^BOSS OF 
 TAROOMBA 
 
 EW HORNUNG
 
 i 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES 
 
 r
 
 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA
 
 THE 
 
 BOSS OF TAROOMBA 
 
 BY 
 
 ERNEST WILLIAM HORNUNG 
 
 SANDS & CO. 
 
 LONDON: 15 KING STREET, COVENT GARDEN 
 
 EDINBURGH: 37 GEORGE STREET 
 
 1910
 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 A T least a third of this tale has appeared 
 '^ already in a Christmas Number of The 
 Detroit Free Press. The remainder is pub- 
 lished now for the first time. 
 
 E. W. HORNUNG. 
 
 i 702117
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 Chap. 
 
 
 
 
 Page 
 
 I. 
 
 The Little Musician . 
 
 
 
 I 
 
 II. 
 
 A Friend Indeed 
 
 
 
 14 
 
 III. 
 
 " Hard Times " . 
 
 
 
 27 
 
 IV. 
 
 The Treasure in the Store 
 
 
 
 AS 
 
 V. 
 
 Masterless Men 
 
 
 
 61 
 
 VI. 
 
 £500 . . . . 
 
 
 
 78 
 
 VII. 
 
 The Ringer of the Shed 
 
 
 
 92 
 
 VIII. 
 
 "Three Shadows" 
 
 
 
 113 
 
 IX. 
 
 No Hope for Him 
 
 
 
 132 
 
 X. 
 
 Missing 
 
 
 
 152 
 
 XI. 
 
 Lost in the Bush 
 
 
 
 168 
 
 XII. 
 
 Fallen Among Thieves 
 
 
 
 . 179 
 
 XIII. 
 
 A Smoking Concert 
 
 
 
 . 198 
 
 XIV. 
 
 The Raid on the Station 
 
 
 
 214 
 
 XV. 
 
 The Night Attack 
 
 
 
 . 231 
 
 XVI. 
 
 In the Midst of Death , 
 
 1 
 
 
 2SS
 
 The Boss of Taroomba, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. 
 
 THEY were terribly sentimental words 
 but the fellow sang them as though he 
 meant every syllable. Altogether, the song 
 was not the kind of thing to go down with 
 a back- block audience, any more than the 
 singer was the class of man. 
 
 He was a little bit of a fellow, with long 
 dark hair and dark glowing eyes, and he 
 swayed on the music-stool, as he played and 
 sang, in a manner most new to the young 
 men of Taroomba. He had not much voice, 
 but the sensitive lips took such pains with 
 each word, and the long, nervous fingers 
 fell so lightly upon the old piano, that every 
 one of the egregious lines travelled whole 
 
 B
 
 2 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 and unmistakeable to the furthest corner of 
 the room. And that was an additional pity, 
 because the piano was so placed that the 
 performer was forced to turn his back upon 
 his audience ; and behind it the young men 
 of Taroomba were making great game of him 
 all the time. 
 
 In the moderate light of two kerosene lamps, 
 the room seemed full of cord breeches and 
 leather belts and flannel collars and sunburnt 
 throats. It was not a large room, however, 
 and there were only four men present, not 
 counting the singer. They were young fellows, 
 in the main, though the one leaning his elbow 
 on the piano had a bushy red beard, and his 
 yellow hair was beginning to thin. Another 
 was reading The Australasian on the sofa ; 
 and a sort of twist to his moustache, a certain 
 rigour about his unshaven chin, if they betrayed 
 no sympathy with the singer, suggested a 
 measure of contempt for the dumb clownery 
 going on behind the singer's back. Over his 
 very head, indeed, the red-bearded man was 
 signalling maliciously to a youth who with 
 coarse fat face and hands was mimicking the 
 performer in the middle of the room ; while
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. 3 
 
 the youngest man of the lot, who wore spec- 
 tacles and a Home-bred look, giggled in a half- 
 ashamed, half- anxious way, as though not a 
 little concerned lest they should all be caught. 
 And when the song ended, and the singer 
 spun round on the stool, they had certainly a 
 narrow escape. 
 
 " Great song ! " cried the mimic, pulling 
 himself together in an instant, and clapping 
 out a brutal burlesque of applause. 
 
 " Shut up, Sandy," said the man with the 
 beard, dropping a yellow-fringed eyelid over 
 a very blue eye. " Don't you mind Mr. San- 
 derson, sir," he added to the musician; "he's 
 not a bad chap, only he thinks he 's funny. 
 We '11 show him what funniment really is in 
 a minute or two. I 've just found the very 
 song ! But what 's the price of the last pretty 
 thing.'*" 
 
 "Of 'Love Flees before the Dawn'.^" said 
 the musician, simply, 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " It's the same as all the rest ; you see " 
 
 Here the mimic broke in with a bright con- 
 genial joke. 
 
 "Love how much?" cried he, winking with
 
 4 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 his whole heavy face. " I don't, chaps, do 
 you : 
 
 The sally was greeted with a roar, in which 
 the musician joined timidly, while the man on 
 the sofa smiled faintly without looking up 
 from his paper. 
 
 ** Never mind him," said the red - bearded 
 man, who was for keeping up the fun as long 
 as possible ; " he 's too witty to live. What 
 did you say the price was?" 
 
 " Most of the songs are half-a- crown." 
 
 "Come, I say, that's a stiffish price, isn't it?" 
 
 "Plucky stiff for fleas!" exclaimed the wit. 
 
 The musician flushed, but tossed back his 
 head of hair, and held out his hand for the 
 song. 
 
 " I can't help it, gentlemen. I can't afford 
 to charge less. Every one of these songs 
 has been sent out from Home, and I get them 
 from a man in Melbourne, who makes me 
 pay for them. You 're five hundred miles up 
 country, where you can't expect town prices." 
 
 " Keep your hair on, old man !" said the 
 wit, soothingly. 
 
 " My what ? My hair is my own business !" 
 
 The little musician had turned upon his
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. 5 
 
 tormentor like a knife. His dark eyes were 
 glaring indignantly, and his nervous fingers 
 had twitched themselves into a pair of absurdly 
 unserviceable white fists. But now a freckled 
 hand was laid upon his shoulder, and the man 
 with the beard was saying, " Come, come, my 
 good fellow, you 've made a mistake ; my 
 friend Sanderson meant nothing personal. It's 
 our way up here, you know, to chi-ak each 
 other and our visitors too." 
 
 "Then I don't like your way," said the 
 little man, stoutly. 
 
 "Well, Sandy meant no offence, I'll swear 
 to that." 
 
 " Of course I didn't," said Sanderson. 
 
 The musician looked from one to the other, 
 and the anger went out of him, making way 
 for shame. 
 
 " Then the offence is on my side," said he, 
 awkwardly, "and I beg your pardon." 
 
 He took a pile of new music from the piano, 
 and was about to go. 
 
 "No, no, we're not going to let you off so 
 easily," said the bearded man, laughing. 
 
 "You'll have to sing us one more song to 
 show there 's no ill-feeling," put in Sanderson.
 
 6 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "And here's the song," added the other. 
 " The very thing. I found it just now. There 
 you are — ' The World's Creation ! '" 
 
 "Not that thing ! " said the musician. 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " It's a comic song." 
 
 " The very thing we want." 
 
 " We '11 buy up your whole stock of comic 
 songs," said Sanderson. 
 
 " Hear, hear," cried the silent youth who 
 wore spectacles. 
 
 " I wish you would," the musician said, 
 smiling. 
 
 " But we must hear them first." 
 
 " I hate singing them." 
 
 " Well, give us this one as a favour ! Only 
 this one. Do." 
 
 The musician wavered. He was a very 
 sensitive young man, with a constitutional 
 desire to please, and an acute horror of making 
 a fool of himself. Now the whole soul of him 
 was aching with the conviction that he had 
 done this already, in showing his teeth at what 
 had evidently been meant as harmless and 
 inoffensive badinage. And it was this feeling 
 that engendered the desperate desire at once
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. 7 
 
 to expiate his late display of temper, and to 
 win the good opinion of these men by fairly 
 amusing them after all. Certainly the song in 
 demand did not amuse himself, but then it was 
 equally certain that his taste in humour differed 
 from theirs. He could not decide in his mind. 
 He longed to make these men laugh. To get 
 on with older and rougher men was his great 
 difficulty, and one of his ambitions. 
 
 " We must have this," said the man with the 
 beard, who had been looking over the song. 
 " The words are first chop ! " 
 
 " I can't stand them," the musician con- 
 fessed. 
 
 " Why, are they too profane ? " 
 
 " They are too silly." 
 
 "Well, they ain't for us. CHmb down to 
 our level, and fire away." 
 
 With a sigh and a smile, and a full comple- 
 ment of those misgivings which were a part 
 of his temperament, the little visitor sat down 
 and played with much vivacity a banjo ac- 
 companiment which sounded far better than 
 anything else had done on the antiquated 
 weather-beaten bush piano. The jingle struck 
 fire with the audience, and the performer knew
 
 8 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 it, as he went on to describe himself as 
 "stralg-ht from Old Vlra-Inla," with his "head 
 stuffed full of knowledge," in spite of the fact 
 that he had "never been to 'Frisco or any 
 other college " ; the entertaining information 
 that "this world it was created in the twinkling 
 of two cracks " bringing the first verse to a 
 conclusion. Then came the chorus — of which 
 there can scarcely be two opinions. The 
 young men caught it up with a howl, with 
 the exception of the reader on the sofa, who 
 put his fingers in his ears. This is how it 
 went : 
 
 " Oh, walk up, Mr. Pompey, oh, walk up while I say. 
 Will you walk into the banjo and hear the parlour play? 
 Will you walk into the parlour and hear the banjo ring? 
 Oh, listen to de darkies how merrily dey sing ! " 
 
 The chorus ended with a whoop which 
 assured the soloist that he was amusing his 
 men ; and having himself one of those suscep- 
 tible, excitable natures which can enter Into 
 almost anything, given the fair wind of appre- 
 ciation to fill their sails, the little musician 
 began actually to enjoy the nonsense himself. 
 His long fingers rang out the tinkling accom- 
 paniment with a crisp, confident touch. He
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. 9 
 
 sang the second verse, which buih up the 
 universe in numbers calculated to shock a 
 religious or even a reasonably cultivated order 
 of mind, as though he were by no means 
 ashamed of it. And so far as culture and 
 religion were concerned he was tolerably safe 
 — each fresh peal of laughter re-assured him 
 of this. That the laugh was with him he 
 never doubted until the end of the third verse. 
 Then it was that the roars of merriment rose 
 louder than ever, and that their note suddenly 
 struck the musician's trained ear as false. He 
 sang- throuofh the next verse with an over- 
 whelming sense of its inanity, and with the 
 life gone out of his voice and fingers alike. 
 Still they roared with laughter, but he who 
 made them knew now that the laugh was at 
 his expense. He turned hot all over, then 
 cold, then hotter than ever. A shadow was 
 dancing on the music in front of him ; he 
 could hear a suppressed titter at the back 
 of the boisterous laughter ; something brushed 
 against his hair, and he could bear it all no 
 longer. Snatching his fingers from the keys, 
 he wheeled round on the music-stool in time 
 to catch the heavy youth Sanderson in the
 
 lO THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 mimic act of braining him with a chair ; his 
 tongue was out Hke a brat's, his eyes shone 
 with a baleful mirth, while the red-bearded 
 man was rolling about the room in an ecstasy 
 of malicious merriment. 
 
 The singer sprang to his feet in a palsy 
 of indignation. His dark eyes glared with 
 the dumb rage of a wounded animal ; then 
 they ranged round the room for something 
 with which to strike, and before Sanderson 
 had time to drop the chair he had been 
 brandishing over the other's head, the musician 
 had snatched up the kerosene lamp from the 
 top of the piano, and was poising it in the 
 air with murderous intent. Yet his anger had 
 not blinded him utterly. His flashing eyes 
 were fixed upon the fat mocking face which 
 he longed to mark for life, but he could also 
 see beyond it, and what he saw made him 
 put down the lamp without a word. 
 
 At the other side of the room was a door 
 leading out upon the verandah ; it had been 
 open all the evening, and now it was the 
 frame of an unlooked-for picture, for a tall 
 strong girl was standing upon the threshold. 
 
 "Well, I never!" said she calmly, as she
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. II 
 
 came Into their midst with a slow, commanding 
 stride. "So this is the way you play when 
 I 'm away, is it ? What poor little mice they 
 are, to be sure ! " 
 
 Sanderson had put down the chair, and 
 was looking indescribably foolish. The boy 
 in the spectacles, though he had been a merely 
 passive party to the late proceedings, seemed 
 only a little less uncomfortable. The man 
 on the sofa and the little trembling musician 
 were devouring the girl with their eyes. It 
 was the personage with the beard who 
 swaggered forward into the breach. 
 
 "Good evening, Naomi," said he, holding 
 out a hand which she refused to see. " This 
 is Mr. Engelhardt, who has come to tune your 
 piano for you. Mr. Engelhardt — Miss Pryse." 
 
 The hand which had been refused to the 
 man who was in a position to address Miss 
 Pryse as Naomi, was held out frankly to the 
 stranger. It was a firm, cool hand, which left 
 him a stronger and a saner man for its touch. 
 
 " I am delighted to see you, Mr. Engelhardt. 
 I congratulate you on your songs, and on your 
 spirit too. It was about time that Mr. Sander- 
 son met somebody who objected to his peculiar
 
 12 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 form of fun. He has been spoiling for this 
 ever since I have known him!" 
 
 "Come, I say, Naomi," said the man who 
 was on familiar terms with her, ''it was all 
 meant in good part, you know. You 're rather 
 rough upon poor Sandy." 
 
 "Not so rough as both you and he have 
 been upon a visitor. I am ashamed of you 
 all ! " 
 
 Her scornful eyes looked black in the lamp- 
 light ; her eyebrows were black. This with 
 her splendid colouring was all the musician 
 could be sure of; though his gaze never shifted 
 from her face. Now she turned to him and 
 said kindly — 
 
 " I have been enjoying your songs immensely 
 — especially the comic one. I came in some 
 time ago, and have been listening to every- 
 thing. You sing splendidly." 
 
 " These gentlemen will hardly agree with 
 you." 
 
 " These gentlemen," said Miss Pryse, laying 
 an unpleasant stress on the word, "disagree 
 with me horribly at times. They make me ill. 
 What a lot of songs you have brought !" 
 
 "I brought them to sell," said the young
 
 THE LITTLE MUSICIAN. I3 
 
 fellow, blushing. " I have just started business 
 — set up shop at Deniliquin — a music shop 
 you know. I am making a round to tune the 
 pianos at the stations." 
 
 " What a capital idea! You will find ours in 
 a terrible state, I 'm afraid." 
 
 "Yes, it is rather bad; I was talking about 
 it to the boss before I started to make a fool of 
 myself." 
 
 " To the boss, do you say.'*" 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 "And pray which is he?" 
 
 The piano-tuner pointed to the bushy red 
 beard. 
 
 " Why, bless your life," cried Naomi Pryse, 
 as the red beard split across and showed its 
 teeth, " he 's not the boss ! Don't you believe 
 it. If you Ve anything to say to the boss, 
 you 'd better come outside and say it." 
 
 " But which is he, Miss Pryse.?" 
 
 " He's a she, and you're talking to her now, 
 Mr. Engelhardt!"
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. 
 
 " T~AO you mean to say that you have 
 
 J_y never heard of the female boss of 
 Taroomba?" said Naomi Pryse, as she led 
 the piano-tuner across the verandah and out 
 into the station yard. The moon was gleaming 
 upon the galvanised-iron roofs of the various 
 buildings, and it picked out the girl's smile 
 as she turned to question her companion. 
 
 " No, I never heard of you before," replied 
 the piano-tuner stolidly. For the moment the 
 girl and the moonlight stupefied him. The 
 scene in the room was still before his eyes and 
 in his ears. 
 
 "Well, that's one for me! What station 
 have you come from to-day } " 
 
 " Kerulijah." 
 
 "And you never heard of me there! Ah 
 well, I 'm very seldom up here. I 've only 
 
 «4
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. 1$ 
 
 come for the shearing. Still, the whole place 
 is mine, and I 'm not exactly a cipher in the 
 business either ; I rather thought I was the 
 talk of the back-blocks. At one time I know 
 I was. I 'm very vain, you see." 
 
 "You have something to be vain about," 
 said the piano-tuner, looking at her frankly. 
 
 She made him a curtsey in the moonlit yard. 
 
 "Thank you kindly. But I'm not satisfied 
 yet ; I understand that you arrived in time for 
 supper ; didn't you hear of me at table ? " 
 
 " I just heard your name." 
 
 "Who mentioned it.^*" 
 
 " The fellow with the beard." 
 
 " Prettily ? " 
 
 " I think so. He was wondering where you 
 were. He seems to know you very well ? " 
 
 " He has known me all my life. He is a 
 sort of connection. He was overseer here 
 when my father died a year or two ago. He is 
 the manager now." 
 
 " But you are the boss ? " 
 
 " I am so ! His name, by the way, is Gilroy 
 — my mother was a Gilroy too. See ."* That 's 
 why he calls me Naomi ; I call him Monty 
 when I am not wroth with him. I am dis-
 
 l6 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 gusted with them all to-night! But you mustn't 
 mind them ; it 's only their way. Did you 
 speak to the overseer, Tom Chester ? " 
 
 "Which was he?" 
 
 " The one on the sofa." 
 
 " No, he hardly spoke to me." 
 
 " Well, he 's a very good sort ; you would 
 like him if you got to know him. The new 
 chum with the eye-glasses is all right, too. I 
 don't believe those two were to blame. As 
 for Mr. Sanderson, I wouldn't think any more 
 about him if I were you ; he really isn't worth 
 it." 
 
 " I forgive him," said the musician, simply ; 
 "but I shall never forgive myself for playing 
 the fool and losing my temper ! " 
 
 "Nonsense! It did them good, and they'll 
 think all the more of you. Still, I must say 
 I 'm glad you didn't dash the kerosene lamp in 
 Mr. Sanderson's face ! " 
 
 " The what ? " cried Engelhardt, in horror. 
 
 *' The lamp ; you were brandishing it over 
 your head when I came in." 
 
 " The lamp ! To think that I caught up the 
 lamp ! I can't have known what I was doing !" 
 
 He stood still and aghast in the sandy yard ;
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. 17 
 
 they had wandered to the far side of it, where 
 the kitchen and the laundry stood cheek-by- 
 jowl with the wood-heap between them, and 
 their back-walls to the six-wire fence dividing 
 the yard from the plantation of young pines 
 which bordered it upon three sides. 
 
 "You were in a passion," said Miss Pryse, 
 smiling gravely. ''There's nothing in this 
 world that I admire more than a passion — it 's 
 so uncommon. So are you ! There, I owed 
 you a pretty speech, you know ! Do you mind 
 giving me your arm, Mr. Engelhardt.'*" 
 
 But Engelhardt was gazing absently at the 
 girl, and the road between ear and mind was 
 choked with a multitude of new sensations. 
 Her sudden request made no impression upon 
 him, until he saw her stamping her foot in the 
 sand. Then, and awkwardly enough, he held 
 out his arm to her, and her firm hand caught 
 in it impatiently. 
 
 " How slow you are to assist a lady ! Yet I 
 feel sure that you come from the old country?" 
 
 "I do ; but I have never had much to do 
 with ladies." 
 
 The piano-tuner sighed. 
 
 " Well, it 's all right ; only I wanted you to 
 
 c
 
 1 8 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 take my arm for Monty Gilroy's benefit. He's 
 just come out on to the verandah. Don't look 
 round. This will rile him more than any- 
 thing." 
 
 " But why ?" 
 
 'Why? Oh, because he showed you the 
 hoof; and when a person does that, he never 
 likes to see another person being civil to the 
 same person. See ? Then if you don't, you 'd 
 better stand here and work it out while I run 
 into the kitchen to speak to Mrs. Potter about 
 your room." 
 
 "But I'm not going to stay!" the piano- 
 tuner cried, excitedly. 
 
 " Now what are you giving us, Mr. Engel- 
 hardt ? Of course you are going to stay. 
 You 're going to stay and tune my poor old 
 piano. Why, your horse was run out hours 
 ago! 
 
 " But I can't face those men again " 
 
 "What rubbish!" 
 
 ** After the way I made a fool of myself this 
 evening !" 
 
 "It was they who made fools of themselves. 
 They '11 annoy you no more, I promise you. 
 In any case, they all go back to the shed
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. ig 
 
 to-morrow evening ; it 's seven miles away, and 
 they only come in for Sunday. You needn't 
 start on the piano before Monday, if you don't 
 like." 
 
 " Oh no, I '11 do it to-morrow," Engelhardt 
 said moodily. He now felt bitterly certain that 
 he should never make friends with the young 
 men of Taroomba, and shamefully thankful to 
 think that there would be a set occupation to 
 keep him out of their way for the whole of the 
 morrow. 
 
 ** Very well, then ; wait where you are for 
 two twos." 
 
 Engelhardt waited. The kitchen door had 
 closed upon Miss Naomi Pryse ; there was no 
 sense in watching that any longer. So the 
 piano-tuner's eyes climbed over the waterspout, 
 scaled the steep corrugated roof, and from the 
 wide wooden chimney leapt up to the moon. 
 It was at the full. The white clear light hit the 
 young man between his expressive eyes, and 
 still he chose to face it. It gave to the 
 delicate eager face an almost ethereal pallor; 
 and as he gazed on without flinching, the raised 
 head was proudly carried, and the little man 
 looked tall. To one whom he did not hear
 
 20 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 when she Hfted the kitchen latch and opened 
 the door, he seemed a different being ; she 
 watched him for some moments before she 
 spoke. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Engelhardt?" 
 
 "Well," said he, coming down from the 
 moon with an absent smile, and slowly. 
 
 " I have been watching you for quite a 
 minute. I believe it would have been an hour 
 if I hadn't spoken. I wish I hadn't ! We 're 
 going to put you in that little building over 
 there — we call it the * barracks.' You '11 be 
 next door to Tom Chester, and he '11 take care 
 of you. There's no occasion to thank me; 
 you can tell me what you've been thinking 
 about instead." 
 
 ** I wasn't thinking at all." 
 
 "Now, Mr. Engelhardt!" said Naomi, hold- 
 ing up her finger reprovingly. " If you weren't 
 thinking, I should like to know what you were 
 doing?" 
 
 " I was waiting for you." 
 
 " I know you were. It was very good of 
 you. But you were smiling too, and I want 
 to know the joke." 
 
 " Was I really smiling ?"
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. 21 
 
 " Haven't I told you so? Have you signed 
 the pledge against smiles? You look glum 
 enough for anything now." 
 
 ''Yes?" 
 
 " Very much yes ! I wish to goodness you 'd 
 smile aorain," 
 
 " Oh, I '11 do anything you like." He forced 
 up the corners of his mouth, but it was not a 
 smile ; his eyes ran into her like bayonets. 
 
 " Then give me your arm again," she said, 
 " and let me tell you that I 'm very much sur- 
 prised at you for requiring to be told that 
 twice. 
 
 " I 'm not accustomed to ladies," Engelhardt 
 explained once more. 
 
 " That 's all right. I 'm not one, you know. 
 I 'm going to negotiate this fence. Will you 
 have the goodness to turn your back ? " 
 
 Engelhardt did so, and saw afar off in the 
 moonlit verandah the lowering solitary figure 
 of the manager, Gilroy. 
 
 "Yes, he sees us all right," Miss Pryse 
 remarked from the other side of the fence. 
 "It'll do him good. Come you over, and 
 we '11 make his beard curl ! " 
 
 The piano-tuner looked at her doubtfully,
 
 22 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 but only for one moment. The next he also 
 was over the fence and by her side, and she 
 was leading him into the heart of the pines, 
 her strong kind hand within his arm. 
 
 "We'll just have a little mouch round," 
 she said confidentially. "You needn't be 
 frightened." 
 
 *' Frightened ! " he echoed defiantly. The 
 hosts of darkness could not have frightened 
 such a voice. 
 
 " You see, I 'm the boss, and I 'm obliged 
 to show it sometimes." 
 
 "I see." 
 
 " And you have given me an opportunity of 
 showing it pretty plainly." 
 
 "Oh!" 
 
 " Consequently I 'm very much obliged to 
 you ; and I do hope you don't mind helping 
 me to shock Monty Gilroy.'*" 
 
 " I am proud." 
 
 But the kick had gone out of his voice, and 
 to her hand his arm was suddenly as a log of 
 wood. She mused a space. Then — 
 
 " It isn't every one I would ask to help me 
 in such — in such a delicate matter," she said, 
 in a troubled tone. "You see I am a woman
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. 23 
 
 at the mercy of men. They 're all very kind 
 and loyal in their own way, but their way 7s 
 their own, as you know, I thought as I had 
 given you a hand with them — well, I thought 
 you would be in sympathy." 
 
 " I am, I am — Heaven knows ! " 
 
 The log had become exceedingly alive. 
 
 " Then let us skirt in and out, on the edge 
 of the plantation, so that Mr. Gilroy may have 
 the pleasure of seeing my frock from time to 
 time." 
 
 " I 'm your man." 
 
 " No, not that way — this. There, I 'm sure 
 he must have seen me then." 
 
 " He must." 
 
 " It 's time we went back ; but this will have 
 done him all the good in the world," said Naomi. 
 
 " It 's a pity you haven't a manager whom 
 you can respect and like," the piano-tuner 
 remarked. 
 
 Naomi started. She also stopped to lace up 
 her shoe, which necessitated the withdrawal 
 of her hand from the piano-tuner's arm ; and 
 she did not replace it. 
 
 "Oh, but I do like him, Mr. Engelhardt," 
 she explained as she stooped. ** I like Mr,
 
 24 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Gilroy very much ; I have known him all 
 my life, you know. However, that's just 
 where the disadvantage comes in — he's too 
 much inclined to domineer. But don't you 
 run away with the idea that I dislike him ; 
 that would never do at all." 
 
 The piano-tuner felt too small to apologise. 
 He had made a deadly mistake — so bad a 
 one that she would take his arm no more. 
 He looked up at the moon with miserable 
 eyes, and his brain teemed with bitter self- 
 upbraiding thoughts. His bitterness was 
 egregiously beyond the mark ; but that was 
 this young man's weakness. He would con- 
 demn himself to execution for the pettiest 
 sin. So ashamed was he now that he dared 
 not even offer her his hand when they got 
 back to the verandah, and she consigned him 
 to the boy in spectacles, who then showed him 
 his room in the barracks. And his mistake 
 kept him awake more than half that night; 
 it was only in the gray morning he found 
 consolation in recollecting that although she 
 had declared so many times that she liked 
 Monty Gilroy, she had never once said she 
 respected him.
 
