 Maiden sprang to him, holding him about 
 the neck and never heeding his tattered shirt 
 against her whiteness. 
 
 "Steve! You never killed no one! Ah! 
 Not that! Not that, Steve!" 
 
 "Killed him! No, dearie! But he's dead. 
 Lou's dead, Maiden. He died game. I near 
 died with him." 
 
 She leant back from him, her lips quivering 
 between laughter and tears. 
 
 "And if you had I'd have never forgiven 
 you, Steve. Steve, you silly boy! When you 
 knew there was never anyone else but only 
 you only you!" 
 
 "Maiden! You never tolt me 
 
 "You never asked me, you mean," she said. 
 
 Steve took her up in his great arms, and in
 
 302 THE TRACKS WE TREAD 
 
 that moment the dead man out on the ranges 
 was forgotten. 
 
 "Well; ef I ain't bin a d idjit!" he said 
 
 solemnly. 
 
 FINIS
 
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