 A FRIEND INDEED. 25 
 
 Had he heard a conversation which took 
 place in the station yard later that night, but 
 only a little later, and while the full moon 
 was in much the same place, the piano-tuner 
 might have gone to sleep instead of lying 
 awake to flagellate his own meek spirit ; though 
 it is more likely that he would have lain 
 quietly awake for very joy. The conversation 
 in question was between Naomi Pryse and 
 Montague Gilroy, her manager, and it would 
 scarcely repay a detailed report ; but this is 
 how it culminated : 
 
 " I tell you that I found you bullying him 
 abominably, and whenever I find you bullying 
 anybody I '11 make it up to that body in my 
 own way. And I won't have my way criticised 
 by you." 
 
 "Very good, Naomi. Very good indeed! 
 But if you want to guard against all chance 
 of the same thing happening next week, I 
 should recommend you to be in for supper 
 next Saturday, instead of gallivanting about 
 the run by yourself and coming in at ten 
 o'clock at night." 
 
 " The run is mine, and I '11 do what I like 
 while I 'm here."
 
 26 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "Well, if you won't listen to reason, you 
 might at least remember our engagement." 
 
 " You mean your engagement ? I remember 
 the terms perfectly. I have only to write 
 you a cheque for the next six months' salary 
 any time I like, to put an end to it. And 
 upon my word, Monty, you seem to want 
 me to do so to-night!"
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 ''HARD TIMES." 
 
 IT was the middle of the Sunday afternoon, 
 when the young men of Taroomba were 
 for the most part sound asleep upon their 
 beds. They were wise young men enough, 
 in ways, and to punctuate the weeks of 
 hard labour at the wool-shed with thoroughly 
 slack Sundays at the home station was a 
 practice of the plainest common-sense. To 
 do otherwise would have been to fly in the 
 face of nature. Yet just because Naomi 
 Pryse chose to settle herself in the verandah 
 outside the sitting-room door with a book, 
 the young man who had worked harder than 
 any of the others during the week must needs 
 be the one to spend the afternoon of rest at 
 her feet, and with nothing but a lean verandah- 
 post to shelter his broad back from the sun. 
 This was Tom Chester, of whom Naomi
 
 28 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 had spoken highly to her prot6g6 the piano- 
 tuner. Tom was newly and beautifully shaved, 
 and he had further observed the Sabbath by 
 putting on a white shirt and collar, and a 
 suit of clothes in which a man might have 
 walked down Collins Street ; but he seemed 
 quite content to sit in them on the dirty 
 verandah boards, for the sake of watching 
 Naomi as she read. She had not a great 
 deal to say to him, but she had commanded 
 him to light his pipe, and as often as she 
 dropped the book into her lap to make a 
 remark she could reckon upon a sympathetic 
 answer, preceded by a puff of the tobacco- 
 smoke she loved. 
 
 " It is a dreadful noise, though, isn't it ? " 
 Naomi had observed more than once. 
 
 " It is so," Tom Chester would answer, with 
 a smile and another puff. 
 
 ** He made such a point of setting to work 
 this morning, you know, and it's so good of 
 him to work on Sunday. I don't see how 
 we can stop him." 
 
 Then Naomi would sit silent, but not read- 
 ing, and would presently announce that she 
 had counted the striking of that note twenty-
 
 "HARD TIMES." 29 
 
 nine times in succession. Once she made it 
 sixty-six ; but the piano-tuner behind the 
 closed door had broken his own record, and 
 seemed in a fair way of hammering out the 
 same note a hundred times running, when 
 Monty Gilroy came tramping along the 
 verandah with bhnking yellow eye-lashes, and 
 his red face pale with temper. Miss Pryse 
 was keeping tally aloud when the manager 
 blundered upon the scene. 
 
 " I say, Naomi, how long is this to go on ? " 
 exclaimed Gilroy, in a tone that was half- 
 complaining, half-injured, but wholly different 
 from that which he had employed towards her 
 the night before. 
 
 " Eighty- three, eighty- four, eighty- five," 
 counted Naomi, giving him a nod and a smile. 
 
 " I hadn't been asleep ten minutes when he 
 awoke me with his infernal din." 
 
 " Ninety, ninety-one, ninety-two, ninety- 
 three " 
 
 " It 's no joke when a man has been over the 
 board the whole week," said Gilroy, trying to 
 smile, nevertheless. 
 
 ** Ninety-seven, ninety-eight — well, I'll be 
 jiggered ! "
 
 30 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Ninety-eight it is," said Tom Chester. 
 
 "Yes, he's changed the note. He might 
 have given it a couple more ! Still, it 's the 
 record. Now, Monty, please forgive us ; we're 
 trying to make the best of a bad job, as you 
 see." 
 
 " It is a bad job," assented Gilroy, whose 
 rueful countenance concealed (but not from the 
 girl) a vile temper smouldering. " It's pretty 
 rough, I think, on us chaps who've been work- 
 ing like Kanakas all the week." 
 
 " Well, but you were pretty rough upon poor 
 Mr. Engelhardt last night ; so don't you think 
 that it serves you quite right ? " 
 
 " Poor Mr. Engelhardt ! " echoed Gilroy 
 savagely. " So it serves us right, does it ? " 
 He forced a laugh. " What do you say, 
 Tom ? " 
 
 "/think it serves you right, too," answered 
 Tom Chester, coolly. 
 
 Gilroy laughed again. 
 
 " So you 're crackin', old chap," said he, 
 genially. He generally was genial with Tom 
 Chester, for whom he entertained a hatred 
 enhanced by fear. " But I say, Naomi, need 
 this sort of thing go on all the afternoon?"
 
 "HARD TIMES." 3 1 
 
 "If it doesn't he will have to stay till to- 
 
 morrow." 
 
 "Ah! I see." 
 
 " I thought you would. The piano was in 
 a bad way, and he said there was a long day's 
 work in it ; but he seems anxious to get away 
 this evening, that 's why he began before 
 breakfast." 
 
 " Then let him stick to it, by all means, and 
 we '11 all clear out together, I '11 see that his 
 horse is run up — I '11 go now." 
 
 He went. 
 
 "That's the most jealous gentleman in this 
 colony," said Naomi to her companion. " He 'd 
 rather suffer anything than leave this little 
 piano-tuner and me alone together ! " 
 
 " Poor little chap," said Chester of the 
 musician ; he had nothing to say about Gilroy, 
 who was still in view from the verandah, a 
 swaggering figure in the strong sunlight, with 
 his hands in his cross-cut breeches' pockets, 
 his elbows sticking out, and the strut of a cock 
 on its own midden. Tom Chester watched 
 him with a hard light in his clear eye, and a 
 moistening of the palms of his hands. Tom 
 was pretty good with his fists, and for many a
 
 32 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 weary month he had been spoiling for a fight 
 with Monty Gilroy, who very Hkely was not 
 the only jealous gentleman on Taroomba. 
 
 All this time the piano-tuner was at his 
 fiendish work behind the closed door, over 
 which Naomi Pryse had purposely mounted 
 guard. Distracting repetitions of one note 
 were varied only by depressing octaves and 
 irritating thirds. Occasionally a chord or two 
 promised a trial trip over the keys, but such 
 promises were never fulfilled. At last Naom.i 
 shut her book, with a hopeless smile at Tom 
 Chester, who was ready for her with an 
 answering grin. 
 
 " Really I can't stand it any longer, Mr. 
 Chester." 
 
 " You have borne it like a man, Miss Pryse." 
 
 ** I wanted to make sure that nobody 
 bothered him. Do you think we may safely 
 leave him now ?" 
 
 "Quite safely. Gilroy is up at the yards, 
 and Sanderson only plays the fool to an 
 audience. Let me pull you out of your 
 chair." 
 
 " Thanks. That 's it. Let us stroll up to 
 the horse-paddock gate and back ; then it will
 
 "HARD TIMES." 33 
 
 be time for tea ; and let 's hope our little tuner 
 will have finished his work at last." 
 
 " I believe he has finished now," Tom 
 Chester said, as they turned their backs on 
 the homestead. "He's never run up and 
 down the board like that before." 
 
 "The board!" said Miss Pryse, laughing. 
 " No, don't you believe it ; he won't finish for 
 another hour." 
 
 Tom Chester was right, however. As 
 Naomi and he passed out of earshot, the 
 piano -tuner faced about on the music-stool, 
 and peered wistfully through the empty room 
 at the closed door, straining his ear for their 
 voices. Of course he heard nothing ; but the 
 talking- on the verandah had never been con- 
 tinuous, so that did not surprise him. It 
 gladdened him, rather. She was reading. 
 She might be alone ; his heart beat quicker 
 for the thought. She had sat there all day, 
 of her own kind will, enduring his melancholy 
 performance; now she should have her reward. 
 His eyes glistened as he searched in his 
 memory for some restful, dreamy melody, 
 which should at once soothe and charm her 
 ears aching from his crude unmusical mono- 
 
 D
 
 34 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 tonies. Suddenly he rubbed his hands, and 
 then stretching them out and leaning backward 
 on the stool he let his fingers fall with their 
 lightest and daintiest touch upon Naomi's old 
 piano. 
 
 He had chosen a very simple, well-known 
 piece ; but it need not be so well-known in the 
 bush. Miss Pryse might never have heard it 
 before, in which case she could not fail to be 
 enchanted. It was the " Schlummerlied " of 
 Schumann, and the piano-tuner played it with 
 all the very considerable feeling and refinement 
 of which he was capable, and with a smile all 
 the time for its exceeding appropriateness. 
 What could chime more truly with the lazy 
 stillness of the Sunday afternoon than this 
 sweet, bewitching lullaby.? Engelhardt had 
 always loved it; but never in his life had he 
 played it half so well. As he finished — softly, 
 but not so softly as to risk a single note 
 dropping short of the verandah — he wheeled 
 round again with a sudden self-conscious 
 movement. It was as though he expected 
 to find the door open and Naomi entranced 
 upon the threshold. It is a fact that he sat 
 watching the door-handle to see it turn, first
 
 "HARD TIMES." 35 
 
 with eagerness, and at last with acute dis- 
 appointment. His disappointment was no 
 greater when he opened the door himself and 
 saw the book lying in the empty chair. That, 
 indeed, was a relief. To find her sitting there 
 unmoved was what his soul had dreaded. 
 
 But now that his work was done, the piano- 
 tuner felt very lonely and unhappy. To escape 
 from these men with whom he could not get 
 on was his strongest desire but one ; the other 
 was to stay and see more of the glorious girl 
 who had befriended him ; and he was torn 
 between the two, because his longing for love 
 was scarcely more innate than his shrinking 
 from ridicule and scorn. He knew this, too, 
 and had as profound a scorn for himself as any 
 he was likely to meet with from another. His 
 saving grace was the moral courage which 
 enabled him to run counter to his own craven 
 inclinations. 
 
 Thus in the early morning he had apologised 
 to Sanderson, the store-keeper, for the loss 
 of his temper overnight : after lying awake 
 for hours chewing the bitterness of this 
 humiliating move, he had determined upon 
 it in the end. But determination was what
 
 36 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 he had — it takes not a little to bring you to 
 apologise in cold blood to a rougher man than 
 yourself. Engelhardt had done this, and more. 
 At breakfast and at dinner he had made heroic 
 efforts to be affable and at ease with the men 
 who despised him ; though each attempt 
 touched a fresh nerve in his sensitive self- 
 conscious soul. And now, because from the 
 verandah he could descry Gilroy and Sanderson 
 up at the stock-yards, and because these men 
 were the very two whose society he most 
 dreaded, his will was that he must join them 
 then and there. 
 
 He was a man himself; and if he could not 
 get on with other men, that was his own look- 
 out. No doubt, too, it was his own fault. It 
 was a fault of which he swore an oath that he 
 would either cure himself or suffer the con- 
 sequences like a man. He may even have 
 taken a private pride in being game against 
 the grain. There is no fathoming the thoughts 
 that generate action in egotistical, but noble 
 natures, whose worst enemy is their own inner 
 consciousness. 
 
 Gilroy and Sanderson were in the horse- 
 yard, leaning backward against the heavy
 
 "HARD TIMES." 37 
 
 white rails. Their pipes were in their mouths, 
 and they were watching Sam Rowntree stalk 
 a wiry bay horse that took some catching. 
 Sam was the groom, and he had just run 
 up all the horses out of the horse -paddock. 
 The yard was full of them. Gilroy hauled a 
 freckled hand out of a cross pocket to point 
 at the piano-tuner's nag. 
 
 " Poor-looking devil," said he. 
 
 " Yes, the kind you see when you 're out 
 without a gun," remarked the wit. " Quite 
 good enough for a thing like him, though." 
 Some association of ideas caused him to glance 
 round towards the homestead through the rails. 
 "By the hokey, here's the thing itself!" he 
 cried. 
 
 The pair watched Engelhardt approach. 
 
 " I 'd like to break his beastly head for him," 
 muttered the manager. " The cheek of him, 
 spoiling our spell with that cursed row ! " 
 
 The piano-tuner came up with a pleasant 
 smile that was an effort to him, and pretended 
 not to notice Sanderson's stock remark, that 
 ** queer things come out after the rain." 
 
 " You'll be glad to hear, gentlemen, that 
 I've finished my job," said he, airily.
 
 38 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Thank God," growled Gilroy. 
 
 " I know it 's been a great infliction " 
 
 " Oh no, not at all," said Sanderson, winking 
 desperately. " We liked it. It 's just what we 
 do like. You bet ! " 
 
 The wiry bay horse had been caught by this 
 time, and Sam Rowntree was saddling it, by 
 degrees, for the animal was obviously fresh and 
 touchy. Engelhardt watched the performance 
 with a bitter feeling of envy for all Australian 
 men, and of contempt for himself because they 
 contemned him. The fault was his, not theirs. 
 He was of a different order from these rouofh 
 light-hearted men — of an altogether inferior 
 order, as it seemed to his self-criticising mind. 
 But that was no excuse for his not getting on 
 with them, and as a rider puts his horse at a 
 fence again and again, so Engelhardt spurred 
 himself on to one more effort to do so. 
 
 " That 's your horse, Mr. Gilroy .'* " 
 
 *'Yes." 
 
 '• I saw the * G ' on the left shoulder." 
 
 " You mean the near shoulder ; a horse 
 hasn't a left." 
 
 '* No ? I 'm not well up in horses. What 's 
 his name .•* "
 
 "HARD TIMES." 39 
 
 " Hard Times." 
 
 " That 's good ! I like his looks too — not 
 that I know anything about horses." 
 
 Here Sanderson whispered something to 
 Gilroy, who said carelessly to Engelhardt — 
 
 " Can you ride ? " 
 
 " I can ride my own moke." 
 
 *' Like a turn on Hard Times ? " 
 
 " Yes ! I should." 
 
 This was said in a manner that was all the 
 more decided for the moments of deliberation 
 which preceded it. The piano-tuner was paler 
 even than usual, but all at once his jaw had 
 grown hard and strong, and there was a keen 
 light in his eyes. The others looked at him, 
 unable to determine whether it was a good 
 rider they were dealing with or a born fool. 
 
 " Fetch him out of the yard, Sam," said 
 Gilroy to the groom. " This gentleman here 
 is going to draw first blood." 
 
 Sam Rowntree stared. 
 
 "You'd better not, mister," said he, looking 
 doubtfully at the musician. "He's fresh off 
 the grass — hasn't had the saddle on him for 
 two months." 
 
 *' Get away, Sam. The gentleman means
 
 40 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 to take some of the cussedness out of him. 
 Isn't that it, Engelhardt?" 
 
 " I mean to try," said Engelhardt, quietly. 
 
 A lanky middle-aged bushman, who had 
 loafed across from the men's hut, here spat into 
 the sand without removing the pipe from his 
 teeth, and put in his word. 
 
 " Becod, then ye're a brave man! He bucks 
 like beggary. He 's bucked me as high as a 
 blessed house ! " 
 
 " We '11 see how high he can buck me," said 
 Engelhardt. 
 
 Gilroy was losing interest in the proceedings. 
 The little fool could ride after all ; instead of 
 being scored off, he was going to score. The 
 manager thrust his hands deep in his cross 
 pockets, and watched sullenly, with his yellow 
 eyelashes drooping over his blue eyes. 
 Suddenly he strode forward, crying — 
 
 " What the blazes are you up to, you idiot .•* " 
 
 Engelhardt had shown signs of mounting on 
 the off-side, but was smiling as though he had 
 done it on purpose. 
 
 "He's all right," said the long stockman 
 with the pipe. "He knows a thing or two, 
 my word."
 
 "HARD TIMES." 4I 
 
 But his style of mounting in the end hardly- 
 tallied with this theory. The piano-tuner 
 scrambled into the saddle, and kicked about 
 awkwardly before finding his stirrups ; and the 
 next thing he did was to job the horse's mouth 
 with the wanton recklessness of pure inno- 
 cence. The watchers held their breath. As 
 for Hard Times, he seemed to know that he 
 was bestridden by an unworthy foeman, to 
 appreciate the humour of the situation, and to 
 make up his evil mind to treat it humorously as 
 it deserved. Away he went, along the broad 
 road between homestead and yards, at the 
 sweetest and most guileless canter. The rider 
 was sitting awkwardly enough, but evidently 
 as tight as he knew how. And he needed all 
 the grip within the power of his loins and 
 knees. Half-way to the house, without a 
 single premonitory symptom, the wiry bay 
 leapt clean into the air, with all its legs 
 gathered up under its body, its head tucked 
 between its knees, and its back arched like 
 a bent bow. Down it came, with a thud, 
 then up again like a ball, again and again, 
 and yet again. 
 
 At the first buck Engelhardt stuck nobly;
 
 42 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 he evidently had been prepared for the worst. 
 The second displayed a triangle of blue sky 
 between his legs and the saddle ; he had lost 
 his stirrups and the reins, but was clinging 
 to the mane with all ten fingers, and to the 
 saddle with knees and shins. 
 
 "Sit tight!" roared Gilroy. "Stick to 
 him ! " yelled Sanderson. " Slide off as he 
 comes down ! " shouted the groom. 
 
 But if Engelhardt heard them he did not 
 understand. He only knew that for the first 
 time in his life he was on a buck-jumper : and 
 that he meant to stay there as long as the 
 Lord would let him. A wild exhilaration 
 swamped every other sensation. The blue sky 
 fell before him like a curtain at each buck ; at 
 the fifth his body was seen against it like a 
 burst balloon ; and after that, Hard Times was 
 left to the more difficult but less exciting task 
 of bucking himself out of an empty saddle. 
 
 They carried Engelhardt towards the house. 
 Bnt Naomi came running out and met them 
 half-way, and Tom Chester was at her back. 
 From the verandah the two had seen it 
 happen. And in all that was done during 
 the next minutes Naomi was prime mover.
 
 "HARD TIMES." 43 
 
 "You call yourselves men. Men indeed! 
 There 's more manhood lying here than ever 
 there was or will be in the two of you put 
 together ! " 
 
 "Hear, hear!" 
 
 The voices were those of Miss Pryse and 
 Tom Chester. They were the first that 
 Engelhardt heard when his senses came back 
 to him. But the first thing that was said to 
 him when he opened his eyes was said by 
 Gilroy : 
 
 " Why the devil didn't you tell us you 
 couldn't ride ? " 
 
 He did not answer, but Tom Chester said 
 coolly before them all : 
 
 "He can ride a jolly sight better than you 
 can, Gilroy. You sit five bucks and I'll give 
 you five notes." 
 
 There was bad blood in the air. The 
 piano-tuner could not help it. His head was 
 all wrong, and his right arm felt red-hot from 
 wrist to elbow ; he discovered that it was bare, 
 and in the hands of Miss Pryse. He felt 
 ashamed, it was such a thin arm. But Miss 
 Pryse smiled at him kindly, and he smiled 
 faintly back at her ; he just saw Tom Chester
 
 44 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 tearing the yellow backs off a novel, and 
 handing them to the kneeling girl ; then once 
 more he closed his eyes. 
 
 "He's off again," said Naomi. "Thank 
 God I can set a joint. There's nothing to 
 watch, all of you ! Sam, you may as well turn 
 out this gentleman's horse again. If anybody 
 thought of getting rid of him to-night, they 've 
 gone the wrong way about it, for now he shall 
 stay here till he 's able to go on tuning pianos." 
 
 And as she spoke Naomi looked up, and 
 sent her manager to the rightabout with a 
 single stare of contempt and defiance.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 
 
 WHEN Engelhardt regained conscious- 
 ness he found himself spread out on 
 his bed in the barracks, with Tom Chester 
 rather gingerly pulling off his clothes for 
 him as he lay. The first thing he saw 
 was his own heavily- splinted arm stretched 
 stiffly across his chest. For the moment this 
 puzzled him. His mind was slow to own so 
 much lumber as a part of his person. Then 
 he remembered, and let his lids fall back 
 without speaking. His head ached abomin- 
 ably, but it was rapidly clearing, both as to 
 what had happened and what was happening 
 now. With slight, instinctive movements, first 
 of one limb, then another, he immediately 
 lightened Tom Chester's task. Presently he 
 realised that he was between the sheets and 
 on the point of being left to himself This 
 
 45
 
 46 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 put some life in him for perhaps the space of 
 a minute. 
 
 "Thank you," he said, opening his eyes 
 again. "That was awfully good of you." 
 
 "What was?" asked the other, in some 
 astonishment. " I thought you were stunned." 
 
 " No, not this last minute or two ; but my 
 head 's splitting ; I want to sleep it off." 
 
 " Poor chap ! I '11 leave you now. But what 
 induced you to tackle Hard Times, when you 
 weren't a rider, sweet Heaven only knows!" 
 
 *' I was a fool," said Engelhardt, wearily. 
 
 " You leave that for us to say," returned 
 the other. "You've got some pluck, whatever 
 you are, and that 's about all you want in the 
 bush. So long." 
 
 He went straight to Naomi, who was await- 
 ing him outside with considerable anxiety. 
 They hovered near the barracks, talking all 
 thinofs over for some time lono^er. Then 
 Naomi herself stole with soft, bold steps to 
 the piano-tuner's door. There she hesitated, 
 one hand on the latch, the other at her ear. 
 It ended in her entering his room on tiptoe. 
 A moment later she was back in the yard, 
 her fine face shining with relief.
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 4/ 
 
 "He's sleeping like a baby," she said to 
 Chester. " I think we may perhaps make our 
 minds easy about him now — don't you ? I was 
 terribly frightened of concussion ; but that 's all 
 right, or he wouldn't be breathing as he is now. 
 We'll let him be for an hour or two, and then 
 send Mrs. Potter to him with some toast and 
 tea. Perhaps you '11 look him up last thing, 
 Mr. Chester, and give him a hand in the 
 morning if he feels well enough to get up ? " 
 
 " Certainly I would, Miss Pryse, if I were 
 here ; but we were all going out to the shed 
 to-night, as usual, so as to make an early 
 start " 
 
 " I know ; I know. And very glad I shall 
 be to get quit of the others ; but I have this 
 poor young man on my mind, and you at least 
 must stop till morning to see me through. I 
 shall mention it myself to Mr. Gilroy." 
 
 "Very well," said Chester, who was only too 
 charmed with the plan. " I '11 stop, with all 
 my heart, and be very glad to do anything 
 that I can." 
 
 With Chester It was certainly two for 
 himself and one for the unlucky Engelhardt. 
 He made the most of his evening with Naomi
 
 48 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 all to himself. It was not a very long evening, 
 for Gilroy delayed his departure to the last 
 limit, and then drove off in a sullen fury, 
 spitting oaths right and left and lashing his 
 horses like a madman. This mood of the 
 manager's left Chester in higher spirits than 
 ever ; he had the satisfaction of feeling himself 
 partly responsible for it. Moreover, he had 
 given Gilroy, whom he frankly detested, the 
 most excellent provocation to abuse him to his 
 face before starting ; but, as usual, the opening 
 had been declined. Such were the manager of 
 Taroomba and his subordinate the overseer ; 
 the case was sufficiently characteristic of them 
 both. As for Chester, he made entertaining 
 talk with Naomi as long as she would sit up, 
 and left her with an assurance that he would 
 attend to the piano-tuner like a mother. Nor 
 was he much worse than his word ; though the 
 patient knew nothing until awakened next 
 morning by the clatter and jingle of boots and 
 spurs at his bedside. 
 
 "What is it?" he cried, struggling to 
 sit up. 
 
 " Me," said Chester. " Lie perfectly tight. 
 I only came to tell you that your breakfast's
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 49 
 
 coming in directly, and to see how you are. 
 How are you ? Had some sleep ? " 
 
 "Any quantity," said Engelhardt, with a 
 laugh that slipped into a yawn. " I feel 
 another man." 
 
 "How's the arm.?" 
 
 " I don't feel to have one. I suppose it 's 
 broken, is it ? " 
 
 " No, my boy, only dislocated. So Miss 
 Pryse said when she fixed it up, and she 
 knows all about that sort of thing. How 's the 
 head ? " 
 
 "Right as the bank!" 
 
 " I don't believe you. You 're the colour of 
 candles. If you feel fit to get up, after you 've 
 had something to eat, I 'm to give you a hand ; 
 but if I were you I 'd lie in." 
 
 " Die first," cried the piano-tuner, laughing 
 heartily with his white face. 
 
 "Well, we'll see. Here comes Mother 
 Potter with your breakfast. I '11 be back in 
 half an hour, and we'll see about it then." 
 
 Chester came back to find the piano-tuner 
 half dressed with his one hand. He was 
 stripped and dripping to the waist, and he 
 raised his head so vigorously from the cold 
 
 E
 
 50 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA, 
 
 water, at the overseer's entrance, that the latter 
 was well splashed. 
 
 " Dry me," he cried. 
 
 The overseer did his best. 
 
 " I feel as fit as a Strad," panted Engelhardt. 
 
 "What may that be?" 
 
 "A fiddle and a half." 
 
 " Then you don't look it." 
 
 "But I soon shall. What's a dislocated 
 arm? Steady on, I say, though. Easy over 
 the stones ! " 
 
 Chester was nonplussed. 
 
 " My dear fellow, you 're bruised all over. 
 It'd be cruel to touch you with a towel of 
 cotton-wool." 
 
 " Go on," said Engelhardt. " I must be 
 dried and dressed. Dry away ! I can stand 
 it." 
 
 The other exercised the very greatest care ; 
 but ribs and shoulder on the same side as the 
 injured arm were fairly dappled with bruises, 
 and it was perfectly impossible not to hurt. 
 Once he caught Engelhardt wincing. He was 
 busy at his back, and only saw it in the mirror. 
 
 " I am hurting you ! " he cried. 
 
 "Not a bit, sir. Fire away ! "
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 5 I 
 
 The white face in the mirror was still 
 racked with pain. 
 
 "Where did you get your pluck?" asked 
 Chester casually, when all was over. 
 
 " From my mother," was the prompt reply ; 
 "such as I possess." 
 
 "My boy," said Chester, "you've as much 
 as most ! " And, without thinking, he slapped 
 the other only too heartily on the bruised 
 shoulder. Next moment he was sufficiently 
 horrified at what he had done, for this time 
 the pain was more than the sufferer could 
 conceal. In an instant, however, he was 
 laughing off his friend's apologies with no 
 less tact than self-control. 
 
 " You 're about the pluckiest little devil I 've 
 ever seen," said the overseer at last. " I 
 thought so yesterday — I know so to-day." 
 
 The piano-tuner beamed with joy. " What 
 rot," however, was all he said. 
 
 "Not it, my boy! You're a good sort. 
 You 've got as much pluck in one hair of your 
 head — though they are long 'uns, mind — as 
 that fellow Gilroy has in his whole composition. 
 Now I must be off to the shed. I should 
 stroll about in the air, if I were you, but keep
 
 52 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 out of the sun. If you care to smoke, you'll 
 find a tin of cut-up on the corner bracket in 
 my room, and Miss Pryse'll give you a new 
 pipe out of the store if you want one. You '11 
 see her about pretty soon, I should say. Oh 
 yes, she had breakfast with me. She means 
 to keep you by main force till you 're up to 
 piano-tuning again. Serve Gilroy jolly well 
 right, the brute ! So we '11 meet again this 
 week-end ; meanwhile, good-bye, old chap, and 
 more power to the arm." 
 
 Engelhardt watched the overseer out of 
 sight, with a mingled warmth and lightness of 
 heart which for the moment were making an 
 unusually happy young man of him. This 
 Chester was the very incarnation of a type 
 that commonly treated him, as he was too ready 
 to fancy, with contempt ; and yet that was the 
 type of all others whose friendship and admi- 
 ration he coveted most. All his life he had 
 been so shy and so sensitive that the good in 
 him, the very best of him, was an unknown 
 quantity to all save those who by accident or 
 intimacy struck home to his inner nature. The 
 latter was true as steel, and brave, patient, 
 and enduring to an unsuspected degree ; but a
 
 THE TREASURE !N THE STORE. 53 
 
 cluster of small faults hid this from the ordi- 
 nary eye. The man was a little too anxious 
 to please — to do the right thing — to be liked 
 or loved by those with whom he mixed. As 
 a natural consequence, his anxiety defeated 
 his design. Again, he was a little too apt to 
 be either proud or ashamed of himself — one 
 or the other — he never could let himself alone. 
 Wherefore appreciation was inordinately sweet 
 to his soul, and the reverse proportionately 
 bitter. Mere indifference hurt him no less than 
 active disdain ; indeed, where there was the 
 former, he was in the bad habit of supposing 
 the latter ; and thus the normal current of his 
 life was never clear of little unnecessary griefs 
 of which he was ashamed to speak, but which 
 he only magnified by keeping them to himself. 
 Perhaps he had his compensating joys. 
 Certainly he was as often in exceedingly high 
 spirits as in the dumps, and it is just pos- 
 sible that the former are worth the latter. In 
 any case he was in the best of spirits this 
 morning ; nor by any means ashamed of his 
 slung arm, but rather the reverse, if the whole 
 truth be told. And yet, with a fine girl like 
 Naomi, and a smart bushman like Tom
 
 54 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Chester, both thinking well of him together, 
 there surely was for once some slight excuse 
 for an attack of self-satisfaction. It was trans- 
 itory enough, and rare enough, too, Heaven 
 knows. 
 
 In this humour, at all events, he wandered 
 about the yard for some time, watching the 
 verandah incessantly with jealous eyes. His 
 saunterings led him past the rather elaborate 
 well, in the centre of the open space, to the 
 store on the further side. This was a solid 
 isolated building, very strongly built, with an 
 outer coating of cement, and a corrugated roof 
 broken on the foremost slope by a large-sized 
 skylight. A shallow verandah ran in front, 
 but was neither continued at the ends nor 
 renewed at the back of the building. Nor 
 were there any windows ; the piano-tuner 
 walked right round to see, and on coming back 
 to the door (a remarkably strong one) there 
 was Naomi fitting in her key. She was 
 wearing an old black dress, an obvious item 
 of her cast-off mourning, and over it, from 
 her bosom to her toes, a brilliantly white 
 apron, which struck Englehardt as the most 
 charming garment he had ever seen.
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 55 
 
 " Good business ! " she cried at sight of 
 him. " I know how you are from Mr. 
 Chester. Just hold these things while I take 
 both hands to this key; it always is so stiff" 
 
 The things in question, which she reached 
 out to him with her left hand, consisted of 
 a box of plate-powder, a piece of chamois 
 leather, a tooth-brush, and a small bottle of 
 methylated spirits ; the lot lying huddled to- 
 gether in a saucer. 
 
 " That does it," continued Naomi as the 
 lock shot back with a bang and the door flew 
 open. ** Now come on in. You can lend me 
 your only hand. I never thought of that." 
 
 Engelhardt followed her into the store. 
 Inside it was one big room, filled with a good 
 but subdued light (for as yet the sun was 
 beating upon the hinder slope of corrugated 
 iron), and with those motley necessaries of 
 station life which are to be seen in every 
 station store. Sides of bacon, empty ration- 
 bags, horse-collars and hames, bridles and 
 reins, hung promiscuously from the beams. 
 Australian saddles kept their balance on stout 
 pegs jutting out from the walls. The latter 
 were largely lined with shelves, like book-
 
 56 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 cases, but laden with tinned provisions of 
 every possible description, sauces and patent 
 medicines in bottles, whisky and ink in stone 
 jars, cases of tea, tobacco, raisins, and figs. 
 Engelhardt noticed a great green safe, with 
 a couple of shot-guns and a repeating-rifle in a 
 rack beside it, and two or three pairs of rusty 
 hand-cuffs on a nail hard by. The floor was 
 fairly open, but for a few sacks of flour in a far 
 corner. It was cut up, however, by a raised 
 desk with a high office stool to it, and by the 
 permanent, solid-looking counter which faced 
 the door. A pair of scales, of considerable 
 size and capacity, was the one encumbrance on 
 the counter. Naomi at once proceeded to 
 remove it, first tossing the weights on to the 
 flour bags, one after the other, and then lifting 
 down the scales before Engelhardt had time to 
 help her. Thereafter she slapped the counter 
 with her flat hand, and stood looking quizzi- 
 cally at her guest. 
 
 "You don't know what 's under this counter," 
 she said at last, announcing an obvious fact 
 with extraordinary unction. 
 
 " I don't, indeed," said the piano -tuner, 
 shaking his head.
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 57 
 
 " Nor does your friend Mr. Sanderson, 
 though he's the store-keeper. He's out at 
 the shed during shearing-time, branding bales 
 and seeing to the loading of the drays. But 
 all the rest of the year he keeps the books 
 at that desk or serves out rations across this 
 counter ; and yet he little dreams what 's 
 underneath it." 
 
 "You interest me immensely. Miss Pryse." 
 " I wonder if I dare interest you any more?" 
 " You had better not trust me with a secret." 
 " Why not? Do you mean that you couldn't 
 keep one ?" 
 
 " I don't say that; but I have no right " 
 
 "Right be bothered," cried Naomi crisply; 
 "there's no question of right." 
 Engelhardt coloured up. 
 " I was only going to say that I had no 
 right to get in your way and perhaps make 
 you feel it was better to tell me things than to 
 turn me out," he explained humbly. " I shall 
 turn myself out, since you are too kind to do 
 it for me. I meant in any case to take a 
 walk in the pines." 
 
 " Did I invite you to come in here, or did I 
 not?" inquired Miss Pryse.
 
 58 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "Well, only to carry these things. Here 
 they are." 
 
 He held them out to her, but she refused to 
 look at them. 
 
 "When I tell you I don't want you, then it 
 will be time for you to go," she said. " Since 
 you don't live here, there 's not the least reason 
 why you shouldn't know what no man on the 
 place knows, except Mr. Gilroy. Besides, you 
 can really help me. So now will you be good?" 
 
 " I'll try," said Engelhardt, catching her 
 smile. 
 
 "Then I forgive everything. Now listen to 
 me. My dear father was the best and kindest 
 man in all the world ; but he had his fair share 
 of eccentricity. I have mine too ; and you 
 most certainly have yours ; but that 's neither 
 here nor there. My father came of a pretty 
 good old Welsh family. In case you think 
 I 'm swaggering about it, let me tell you I 'd 
 like to take that family and drop the whole 
 crew in the well outside — yes, and heat up the 
 water to boil 'em before they 'd time to drown ! 
 I owe them nothing nice, don't you believe it. 
 They treated my father shamefully ; but he 
 was the eldest son, and when the old savage,
 
 THE TREASURE IN THE STORE. 59 
 
 his father, had the good taste to die, mine 
 went home and collared his dues. He didn't 
 get much beyond the family plate ; but sure 
 enough he came back with that. And didn't 
 the family sit up, that 's all ! However, his 
 eccentricity came in then. He must needs 
 bring that plate up here. It 's here still. I 'm 
 sitting on it now !" 
 
 Indeed, she had perched herself on the 
 counter while speaking ; and now, spinning 
 round where she sat, she was down on the 
 other side and fumbling at a padlock before 
 her companion could open his mouth. 
 
 "Isn't it very dangerous?" he said at length, 
 as Naomi stood up and set the padlock on the 
 desk. 
 
 " Hardly that. Mr. Gilroy is absolutely the 
 only person who knows that it is here. Still, 
 the bank would be best, of course, and I mean 
 to have it all taken there one of these days. 
 Meanwhile, I clean my silver whenever I come 
 up here. It's a splendid opportunity when my 
 young men are all out at the shed. I did a lot 
 last week, and I expect to finish off this 
 morning." 
 
 As she spoke the top of the counter
 
 6o THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 answered to the effort of her two strong arms, 
 and came up with a jerk. She raised it un«-,il it 
 caught, when Engelhardt could just get his 
 chin over the rim, and see a huge heavily- 
 clamped plate-chest lying like a kernel in its 
 shell. There were more locks to undo. Then 
 the baize-lined lid of the chest was raised in 
 its turn. And in a very few minutes the 
 Taroomba store presented a scene which it 
 would have been more than difficult to match 
 throughout the length and breadth of the 
 Australian bush.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 
 
 NAOMI had seated herself on the tall 
 stool at the book-keeper's desk, on 
 which she had placed in array the silver that 
 was still unclean. This included a fine old 
 epergne, of quaint design and exceedingly- 
 solid proportions ; a pair of candle-sticks, in 
 the familiar form of the Corinthian column — 
 more modern, but equally handsome in their 
 way ; a silver coffee-pot with an ivory handle ; 
 and a number of ancient skewers. She tackled 
 the candle-sticks first. They were less tarnished 
 than might have been expected, and in Naomi's 
 energetic hands they soon regained their pristine 
 purity and lustre. As she worked she talked 
 freely of her father, and his family in Wales, 
 to Engelhardt, for whose benefit she had 
 unpacked many of the things which she had 
 already cleaned, and set them out upon the 
 
 6i
 
 62 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 counter after shutting it down as before. He 
 too was seated, on the counter's further edge, 
 with his back half-turned to the door. And 
 the revelation of so much treasure in that wild 
 place made him more and more uneasy. 
 
 " I should have thought you'd be frightened 
 to have this sort of thing on the premises," he 
 could not help saying. 
 
 " Frightened of what ?" 
 
 ** Well — bushrangers." 
 
 "They don't exist. They're as extinct as 
 the dodo. But that reminds me ! " 
 
 She broke off abruptly, and sat staring 
 thoughtfully at the door, which was standing 
 ajar. She even gave the steps of her Corinthian 
 column a rest from tooth-brush and plate- 
 powder. 
 
 " That reminds you ? " 
 
 " Yes — of bushrangers. We once had some 
 here, before they became extinct." 
 
 " Since you 've had the plate ? " 
 
 " Yes ; it was the plate they were after. 
 How they got wind of it no one ever knew." 
 
 *' Is it many years ago ? " 
 
 "Well, I was quite a little girl at the time. 
 But I never shall forget it ! I woke in the night,
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 63 
 
 hearing shots, and I ran into the verandah 
 in my night-dress. There was my father 
 behind one of the verandah posts, with a 
 revolver in each hand, roaring and laughing 
 as though it were the greatest joke in the 
 world ; and there were two men in the store- 
 verandah, just outside this door. They were 
 shooting at father, all they knew, but they 
 couldn't hit him, though they hit the post 
 nearly every time. I '11 show you the marks 
 when we go over to lunch. My father kept 
 laughing and shooting at them the whole time. 
 It was just the sort of game he liked. But at 
 last one of the men fell in a heap outside the 
 door, and then the other bolted for his horse. 
 He got away too ; but he left something 
 behind him that he'll never replace in this 
 world or the next." 
 
 "What was that."*" asked Engelhardt with 
 a long breath, 
 
 " His little finger. My father amputated it 
 with one of his shots. It was picked up 
 between this and the place where he mounted 
 his horse. Father got him on the wing ! " said 
 Naomi proudly, 
 
 " Was he caught ? "
 
 64 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " No, he was never heard of again." 
 
 " And the man who was shot ? " 
 
 " He was as dead as sardines. And who do 
 you suppose he turned out to be ? " 
 
 Engelhardt shook his head. 
 
 " Tigerskin the bushranger ! No less ! It 
 was a dirty burghng business for a decent 
 bushranger to lose his life in, now wasn't it ? 
 For they never stuck up the station, mind you ; 
 they were caught trying to burst into the store. 
 Luckily they didn't succeed. The best of it 
 was that at the inquest, and all that, it never 
 came out what it was they really wanted in our 
 store. Soon afterwards my father had the 
 windows blocked up and the whole place 
 cemented over, as you see it now." 
 
 Naomi was done. Back went the tooth- 
 brush to work on the Corinthian column, and 
 Engelhardt saw more of the pretty hair, but 
 less of the sweet face, as she bent to her task 
 with redoubled vigour. Sweet she most 
 certainly was in his sight, and yet she could 
 sit there, and tell him of blood spilt and life 
 lost before her own soft eyes, as calmly as 
 though such sights were a natural part of a 
 young girl's education. For a space he so
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 65 
 
 marvelled at her that there was room in his 
 soul for no other sensation. Then the tower- 
 ing sun struck down through the skylight, 
 setting light to the silver, and brushing the 
 girl's hair as she leant forward, so that it shone 
 like spun copper. From that moment the 
 piano-tuner could only and slavishly admire ; 
 but he was not allowed much time for this 
 slightly perilous recreation. Abruptly, impul- 
 sively, as she did most things, Naomi raised 
 her face and gave him a nod. 
 
 "Now, Mr. Engelhardt, it's your turn to 
 talk. I 've done my share. Who are you, 
 where do you come from, and what's your 
 ambition in life ? It really is time I knew 
 something more about you." 
 
 The poor fellow was so taken aback, and 
 showed it so plainly, that Naomi simplified her 
 question without loss of time. 
 
 " It doesn't matter who you are, since you're 
 a very nice young man — which is the main 
 thing. And I know that you hail from old 
 England, which is all I have any business to 
 know. But come ! you must have some 
 ambitions. I like all young men to have their 
 ambitions. I distrust them when they have
 
 66 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 none. So what 's yours ? Out with it 
 quick ! " 
 
 She discerned delight behind his blushes. 
 
 " Come on, I can't wait ! What is it .-* " 
 
 " I suppose it's music." 
 
 " I knew it. Oh, but that 's such a splendid 
 ambition ! " 
 
 " Do you really think so ? " 
 
 "It's grand! But what do you aspire to 
 do ? Mephistopheles or Faust in the opera ? 
 Or sentimental songs in your dress-suit, with a 
 tea-rose in your button-hole and a signet-ring 
 plain as a pike-staff to the back row ? Some- 
 how or other I don't think you 're sleek 
 enough for a tenor or coarse enough for a bass. 
 Certainly I know nothing at all about it." 
 
 "Oh, Miss Pryse, I can't sing a bit!" 
 
 ** My dear young man, I 've heard you." 
 
 " I only tried because they made me — and 
 to sell my wretched songs." 
 
 *' Then is it to be solos on the piano ? " 
 
 " I 'm not good enough to earn my rations at 
 that." 
 
 ** The organ — and a monkey? Burnt cork 
 and the bones ? " 
 
 " Oh, Miss Pryse ! "
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 67 
 
 "Well, then, what?" 
 
 "How can I say it? I should like, above 
 everything else — if only I ever could ! — to 
 write music — to compose." He said it shyly 
 enough, with downcast eyes, and more of his 
 blushes. 
 
 " And why not ? " 
 
 " Well, I don't know why not — one of these 
 days." 
 
 His tone had changed. He had tossed up 
 his head erect. She had not laughed at him 
 after all ! 
 
 " I should say that you would compose very 
 well indeed," remarked Naomi naively. 
 
 *' I don't know that ; but some day or other 
 I mean to try." 
 
 " Then why waste your time tuning pianos ?" 
 
 " To keep myself alive meanwhile. I don't 
 say that I shall ever do any good as a com- 
 poser. Only that 's what you 'd call my 
 ambition. In any case, I don't know enough 
 to try yet, except to amuse myself when I 'm 
 alone. I have no technique. I know only the 
 rudiments of harmony. I do get ideas ; but 
 they 're no use to me. I haven't enough know- 
 ledge — of treatment — of composition — to turn
 
 68 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA- 
 
 them to any account. But I shall have some 
 day! Miss Pryse, do you know why I'm out 
 here? To make enough money to go back 
 again and study — and learn my trade — with 
 plenty of time and pains — which all trades 
 require and demand. I mean all artistic trades. 
 And I 'm not doing so very badly, seeing I Ve 
 only been out three years. I really am be- 
 ginning to make a little. It was my mother's 
 idea, my coming out at all. I wasn't twenty- 
 three at the time. It was a splendid idea, like 
 everything she does or says or thinks ! How 
 I wish you knew my mother ! She is the best 
 and cleverest woman in all the world, though 
 she is so poor, and has lived in a cottage all 
 her Jife. My father was a German. He was 
 clever too, but he wasn't practical. So he 
 never .succeeded. But my mother is every- 
 thing ! One day I shall go back to her with 
 my little pile. Then we shall go abroad 
 together — perhaps to Milan — and I shall study 
 hard-all, and we '11 soon find out whether 
 there's anything in me or not. If there isn't, 
 back I come to the colonies to tune pianos 
 and sell music ; but my mother shall come 
 with me, next time."
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 69 
 
 "You will find that there is something in 
 you," said Naomi. " I can see it." 
 
 Indeed, it was not unreasonable to suppose 
 that there was something behind that broad, 
 high forehead and those enthusiastic and yet 
 intelligent eyes. The mouth, too, was the 
 delicate, mobile mouth of the born artist ; 
 the nostrils were as sensitive as those of a 
 thoroughbred racehorse ; and as he spoke 
 the young man's face went white-hot with 
 sheer enthusiasm. Clearly there was reason 
 in what Naomi thought and said, though she 
 knew little about music and cared less. He 
 beamed at her without answering, and she 
 spoke again. 
 
 *' Certainly you have ambition," she said ; 
 "and honestly, there's nothing I admire so 
 much in a young man. Please understand 
 that I for one am with you heart and soul 
 in all you undertake or attempt. I feel quite 
 sure that I shall live to see you famous. Oh, 
 isn't it splendid to be a man and aim so 
 high ? " 
 
 " It is," he answered simply, out of the 
 frankness of his heart. 
 
 " Even if you never succeed, it is fine to try ! '*
 
 70 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Thank Heaven for that. Even if you 
 never succeed ! " 
 
 " But you are going to " 
 
 " Or going to know the reason why ! " 
 To a sympathetic young woman who be- 
 lieves in him, and thus stimulates his belief 
 in himself; who is ready with a nod and a 
 smile when his mind outstrips his tongue ; 
 who understands his incoherences, and is 
 with him in his wildest flights ; to such a 
 listener the ordinary young man with enthu- 
 siasm can talk by the hour together, and does. 
 Naomi was one such ; she was eminently 
 understanding. Engelhardt had enthusiasm. 
 He had more than it is good for a man to 
 carry about in his own breast. And there 
 is no doubt that he would have spent the 
 entire morning in putting his burden, bit by 
 bit, upon Naomi as she sat and worked and 
 listened, had no interruption occurred. As 
 it was, however, she interrupted him herself, 
 and that in the middle of a fresh tirade, by 
 suddenly holding up her finger and sharply 
 enjoining silence. 
 
 " Don't you hear voices ? " she said. 
 He listened.
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 7l 
 
 "Yes, I do." 
 
 " Do you mind seeing who it is ? " 
 
 He went to the door. " There are two men 
 hanging about the station verandah," he said. 
 "Stay! Now they have seen me, and are 
 coming this way." 
 
 Naomi said not one word, but she managed 
 to fetch over the office-stool in the haste with 
 which she sprang to the ground. At a run 
 she rounded the counter, and reached the 
 door just as the men came up. She pushed 
 Engelhardt out first, and then followed him 
 herself, locking the door and putting the key 
 in her pocket before turning to the men. 
 Last of all, but in her most amiable manner, 
 she asked them what they wanted. 
 
 ** Travellers' rations," said one. 
 
 " Especially meat," added the other. 
 
 "Very good," said Naomi, "go to the 
 kitchen and get the meat first. Mr. Engel- 
 hardt, you may not know the station custom 
 of giN iug rations to travellers. We don't give 
 meat here as a rule ; so will you take these 
 men over to the kitchen, and tell Mrs. Potter I 
 wish them each to have a good helping of cold 
 mutton ? Then bring them back to the store."
 
 72 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " We don't seek no favours," growled the 
 man who had spoken first. 
 
 "No?" said Naomi with a charming smile. 
 " But I 'm sure you need some meat. What's 
 more, I mean you to have some ! " 
 
 "Suppose we take the tea and flour first, 
 now we are at the store ? " 
 
 "Ah, I can't attend to you for a few 
 minutes," said the girl casually. As she spoke 
 she turned and left them, and Engelhardt 
 gathered her unconcern from the snatch of a 
 song as she entered the main building. The 
 men accompanied him to the kitchen in a 
 moody silence. As for himself, he already 
 felt an extraordinary aversion from them both. 
 
 And indeed their looks were against them. 
 The one who had spoken offensively about 
 the meat was a stout, thick-set, middle-ao-ed 
 man, who gave an impression of considerable 
 activity in spite of his great girth. Half his 
 face was covered with short grey bristles, like 
 steel spikes. Though his hands were never 
 out of his pockets, he carried his head like 
 a man of character ; but the full force of a 
 bold, insolent, vindictive expression was split 
 and spoilt by the most villainous of squints.
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 73 
 
 Nevertheless the force was there. It was not 
 so conspicuous in his companion, who was, 
 however, almost equally untoward-looking in 
 his own way. He was of the medium size, 
 all bone and gristle like a hawk, and with 
 no sign upon his skin of a drop of red blood 
 underneath. The hands were brown and furry 
 as an ape's, with the nails all crooked and 
 broken by hard work. The face was as 
 brown, and very weather-beaten, with a pair of 
 small black eyes twinkling out of the ruts and 
 puckers like pools in the sun upon a muddy 
 road. This one rolled as he walked, and wore 
 brass rings in his ears ; and Engelhardt, who 
 had come out from England in a sailing ship, 
 saw in a moment that he was as salt as junk 
 all through. Decidedly he was the best of the 
 two, though his eyes were never still, nor the 
 hang of his head free and honest. And on the 
 whole the piano-tuner was thankful when his 
 share of the trouble with these men was at an 
 end, and they all came back to the store. 
 
 Rather to his surprise, Naomi was there 
 before them, and busy weighing out the 
 traveller's quantum of sugar, tea, and flour, 
 for each man. What was really amazing,
 
 74 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 however, was the apparent miracle that had 
 put every trace of the silver out of sight. 
 
 " No work for us on the station ? " said the 
 stout man, before they finally sheered off, and 
 in a tone far from civil, to Engelhardt's thinking. 
 
 " None, I 'm afraid," said Naomi, again with 
 a smile. 
 
 "Nor yet at the shed?" inquired the other, 
 civilly enough. 
 
 "Nor yet at the shed, I am sorry to say." 
 
 "So long, then," said the fat man, in his 
 impudent manner. " Mayhap we shall be 
 coming to see you again, miss, one o' these 
 fine days or nights. My dear, you look out 
 for us ! You keep your spare-room in readiness! 
 A feather-bed for me " 
 
 " Stow it, mate," said the other tramp, as he 
 hitched his swag across his shoulders. " Can't 
 you hump your bluey and come away decent?" 
 
 " If you don't," cried Engelhardt, putting in 
 his Httle word in a gigantic voice, "it will be 
 the worse for you ! " 
 
 The big fellow laughed and swore. 
 
 "Will it, my Httle man?" said he. "Are 
 you going to make it the worse ? I 've a 
 blessed good mind to take and crumple you
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 75 
 
 Up for manure, I have. And a blessed bad 
 barrerful you 'd make ! See here, my son, 
 I reckon you 've got one broke bone about 
 you already; mind out that I don't leave a few 
 pals to keep it company. A bit more of your 
 cheek, and I '11 make you so as your own 
 sweetheart — a fine girl she is, as ought to be 
 above the likes of you ; but I suppose you 're 
 better than nothing — I tell you I '11 make you 
 so as your sweetheart " 
 
 It was the man's own mate who put a stop 
 to this. 
 
 " Can't you shut it and come on ? " he cried, 
 with a kind of half-amused anger. " Wot 
 good is this going to do either me or you, or 
 any blessed body else ? " 
 
 "It'll do somebody some harm," returned 
 the other, "if he opens his mouth again. 
 Yes, I '11 clear out before I smash 'im ! Good- 
 bye, my dear, and a bigger size to you in 
 sweethearts. So long, little man. You may 
 thank your broke arm that your 'ead's not 
 broke as well ! " 
 
 They were gone at last. Naomi and 
 Engelhardt watched them out of sight from 
 the verandah, the latter heaving with rage and
 
 'j6 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 indignation. He was not one to forget this 
 degradation in a hurry. Naomi, on the other 
 hand, who had more to complain of, being a 
 woman, was in her usual spirits in five minutes. 
 She took him by the arm, and told him to 
 cheer up. He made bitter answer that he 
 could never forgive himself for havino- stood 
 
 •J o 
 
 by and heard her spoken to as she had been 
 spoken to that morning. She pointed to his 
 useless arm, and laughed heartily. 
 
 " As long as they didn't see the silver," said 
 she, " I care very little what they said." 
 
 " But I care ! " 
 
 " Then you are not to. Do you think they 
 saw the silver ? " 
 
 " No ; I 'm pretty sure they didn't. How 
 quickly you must have bundled it in again ! " 
 
 "There was occasion for quickness. We 
 must put it to rights after lunch. Meanwhile 
 come along and look here." 
 
 She had led the way along the verandah, 
 and now stood fingering one of the white- 
 washed posts. It was pocked about the middle 
 with ancient bullet-marks 
 
 "This was the post my father stood behind. 
 Not much of a shelter, was it }"
 
 MASTERLESS MEN. 77 
 
 Engelhardt seemed interested and yet dis- 
 trait. He made no answer. 
 
 "Why don't you speak?" cried Naomi. 
 " What has struck you ?" 
 
 " Nothing much," he replied. " Only when 
 you heard the voices, and I went to the door, 
 the big brute was showing the little brute this 
 very verandah-post !" 
 
 Naomi considered. 
 
 " There 's not much in that," she said at last. 
 ** It's the custom for travellers to wait about a 
 verandah ; and what more natural than their 
 spotting these holes and having a look at them ? 
 As long as they didn't spot my silver ! Do 
 you know why I came over to the house before 
 putting it away."*" 
 
 "No." 
 
 ** To get this," said Naomi, pulling something 
 from her pocket. She was laughing rather 
 shyly. It was a small revolver.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 £500. 
 
 " ^ ND what is your other name, Mr. Engel- 
 
 A^ 
 
 hardt ?" 
 
 " Hermann." 
 
 "Hermann Engelhardt! That's a lovely 
 name. How well it will look in the news- 
 papers ! " 
 
 The piano-tuner shook his head. 
 
 "It will never get into them now," said he, 
 sadly. 
 
 " What nonsense ! " exclaimed the girl. 
 "When you have told me of all the big 
 things you dream of doing one day ! You '11 
 do them every one when you go home to 
 England again ; I '11 put my bottom dollar 
 on you." 
 
 " Ah, but the point is whether I shall ever 
 go back at all." 
 
 "Of course you will." 
 
 28
 
 £500. 79 
 
 " I have a presentiment that I never 
 shall." 
 
 "Since when?" inquired Naomi, with a 
 kindly sarcasm. 
 
 " Oh, I always have it, more or less." 
 
 " You had it very much less this morning, 
 when you were telling me how you 'd go home 
 and study at Milan and I don't know where- 
 all, once you'd made the money." 
 
 " But I don't suppose I ever shall make 
 It. 
 
 "Bless the man!" cried Naomi, giving him 
 up, for the moment, in despair. She continued 
 to gaze at him, however, as he leant back in 
 his wicker chair, with hopeless dark eyes fixed 
 absently upon the distant clumps of pale green 
 trees that came between glaring plain and cloud- 
 less sky. They were sitting in the verandah 
 which did not face the station yard, because it 
 was the shady one in the afternoon. The silver 
 had all been properly put away, and locked up 
 as carefully as before. As for the morning's 
 visitors, Naomi was herself disposed to think 
 no more of them or their impudence ; it is 
 therefore sad to relate that her present com- 
 panion would allow her to forget neither.
 
 So THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 With him the incident rankled characteristi- 
 cally : it had left him solely occupied by an 
 extravagantly poor opinion of himself. For 
 the time being, this discoloured his entire 
 existence and prospects, draining his self-con- 
 fidence to the last drop. Accordingly he 
 harped upon the late annoyance, and his own 
 inglorious share in it, to an extent which in 
 another would have tried Naomi very sorely 
 indeed ; but in him she rather liked it. She 
 had a book in her lap, but it did not 
 interest her nearly so much as the human 
 volume in the wicker chair at her side. 
 She was exceedingly frank about the matter. 
 
 " You 're the most interesting man I 
 ever met in my life," was her very next 
 remark. 
 
 "I can't think that!" 
 
 He had hauled in his eyes some miles to see 
 whether she meant it. 
 
 *' Nevertheless, it's the case. Do you know 
 why you're so interesting?" 
 
 " No, that I don't ! " 
 
 " Because you 're never the same for two 
 seconds together." 
 
 His face fell.
 
 £500. S I 
 
 "Among other reasons," added Naomi, 
 nodding kindly. 
 
 But Engelhardt had promptly put himself 
 upon the spit. He was always doing this. 
 
 " Yes, I know I 'm a terribly up-and-down 
 kind of chap," said he miserably; ** there's no 
 happy medium about meT 
 
 "When you are good you are very good 
 indeed, and when you are bad you are horrid ! 
 That's just what I like. I can't stand your 
 always-the-same people. They bore me beyond 
 words ; they drill me through and through ! 
 Still, you were very good indeed this morning, 
 you know. It is too absurd of you to give 
 a second thought to a couple of tramps and 
 their insolence ! " 
 
 " I can't help it. I 'm built that way. To 
 think that I should have stood still to hear 
 you insulted like that ! " 
 
 " But you didn't stand still." 
 
 "Oh, yes, I did." 
 
 " Well, I wish you wouldn't bother about 
 it. I wish you wouldn't bother about your- 
 self." 
 
 "When I am bad I am horrid," he said, 
 with a wry smile, "and that's now." 
 
 G
 
 82 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " No, I tell you I like it. I never know 
 where I 've got you. That 's one reason why 
 you 're so interesting." 
 
 His face glowed, and he clasped her with 
 his glance. 
 
 " How kind you are ! " he said softly. 
 "How you make the best of one, even at 
 one's worst ! But oh, how bitterly you make 
 me wish that I were different ! " 
 
 " I 'm very glad that you 're not," said 
 Naomi ; "everybody else is different." 
 
 " But I would give my head to be like 
 everybody else — to be hail-fellow with those 
 men out at the shed, for instance. They 
 wouldn't have stood still this morning." 
 
 " Wouldn't you as soon be hail-fellow with 
 me ? " asked the girl, ignoring his last sentence. 
 
 *' A million times sooner, of course ! But 
 surely you understand } " 
 
 " I think I do." 
 
 " I know you do ; you understand every- 
 thing. I never knew anyone like you, never ! " 
 
 "Then we're quits," said Naomi, as though 
 the game were over. And she closed her 
 eyes. But it was she who began it again ; it 
 always was.
 
 £500. 83 
 
 "You have one great fault," she said 
 maternally. 
 
 " I have a thousand and one." 
 
 "There you are. You think too much 
 about them. You take too much notice of 
 yourself ; that 's your great fault." 
 
 " Yet I didn't think I was conceited." 
 
 "Not half enough! That's just it. Yet 
 you are egotistical." 
 
 He looked terribly crestfallen. " I suppose 
 I am," he said dolefully. " In fact, I am." 
 
 " Then you 're not, so there ! " 
 
 " Which do you mean ? " 
 
 " I only said it to tease you. Do you 
 suppose I 'd have said such a thing if I 'd 
 really thought it ? " 
 
 " I shouldn't mind what you said. If you 
 really do think me egotistical, pray say so 
 frankly." 
 
 "Of course I don't think anything of the 
 kind ! " 
 
 "Is that the truth?" 
 
 " The real truth." 
 
 (It was not.) 
 
 " If it 's egotistical to think absolutely nothing 
 of yourself," continued Naomi, "and to blame
 
 84 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA- 
 
 yourself and not other people for every little 
 thing that goes wrong, then I should call you 
 a twenty- two -carat egotist. But even then 
 your aims and ambitions would be rather lofty 
 for the billet." 
 
 "They never seemed so to me," he 
 whispered, "until you sympathised with 
 them." 
 
 " Of course I sympathise," said Naomi, 
 laughing at him. It was necessary to laugh 
 at him now and then. It kept him on his 
 feet ; this time it led him from the abstract 
 to the concrete. 
 
 "If only I could make enough money to 
 go home and study, to study even in London 
 for one year," murmured Engelhardt, as his 
 eyes drifted out across the plains. " Then 
 I should know whether my dreams ever were 
 worth dreaming. But I have taken root out 
 here, I am beginning to do well, better than 
 ever I could have hoped. At our village in 
 the old country I was glad enough to play 
 the organ in church for twelve pounds a year. 
 Down in Victoria they gave me fifty without 
 a murmur, and I made a little more out of 
 teaching. Oh ! didn't I tell you I started life
 
 £500. 85 
 
 out here as an organist ? That 's how it was 
 I was able to buy this business, and I am 
 doing very well indeed. Two pounds for 
 tuning a piano ! They wouldn't credit it 
 in the old country." 
 
 " The man before you used to charge three. 
 A piano-tuner in the bush is an immensely 
 welcome visitor, mind. I don't think I should 
 have lowered my terms at all, especially when 
 you have no intention of doing this sort of 
 thing all your days." 
 
 "Ah well, I shall never dare to throw 
 It up. 
 
 " Never 's not a word I like to hear you use, 
 Mr. Engelhardt. Remember that you 've only 
 been out here three years, and that you are 
 not yet twenty-six. You told me so yourself 
 this morning." 
 
 "It's perfectly true," said Engelhardt. 
 ** But there 's one's mother to consider. I 
 told you about her. I am beginning to 
 send her so much money now. It would be 
 frightful to give that up, just because there 
 are tunes in my head now and then, and I 
 can't put them together in proper harmony." 
 
 "I should say that your mother would
 
 86 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 rather have you than your money, Mr. Engel- 
 hardt." 
 
 " Perhaps so, but not if I were on her hands 
 composing things that nobody would publish." 
 
 " That couldn't be. You would succeed. 
 Something tells me that you would. I see it 
 in your face ; I did this morning. I know 
 nothing about music, yet I feel so certain 
 about you. The very fact that you should 
 have these ambitions when you are beginning 
 to do well out here, that in itself is enough 
 for me." 
 
 He shook his head, without turning it to 
 thank her by so much as a look. The girl 
 was glad of that. Though he had so little 
 confidence in himself, she knew that the dreams 
 of which he had spoken more freely and 
 more hopefully in the morning were thick 
 upon him then, as he sat in the wicker chair 
 and looked out over the plains, with parted 
 lips and such wistful eyes that Naomi's mind 
 went to work at the promptings of the heart 
 in her which he touched. It was a nimble, 
 practical mind, and the warm heart beneath it 
 was the home of noble impulses, which broke 
 forth continually in kind words and generous
 
 £600. $7 
 
 acts. Naomi wore that heart upon her sweet 
 frank face, it shone with a clear light out of 
 the fearless eyes that were fixed now so long 
 and so steadily upon the piano-tuner's eager 
 profile. She watched him while the shadow 
 of the building grew broader and broader 
 under his eyes until all at once it lost its edges, 
 and there were no more sunlit patches on the 
 plain. Still he neither moved nor looked at 
 her. At last she touched him on the arm. 
 She was sitting on his right, and she laid her 
 fingers lightly upon the splints and bandages 
 which were her own handiwork. 
 
 "Well, Mr. Engelhardt?" 
 
 He started round, and she was smiling at 
 him in the gloaming, with her sweet warm 
 face closer to his than it had ever been before. 
 
 " I have been very rude," he stammered. 
 
 " I am going to be much ruder." 
 
 ** Now you are laughing at me." 
 
 '* No, I am not. I was never further from 
 laughing in my life, for I fear that I shall 
 offend you, though I do hope not." 
 
 He saw that something was upon her mind. 
 " You couldn't do it if you tried," he said, 
 simply.
 
 88 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Then I want to know how much money 
 you think you ought to have to go home 
 to England with a clear conscience, and to 
 give yourself heart and soul to music for a 
 year certain? I am so inquisitive about it 
 all." 
 
 She was employing, indeed, and successfully, 
 a tone of pure and indefensible curiosity. He 
 thought for some moments before answering. 
 Then he said quite innocently — 
 
 " Five hundred pounds. That would leave 
 me enough to come back and start all over 
 again out here if I failed. I wouldn't tackle it 
 on less." 
 
 " But you wouldn't fail. I know nothing 
 about it, but I have my instincts, and I see 
 success in your face. I see it there ! And I 
 want to bet on you. I have more money than 
 is good for any girl, and I want to back you 
 for five hundred pounds." 
 
 " It is very kind of you," he said, "but you 
 would lose your money." He did not see her 
 meaning. The southern night had set in all at 
 once ; he could not even see her strenuous 
 eyes. 
 
 " How dense you are," she said, softly, and
 
 £500. $9 
 
 with a little nervous laugh. " Can't you see 
 that I want to lend you the money ?" 
 
 "To lend it tome!" 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Five hundred pounds !" 
 
 " My dear young man, I 'm ashamed to say 
 that I should never feel it. It 's a sporting 
 offer merely. Of course I 'd charge interest — 
 you 'd dedicate all your nice songs to me. 
 Why don't you answer } I don't like to see 
 you in the bush, it isn't at all the place for 
 you ; and I do want to send you home to your 
 mother. You might let me, for her sake. 
 Have you lost your tongue ? " 
 
 Her hand had remained upon the splints 
 and bandages ; indeed, she had forgotten that 
 there was a living arm inside them, but 
 now something trivial occurred that made 
 her withdraw it, and also get up from her 
 chair. 
 
 " Are you on, or are you not } " 
 
 " Oh, how can I thank you ? What can I 
 say .? " 
 
 " Yes or no," replied Naomi, promptly. 
 
 " No, then. I can't — I can't " 
 
 "Then don't. Now not another word!
 
 90 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 No, there's no offence on either side, unless 
 it's I that have offended you. It was great 
 cheek of me, after all. Yes, it was ! Well, 
 then, if it wasn't, will you have the goodness to 
 lend me your ears on an entirely different 
 matter ? " 
 
 "Very well ; with all my heart ; yet if only 
 I could ever thank you " 
 
 " If only you would be quiet and listen to 
 me! How are the bruises behavine.'* That's 
 all I want to hear now." 
 
 " The bruises ? Oh, they 're all right ; I 'd 
 quite forgotten I had any." 
 
 " You can lean back without hurting- ? " 
 
 " Rather ! If I put my weight on the left 
 side it doesn't hurt a bit." 
 
 " Think you could stand seven miles in a 
 buggy to-morrow morning ? " 
 
 "Couldn't I!" 
 
 *' Then I thought of driving over to the 
 shed in the morning ; and you shall come with 
 me, if you're good." 
 
 For an instant he looked radiant. Then his 
 face clouded over as he thought again of her 
 goodness and his own ingratitude. 
 
 "Miss Pryse," he began — and stuck — but
 
 £500. 9 1 
 
 his tone spoke volumes of remorse and self- 
 abasement. 
 
 Evidently she was getting to know that 
 tone, for she caught him up with a look of 
 distinct displeasure. 
 
 " Only if you 're good, mind ! " she told him 
 sharply. " Not on any account unless ! " 
 
 And Engelhardt said no more.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. 
 
 A SWEET breeze and a flawless sky- 
 rendered it an exquisite morning when 
 Naomi and her piano-tuner took their seats 
 behind the kind of pair which the girl loved 
 best to handle. They were youngsters both, 
 the one a filly as fresh as paint, the other a 
 chestnut colt, better broken, perhaps, but 
 sufficiently ready to be led astray. The very 
 start was lively. Engelhardt found himself 
 holding on with his only hand as if his life 
 depended on it, instead of on the firm gloved 
 fingers and the taut white -sleeved arm at his 
 side. He looked from the pair of young ones 
 to that arm and those fingers, and back again 
 at the pair. They were pulling alarmingly, 
 especially the filly. Engelhardt took an 
 anxious look at the driver's face. He was 
 prepared to find it resolute but pale. He 
 92
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. 93 
 
 found it transfigured with the purest exultation. 
 After all, this was the daughter of the man 
 who had returned the bushranger's fire with 
 laughter as loud as his shots ; she was her 
 father's child ; and from this moment onward, 
 the piano-tuner felt it a new honour to be 
 sitting- at her side. 
 
 •' How do you like It?" she found time to 
 ask him when the worst seemed over. 
 
 " First-rate," he replied. 
 
 "Not in a funk?" 
 
 " Not with you." 
 
 " That 's a blessing. The filly needs watch- 
 ing — little demon ! But she shan't smash your 
 other arm for you, Mr. Engelhardt, if I can 
 prevent it. No screws loose, Sam, I hope ? " 
 
 " Not if I knows it, miss ! " 
 
 Sam Rowntree had jumped on behind to 
 come as far as the first gate, to open it. 
 Already they were there, and as Sam ran in 
 front of the impatient pair the filly shied 
 violently at a blue silk fly-veil which fluttered 
 from his wideawake. 
 
 " That nice youth is the dandy of the men's 
 hut," explained Naomi, as they tore through 
 the gates, leaving Sam and his fly-veil astern
 
 94 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA, 
 
 in a twinkling. " I daren't say much to him, 
 because he's the only man the hut contains 
 just at present. The rest spend most nights 
 out at the shed, so I should be pretty badly 
 off if I offended Sam. I wasn't too pleased 
 with the state of the buggy, as a matter of 
 fact. It's the old Shanghai my father used 
 to fancy, and somehow it 's fallen on idle days ; 
 but it runs lighter than anything else we 've 
 got, and it's sweetly swung. That's why I 
 chose it for this little trip of ours. You'll 
 find it like a feather-bed for your bruises and 
 bones and things — if only Sam Rowntree used 
 his screw -hammer properly. Feeling happy 
 so far.?" 
 
 Engelhardt declared that he had never been 
 happier in his life. There was more truth in 
 the assertion than Naomi suspected. She also 
 was happy, but in a different way. A tight 
 rein, an aching arm, a clear course across a 
 five-mile paddock, and her beloved Riverina 
 breeze between her teeth, would have made 
 her happy at any time and in any circum- 
 stances. The piano-tuner's company added 
 no sensible zest to a performance which she 
 thoroughly enjoyed for its own sake ; but with
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. 95 
 
 him the exact opposite was the case. She was 
 not thinking of him. He was thinking only 
 of her. She had her young bloods to watch. 
 His eyes spent half their time upon her grand 
 strong hand and arm. Suddenly these gave 
 a tug and a jerk, both together. But he 
 was in too deep a dream either to see what 
 was wrong or to understand his companion's 
 exclamation. 
 
 " He didn't ! " she had cried. 
 
 "Didn't what.?" said Engelhardt. "And 
 who, Miss Pryse?" 
 
 " Sam Rowntree didn't use his screw-hammer 
 properly. Wretch ! The near swingle-tree 's 
 down and trailinof." 
 
 It took Engelhardt some moments to grasp 
 exactly what she meant. Then he saw. The 
 near swingle - tree was bumping along the 
 ground at the filly's heels, dragged by the 
 traces. Already the filly had shown herself 
 the one to shy as well as to pull, and it now 
 appeared highly probable that she would give 
 a further exhibition of her powers by kicking 
 the Shanghai to matchwood. Luckily the 
 present pace was too fast for that. The filly 
 had set the pace herself. The filly was
 
 96 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 keeping it up. As for the chestnut, it was 
 contentedly playing second fiddle with traces 
 drooping like festoons. Thus the buggy was 
 practically being drawn by a single rein with 
 the filly's mouth at one end of it and Naomi's 
 hand at the other. 
 
 " Once let the bar tickle her hoofs, and 
 she '11 hack us to smithereens," said the latter 
 cheerfully. " We '11 euchre her yet by keeping 
 this up ! " And she took her whip and flogged 
 the chestnut. 
 
 But this did not ease the strain on her left 
 hand and arm, for the chestnut's pace was 
 nothing to the filly's, so that even with the will 
 he had not the power to tighten his traces and 
 perform his part. Engelhardt saw the veins 
 swelling in the section of wrist between the 
 white sleeve and the dogskin glove. He 
 reached across and tried to help her with 
 his left hand ; but she bade him sit quiet, or he 
 would certainly tumble out and be run over ; 
 and with her command she sent a roar of 
 laughter into his ear, though the veins were 
 swelling on her forehead too. Truly she was 
 a chip of the old block, and the grain was as 
 good as ever.
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED, 97 
 
 It came to an end at last. 
 
 " Hurray! " said Naomi. " I see the fence." 
 
 Englehardt saw it soon after, and in another 
 minute the horses stood smoking, and the 
 buggy panting on its delicate springs, before 
 a six-bar gate which even the filly was dis- 
 inclined to tackle just then. 
 
 " Do you think you can drive through with 
 your one hand, and hold them tight on t' other 
 side?" said Naomi. "Clap your foot on the 
 brake and try." 
 
 He nodded, and managed creditably ; but 
 before opening the gate Naomi made a tem- 
 porary fixture of the swingle-tree by means 
 of a strap ; and this proved the last of their 
 troubles. The shed was now plainly in sight, 
 with its long regular roof, and at one end three 
 huts parallel with it and with each other. To 
 the left of the shed, as they drove up, Naomi 
 pointed out the drafting yards. A dense yellow 
 cloud overhung them like a lump of London 
 fog. 
 
 " They 're drafting now," said Naomi. " I 
 expect Mr. Gilroy is drafting himself. If so 
 let 's hope he 's too busy to see us. It would 
 be a pity, you know, to take him away from 
 
 H
 
 98 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 his work," she added next instant ; but Engel- 
 hardt was not deceived. 
 
 They drove down the length of the shed, 
 which had small pens attached on either side, 
 with a kind of port-hole opening into each. 
 Out of these port-holes there kept issuing 
 shorn sheep, which ran down little sloping 
 boards, and thus filled the pens. At one of the 
 latter Naomi pulled up. It contained twice as 
 many sheep as any other pen, and a good half 
 of them were cut and bleeding. The pens 
 were all numbered, and this one was number 
 nineteen. 
 
 " Bear that in mind," said Naomi. " Nine- 
 teen ! " 
 
 Engelhardt looked at her. Her face was 
 flushed and her voice unusually quiet and 
 hard. But she drove on without another word, 
 save of general explanation. 
 
 "Each man has his pen," she said, "and 
 shears his sheep just inside those holes. Then 
 the boss of the shed comes round with his 
 note-book, counts out the pens, and enters the 
 number of sheep to the number of each pen. 
 If a shearer cuts his sheep about much, or 
 leaves a lot of wool on, he just runs that man's
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. 99 
 
 pen — doesn't count 'em at all. At least, 
 he ought to. It seems he doesn't always 
 do it." 
 
 Again her tone was a singular mixture of 
 hard and soft. 
 
 "Mr, Gilroy is over the shed, isn't he?" 
 said Engelhardt, a little injudiciously, 
 
 " He is," returned Naomi, and that was all. 
 
 They alighted from the buggy at the further 
 end of the shed, where huge doors stood open, 
 showing a confused stack of wool-bales within, 
 and Sanderson the store -keeper engaged in 
 branding them with stencil and tar-brush. He 
 took off his wideawake to Naomi, and winked 
 at the piano-tuner. The near-sighted youth 
 was also there, and he came out to take 
 charge of the pair, while Engelhardt entered 
 the shed at Naomi's skirts. 
 
 Beyond the bales was the machine which 
 turned them out. Here the two wool-pressers 
 were hard at work and streaming with perspi- 
 ration, Naomi paused to see a bale pressed 
 down and sewn up. Then she led her com- 
 panion on to where the wool-pickers were busy 
 at side tables, and the wool-sorter at another 
 table which stood across the shed in a
 
 lOO THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 commanding position, with a long line of 
 shearers at work to right and left, and an 
 equally long pen full of unshorn sheep 
 between them. The wool-sorter's seemed the 
 softest job in the shed. Boys brought him 
 fleeces — perhaps a dozen a minute — flung 
 them out upon the table, and rolled them up 
 again into neat bundles swiftly tied with string. 
 These bundles the wool-sorter merely tossed 
 over his shoulder into one or other of the five 
 or six bins at his back. 
 
 " He gets a pound a thousand fleeces," 
 Naomi whispered, "and we shear something 
 over eighty thousand sheep. He will take 
 away a cheque of eighty odd pounds for his 
 six weeks' work." 
 
 *' And what about the shearers ?" 
 
 " A pound a hundred. Some of them will 
 go away with forty or fifty pounds." 
 
 ** It beats piano-tuning," said Engelhardt, 
 with a laugh. They crossed an open space, 
 mounted a few steps, and began threading 
 their way down the left-hand aisle, between 
 the shearers and the pen from which they had 
 to help themselves to woolly sheep. The air 
 was heavy with the smell of fleeces, and not
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. lOI 
 
 unmusical with the constant swish and chink 
 of forty pairs of shears. 
 
 "Well, Harry?" said Naomi, to the second 
 man they came to. " Harry is an old friend 
 of mine, Mr. Engelhardt — he was here in the 
 old days. Mr. Engelhardt is a new friend, 
 Harry, but a very good one, for all that. 
 How are you getting on.-* What's your top- 
 score ? " 
 
 "Ninety -one, miss — I shore ninety -one 
 yesterday." 
 
 "And a very good top -score too, Harry. 
 I 'd rather spend three months over the shear- 
 ing than have sheep cut about and wool left 
 on. What was that number I asked you to 
 keep in mind, Mr. Engelhardt?" 
 
 " Nineteen, Miss Pryse." 
 
 "Ah, yes! Who s number nineteen, Harry?" 
 
 Harry grinned. 
 
 " They call him the ringer of the shed, 
 miss. 
 
 " Oh, indeed. That means the fastest 
 shearer, Mr. Engelhardt — the man who runs 
 rings round the rest, eh, Harry ? What 's 
 his top-score, do you suppose ? " 
 
 "Something over two hundred."
 
 I02 THE BO€S OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 *' I thought as much. And his name ? " 
 
 "Simons, miss." 
 
 " Point him out, Harry." 
 
 " Why, there he is ; that big chap now help- 
 ing himself to a woolly." 
 
 They turned and saw a huge fellow drag 
 out an unshorn sheep by the leg, and fling it 
 against his moleskins with a clearly unneces- 
 sary violence and cruelty. 
 
 "Come on, Mr. Engelhardt," said Naomi, 
 in her driest tones ; " I have a word to say 
 to the ringer of the shed. I rather think he 
 won't ring much longer." 
 
 They walked on and watched the long man 
 at his work. It was the work of a ruffian. 
 The shearer next him had started on a new 
 sheep simultaneously, and was no further than 
 the brisket when the ringer had reached the 
 buttocks. On the brisket of the ringer's sheep 
 a slit of livid blue had already filled with blood, 
 and blood started from other places as he went 
 slashing on. He was either too intent or too 
 insolent to take the least heed of the lady 
 and the young man watching him. The young 
 man's heart was going like a clock in the night, 
 and he was sufficiently ashamed of it. As for
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. I03 
 
 Naomi, she was visibly boiling over, but she 
 held her tongue until the sheep rose bleeding 
 from its fleece. Then, as the man was about 
 to let the poor thing go, she darted between it 
 and the hole. 
 
 " Tar here on the brisket ! " she called down 
 the board. 
 
 A boy came at a run and dabbed the wounds. 
 
 "Why didn't you call him yourself?" she 
 then asked sternly of the man, still detaining 
 his sheep. 
 
 " What business is that of yours ? " he 
 returned impudently. 
 
 "That you will see presently. How many 
 sheep did you shear yesterday?" 
 
 " Two hundred and two." 
 
 " And the day before ? " 
 
 " Two hundred and five." 
 
 " That will do. It's too much, my man, you 
 can't do it properly. I 've had a look at your 
 sheep, and I mean to run your pen. What's 
 more, if you don't intend to go slower and 
 do better you may throw down your shears 
 this minute ! " 
 
 The man had slowly lifted himself to some- 
 thing like his full height, which was enormous.
 
 I04 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 So were his rounded shoulders and his long, 
 hairy arms and hands. So was his face, with 
 its huge hook-nose and its mouthful of yellow 
 teeth. These were showing in an insolent yet 
 savage grin, when a good thing happened at 
 a very good time. 
 
 A bell sounded, and some one sang out 
 "Smoke-oh!" 
 
 Instantly many pairs of shears were dropped; 
 in the ensuing two minutes the rest followed, 
 as each man finished the sheep he was en- 
 gaged on when the bell rang. Thus the swish 
 and tinkle of the shears changed swiftly to a 
 hum of conversation mingled with deep-drawn 
 sighs. And this stopped suddenly, miracu- 
 lously, as the shed opened its eyes and ears to 
 the scene going forward between its notorious 
 ringer and Naomi Pryse, the owner of the 
 run. 
 
 In another moment men with pipes in their 
 hands and sweat on their brows were edging 
 towards the pair from right and left. 
 
 "Your name, I think, is Simons.^" Naomi 
 was saying coolly, but so that all who had a 
 mind might hear her. *' I have no more to 
 say to you, Simons, except that you will shear
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. I05 
 
 properly or go where they like their sheep 
 to have lumps of flesh taken out and lumps 
 of wool left on." 
 
 " Since when have you been over the board, 
 miss ? " asked Simons, a little more civilly 
 under the eyes of his mates. 
 
 " I am not over the board," said Naomi 
 hotly, "but I am over the man who is." 
 
 She received instant cause to regret this 
 speech. 
 
 "We wish you was!" cried two or three. 
 " Vou wouldn't make a blooming mull of 
 things, you wouldn't ! " 
 
 " I '11 take my orders from Mr. Gilroy, and 
 from nobody else," said Simons defiantly. 
 
 " Well, you may take fair warning from 
 me." 
 
 *' That 's as I like." 
 
 ♦' It's as / like," said Naomi. "And look 
 here, I won't waste more words upon you, 
 and I won't stand your impertinence. Better 
 throw down your shears now — for I 've done 
 with you — before I call upon your mates to 
 take them from you." 
 
 *' We don't need calling, miss, not we ! " 
 
 Half a dozen fine fellows had stepped
 
 I06 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 forward, with Harry at their head, and the 
 affair was over. Simons had flung his shears 
 on the floor with a clatter and a curse, and 
 was striding out of the shed amid the hisses 
 and imprecations of his comrades. 
 
 Naomi would have got away too, for she 
 had had more than enough of the whole 
 business, but this was not so easy. Someone 
 raised three cheers for her. They were given 
 with a roar that shook the iron roof like 
 thunder. And to cap all this a gray old 
 shearer planted himself in her path. 
 
 "It's just this way, miss," said he. "We 
 liked Simons little enough, but, begging your 
 pardon, we like Mr. Gilroy less. He doesn't 
 know how to treat us at all. He has no 
 idea of bossing a shed like this. And mark 
 my words, miss, unless you remove that man, 
 and give us some smarter gentleman like, 
 say, young Mr. Chester " 
 
 "Ay, Chester '11 do ! " 
 
 "He knows his business ! " 
 
 " He 's a man, he is " 
 
 " And the man for us ! " 
 
 " Unless you give us someone more to our 
 fancy, like young Mr. Chester," concluded
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. IO7 
 
 the old man, doing his best to pacify his 
 mates with look and gesture, " there '11 be 
 further trouble. This is only the beginning. 
 There'll be trouble, and maybe worse, until 
 you make a change." 
 
 Naomi felt inexpressibly uncomfortable. 
 
 " Mr. Gilroy is the manager of this station," 
 said she, for once with a slight tremor in her 
 voice. "Any difference that you have with 
 him, you must fight it out between you. I 
 am quite sure that he means to be just. I at 
 any rate must interfere no more. I am sorry 
 I interfered at all." 
 
 So they let her go at last, the piano-tuner 
 following close upon her heels. He had stuck 
 to her all the time with shut mouth and 
 twitching fingers, ready for anything, as he 
 was ready still. And the first person these two 
 encountered in the open air was Gilroy him- 
 self, with so white a face and such busy lips 
 that they hardly required him to tell them 
 he had heard all. 
 
 " I am very sorry, Monty," said the girl, 
 in a distressed tone which highly surprised 
 her companion ; " but I simply couldn't help 
 it. You can't stand by and see a sheep cut
 
 I08 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 to pieces without opening your mouth. Yet 
 I know I was at fault." 
 
 *' It s not much good knowing it now," 
 returned Gilroy ungraciously, as he rolled 
 along at her side ; ** you should have thought 
 of that first. As it is, you've given me 
 away to the shed, and made a tough job 
 twice as tough as it was before." 
 
 " I really am very sorry, Monty. I know 
 I oughtn't to have interfered at all. At the 
 same time, the man deserved sending away, 
 and I am sure you would have been the 
 first to send him had you seen what I saw. 
 I know I should have waited and spoken to 
 you ; but I shall keep away from the shed 
 in future." 
 
 "That won't undo this morning's mischief 
 1 heard what the brutes said to you!" 
 
 " Then you must have heard what I said to 
 them. Don't try to make me out worse than 
 I am, Monty." 
 
 She laid her hand upon his arm, and Engel- 
 hardt, to his horror, saw tears on her lashes. 
 Gilroy, however, would not look at her. 
 Instead, he hailed the store-keeper, who had 
 passed them on his way to the huts.
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. 109 
 
 ** Make out Simons's account, Sandy," he 
 shouted at the top of his voice, " and give 
 him his cheque. Miss Pryse has thought fit 
 to sack him over my head!" 
 
 Instantly her penitence froze to scorn. 
 
 " That was unnecessary," she said, in the 
 same quiet tone she had employed towards the 
 shearer, but dropping her arm and halting 
 dead as she spoke. "If this is the way you 
 treat the men, no wonder you can't manage 
 them. Come, Mr. Engelhardt ! " 
 
 And with this they turned their back on the 
 manager ; but not on the shed ; that was not 
 Naomi's way at all. She was pre-eminently 
 one to be led, not driven, and she remained 
 upon the scene, showing Engelhardt every- 
 thing, and explaining the minutest details 
 for his benefit, much longer than she would 
 have dreamt of staying in the ordinary course 
 of affairs. This involved luncheon in the 
 manager's hut, at which meal Naomi appeared 
 in the highest spirits, cracking jokes with 
 Sanderson, chaffing the boy in spectacles, and 
 clinking pannikins with everyone but the 
 manager himself. The latter left early, after 
 steadily sulking behind his plate, with his
 
 no THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 beard in his waistcoat and his yellow head 
 presented like a bull's. Tom Chester was not 
 there at all. Engelhardt was sorry, though 
 the others treated him well enough to-day — 
 Sanderson even cutting up his meat for him. 
 It was three o'clock before Naomi and he 
 started homeward in the old Shanghai. 
 
 With the wool-shed left a mile behind, they 
 overtook a huge horseman leading a spare 
 horse. 
 
 " That 's our friend Simons," said Naomi. 
 " I wonder what sort of a greeting he '11 give 
 me. None at all, I should imagine." 
 
 She was wrong. The shearer reined up on 
 one side of the track, and gave her a low bow, 
 wideawake in hand, and with it a kind of a 
 glaring grin that made his teeth stand out like 
 brass-headed nails in the afternoon sunshine. 
 Naomi laughed as they drove on, 
 
 " Pretty, wasn't it ? That man loves me to 
 distraction, I should say. On the whole we may 
 claim to have had a rather lively day. First 
 came that young lady on the near side, who 's 
 behaving herself so angelically now ; and then 
 the swingle-tree, which they 've fixed up well 
 enough to see us through this afternoon at any
 
 THE RINGER OF THE SHED. Ill 
 
 rate. Next there was our friend Simons ; and 
 after him, poor dear Monty Gilroy — who had 
 cause to complain, mind you, Mr. Engelhardt. 
 We mustn't forget that I had no sort of right 
 to interfere. And now, unless I 'm very much 
 mistaken, we 're on the point of meeting two 
 more of our particular friends." 
 
 In fact, a couple of tramps were approach- 
 ing, swag on back, with the slow swinging 
 stride of their kind. Engelhardt coloured 
 hotly as he recognised the ruffians of the day 
 before. They were walking on opposite sides 
 of the track, and as the buggy cut between 
 chem the fat man unpocketed one hand and 
 saluted them as they passed. 
 
 " Not got a larger size yet ?" he shouted out. 
 " Why, that ain't a man at all ! " 
 
 The poor piano-tuner felt red to his toes, 
 and held his tongue with exceeding difficulty. 
 But as usual Naomi and her laugh came to 
 his rescue. 
 
 "How polite our friends are, to be sure ! 
 A bow here and a salute there ! Birds of 
 a feather, too, if ever I saw any ; you might 
 look round, Mr. Engelhardt, and see if they 're 
 flocking together."
 
 112 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " They are," said he, next minute. 
 
 Then Naomi looked for herself. They were 
 descending a slight incline, and sure enough 
 on top of the ridge stood the two tramps and 
 the mounted shearer. Stamped clean against 
 the sky, it looked much as though horses and 
 men had been carved out of a single slab of 
 ebony.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 ''THREE SHADOWS." 
 
 THAT night the piano-tuner came out in 
 quite a new character, and with 
 immediate success. He began repeating 
 poetry in the moonlit verandah, and Naomi 
 let him go on for an hour and a half ; indeed, 
 she made him ; for she was in secret tribu- 
 lation over one or two things that had 
 happened during the day, and only too thank- 
 ful, therefore, to be taken out of herself and 
 made to think on other matters. Engelhardt 
 did all this for her, and in so doing furthered 
 his own advantage, too, almost as much as his 
 own pleasure. At all events Naomi took to 
 her room a livelier interest in the piano-tuner 
 than she had felt hitherto, while her own 
 troubles were left, with her boots, outside the 
 door. 
 
 It was true she had been interested in him 
 
 I "3
 
 I 14 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 from the beginning. He had so very soon 
 revealed to her what she had never come in 
 contact with before — a highly sensitised 
 specimen of the artistic temperament. She 
 did not know it by this name, or by any name 
 at all ; but she was not the less alive to his 
 little group of interesting peculiarities, because 
 of her inability to label the lot with one phrase. 
 They interested her the more for that very 
 reason ; just as her instinct as to the possi- 
 bilities that were in him was all the stronger 
 for her incapacity to reason out her conviction 
 in a satisfactory manner. Her intellectual 
 experience was limited to a degree ; but she 
 had seen success in his face ; and she now 
 heard it in his voice when he quoted verses to 
 her, so beautifully that she was delighted to 
 listen whether she followed him or not. Her 
 faith in him was sweetly unreasonable, but it 
 was immensely strong. She was ready and 
 even eager to back him heavily ; and there 
 are those who would rather have one brave 
 girl do that on instinct, than win the votes of 
 a hundred clear heads, basing their support 
 upon a logical calculation. 
 
 For reasons of her own, however, Naomi
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." II5 
 
 decided overnight to take her visitor a little 
 less seriously to his face. She had been too 
 confidential with him concerninof station affairs 
 past and present ; that she must drop, and at 
 the same time discourage him from opening his 
 heart to her, as he was beginning to do, on the 
 slightest provocation. These resolutions would 
 impose a taboo on nearly all the subjects 
 they had found in common. She quite saw 
 that, and she thought it just as well. Too 
 much sympathy with this young man might 
 be bad for him. Naomi realised this somewhat 
 suddenly in the night, and it kept her awake 
 rather longer than she liked. But she rose 
 next morning fully resolved to eschew conver- 
 sation of too sympathetic a character, and to 
 encourage her young friend in quotations from 
 the poets instead. Obviously this was quite 
 as great a pleasure to him, while it was a much 
 safer one — or so Naomi thought in her 
 innocence. But then it was a very genuine 
 pleasure to her too, because the poetry was 
 entirely new to her, and her many-sided 
 young man knew so much and repeated it 
 so charmingly. 
 
 It was incredible, indeed, what a number of
 
 Il6 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 the poets of all ages he had at his finger-ends, 
 and how justly he rendered their choicest 
 numbers. Their very names were mostly 
 new to Naomi. There was consequently an 
 aboriginal barbarity about many of her com- 
 ments and criticisms, and more than once the 
 piano-tuner found it impossible to sit still and 
 hear her out. This was notably the case at 
 their second poetical stance, when Naomi had 
 got over her private depression on the one 
 hand, and was full of her new intentions 
 towards the piano-tuner on the other. He 
 would jump out of his chair, and fume up 
 and down the verandah, running his five 
 available fingers through his hair until the 
 black shock stood on end. It was at these 
 moments that Naomi liked him best. 
 
 He had been giving her "Tears, idle tears" 
 (because she had "heard of Tennyson," she 
 said) on the Wednesday morning in the 
 verandah facing the station-yard. He had 
 recited the great verses with a force and 
 feeling all his own. Over one of them in 
 particular his voice had quivered with emotion. 
 It was the dear emotion of an aesthetic soul 
 touched to the quick by the sheer beauty
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." Il7 
 
 of the Idea and its words. And Naomi 
 
 said : 
 
 " That 's jolly ; but you don't call it poetry, 
 
 do you ? " 
 
 His eyes dried in an instant. Then they 
 opened as wide as they would go. He was 
 speechless. 
 
 "It doesn't rhyme, you know," Naomi ex- 
 plained cheerfully. 
 
 " No," said Engelhardt, gazing at her 
 severely. "It isn't meant to; it's blank 
 verse." 
 
 " It 's blank bad verse, if you ask me," said 
 Naomi Pryse, with a nod that was meant to 
 finish him; but it only Hfted him out of his 
 chair. 
 
 "Well, upon my word," said the piano- 
 tuner, striding noisily up and down, as 
 Naomi laughed. "Upon my word!" 
 
 " Please make me understand," pleaded the 
 girl, with a humility that meant mischief, if 
 he had only been listening ; but he was still 
 wrestling with his exasperation. " I can't help 
 being ignorant, you know," she added, as 
 though hurt. 
 
 " You can help it— that 's just it ! " he
 
 Il8 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 answered bitterly. " I 've been telling you 
 one of the most beautiful things that Tenny- 
 son himself ever wrote, and you say it isn't 
 verse. Verse, forsooth! It's poetry — it's 
 gorgeous poetry ! " 
 
 "It may be gorgeous, but I don't call it 
 poetry unless it rhymes," said Naomi stoutly. 
 ** Gordon always does." 
 
 Gordon, the Australian poet, she was for 
 ever throwing at his head, as the equal of any 
 of his English bards. They had already had 
 a heated argument about Gordon. Therefore 
 Engelhardt said merely — 
 
 " You 're joking, of course ? " 
 
 " I am doing nothing of the sort." 
 
 *' Then pray what do you call Shakespeare " 
 — pausing in front of her with his hand in 
 his pocket — "poetry or prose?" 
 
 " Prose, of course." 
 
 " Because it doesn't rhyme?" 
 
 " Exactly." 
 
 "And why do you suppose it's chopped up 
 into lines ? " 
 
 "Oh, /don't know — to moisten it perhaps." 
 
 " I beg your pardon ? " 
 
 *' To make it less dry."
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." II9 
 
 ** Ah ! Then it doesn't occur to you that 
 there might be some law which decreed the 
 end of a line after a certain number of beats, 
 or notes — exactly like the end of a bar of 
 music, in fact ? " 
 
 " Certainly not," said Naomi. There was 
 a touch of indignation in this denial. He 
 shrugged his shoulders and then turned them 
 upon the girl, and stood glowering out upon 
 the yard. Behind his back Naomi went 
 into fits of silent laughter, which luckily she 
 had overcome before he wheeled round 
 suddenly with a face full of eager deter- 
 mination. His heart now appeared set upon 
 convincing her that verse might be blank. 
 And for half an hour he stood beating his 
 left hand in the air, and declaiming, in feet, 
 certain orations of Hamlet, until Mrs. Potter, 
 the cook-laundress, came out of the kitchen 
 to protect her young mistress if necessary. 
 It was not necessary. The broken -armed 
 gentleman was standing over her, shaking 
 his fist and talking at the top of his voice; 
 but Miss Pryse was all smiles and apparent 
 contentment ; and, indeed, she behaved much 
 better for a while, and did her best to
 
 I20 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 understand. But presently she began to 
 complain of the " quotations " (for he was 
 operating on the famous soliloquy), and to 
 profane the whole subject. And the question 
 of blank verse was discussed between them 
 no more. 
 
 She could be so good, too, when she liked, 
 so appreciative, so sympathetic, so under- 
 standing. But she never liked very long. 
 He had a tendency to run to love-poems, and 
 after listening to five or six with every sign of 
 approval and delight, Naomi would suddenly 
 become flippant at the sixth or seventh. On 
 one occasion, when she had turned him on by 
 her own act aforethought, and been given a 
 taste of several past-masters of the lyric, from 
 Waller to Locker, and including a poem of 
 Browning's which she allowed herself to be 
 made to understand, she inquired of Engel- 
 hardt whether he had ever read anything by 
 "a man called Swinton." 
 
 "Swinburne," suggested Engelhardt. 
 
 "Are you sure?" said Naomi, jealously. 
 *' I believe it 's Swinton. I 'm prepared to bet 
 you that it is !" 
 
 "Where have you come across his name.**"
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." 121 
 
 the piano-tuner said, smiling as he shook his 
 head. 
 
 "In the preface to Gordon's poems." 
 
 Engelhardt groaned. 
 
 "It mentions Swinton — what are you 
 laughing at ? All right ! I '11 get the book 
 and settle it!" 
 
 She came back laughing herself. 
 
 "Well.?" said Engelhardt. 
 
 " You know too much ! Not that I should 
 accept anything that preface says as conclu- 
 sive. It has the cheek to say that Gordon 
 was under his influence. You give me some- 
 thing of his, and we '11 soon see." 
 
 " Something of Swinburne's ?" 
 
 " Oh, you needn't put on side because you 
 happen to be right according to a preface. I '11 
 write and ask The Australasian ! Yes, of 
 course I mean something of his." 
 
 Engelhardt reflected. " There 's a poem 
 called 'A Leave-taking,' " said he, tentatively, 
 at length. 
 
 " Then trot it out," said Naomi ; and she 
 set herself to listen with so unsympathetic 
 an expression on her pretty face, that he was 
 obliged to look the other way before he could
 
 122 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 begin. The contrary was usually the case. 
 However, he managed to get under way : — 
 
 "'Let us go hence, my songs; she will not hear. 
 Let us go hence together without fear ; 
 Keep silence now, for singing-time is over, 
 And over all old things and all things dear. 
 She loves not you nor me as all we love her. 
 Yea, though we sang as angels in her ear, 
 She would not hear. 
 
 " ' Let us rise up and part ; she will not know. 
 Let us go seaward as the great winds go, 
 Full of blown sand and foam ; what help is there ? 
 There is no help, for all these things are so, 
 And all the world is bitter as a tear. 
 And how these things are, though ye strove to show 
 She would not know. 
 
 '"Let us go home and hence; she will not weep '" 
 
 " Stop a moment," said Naomi, " I 'm in 
 a difficulty. I can't go on listening until I 
 know something." 
 
 "Until you know what.-*" said Engelhardt, 
 who did not like being interrupted. 
 
 " Who it 's all about — who ske is ! " cried 
 Naomi, inquisitively. 
 
 "Who — she — is," repeated the piano-tuner, 
 talking aloud to himself. 
 
 " Yes, exactly ; who is she ? "
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." I 23 
 
 "As if it mattered!" Engelhardt went on 
 in the same aside. *' However, who do you 
 say she is ? " 
 
 " I ? She may be his grandmother for all 
 I know. I 'm asking you." 
 
 " I know you are. I was prepared for you 
 to ask me anything else." 
 
 "Were you.-* Then why is she such an 
 obstinate old party, any way.-* She won't 
 hear and she won't know. What will she do ? 
 Now it seems that you can't even make her 
 cry ! ' She will not weep ' was where you 'd 
 got to. As you seem unable to answer 
 my questions, you 'd better go on till she 
 does." 
 
 *' I 'm so likely to go on," said Engelhardt, 
 getting up. 
 
 Naomi relented a little. 
 
 " Forgive me, Mr. Engelhardt ; I 've been 
 behaving horribly. I 'm sorry I spoke at all, 
 only I did so want to know who she was." 
 
 ** I don't know myself" 
 
 ** I was sure you didn't ! " 
 
 "What's more, I don't care. What has it 
 got to do with the merits of the poem } " 
 
 •' I won't presume to say. I only know
 
 124 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 that it makes all the difference to my interest 
 in the poem." 
 
 '• But why ? " 
 
 " Because I want to know what she was like." 
 
 " But surely to goodness," cried Engelhardt, 
 •' you can imagine her, can't you ? You 're 
 meant to fill her in to your own fancy. You 
 pays your money and you takes your choice." 
 
 " I get precious little for my money," 
 remarked Naomi pertinently, "if I have to 
 do the filling in for myself!" 
 
 Engelhardt had been striding to and fro. 
 Now he stopped pityingly in front of the chair 
 in which this sweet Philistine was sitting un- 
 ashamed. 
 
 " Do you mean to say that you like to have 
 every little thing told you in black and white ?" 
 
 " Of course I do. The more the better." 
 
 "And absolutely nothing left to your own 
 imagination ? " 
 
 " Certainly not. The idea ! " 
 
 He turned away from her with a shrug of 
 his shoulders, and quickened his stride up and 
 down the verandah. He was visibly annoyed. 
 She watched him with eyes full of glee. 
 
 " I do love to make you lose your wool ! "
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." I 25 
 
 she informed him, in a minute or two, with a 
 sudden attack of candour. " I Hke you best 
 when you give me up and wash your hands 
 of me ! " 
 
 This cleared his brow instantaneously, and 
 brought him back to her chair with a smile. 
 
 "Why so, Miss Pryse?" 
 
 " Must I tell you ? " 
 
 " Please." 
 
 "Then it's because you forget yourself, and 
 me, too, when I rile you ; and you 're delightful 
 whenever you do that, Mr. Engelhardt." 
 
 Naomi regretted her words next moment ; 
 but it was too late to unsay them. He went 
 on smiling, it is true, but his smile was no 
 longer naive and unconsidered ; no more were 
 his recitations during the next few hours. 
 His audience did her worst to provoke him 
 out of himself, but she could not manage 
 it. Then she tried the other extreme, and 
 became more enthusiastic than himself over 
 this and that, but he would not be with her ; 
 he had retired into the lair of his own self- 
 consciousness, and there was no tempting 
 him out any more. When he did come out 
 of himself, it was neither by his own will
 
 126 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 nor her management, and the moment was a 
 startling one for them both. 
 
 It was late in the afternoon of that same 
 Wednesday. They were sitting, as usual, in 
 the verandah which overlooked not the station 
 yard but the boundless plains, and they were 
 sitting in silence and wide apart. They had 
 not quarrelled ; but Engelhardt had made up 
 his mind to decamp. He had reasoned the 
 whole thing out in a spirit of mere common- 
 sense ; yet he was reasoning with himself still, 
 as he sat in the quiet verandah ; he thought 
 it probable that he should go on with his 
 reasoning — with the same piece of reasoning — 
 until his dying hour. He looked worried 
 He was certainly worrying Naomi, and annoy- 
 ing her considerably. She had given up trying 
 to take him out of himself, but she knew that 
 he liked to hear himself saying poetry, and she 
 felt perfectly ready to listen if it would do him 
 any good. Of course she was not herself 
 anxious to hear him. It was entirely for his 
 sake that she put down the book she was 
 reading, and broached the subject at last. 
 
 " Have you quite exhausted the poetry that 
 you know by heart, Mr. Engelhardt?"
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." I 27 
 
 " Quite, I 'm afraid, Miss Pryse ; and I 'm 
 sure you must be thankful to hear it." 
 
 " Now you 're fishing," said Naomi with a 
 smile (not one of her sweetest) ; " we 've 
 quarrelled about all your precious poets, it 's 
 true, but that 's why I want you to trot out 
 another. I 'm dying for another quarrel, don't 
 you see? Out with somebody fresh, and let 
 me have shies at him ! " 
 
 " But I don't know them all off by heart — 
 I 'm not a walking Golden Treasury, you 
 know." 
 
 "Think!" commanded Naomi. When she 
 did this there was no disobeying her. He 
 had found out that already. 
 
 "Have you ever heard of Rossetti — Dante 
 Gabriel ? " 
 
 " Kill whose cat?" cried Naomi. 
 
 He repeated the poet's name in full. She 
 shook her head. She was smiling now, and 
 kindly, for she had got her way. 
 
 " There is one little thing of his — but a 
 beauty — that I once learnt," Engelhardt said, 
 doubtfully. " Mind, I 'm not sure that I can 
 remember it, and I won't spoil it if I can't; 
 no more must you spoil it, if I can."
 
 128 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Is there some sacred association, then ? " 
 
 He laughed. " No, indeed ! There 's more 
 of a sacrilegious association, for I once swore 
 that the first song I composed should be a 
 setting for these words." 
 
 " Remember, you 've got to dedicate it to 
 me ! What 's the name of the thing ? " 
 
 "'Three Shadows.'" 
 
 " Let's have them, then." 
 
 "Very well. But I love it! You must 
 promise not to laugh." 
 
 " Begin," she said sternly, and he began : — 
 
 " ' I looked and saw your eyes 
 
 In the shadow of your hair, 
 As a traveller sees the stream 
 
 In the shadow of the wood ; 
 And I said, " My faint heart sighs 
 
 Ah me ! to linger there. 
 To drink deep and to dream 
 
 In that sweet solitude." ' " 
 
 " Go on," said Naomi, with approval. " I 
 hope you dorit see all that ; but please 
 go on." 
 
 He had got thus far with his face raised 
 steadfastly to hers, for he had left his chair and 
 seated himself on the edge of the verandah, at
 
 "THREE SHADOWS." 129 
 
 her feet, before beginning. He went on with- 
 out wincing or lowering his eyes : — 
 
 " ' I looked and saw your heart 
 
 In the shadow of your eyes, 
 As a seeker sees the gold 
 
 In the shadow of the stream ; 
 And I said, " Ah me ! what art 
 
 Should win the immortal prize, 
 Whose want must make life cold 
 
 And heaven a hollow dream ? " '" 
 
 " Surely not as bad as all that?" said Naomi, 
 laughing. He had never recited anything so 
 feelingly, so slowly, with such a look in his 
 eyes. There was occasion to laugh, obviously. 
 
 " Am I to go on," said Engelhardt, in des- 
 perate earnest, "or am I not ?" 
 
 " Go on, of course ! I am most anxious to 
 know what else you saw." 
 
 But the temptation to lower the eyes was 
 now hers ; his look was so hard to face, his 
 voice was grown so soft. 
 
 " * I looked and saw your love 
 In the shadow of your heart, 
 As a diver sees the pearl 
 
 In the shadow of the sea ; 
 And I murmured, not above 
 
 My breath, but all apart '" 
 
 K
 
 T30 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Here he stopped. Her eyes were shining. 
 He could not see this, because his own were 
 dim. 
 
 "Go on," she said, nodding violently, "do 
 go on ! 
 
 " That 's all I remember." 
 
 " Nonsense ! What did you murmur?" 
 
 " I forget." 
 
 " You do no such thing." 
 
 " I 've said all I mean to say." 
 
 " But not all I mean you to. I will have 
 the lot." 
 
 And, after all, his were the eyes to fall ; but 
 in a moment they had leapt up again to her 
 face with a sudden reckless flash. 
 
 " There are only two more lines," he said ; 
 "you had much better not know them." 
 
 " I must," said she. " What are they ?" 
 
 '" Ah ! you can love, true girl, 
 And is your love for me ? '" 
 
 " No, I 'm afraid not," said Naomi, at last. 
 " I thought not." 
 
 "Nor for anybody else — nor for anybody 
 else ! " 
 
 She was leaning over him, and one of her
 
 THREE SHADOWS." I3I 
 
 hands had fallen upon his neck — so kindly — so 
 naturally — like a mother's upon her child. 
 
 "Then you are not in love with anybody else!" 
 he cried joyously. "You are not engaged ! " 
 
 "Yes," she answered sadly. " I am engaged." 
 
 Then Naomi learnt how it feels to quench 
 the fire in joyous eyes, and to wrinkle a 
 hopeful young face with the lines of anguish 
 and despair. She could not bear it. She 
 took the head of untidy hair between her two 
 soft hands, and pressed it down upon the open 
 book on her knees until the haunting eyes 
 looked into hers no more. And as a mother 
 soothes her child, so she stroked him, and 
 patted him, and murmured over him, until he 
 could speak to her calmly. 
 
 "Who is he?" whispered Engelhardt, draw- 
 ing away from her at last, and gazing up into 
 her face with a firm lip. " What is he? Where 
 is he ? I want to know everything ! " 
 
 " Then look over your shoulder, and you 
 will see him for yourself." 
 
 A horseman had indeed ridden round the 
 corner of the house, noiselessly in the heavy 
 sand. Monty Gilroy sat frowning at them 
 both from his saddle.
 
 CHAPTER IX, 
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. 
 
 " T 'M afraid I have interrupted a very in- 
 jL teresting conversation ? " said Gilroy, 
 showing his teeth through his beard. 
 Naomi smiled coolly. 
 *' What if I say that you have, Monty ? " 
 "Then I'm sorry, but it can't be helped," 
 replied the manager, jumping off his horse, 
 and hang-inCT the bridle over a hook on one 
 of the verandah posts. 
 
 " Ah, I thought as much," said Naomi, 
 dryly. She held out her hand, however, as 
 she spoke. 
 
 But Gilroy had stopped before setting foot 
 in the verandah. He stood glaring at Engel- 
 hardt, who was not looking at him, but at the 
 fading sky-line away beyond the sand and 
 scrub, and with a dazed expression upon his 
 pale, eager face. The piano-tuner had not 
 132
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. I33 
 
 risen ; he had merely turned round where he 
 sat, at the sound of Gilroy's voice. 
 
 Now, however, he seemed neither to see 
 nor to heed the manager, though the latter 
 was towering over him, white with mortifi- 
 cation. 
 
 " Now then, Mr. Piano-tuner, jump up and 
 clear ; I 've ridden over to see Miss Pryse on 
 urgent business " 
 
 *' Leaving your manners behind you, evi- 
 dently," observed that young lady, "or I think 
 you would hardly be ordering my visitors out 
 of my verandah and my presence ! " 
 
 "Then will you speak to the fellow."^" said 
 Gilroy, sulkily. "He seems deaf, and I haven't 
 ridden in for my own amusement. I tell you 
 it's an important matter, Naomi." 
 
 " Mr. Engelhardt ! " said Naomi, gently. 
 He turned at once. " Mr. Gilroy," she went 
 on to explain, "has come from the shed to 
 see me about something or other. Will you 
 leave us for a little while } " 
 
 " Certainly, Miss Pryse." He rose in sudden 
 confusion. "I — I beg your pardon. I was 
 thinking of something else." 
 
 It was only Naomi's pardon that he begged.
 
 134 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA, 
 
 He had not looked twice at Gilroy ; but as he 
 rounded the corner of the building, he glanced 
 sharply over his shoulder. He could not help 
 it. He felt instinctively that a glimpse of their 
 lovers' greeting would do something towards 
 his cure. All that he saw, however, was 
 Naomi with her back to the wall, and her hands 
 laid firmly upon the wicker chair -back where 
 her head had rested a moment before. Across 
 this barrier Gilroy had opened so vehement 
 a fire upon her that Engelhardt thought twice 
 about leaving them alone together. As he 
 hesitated, however, the girl shot him a glance 
 which commanded him to be gone, while it as 
 plainly intimated her perfect ability to take 
 care of herself. 
 
 Once out of her sight, the piano-tuner turned 
 a resolute back upon the homestead, deter- 
 mining to get right away from it for the time 
 being — to get away and to think. He did not, 
 however, plunge into the plantation of pines, 
 in which Naomi and he had often wandered 
 during these last few days, that seemed a happy 
 lifetime to him now that he felt they were over. 
 He took the broad, sandy way which led past 
 the stables to the men's hut on the left, and to
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. 1 35 
 
 the stock-yards on the right. Behind the yards 
 the sun was setting, the platform for the pithing 
 of bullocks, and the windlass for raising their 
 carcases, standing out sharp and black against 
 the flaming sky ; and still further to the right, 
 where there were sheep -yards also, a small 
 yellow cloud rose against the pink like a pillar 
 of sand. Engelhardt knew little enough of 
 station life, but he saw that somebody was 
 yarding- up a mob of sheep for the night. He 
 went on to have a look at the job, which was 
 over, however, before he reached the spot. 
 Three horses were trotting off in the direction 
 of the horse-paddock, while, coming away from 
 the yard, carrying their saddles and bridles, 
 were two of the station hands and the overseer, 
 Tom Chester. 
 
 " Hulloa, Engelhardt, still here?" said the 
 latter, cheerily, as they met. "How goes the 
 arm ? " 
 
 " First-rate, thanks. I 'm off to-morrow." 
 "Yes? Come on back to the homestead, 
 and help me shave and brush up. I 've been 
 mustering seventeen miles from the shed. 
 We've run the mob into these yards for the 
 night, and I 'm roosting in the barracks."
 
 136 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " So is Mr. Gilroy, I fancy." 
 
 "The devil he is! Has he come in from 
 the shed, then ? " 
 
 " Yes ; within the last ten minutes." 
 
 Chester looked black. 
 
 " You didn't hear what for, I suppose ? " 
 
 " To speak to Miss Pryse about some im- 
 portant matter ; that 's all I know." 
 
 •* I should have thought they 'd had enough 
 to say to each other yesterday, to last Gilroy 
 for a bit. I 'm mustering, you know ; but I 
 heard all about it when I got back to the shed 
 last night. Some of the men came to me in a 
 sort of deputation. They hate Gilroy about 
 as much as I do, and they want him out of 
 that. If he's a sensible man he's come in 
 to chuck up the sponge himself." 
 
 Tom Chester flung his saddle and bridle 
 over the rail as they passed the stable, and 
 walked on to the station-yard, and across it to 
 the little white barracks, without another word. 
 Engelhardt followed him into his room and 
 sat down on the bed. He felt that they under- 
 stood one another. That was what made him 
 say, while Chester was stropping his razor ; 
 
 "You don't love Gilroy, I imagine."
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. I37 
 
 " No, I don't," replied Tom Chester, after a 
 pause. 
 
 " But Miss Pryse does ! " Engelhardt ex- 
 claimed bitterly. 
 
 The other made a longer pause. He was 
 lathering his chin. *' Not she," said Tom, 
 coolly, at length. 
 
 " Not! But she's engaged to him, I hear.-*" 
 
 " There 's a sort of understanding." 
 
 " Only an understanding ? " 
 
 "Well, she doesn't wear a ring, for one 
 thing." 
 
 " I wish you would tell me just how it stands," 
 said Engelhardt, inquisitively. His heart was 
 beating, nevertheless. 
 
 " Tell you ? " said Tom Chester, looking 
 only into the glass as he flourished his razor. 
 " Why, certainly. I don't wonder at your 
 wanting to know how a fine girl like that could 
 go and engage herself to a God-forsaken image 
 like Gilroy. / don't know, mind you. I 
 wasn't here in Mr. Pryse's time ; but everyone 
 says he was a good sort, and that the worst 
 thing he ever did was to take on Gilroy, just 
 because he was some sort of relation of his 
 dead wife's. He's second cousin to Miss
 
 138 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Pryse, that 's what Gilroy is ; but he was 
 overseer here when the boss was his own 
 manager, and when he died Gilroy got the 
 management, naturally. Well, and then he 
 got the girl too — the Lord knows how. She 
 knew that her father thought well of the 
 skunk, and no doubt she herself felt it was 
 the easiest way out of her responsibilities 
 and difficulties. Ay, she was a year or two 
 younger then than she is now, and he got 
 the promise of her ; but I '11 bet you an even 
 dollar he never gets her to keep." 
 
 The piano-tuner had with difficulty sat still 
 upon the bed, as he listened to this seemingly 
 impartial version of the engagement which 
 had numbed his spirit from the moment he 
 heard of it. Tom Chester had spoken with 
 many pauses, filled by the tinkle of his razor 
 against a healthy beard three days old. When 
 he offered to bet the dollar, he was already 
 putting the razor away in its case. 
 
 " I won't take you," said Engelhardt. "You 
 don't think she'll marry him, then.'*" he added, 
 anxiously. 
 
 " Tar here on the brisket," remarked 
 Chester, in the shearer's formula, as he dabbed
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. 1 39 
 
 at a cut that he had discovered under his 
 right jaw. " What 's that .-* Marry him.-* No; 
 of course she won't." 
 
 Engelhardt waited while the overseer per- 
 formed elaborate ablutions and changed his 
 clothes. Then they crossed over together to 
 the front verandah, which was empty ; but as 
 they went round to the back the sound of 
 voices came fast enough to their ears. The 
 owner and her manager were still talking in 
 the back verandah, which was now in dark- 
 ness, and their voices were still raised. It was 
 Tom Chester's smile, however, that helped 
 Engelhardt to grasp the full significance of 
 the words that met their ears. Gilroy was 
 speaking. 
 
 •'All right, Naomi! You know best, no 
 doubt. You mean to paddle your own canoe, 
 you say, and that 's all very well ; but if Tom 
 Chester remains on at the shed there '11 be 
 a row, I tell you straight." 
 
 " Between whom ? " Naomi inquired. 
 
 " Between Tom Chester and me. I tell you 
 he 's stirring up the men against me ! You 
 yourself did mischief enough yesterday ; but 
 when he came in he made bad worse. It may
 
 140 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 be an undignified thing to do, for the boss of 
 the shed ; but I can't help that, I shall have to 
 fiorht him." 
 
 o 
 
 " Fight whom ?" said Chester, in a tone of 
 interest, as he and Engelhardt came upon the 
 scene together. 
 
 " You," replied Naomi, promptly. " You 
 have arrived in the nick of time, Mr. Chester. 
 I am sorry to hear that you two don't hit it off 
 together at the shed." 
 
 "So that's it, is it?" said Tom Chester, 
 quietly, glancing from the girl to Gilroy, who 
 had not opened his mouth. " And you 're 
 prepared to hit it off somewhere else, are 
 you ? I 'm quite ready. I have been wanting 
 to hit it off with you, Gilroy, ever since I 've 
 known you." 
 
 His meaning was as plain as an italicised 
 joke. They all waited for the manager's reply. 
 
 "Indeed!" said he, at length, out of the 
 kindly dark that hid the colour of his face. 
 " So you expect me to answer you before 
 Miss Pryse, do you.-*" 
 
 "On the contrary, I'd far rather you came 
 down to the stables and answered me there. 
 But you might repeat before Miss Pryse what-
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. I4I 
 
 ever it is you were telling her about me behind 
 my back." 
 
 " I shall do nothing of the sort." 
 
 "Then I must do it for you," said Naomi, 
 
 firmly. 
 
 " Do," said Gilroy. And diving his hands 
 deep into his cross-pockets, he swaggered off 
 the scene with his horse at his heels and his 
 arm through the reins. 
 
 " I think I can guess the kind of thing, 
 Miss Pryse," Tom Chester waited to say ; 
 "you needn't trouble to tell me, thank you." 
 A moment later he had followed the manager, 
 and the piano- tuner was following Tom ; but 
 Naomi Pryse remained where she was. She 
 had not lifted a finger to prevent the fight 
 which, as she saw for herself, was a good deal 
 more imminent than he had imagined who 
 warned her of it five minutes before. 
 
 "Will you take off your coat?" said Chester, 
 as he caught up Gilroy between homestead 
 and stables. 
 
 "Is it likely.'*" queried Gilroy, without look- 
 ing; round. 
 
 " That depends whether you 're a man. 
 The light's the same for both. There are
 
 142 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 lanterns in the stables, whether or no. Will 
 you take off your coat when we get there ?" 
 
 " To you ? Manager and overseer ? Don't 
 be a fool, Tom." 
 
 "I'll show you who's the fool in a brace of 
 shakes," said Tom Chester, following Gilroy 
 with a swelling chest. " I never thought you 
 had much pluck, but, by God, I don't believe 
 you 've got the pluck of a louse !" 
 
 Gilroy led on his horse without answering. 
 
 "Have you got the pluck of a louse.'*" the 
 overseer sang into his ear. Gilroy was trem- 
 bling, but he turned as they reached the stable. 
 
 "Take off your coat, then," said he doggedly; 
 " I'll leave mine inside." 
 
 Gilroy led his horse into the stable. Instead 
 of taking off his coat, however, Tom Chester 
 stood waiting with his arms akimbo and his 
 eyes upon the open stable door. 
 
 "Aren't you going to take it off?" said an 
 eager yet nervous voice at his side. " Don't 
 you mean to fight him after all ? " 
 
 It was the piano-tuner, whose desire to see 
 the manager soundly thrashed was at war with 
 his innate dread of anything approaching a 
 violent scene. He could be violent himself
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. I43 
 
 when his blood was up, but in his normal 
 state the mere sound of high words made him 
 miserable. 
 
 "Hulloa! I didn't see that you were there," 
 remarked Chester, with a glance at the queer 
 little figure beside him, " Lord, yes ; I '11 fight 
 him if he 's game, but I won't believe that till I 
 see it, so we '11 let him strip first. The fellow 
 
 hasn't got the pluck of I knew he hadn't ! 
 
 That's just what I should have expected of 
 him ! " 
 
 Before Engelhardt could realise what was 
 happening, a horse had emerged from the 
 shadow of the stable door, a man's head and 
 wide-awake had risen behind its ears as they 
 cleared the lintel, and Gilroy, with a smack of 
 his whip on the horse's flank, and a cut and a 
 curse at Tom Chester, was disappearing in the 
 dusk at a gallop. Chester had sprung forward, 
 but he was not quick enough. When the cut 
 had fallen short of him, he gathered himself 
 together for one moment, as though to give 
 chase on foot ; then stood at ease and watched 
 the rider out of sight. 
 
 " Next time, my friend," said he, " you won't 
 get the option of standing up to me. No ; by
 
 144 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA, 
 
 the Lord, I '11 take him by the scruff of his 
 dirty neck, and I '11 take the very whip he 's 
 got in his hand now, and I '11 hide him within 
 an inch of his miserable life. That 's the way 
 we treat curs in these parts, d 'ye see ? Come 
 on, Engelhardt. No, we'll stop and see which 
 road he takes when he gets to the gate. I can 
 just see him opening it now. I might have 
 caught him up there if I 'd thought. Ah ! he 's 
 shaking his fist at us ; he shall smell mine 
 before he 's a day older ! And he 's taken 
 the township track ; he '11 come back to the 
 shed as drunk as a fool, and if the men don't 
 dip him in the dam I shall be very much 
 surprised." 
 
 "And Miss Pryse is going to marry a 
 creature like that ! " cried Engelhardt, as they 
 walked back to the house. 
 
 " Not she," said Chester, confidently. 
 
 "Yet there's a sort of engagement." 
 
 " There is ; but it would be broken off to- 
 morrow if I were to tell Miss Pryse to-night 
 of the mess he 's making of everything out at 
 the shed. The men do what they like with 
 him, and he goes dropping upon the harmless 
 inoffensive ones, and fining them and running
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. I45 
 
 their sheep ; whereas he daren 't have said a 
 word to that fellow Simons, not to save his 
 life. I tell you there 'd have been a strike 
 last night if it hadn 't been for me. The men 
 appealed to me, and I said what I thought. 
 So his nibs sends me mustering again, about 
 as far off as he can, while he comes in to 
 get Miss Pryse to give me the sack. Of 
 course that 's what he 's been after. That 's 
 the kind of man he is. But here's Miss Pryse 
 herself in the verandah, and we '11 drop the 
 subject, d 'ye see ? " 
 
 Naomi herself never mentioned it. Possibly 
 from the verandah she had seen and heard 
 enough to enable her to guess the rest pretty 
 accurately. However that may be, the name 
 of Monty Gilroy never passed her lips, either 
 now in the interval before dinner, or at that 
 meal, during which she conversed very merrily 
 with the two young men who faced one 
 another on either side of her. She insisted 
 on carving for them both, despite the protests 
 of the more talkative of the two. She 
 rattled on to them incessantly — if anything, to 
 Engelhardt more than to the overseer. But 
 there could be no question as to which of these 
 
 L
 
 146 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 two talked most to her. Engelhardt was even 
 more shy and awkward than at his first meal 
 at Taroomba, when Naomi had not been 
 present. He disappeared immediately after 
 dinner, and Naomi had to content herself with 
 Tom Chester's company for the rest of the 
 evening. 
 
 That, however, was very good company at 
 all times, while on the present occasion Miss 
 Pryse had matters for discussion with her 
 overseer which rendered a private interview 
 quite necessary. So Engelhardt was not 
 wanted for at least an hour ; but he did not 
 come back at all. When Chester went whist- 
 ling to the barracks at eleven o'clock he found 
 the piano-tuner lying upon his bed in all his 
 clothes. 
 
 " Hulloa, my son, are you sick?" said Tom, 
 entering the room. The risen moon was shin- 
 ing into it on all sides of the looking-glass. 
 
 "No, I'm well enough, thanks. I felt rather 
 sleepy." 
 
 "You don't sound sleepy! Miss Pryse was 
 wondering what could be the matter. She 
 told me to tell you that you might at least 
 have said good-night to her."
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. 147 
 
 " I '11 go and say it now," cried Engelhardt, 
 boundincr from the bed. 
 
 " Ah, now you 're too late, you see," said 
 Chester, laughing a little unkindly as he barred 
 the doorway. " You didn't suppose I 'd come 
 away before I was obliged, did you ? Come 
 into my room, and I '11 tell you a bit of news." 
 
 The two rooms were close together ; they 
 were divided by the narrow passage that led 
 without step or outer door into the station 
 yard. It was a lined, set face that the candle 
 lighted up when Tom Chester put a match to 
 it ; but that was only the piano-tuner's face, 
 and Tom stood looking at his own, and the 
 smile in the glass was peculiar and character- 
 istic. It was not conceited ; it was merely 
 confident. The overseer of Taroomba was 
 one of the smartest, most resolute, and con- 
 fident young men in the back-blocks of New 
 South Wales. 
 
 " The news," he said, turning away from 
 the glass and undoing his necktie, " may 
 surprise you, but I 've expected it all along. 
 Didn't I tell you before dinner that Miss 
 Pryse would be breaking off her rotten 
 engagement one of these days ? Well,
 
 148 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 then, she 's been and done it this very after- 
 
 noon." 
 
 " Thank God ! " cried Engelhardt. 
 
 " Amen," echoed Chester, with a laugh. 
 He had paid no attention to the piano-tuner's 
 tone and look. He was winding a keyless 
 watch. 
 
 " And is he going on here as manager ? " 
 Engelhardt asked presently. 
 
 " No, that 's the point. Naomi seems to 
 have told him pretty straight that she could 
 get along without him, and on second thoughts 
 he's taken her at her word. She got a note 
 an hour ago to say she would never see him 
 again. He'd sent a chap with it all the way 
 from the township." 
 
 " Do you mean to say he isn't coming 
 back ? " 
 
 "That's the idea. You bet he had it 
 when he shook his fist at us as he opened 
 that gate. He was shaking his fist at the 
 station and all hands on the place, particu- 
 larly including the boss. She's to send his 
 things and his cheque after him to the town- 
 ship, where they'll find him drunk, you mark 
 my words. Good riddance to the cur! Of
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. I49 
 
 course, he was going to marry her for her 
 money ; but she 's tumbled to him in time, 
 and a miss is as good as a mile any day 
 in the week." 
 
 He finished speaking and winding his watch 
 at the same moment. It was a gold watch, 
 and he set it down carelessly on the dressing- 
 table, where the candle shone upon the mono- 
 srram on its back. 
 
 o 
 
 *' He has nothing of his own ? " queried 
 Engelhardt, with jealous eyes upon the 
 watch. 
 
 " Not a red cent," said Tom Chester con- 
 temptuously. "He lived upon the old boss, 
 and of course he meant to live upon his 
 daughter after him. He was as poor as a 
 church-mouse." 
 
 So indeed was the piano-tuner. He did 
 not say as much, however, though the words 
 had risen to his lips. He said no more until 
 the overseer was actually in bed. Then a 
 flash of inspiration caused him to ask abruptly — 
 
 " Are you anything to do with Chester, 
 Wilkinson, and Killick, the big wool-people 
 down in Melbourne ? " 
 
 " To do with em ? " repeated Tom with
 
 150 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 a smile. " Well, yes ; at least, I 'm Chester's 
 
 son." 
 
 "I 've heard that you own more Riverina 
 stations than any other firm or company ? " 
 
 " Yes ; this is about the only one around 
 here that we haven't got a finger in. That's 
 why I came here, by the way, for a bit of 
 experience." 
 
 " Then you don't want to marry her for her 
 money. You '11 have more than she ever will ! 
 Isn't that so ? " 
 
 " What the blue blazes do you mean, 
 Engelhardt ? " 
 
 Chester had sat bolt upright in his bed. 
 The piano-tuner was still on the foot of it, 
 and all the fire in his being had gone into 
 his eyes. 
 
 "Mean?" he cried. "Who cares what / 
 mean.-^ I tell you that she thinks more of 
 you than ever she thought of Gilroy. She 
 has said so to me in as many words. I tell 
 you to go in and win ! " 
 
 He was holding out his left hand. 
 
 " I intend to," said Tom Chester, taking it 
 good-naturedly enough. " That 's exactly my 
 game, and everybody must know it, for I 've
 
 NO HOPE FOR HIM. 151 
 
 been playing it fair and square in the light 
 of day. I may lose ; but I hope to win. 
 Good-night, Engelhardt. Shall I look you 
 up in the morning? We make a very early 
 start, mind." 
 
 " Then you needn't trouble. But I do wish 
 you luck ! " 
 
 " Thanks, my boy. I wish myself luck 
 too."
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 MISSING. 
 
 NAOMI'S room opened upon the back 
 verandah, and in quitting it next 
 morning it was not unnatural that she should 
 pause to contemplate the place where so many 
 things had lately happened, which, she felt, 
 must leave their mark upon her life for good 
 or evil. It was here that she might have seen 
 the danger of unreserved sympathy with so 
 sensitive and enthusiastic a nature as that of 
 the piano-tuner. Indeed, she had seen it, and 
 made suitable resolutions on the spot ; but 
 these she had broken, and wilfully shut her 
 eyes to that danger until the young man had 
 told her, quite plainly enough, that he loved 
 her. Nay, she had made him tell her that, 
 and until he did so she had purposely withheld 
 from him the knowledge that she was already 
 
 »5a
 
 MISSING. 153 
 
 engaged. That was the cruel part of it, the 
 part of which she was now most sincerely- 
 ashamed. Yet some power stronger than her 
 own will had compelled her to act as she had 
 done, and certainly she had determined before- 
 hand to take the first opportunity of severing 
 all ties still existing between herself and Monty 
 Gilroy. And it was here that she had actually 
 broken off her engagement with him within a few 
 minutes of her announcement of it to Hermann 
 Engelhardt. Still she was by no means pleased 
 with herself as she stepped out into the flood 
 of sunshine that filled the back verandah of 
 a morning, and saw everything as it had been 
 overniofht, even to the book she had laid aside 
 open when Gilroy rode up. It was lying shut 
 in the self-same spot. This little difference 
 was the only one. 
 
 She went round to the front of the house, 
 looking out rather nervously for Engelhardt 
 on the way. Generally he met her in the 
 front verandah, but this morning he was not 
 there. Mrs. Potter was laying the breakfast- 
 table, but she had not seen him either. She 
 looked searchingly at her young mistress as she 
 answered her question.
 
 154 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "Are you quite well, miss?" she asked 
 at length, without preamble. "You look 
 as though you hadn't slep' a wink all 
 night." 
 
 " No more I have," said Naomi calmly. 
 
 " Good gracious, miss ! " cried Mrs. Potter, 
 clapping down the plate-basket with a jingle. 
 " Whatever has been the matter ? That nasty 
 toothache, I '11 be bound ! " 
 
 " No, it wasn't a tooth this time. I may as 
 well tell you what it was," added Naomi, 
 " since you 're bound to know sooner or later. 
 Well, then, Mr. Gilroy has left the station for 
 good, and I am not ever going to marry him. 
 That 'sail." 
 
 "And I'm thankful " 
 
 Mrs. Potter checked herself with a gulp. 
 
 "So am I," said her mistress, dryly; "but 
 it's a little exciting, and I let it keep me 
 awake. You are to pack up his boxes, please, 
 so that I may send them to the township in the 
 spring-cart. But now make haste with the tea, 
 for I need a cup badly, and I '11 go and sing out 
 to Mr. Engelhardt. Did you call him, by the 
 way ? " 
 
 "Yes, miss, I called him as usual."
 
 MISSING. 155 
 
 Naomi left the breakfast- room, and was 
 absent some three or four minutes. She came 
 back looking somewhat scared. 
 
 " I 've called him, too," she said, " at the top 
 of my voice. But there 's no making him hear 
 anything. I 've hammered at his door and at 
 his window too ; both are shut, as if he wasn't 
 up. I do wish that you would come and see 
 whether he is." 
 
 A moment later Mrs. Potter was crossing the 
 sandy yard, with Naomi almost treading on her 
 ample skirts until they reached the barracks, 
 which the elderly woman entered alone. No 
 sooner, however, had she opened Engelhardt's 
 door, than she called her mistress to the spot. 
 The room was empty. It was clear at a 
 glance that the bed had not been slept in. 
 
 "If he hasn't gone away and left us without 
 a word ! " cried Mrs. Potter indignantly. 
 
 " I am looking for his valise," said Naomi. 
 " Where has he generally kept it ? " 
 
 "Just there underneath the dressing-table. 
 He has taken it with him. There's nothing 
 belonging him in the room ! " 
 
 " Except that half-crown under the tumbler, 
 which is evidently meant for you. No, Mrs.
 
 156 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Potter, I 'm afraid you 're right The half- 
 crown settles it. I should take it if I were 
 you. And now I '11 have my breakfast, if you 
 please." 
 
 " But, miss, I can't understand " 
 
 "No more can I. Make the tea at once, 
 please. A little toast is all that I require 
 with it." 
 
 And Naomi went slowly back towards the 
 house, but stopped half way, with bent head 
 and attentive eyes, and then went slower still. 
 She had discovered in the sand the print of 
 feet in stockings only. These tracks led up to 
 the verandah, where they ended opposite the 
 sitting-room door, which Naomi pushed open 
 next moment. The room wore its ordinary 
 appearance, but the pile of music which 
 Engelhardt had brought with him for sale had 
 been removed from the top of the piano to the 
 music-stool ; and lying conspicuously across 
 the music, Naomi was mortified to find a silk 
 handkerchief of her own, which the piano- 
 tuner had worn all the week as a sling for 
 his arm. She caught it up with an angry 
 exclamation, and in doing so caught sight of 
 some obviously left-handed writing on the
 
 MISSING, 157 
 
 topmost song of the pile. She stooped and 
 read — 
 
 " These songs for Miss Pryse, with deep 
 gratitude for all her kindness to Her- 
 mann EngelhardtT 
 
 It was a pale, set face that Mrs. Potter 
 found awaiting her in the breakfast-room 
 when the toast was ready and the tea made. 
 Very little of the toast was eaten, and Mrs. 
 Potter saw no more of her young mistress 
 until the mid-day meal, to which Naomi sat 
 down in her ridinor-habit. 
 
 "Just wait, Mrs. Potter," said she, hastily 
 helping herself to a chop. " Take a chair 
 yourself I want to speak to you." 
 
 " Very good, miss," said the old lady, sitting 
 down. 
 
 " I want to know when you last set eyes on 
 Sam Rowntree." 
 
 " Let me see, miss. Oh, yes, I remember ; 
 it was about this time yesterday. He came 
 to the kitchen, and told me he was going 
 to run up a fresh mob of killing-sheep out 
 of Top Scrubby, and how much meat 
 could I do with ? I said half a sheep, at
 
 158 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 the outside, and that was the last I saw of 
 him." 
 
 "He never came near you last night ? " 
 
 " That he didn't, miss. I was looking out 
 for him. I wanted " 
 
 " You didn't see him in the distance, or hear 
 him whistling ? " 
 
 " No, indeed I didn't." 
 
 "Well, he seems to have vanished into 
 space," said Naomi, pushing away her plate 
 and pouring out a cup of tea. 
 
 "It's too bad," said Mrs. Potter, with 
 sympathy and indignation in equal parts. " I 
 can't think what he means — to go and leave 
 us alone like this." 
 
 " I can't think what Mr. Chester meant by 
 not telling me that he was gone," remarked 
 Naomi, hotly. 
 
 " I 'xpect he knew nothing about it, miss. 
 He went off before daylight, him and the two 
 men that come in with the sheep they was to 
 take on to the shed." 
 
 " How can you know that?" inquired Naomi, 
 with a touch of irritation. Her tea was very 
 hot, and she was evidently in a desperate 
 hurry.
 
 MISSING. 159 
 
 " Because Mr. Chester asked me to put his 
 breakfast ready for him overnight ; and I did, 
 too, and when I got up at six he'd had it and 
 gone long ago. The teapot was cold. The 
 men had gone, too, for I gave 'em their 
 suppers last night, and they asked for a snack 
 to take before their early start this morning. 
 They must all have got away by five. They 
 wouldn't hardly try to disturb Sam so early as 
 all that ; so they weren't to know he wasn't 
 there." 
 
 " Well, he wasn't," said Naomi, " and it 's 
 disgraceful, that's what it is! Here we are 
 without a man on the place, and there are 
 nearly a hundred at the shed ! I have had to 
 catch a horse, and saddle it for myself." As 
 she spoke Naomi made a last gulp at her hot 
 tea, and then jumped up from the table. 
 
 " You are going to the shed, miss ? " 
 
 " No ; to the township." 
 
 " Ah, that 's where you '11 find him ! " 
 
 " I hope I may," said Naomi, softly, and her 
 eyes were far away. She was in the verandah, 
 buttoning her gloves. 
 
 " I meant Sam Rowntree, miss." 
 
 Naomi blushed.
 
 l6o THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "/meant Mr. Engelhardt," said she, stoutly. 
 "They are probably both there; but I have no 
 doubt at all about Mr. Engelhardt. I am going 
 to fetch the mail, but I hope I shall see that 
 young gentleman too, so that I may have an 
 opportunity of telling him what I think of 
 him." 
 
 " I should, miss, I should that ! " cried Mrs. 
 Potter, with virtuous wrath. " I should give 
 him a piece of my mind about his way of 
 treating them that's good and kind to him. 
 I 'm sure, miss, the notice you took of that 
 young man " 
 
 " Come, I don't think he 's treated you so 
 badly," interrupted Naomi, tartly. " Moreover, 
 I am quite sure that he must have had some 
 reason for going off so suddenly. I am curious 
 to know what it was, and also what he expects 
 me to do with his horse. If he had waited till 
 this morning I would have sent him in with 
 the buggy, and saved him a good old tramp. 
 However, you don't mind being left in charge 
 for an hour or so —eh, Mrs. Potter } No one 
 ever troubles the homestead during shearing, 
 you know." 
 
 " Oh, I shall be all right, miss, thank you,"
 
 MISSING. l6l 
 
 Mrs. Potter said cheerfully ; and she followed 
 Naomi out into the yard, and watched her, in 
 the distance, drag a box out of the saddle-room, 
 mount from it, and set off at a canter towards 
 the horse-paddock gate. 
 
 But Naomi did not canter all the way. She 
 performed the greater part of her ride at a 
 quiet amble, leaning forward in her saddle 
 most of the time, and deciding what she 
 should say to the piano-tuner, while she 
 searched the ground narrowly for his tracks. 
 She had the eagle eye for the trail of man or 
 beast, which is the natural inheritance of all 
 children of the bush. Before saddling the 
 night-horse, she had made it her business to 
 discover every print of a stocking sole that 
 had been left about the premises during the 
 night ; and there were so many that she had 
 now a pretty definite idea of the movements 
 of her visitor prior to his final departure from 
 the station. He had spent some time in aim- 
 less wandering about the moonlit yard. Then 
 he had stood outside the kitchen, just where 
 she had left him standing on the night of his 
 arrival ; and afterwards had crossed the fence, 
 just where they had crossed it together, and 
 
 M
 
 1 62 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 steered the very same course through the pines 
 which she had led him that first evening. Still 
 in his stockings, carrying his boots in his one 
 hand and his valise under that arm (for she came 
 to a place where he had dropped one boot, and, 
 in picking it up, the valise also), he had worked 
 round to the back verandah, and sat long on 
 the edge, with his two feet in the soft sand, 
 staring out over the scrub-covered, moonlit 
 plain, just as he had sat staring many a time in 
 broad daylight. Of all this Naomi was as 
 certain as though she had seen it, because it 
 was child's play to her to follow up the trail of 
 his stockinged feet and to sort them out from 
 all other tracks. But it ought to have been 
 almost as easy to trace him in his boots on the 
 well-beaten road to the township, and it was 
 not. 
 
 The girl grew uncomfortable as she rode 
 on and on without ever striking the trail ; and 
 the cutting sentences which she had prepared 
 for the piano-tuner escaped her mind long 
 before she reached the township, and found, 
 as she now expected, that nobody answer- 
 ing to his description had been seen in the 
 vicinity.
 
 MISSING. 163 
 
 Naomi was not the one to waste time in 
 a superfluity of inquiries. She saw in a 
 moment that Engelhardt had not been near 
 the place, and a similar fact was even more 
 easily ascertained in the matter of Sam 
 Rowntree. The township people knew him 
 well. His blue fly-veil had not enlivened 
 their hotel verandahs for a whole week. So 
 Naomi received her mail -bag and rode off 
 without dismounting. A glimpse which she 
 had caught of a red beard, at the other side 
 of the broad sandy road, and the sound of 
 a well-known voice shouting thickly, added 
 to her haste. And on this journey she never 
 once drew rein until her horse cantered 
 into the long and sharp-cut shadows of the 
 Taroomba stables. 
 
 As Naomi dismounted, Mrs. Potter emerged 
 from the homestead verandah. The good 
 woman had grown not a little nervous in her 
 loneliness. Her looks as she came up were in 
 striking contrast to those of her mistress. The 
 one was visibly relieved ; the other had come 
 back ten times more anxious than she had 
 gone away. 
 
 " No one been near you, Mrs. Potter?"
 
 164 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Not a soul, miss. Oh, but it's good to see 
 you back ! I thought the afternoon was never 
 coming to an end." 
 
 " They are neither of them at the township," 
 said Naomi with a miserable sigh. "Nor have 
 they been there at all — neither Mr. Engelhardt 
 nor Sam Rowntree!" 
 
 Mrs. Potter cudgelled her poor brains for 
 some — for any — kind of explanation. 
 
 " Sam did tell me " — she had begun, when 
 she was promptly shut up. 
 
 " Who cares about Sam ?" cried Naomi. 
 *' He 's a good bushman ; he can take care of 
 himself Besides, wherever he is, Sam isn't 
 bushed. But anything may have happened 
 to Mr. Engelhardt !" 
 
 "What do you think has happened?" the 
 old lady asked inanely. 
 
 " How am I to know ?" was the wild 
 answer. " I have nothing to go on. I know 
 no more than you do." 
 
 Yet she stood thinking hard, with her horse 
 still bridled and the reins between her fingers. 
 She had taken off the saddle. Suddenly she 
 slipped the reins over a hook and disappeared 
 into the saddle-room. And in a few moments
 
 MISSING. 165 
 
 she was back, with a blanched face, and in her 
 arms a packed vaHse. 
 
 *' Is this Mr. Engelhardt's ?" 
 
 Mrs. Potter took one look at it. 
 
 " It is," she said. " Yes, it is his !" 
 
 "Take it, then," said Naomi, mastering her 
 voice with difficulty, "while I hunt up his 
 saddle and bridle. If they are gone, all the 
 better. Then I shall know he has his horse ; 
 and with a horse nothing much can happen 
 to one." 
 
 She disappeared again, and was gone a 
 little longer; but this time she came back 
 desperately self-possessed. 
 
 " I have found his saddle. His bridle is not 
 there at all. I know it 's his saddle, because 
 it's a pretty good one, and all our decent 
 saddles are in use; besides, they all have the 
 station brand upon them. This one has no 
 brand at all. It must be Mr. Engelhardt's ; 
 and now I know exactly what he has done. 
 Shall I tell you ?" 
 
 Mrs. Potter clasped her hands. 
 
 " He has taken his bridle," said Naomi, 
 still in a deadly calm, " and he has set out 
 to catch his horse. How he could do such
 
 1 66 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 a thing I can't conceive! He knows the run 
 of our horse-paddock no more than you do. 
 He has failed to find his horse, tried to come 
 back, and got over the fence into Top 
 Scrubby. You don't know what that means! 
 Top Scrubby 's the worst paddock we have. 
 It's half- full of mallee, it's six miles whichever 
 way you take it, and the only drop of water 
 in it is the tank at the township corner. Or 
 he may be in the horse-paddock all the time. 
 People who don't know the bush may walk 
 round and round in a single square mile all 
 day long, and- until they drop. But it's no 
 good our talking here ; wherever he is, I 
 mean to find him." 
 
 As she spoke she caught her saddle from 
 the rail across which she had placed it, and 
 was for flinging it on to her horse again, 
 when Mrs. Potter interposed. The girl was 
 trembling with excitement. The sun was fast 
 sinking into the sand and scrub away west. 
 In half an hour it would be dark. 
 
 " And no moon till ten or eleven," said 
 Mrs. Potter, with sudden foresight and firm- 
 ness. "You mustn't think of it, miss; yon 
 mustn't, indeed ! "
 
 MISSING. 167 
 
 " How can you say that ? Why should 
 you stop me? Do you mean me to leave 
 the poor fellow to perish for want of water ? " 
 
 " My dear, you could do no good in the 
 dark," said Mrs. Potter, speaking as she had 
 not spoken to Naomi since the latter was a 
 little girl. " Besides, neither you nor the 
 horse is fit for anything more until you've 
 both had something to eat and drink." 
 
 "It's true!" 
 
 Naomi said this in helpless tones and with 
 hopeless looks. As she spoke, however, her 
 eyes fastened themselves upon the crimson 
 ball just clear of the horizon, and all at once 
 they filled with tears. Hardly conscious of 
 what she did or said, she lifted up her arms 
 and her voice to the sunset. 
 
 " Oh, my poor fellow ! My poor boy ! If 
 only I knew where you were — if only I could 
 see you now I"
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 LOST IN THE BUSH. 
 
 HAD Naomi seen him then she would have 
 found some difficulty in recognising 
 Hermann Engelhardt, the little piano-tuner 
 whom already she seemed to have known all 
 her life. Yet she had made a singularly shrewd 
 guess at his whereabouts. Top Scrubby held 
 him fast enough. And when Naomi stretched 
 her arms towards the sunset, it is a strange 
 fact that she also stretched them towards the 
 lost young man, who was lying between it and 
 her, not three miles from the spot on which 
 she stood. 
 
 Within a mile of him ran the horse-paddock 
 fence, which he had crossed by mistake at 
 three o'clock that morning. He had never 
 seen it again. All day he had wandered 
 without striking track, or fence, or water. 
 Once indeed his heart had danced at the 
 
 i6S
 
 LOST IN THE BUSH. 169 
 
 sudden revelation of footprints under his 
 very nose. They were crisp and clean and 
 obviously recent. All at once they took a 
 fatally familiar appearance. Slowly he lifted 
 his right foot and compared the mark of it 
 with the marks he had discovered. They 
 were identical. To put the matter beyond a 
 doubt he got both his feet into a couple of 
 the old footprints. They fitted like pipes 
 in a case. And then he knew that he was 
 walking in circles, after the manner of lost 
 men, and that he stood precisely where he 
 had been three hours before. 
 
 That was a bitter moment. There were 
 others and worse before sundown. The worst 
 of all was about the time when Naomi flung; 
 out her arms and cried aloud in her trouble. 
 
 His staggering steps had brought him at 
 last, near sundown, within sight of a ridge 
 of pines which he seemed to know. The 
 nearer he came to them the surer did he 
 become that they were the station pines 
 themselves. Footsore and faint and parched 
 as he was, he plucked up all his remaining 
 strength to reach those pines alive. If he 
 were to drop down now it would be shameful,
 
 170 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 and he deserved to die. So he did not drop 
 until he gained the ridge, and found the pines 
 merely the outer ranks of a regular phalanx of 
 mallee scrub. There was no mallee among the 
 station pines. Nor would it have been possible 
 to get so near to the homestead without 
 squeezing through the wires of two fences 
 at least. He had made a hideous and yet 
 a fatuous mistake, and, when he realised it, 
 he flung himself on his face in the shade of 
 a hop-bush and burst into tears. To think 
 that he must perish miserably after all, when, 
 not five minutes since, he had felt the bottle- 
 neck of the water-bag against his teeth — the 
 smell of the wet canvas in his nostrils — the 
 shrinking and lightening of the bag between 
 his palms as the deep draught of cold water 
 brought his dead throat to life. 
 
 It was all over now. He turned his face to 
 the sand, and waited sullenly for the end. And 
 presently a crow flew down from a pine, and 
 hopped nearer and nearer to the prostrate 
 body, with many a cautious pause, its wise 
 black head now on one side, now on the other. 
 Was it a dead body or a man asleep ? There 
 would have been no immediate knowing had not
 
 LOST IN THE BUSH. 171 
 
 the crow been advancing between the setting 
 sun and the man. Its shadow was a yard long 
 when it came between Engelhardt's eyes, which 
 were wide open, and the patch of sand that 
 was warm with his breath. An instant later 
 the crow was away with a hoarse scream, 
 and Engelhardt was sitting up with a still 
 hoarser oath upon his lips ; indeed, he was 
 inarticulate even to his own ears ; but he 
 found himself shaking his only fist at the 
 crow, now a mere smut upon the evening sky, 
 and next moment he was tottering to his feet. 
 
 He could hardly stand. His eyes were 
 burning, his tongue swollen, his lips cracking 
 like earth in a drought. He was aching, too, 
 from head to foot, but he was not yet food for 
 the crows. He set his teeth, and shook his 
 head once or twice. Not yet — not yet. 
 
 The setting sun made a lane of light 
 through the pines and mallee. The piano- 
 tuner looked right and left along this lane, 
 wondering which way to turn. He had no 
 prejudice in the matter. All day he had 
 been making calculations, and all day his 
 calculations had been working out wrong. 
 Like the struggles of a fly in a spider's web,
 
 172 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 each new effort left him more hopelessly 
 entangled than the last. So now, without 
 thinking, for thought was of no avail, he turned 
 his face to the sunset, and, after half an hour's 
 painful stumbling, was a mile further from the 
 station, and a mile deeper in the maze of Top 
 Scrubby. 
 
 Night had fallen now, and the air was cool 
 and sweet. This slightly refreshed him, and 
 the continual chewing of leaves also did him 
 some little good, as indeed it had done all 
 day. But he was becoming troubled with a 
 growing giddiness in addition to his other 
 sufferings, and he well knew that the sands 
 of his endurance were almost run. When 
 the stars came out he once more altered his 
 course, taking a new line by the Southern 
 Cross ; but it could not be for long, he was 
 losing strength with every step. About this 
 time it occurred to him to cut a branch for 
 a staff, but when he took out his knife he 
 was too weak to open the blade. A fatal 
 lassitude was creeping over him. He could 
 no longer think or even worry. Nothing 
 mattered any more ! Naomi — his mother — 
 the plans and aspirations of his own life —
 
 LOST IN THE BUSH. 1 73 
 
 they were all one to him now, and of little 
 account even in the bulk. It had not been 
 so a few hours earlier, but body and mind 
 were failing together, and with no more hope 
 there was but little more regret. His head and 
 his heart grew light together, and when at last 
 he determined to sit down and be done with it 
 all, his greatest care was the choice of a soft 
 and sandy place. It was as though he had 
 been going to lie down for the night instead 
 of for all time. And yet it was this, the mere 
 fad of a wandering mind, that saved him ; for 
 before he had found what he wanted, suddenly 
 — as by a miracle — he saw a light. 
 
 In a flash the man was alive and electrified. 
 All the nerves in his body tightened like harp- 
 strings, and the breath of life swept over them, 
 leaving his heart singing of Naomi and his 
 mother and the deeds to be done in this world. 
 And the thrill remained ; for the light was no 
 phantom of a rocking brain, but a glorious 
 reality that showed brighter and lighter every 
 moment. 
 
 Yet it was a very long way off. He might 
 never reach it at all. But he rushed on with 
 never a look right or left, or up or down, as if
 
 174 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 his one chance of life lay in keeping his grip 
 of that light steadfast and unrelaxed. His 
 headlong course brought him twice to his 
 knees with a thud that shook him to the very- 
 marrow. Once he ran his face into a tangle of 
 small branches, and felt a hot stream flowing 
 over his lips and chin ; he sucked at it as it 
 leapt his lips, and reeled on, thanking heaven 
 that he could still see out of his eyes. The 
 light had grown into a camp-fire, and he could 
 hear men's voices around it. Their faces he 
 could not see — only the leaping, crackling fire. 
 He tried to coo-ee, but no sound would come. 
 The thought crossed him that even now, 
 within sight and ear-shot of his fellow-men, 
 he might drop for good. His heart kept 
 throbbing against his ribs like an egg boiling 
 in a pan, and his every breath was as a man's 
 last gasp. He passed some horses tethered 
 amonof the trees. Then before the fire there 
 stood a stout figure with shaded eyes and 
 pistols in his belt ; another joined him ; then 
 a third, with a rifle ; and the three loomed 
 larger with every stride, until Engelhardt fell 
 sprawling and panting in their midst, his hat 
 gone, his long hair matted upon his forehead,
 
 LOST IN THE BUSH. 175 
 
 and the white face beneath all streaming with 
 sweat and blood. 
 
 " By God, he 's dying ! " said one of the 
 men, flinging away his fire-arm. "Yank us 
 the water - bag, mate, and give the cuss a 
 chance." 
 
 Engelhardt looked up, and saw one of his 
 two enemies, the swagmen, reaching out his 
 hand for the bag. It was the smaller and 
 quieter of the pair — the man with the weather- 
 beaten face and the twinkling eye — and as 
 Engelhardt looked further he saw none other 
 than Simons, the discharged shearer, handing 
 the dripping bag across. But a third hand 
 stretched over and snatched it away with a 
 bellowing curse. 
 
 " What a blessed soft pair you are ! Can't 
 you see who 'e is? It's 'is bloomin' little 
 nibs with the broke arm, and not a damned 
 drop does he get from me ! " 
 
 "Come on. Bill," said the other tramp. 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " He knows why not," said Bill, who, of 
 course, was the stout scoundrel with the 
 squint. " Don't you, sonny ? " And he kicked 
 Engelhardt in the side with his flat foot.
 
 176 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Easy, mate, easy. The beggar 's dying ! " 
 
 "All the better! If he don't look slippy 
 about it I '11 take an' slit his throat for him ! " 
 
 " Well, give him a drop o' water first." 
 
 " Ay, give 'im a drink, whether or no," put 
 in Simons. " No tortures, mate ! The plain 
 thing's good enough for me." 
 
 " And me too ! " 
 
 " Why, Bo's'n," cried Bill, " you 've got no 
 more spunk than a blessed old ewe ! You 
 sailors and shearers are plucky fine chaps to 
 go mates with in a job like ours ! You 
 wouldn't have done for poor old Tigerskin ! " 
 
 "To hell with Tigerskin," said Simons 
 savagely. " We 've heard more than enough 
 of him. Give the beggar a drink, or, by 
 cripes, I 'm off it ! " 
 
 "All right, boys, all right. You needn't 
 get so scotty about it, matey. But he shan't 
 drink more than 's good for 'im, and he shan't 
 drink much at a time, or 'e'll burst 'is skin ! " 
 
 As he spoke Bill uncorked the water-bag, 
 hollowed a filthy palm, flooded it, and held 
 it out to the piano-tuner, who all this time 
 had been sitting still and listening without a 
 word.
 
 LOST IN THE BUSH. 1 77 
 
 "Drink out o' my hand," said he, "or not 
 at all." 
 
 But Engelhardt could only stare at the great 
 hairy paw thrust under his nose. It had no 
 little finger. He was trying to remember 
 what this meant. 
 
 " Drink out o' that, you swine," thundered 
 Bill, " and be damned to you ! " 
 
 Human nature could endure no more. 
 Instead of drinking, Engelhardt knocked the 
 man's hand up, and made a sudden grab at 
 the water-bag. He got it, too, and had 
 swallowed a mouthful before it was plucked 
 away from him. The oaths came pouring out 
 of Bill's mouth like sheep racing through a 
 gate. But the piano-tuner had tasted what 
 was more to him than blood, and he made a 
 second dash at the bag, which resulted in a 
 quantity of water being spilled ; so without 
 struggling any more, he fell upon his face 
 with his lips to the wet sand. 
 
 " Let the joker suck," said Bill ; " I '11 back 
 the sand ! " 
 
 But Engelhardt rolled over on his left side 
 and moved no more. 
 
 Simons knelt over him. 
 
 N
 
 178 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "He's a stiff 'un, mates. My blessed oath 
 he is ! That 's number two, an' both on 'em 
 yours, Bill." 
 
 Bill laughed. 
 
 "That'll be all right," said he. "Where's 
 my pipe got to ? I 'm weakenin' for a 
 smoke."
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 
 
 THERE was life in Engelhardt yet, though 
 for some time he lay as good as dead. 
 The thing that revived him was the name of 
 Naomi Pryse on the lips of the late ringer 
 of the Taroomba shed. The piano-tuner 
 listened for more without daring to open his 
 eyes or to move a muscle. And more came 
 with a horrifying flow of foul words. 
 
 " She had the lip to sack me ! But I '11 be 
 even with her before the night 's out. Yes, 
 by cripes, by sunrise she'll wish she'd never 
 been born!" 
 
 "It's not the girl we're after,' said Bill's 
 voice, with a pause and a spit. "It's the 
 silver." And Engelhardt could hear him 
 puffing at his pipe. 
 
 "It's gold and silver. She's the gold." 
 
 179
 
 l8o THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " I didn't dislike her," said the sailor-man. 
 *' I 'd leave her be.' 
 
 " She didn't sack you from the shed. 
 Twelve pound a week it meant, with that 
 image over the board ! " 
 
 " Bo's'n 'd let the whole thing be, I do 
 believe," said Bill, "if we give 'im 'alf a 
 chance." 
 
 "Not me," said Bo's'n. "I'll stick to my 
 messmates. But we 've stiffened two people 
 already. It 's two too many." 
 
 " What about your skipper down at Sand- 
 ridge ? " 
 
 " Well, I reckon he 's a stiff 'un too." 
 
 "Then none o' your skite, mate," said Bill, 
 knocking out a clay pipe against his heel. 
 " Look ye here, lads ; it 's a blessed Providence 
 that's raked us together, us three. Here's 
 me, straight out o' quod, coming back like a 
 bird to the place where there's a good thing 
 on. Here's Bo's'n, he's bashed in his 
 skipper's skull and cut and run for it. We 
 meet and we pal on. The likeliest pair in 
 the Colony ! And here 's old Simons, knocked 
 cock-eye by this 'ere gal, and swearing revenge 
 by all that's bloody. He has a couple of
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. l8l 
 
 horses too — just the very thing we wanted — 
 so he's our man. Is he on? He is. Do 
 we join hands an' cuss an' swear to see each 
 other through ? We do — all three. Don't 
 we go to the township for a few little 
 necessaries an' have a drink on the whole 
 thing ? We do. Stop a bit ! Doesn't a chap 
 and a horse come our way, first shot off.'* 
 Don't we want another horse, an' take it, too, 
 ay and cook that chap's hash in fit an' proper 
 style ? Of course we do. Then what 's the 
 good o' talking ? Tigerskin used to say ' We '11 
 swing together, matey, or by God we'll drive 
 together in a coach-and-four with yeller panels 
 and half-a-dozen beggars in gold lace and 
 powdered wigs.' So that 's what I say to you. 
 There's that silver. We'll have it and clear 
 out with it at any blessed price. We Ve let out 
 some blood already. A four- hundred -gallon 
 tankful more or less can make no difference 
 now. We can only swing once. So drink 
 up, boys, and make your rotten lives happy 
 while you have 'em. There 's only one thing 
 to settle : whether do we start at eleven, or 
 twelve, or one in the morning ? " 
 
 Engelhardt heard a pannikin passed round
 
 l82 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 and sucked at by all three. Then a match 
 was struck and a pipe lit. His veins were 
 frozen ; he was past a tremor. 
 
 "Eleven's too early," said Simons; "it's 
 getting on for ten already. I 'm for a spell 
 before we start ; there 's nothing like a spell 
 to steady your nerve." 
 
 " I 'd make it eight bells — if not seven," 
 argued the Bo's'n. " The moon '11 be up 
 directly. The lower she is when we start, the 
 better for us. You said the station lay due 
 east, didn't you, Bill ? Then it '11 be easy 
 steering with a low moon." 
 
 The other two laughed. 
 
 "These 'ere sailors," said Bill, "they're a 
 blessed treat. Always in such an almighty 
 funk of getting bushed. I 've known dozens, 
 and they're all alike." 
 
 "There's no fun in it," said the Bo's'n. 
 " Look at this poor devil." 
 
 Engelhardt held his breath. 
 
 " I suppose he is corpsed } " said Bill. 
 
 " Dead as junk." 
 
 " Well, he 's saved us the trouble. I 'd have 
 stuck the beggar as soon as I 'd stick a sheep. 
 There's only one more point, lads. Do we
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 1 83 
 
 knock up her ladyship, and make her let us 
 into the store " 
 
 " Lug her out by her hair," suggested 
 Simons. " I '11 do that part." 
 
 " Or do we smash into it for ourselves ? 
 That's the game Tigerskin an' me tried, ten 
 year ago. It wasn't good enough. You know 
 how it panned out. Still, we ain't got old 
 Pryse to reckon with now. He was a terror, 
 he was ! So what do you say, boys ? Show 
 hands for sticking-up — and now for breaking-in. 
 Then that settles it." 
 
 Engelhardt never knew which way it was 
 settled. 
 
 " The she-devil ! " said Simons. " The little 
 snake ! I can see her now, when she come 
 along the board and sang out for the tar-boy 
 all on her own account. That little deader, 
 there, he was with her. By cripes, if she 
 isn't dead herself by morning she'll wish she 
 was ! I wonder how she '11 look to-night ? 
 Not that way, by cripes, that 's one thing sure ! 
 You leave her to me, mates ! I shall enjoy 
 that part. She shan't die, because that's what 
 she 'd like best ; but she shall apologise to me 
 under my own conditions — you wait and see
 
 184 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 what they are. They'll make you smile. The 
 little devil ! Twelve pound a week ! By 
 cripes, but I '11 make her wish she was as dead 
 as her friend here. I '11 teach her " 
 
 "Stiffen me purple," roared Bill, "if the 
 joker 's not alive after all ! " 
 
 The rogues were sitting round their fire in a 
 triangle, Simons with his back to the supposed 
 corpse : when he looked over his shoulder, 
 there was his dead man glaring at him with 
 eyes like blots of ink on blood-stained paper. 
 
 Engelhardt, in fact, had been physically 
 unable to lie still any longer and hear Naomi 
 so foully threatened and abused. But the 
 moment he sat up he saw his folly, and tried, 
 quick as thought, to balance it by gaping 
 repeatedly in Simons's face. 
 
 " I beg your pardon, I 'm sure," said he, in 
 the civilest manner. " I 'd been asleep, and 
 couldn't think where I was. I assure you I 
 hadn't the least intention of interrupting you." 
 
 His voice was still terribly husky. Bill 
 seized the water-bag and stuck it ostentatiously 
 between his knees. Simons only scowled. 
 
 *' Please go on with what you were saying," 
 said Engelhardt, crawling to the fire and sitting
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 1 85 
 
 down between these two worthies. " All I ask 
 is a drink and a crust. I 've been out all day 
 without bite or sup. Yes, and all last night as 
 well ! That 's all I ask. I am dead tired. 
 I 'd sleep like a stone." 
 
 No one spoke, but presently, without a 
 word, Bill took a pannikin, filled it from the 
 water-bag, and sullenly handed it to the piano- 
 tuner. Then he knifed a great wedge from 
 a damper and tossed it across. Engelhardt 
 could scarcely believe his eyes, so silendy, 
 so unexpectedly was it done. He thanked 
 the fellow with unnecessary warmth, but no 
 sort of notice was taken of his remarks. He 
 was half afraid to touch without express per- 
 mision the water which he needed so sorely. 
 He even hesitated, pannikin in hand, as he 
 looked from one man to the other ; but the 
 villainous trio merely stared at him with fixed 
 eye-balls, and at last he raised it to his lips 
 and swallowed a pint at one draught. 
 
 Even the mouthful he had fought for earlier 
 in the evening — even that drop had sent a 
 fresh stream of vitality swimming through his 
 veins. But this generous draught made a new 
 man of him in ten seconds. He wanted
 
 1 86 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 more, it is true ; but the need was now a mere 
 desire ; and then there was the damper under 
 his eyes. He never knew how hungry he was 
 until he had quenched his thirst and started to 
 eat. Until he had finished the slice of damper, 
 he took no more heed of his companions than 
 a dog with a bone. Bill threw him a second 
 wedge, and this also he devoured without 
 looking up. But his great thirst had never 
 been properly slaked, and the treatment he 
 was now receiving emboldened him to hold 
 out the pannikin for more water. Even this 
 was granted him, but still without a word. 
 Since he had arisen and joined them by the 
 fire, not one of the men had addressed a single 
 remark to him, and his own timid expressions 
 of thanks and attempts at affability had been 
 received al) alike in impenetrable silence. 
 Nor were the ruffians talking among them- 
 selves. They just sat round the fire, their 
 rough faces reddened by the glow, their 
 weapons scintillating in the light, and stared 
 fixedly at the little man who had stumbled 
 among them. Their steady taciturnity soon 
 became as bad to bear as the conversation 
 he had overheard while feigning insensibility.
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 1 87 
 
 There was a kind of sinister contemplation in 
 their looks which was vague, intangible, 
 terrifying. Then their vile plot ringing in his 
 ears, with dark allusions to a crime already 
 committed, made the piano-tuner's position 
 sickening, intolerable. He spoke again, and 
 again received no answer. He announced that 
 he was extremely grateful to them for saving 
 his life, but that he must now push on to the 
 township. They said nothing to this. He 
 wished them good-night ; they said nothing to 
 that. Then he got to his feet, and found 
 himself on the ground again quicker than he 
 had risen. Bill had grabbed him by the ankle, 
 still without a syllable. When Engelhardt 
 looked at him, however, the heavy face and 
 squinting eyes met him with a series of 
 grimaces, so grotesque, so obscene, that he was 
 driven to bury his face in his one free hand, 
 and patiently to await his captors' will. He 
 heard the Bo's'n chuckling ; but for hours, as 
 it seemed to him, that was all. 
 
 "Who is the joker?" said Bill at last. 
 "What does he do for his rations?" 
 
 "They say as 'e ^unes planners," said 
 Simons.
 
 1 88 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Then he don't hang out on Taroomba?" 
 
 *' No ; 'e only come the other day, an' goes 
 an' breaks his arm off of a buck-jumper. So 
 they were saying at the shed." 
 
 "Well, he enjoyed his supper, didn't he? 
 It 's good to see 'em enjoying theirselves 
 when their time is near. Boys, you was 
 right ; it would have been a sin to send 'im 
 to 'ell with an empty belly an' a sandy throat. 
 If ever I come to swing, I '11 swing with a 
 warm meal in my innards, my oath ! " 
 
 Engelhardt held up his head. 
 
 " So you mean to kill me, do you ?" said 
 he, very calmly, but with a kind of scornful 
 indignation. Bill gave him a horrible leer : 
 but no answer. 
 
 " I suppose there 's nothink else for it," said 
 Simons, half regretfully ; " though mark you, 
 mates, I'm none so keen on the kind o' game." 
 
 " No more ain't I," cried the Bo's'n, with 
 vigour. " I'd give the cove a chance, Bill." 
 
 *'How?" said Bill. 
 
 " I'd lash the beggar to a tree and leave him 
 to snuff out for hisself." 
 
 Engelhardt laughed aloud in mock gratitude. 
 
 " Oh, I ain't partickler as to ways," said
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 1 89 
 
 Bill. "One way's as good as another for me. 
 There 's no bloomin' 'urry, any'ow. The moon 
 ain't up yet, and before we go this beggar 's got 
 to tell us things. He heard what we was 
 saying, mates. I seen it in his eye. Didn't 
 you, you swine ?" 
 
 Engelhardt took no kind of notice. 
 
 " Didn't you — you son of a mangy bandi- 
 coot ?" 
 
 Still Engelhardt would have held his tongue; 
 but Bill started kicking him on one side, and 
 Simons on the other ; and the pain evoked an 
 answer in a note of shrill defiance. 
 
 " I did!" he cried. " I heard every word." 
 
 " We 're after that silver." 
 
 " I know you are." 
 
 "You've seen it.f*" 
 
 " I have." 
 
 " Tell us all about it." 
 
 "Not I!" 
 
 For this he got a kick on each side. 
 
 " Is it in the store yet?" 
 
 No answer. 
 
 "Is the chest easy to find ?" 
 
 No answer. 
 
 "Is it covered up ?''
 
 IQO THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Or underground ?" 
 
 " Or made to look like something else?" 
 
 Each man contributed a question ; none 
 elicited a word ; no more did their boots ; it 
 was no use kicking him. 
 
 There was a long pause. Then Bill said — 
 
 " You 've lost your hat. You need another. 
 Here you are." 
 
 He had blundered to his feet, stepped aside 
 out of the ring of light, and spun a wideawake 
 into Engelhardt's lap. He started. It was 
 adorned with a blue silk fly-veil. 
 
 ** Recognise it ?" 
 
 He had recognised it at once ; it was Sam 
 Rowntree's ; and Sam Rowntree had been 
 missing, yesterday, before Engelhardt himself 
 said his secret farewell to the homestead. 
 
 He looked for more. No more was said. 
 The villains had relapsed into that silence 
 which was more eloquent of horror than all 
 their threats. But Bill now flung fresh 
 branches on the fire ; the wood crackled ; the 
 flames spurted starward ; and in the trebled 
 light, Engelhardt, peering among the trees for 
 some further sign of Sam, saw that which 
 set the pores pringling all over his skin.
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. I91 
 
 It was the glint of firelight upon a pair of 
 spurs that hung motionless in the scrub — not 
 a yard from the ground — not ten paces from 
 the fire. 
 
 He looked again : the spurs were fixed to a 
 pair of sidespring boots : the boots hung out 
 of a pair of moleskins, with a few inches of 
 worsted sock in between. All were steady, 
 immovable, as the stars above. He could see 
 no higher than the knees ; but that was 
 enough ; a hoarse cry escaped him, as he 
 pointed with a quivering finger, and turned 
 his white face from man to man. 
 
 Neither Simons nor the Bo's'n would meet 
 his look ; but Bill gripped his arm, with a loud 
 laugh, and dragged him to his feet. 
 
 " Come and have a look at him," he said. 
 *' He isn't pretty, but he '11 do you good." 
 
 Next instant Engelhardt stood close to the 
 suspended body of the unfortunate Rowntree. 
 Both hands were tied behind his back, his hair 
 was in his eyes, and the chin drooped forward 
 upon his chest like that of a man lost in 
 thought. 
 
 "See what you'll come to," said Bill, giving 
 the body a push that set it swinging like a
 
 192 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 pendulum, while the branch creaked horribly 
 overhead. " See what you '11 come to if you 
 don't speak out ! It was a good ten minutes 
 before he stopped kicking and jingling his 
 spurs ; you 're lighter, and it 'd take you longer. 
 Quarter of an hour, I guess, or twenty minutes." 
 
 Engelhardt had reeled, and would have 
 fallen, but the Bo's'n jumped up and caught 
 him in his arms. 
 
 He did more. 
 
 " Listen to reason, messmate," said the sailor, 
 with a touch of rude friendliness in his lowered 
 tone. " There ain't no sense in keeping mum 
 with us. If you won't speak, you'll swing at 
 the yard-arm along with t' other cove in a brace 
 of shakes ; if you will, you '11 get a chance 
 whether or no. Besides, what good do you 
 think you can do ? We know all that 's worth 
 knowing. Anything you tell us '11 make less 
 trouble in at the homestead — not more." 
 
 " All right," said Engelhardt faintly. " Let 
 me sit down ; I '11 tell you anything you like." 
 
 " That 's more like. Take my place, then 
 you'll be stern-on to that poor devil. Now 
 then. Bill, fire away. The little man's hisseli 
 again."
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. I93 
 
 "Good for him," growled Bill. "Look at 
 me, you stuck pig, and answer questions. 
 Where's that chest.?" 
 
 "In the store." 
 
 " Didn't I say so ! Never been shifted ! 
 Whereabouts in the store ? " 
 
 " Inside the counter." 
 
 " Much of a chest to bust into ? " 
 
 " Two locks, and clamps all over." 
 
 " Where 's the keys ? " 
 
 " I don't know. Miss Pryse keeps them." 
 
 "She won't keep 'em long. See here, you 
 devil, if you look at me again like that I '11 
 plug your eyes into your mouth ! You seem 
 to know a fat lot about this silver. Have you 
 seen it, or haven't you ? " 
 
 " I have." 
 
 " What is there ? " 
 
 " Not much. A couple of candle-sticks ; a 
 few spoons; some old skewers; a biscuit-box; a 
 coffee-pot — but it's half ivory; an epergne " 
 
 " What the 'ell's that ? None o' your Greek, 
 you swine ! " 
 
 " It's a thing for flowers." 
 
 "Why didn't you say so, then? What else?" 
 
 " Let me see " 
 
 o
 
 194 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " You 'd best look slippy ! " 
 
 "Well, there's not much more. A cake- 
 basket, some napkin-rings, and a pair of nut- 
 crackers. And that's about all. It's all /saw, 
 anyhow." 
 
 " All silver ? '• 
 
 " I shouldn't think it." 
 
 "You liar! You plucky well know it is. 
 And not a bad lot neither, even if it was 
 the lot. By the Lord, I 've a good mind to 
 strip and sit you on that fire for not telling 
 me the truth!" 
 
 " Easy, mate, easy!" remonstrated the Bo's'n. 
 " That sounds near enough." 
 
 "By cripes," cried Simons, "it's near enough 
 for me. 'Taint the silver I want. It's the 
 gold, and that's the girl ! " 
 
 "You won't get her," said Engelhardt. 
 
 " Why not .? " 
 
 "She'll put a bullet through you." 
 
 " Can she shoot straight .-* " 
 
 " As straight as her father, I should say. I 
 never saw him. But I 've seen her." 
 
 " What do ? " 
 
 "Stand in the verandah and knock a crow 
 off the well fence — with her own revolver."
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 1 95 
 
 "By crlpes, that's ^.W^' 
 
 (It was.) 
 
 "I'm not so blooming sure," said Bill. 
 " I recollect how the old man dropped 
 Tigerskin at nigh twenty yards. She was 
 with him, too, at the time— a kid out of bed. 
 I took a shot at her and missed. She 'd be as 
 likely as not to knock a hole through one or 
 other of us, lads, if you hadn't got me to see 
 you through. You trust to Bill for ideas! 
 He's got one now, but it'll keep. See here, 
 you swine, you ! When was it you saw all 
 what you pretend to have seen, eh .-* " 
 
 Engelhardt laughed. His answer could do 
 no harm, and it gave him a thrill of satisfaction 
 to score even so paltry a point against his 
 bestial antagonist. 
 
 "It was the day you two came around the 
 station." 
 
 " That morning ? " 
 
 "Yes." 
 
 " Where did you see it ? " 
 
 " In the store." 
 
 " Before we came ? " 
 
 " While you were there. When Miss Pryse 
 locked the door, it was all over the place.
 
 196 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 While we were in the kitchen she got it swept 
 out of sight." 
 
 " Good God ! " screamed Bill ; " if only I 'd 
 known. You little devil, if only I 'd guessed 
 it!" 
 
 His vile face was convulsed and distorted 
 with greed and rage ; his hairy, four-fingered 
 fist shaking savagely in Engelhardt's face. 
 Bo's'n remonstrated again. 
 
 "What's the sense o' that, messmate ? For 
 God's sake shut it! A fat lot we could ha 
 done without a horse between us." 
 
 "We could have rushed the store, stretched 
 'em stiff " 
 
 " And carried a hundredweight o' silver 
 away in our bluies ! No, no, my hearty ; 
 it 's a darn sight better as it is. What do 
 you say, Simons ? 
 
 " I 'm glad you waited, but I 'm bleedin' dry." 
 
 "An me too," said Bill, sulkily, as he un- 
 corked a black bottle. " Give us that pannikin, 
 you spawn ! " 
 
 Engelhardt handed it over unmoved. He 
 was past caring what was said or done to him 
 personally. Bill drank first. 
 
 "Here's fun!" said he, saluting the other
 
 FALLEN AMONG THIEVES. 197 
 
 two simultaneously with a single cross-eyed 
 leer. 
 
 "'An' they say so — an' we hope so!'" 
 chanted the Bo's'n, who came next. "Any- 
 way, here 's to the moon, for there she spouts !" 
 
 As he raised his pannikin, he pointed it 
 over Enofelhardt's shoulder, and the latter in- 
 voluntarily turned his head. He brought it 
 back next moment, with a jerk and a shudder. 
 Far away, behind the scrub, on the edge of 
 the earth, lay the moon, with a silvery path- 
 way leading up to her, and a million twigs 
 and branches furrowing her face. But against 
 the top of the great white disc there fell 
 those horrible boots and spurs, in grisly 
 silhouette, and still swaying a little to the 
 mournful accompaniment of the groaning 
 bough above. Surely the works of God and 
 man were never in ghastlier contrast than 
 when Engelhardt turned his head without 
 thinking and twitched it back with a shudder. 
 And yet to him this was not the worst ; he 
 was now in time to catch that which made 
 the blood run colder still in all his veins.
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT, 
 
 SIMONS was toasting Naomi Pryse. It 
 took Engelhardt some moments to realize 
 this. The language he could stand ; but no 
 sooner did he grasp its incredible applica- 
 tion than his self-control boiled over on 
 the spot. 
 
 " Stop it ! " he shrieked at the shearer. 
 "How dare you speak of her like that .f* 
 How dare you ? " 
 
 The foul mouth fell open, and the camp-fire 
 flames licked the yellow teeth within. Engel- 
 hardt was within a few inches of them, with 
 a doubled fist and reckless eyes. To his 
 amazement, the man burst out laughing in 
 his face. 
 
 ** The little cuss has spunk," said he. "I 
 like to see a cove stick up for 'is gal, by 
 cripes I do I " 
 
 X9S
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 1 99 
 
 "So do I," said Bo's'n. " Brayvo, little 
 man, brayvo ! " 
 
 "My oath," said Bill, "I'd have cut 'is 
 stinkin' throat for 'alf as much if I 'd been 
 you, matey ! " 
 
 " Not me," said Simons. " I '11 give 'im 
 a drink for 'is spunk. 'Ere, kiddy, you wish 
 us luck ! " 
 
 He held out the pannikin. Engelhardt 
 shook his head. He was, in fact, a teetotaler, 
 who had made a covenant with himself, when 
 sailing from old England, to let no stimulant 
 pass his lips until his feet should touch her 
 shores again. The covenant was absolutely 
 private and informal, as between a man and 
 his own body ; but no power on earth would 
 have made him break it. 
 
 " Come on," said Simons. " By cripes, we 
 take no refusals here ! " 
 
 " I must ask you to take mine, nevertheless." 
 
 " Why ? " 
 
 " Because I don't drink." 
 
 " Well, you 've got to ! " 
 
 " I shall not ! " 
 
 Simons seemed bent upon it. Perhaps he 
 had taken a drop too much himself; indeed,
 
 200 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 none of the three were entirely above such a 
 suspicion ; but it immediately appeared that 
 this small point was to create more trouble 
 than everything that had gone before. Small 
 as it was, neither man would budge an inch. 
 Engelhardt said again that he would not drink. 
 Simons swore that he should either drink or 
 die. The piano-tuner cheerfully replied that 
 he expected to die in any case, but he wasn't 
 going to touch whisky for anybody ; so he 
 gave Simons leave to do what he liked and 
 get it over — the sooner the better. The 
 shearer prompdy seized him by his uninjured 
 wrist, twisted it violently behind his back, 
 and held out his hand to Bo's'n for the 
 pannikin. Engelhardt was now helpless, his 
 left arm a prisoner and in torture, his right 
 lying useless in a sling. Bo's'n, however, 
 came to his rescue once more, by refusing to 
 see good grog wasted when there was little 
 enough left. 
 
 '•What's the use?" said he. "If the silly 
 devil won't drink, we'll make him sing us a 
 song. He says he tunes planners. Let him 
 tune up now ! " 
 
 •' That 's better," assented Bill. " The joker
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 201 
 
 shall give us a song before we let his gas out ; 
 and I '11 drink his grog. Give it here, Bo's'n." 
 
 The worst of a gang of three is the strong 
 working majority always obtainable against 
 one or other of them. Simons gave in with 
 a curse, and sent Engelhardt sprawling with a 
 heavy kick. As he picked himself up, they 
 called upon him to sing. He savagely refused. 
 
 " All right," said Bill, " we '11 string him up 
 an' be done with him. I 'm fairly sick o' the 
 swine — I am so ! " 
 
 " By cripes, so am I." 
 
 " Then up he goes." 
 
 "The other beggar's got the rope," said 
 Bo's'n. 
 
 "Then cut him down. He won't improve 
 by hanging any longer. We aint a-going to 
 eat him, are we? Cut him down, and sling 
 this one up. It's your job, Bo's'n." 
 
 Bo's'n was disposed to grumble. Bill cut 
 him short. 
 
 " All right," said he, getting clumsily to his 
 feet, " I '11 do it myself. You call yourself a 
 bloomin' man ! I 'd make a better bloomin* 
 man than you with bloomin' baccy-ash. Out 
 of the light, you cripple, an' the thing '11 be
 
 202 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 done in half the time you take talking about 
 it!" 
 
 Engelhardt was left sitting between Simons 
 and the ill-used Bo'sn'. The latter had his 
 grumble out, but Bill took no more account of 
 him. As for the shearer, the ferocity of his 
 attitude towards the doomed youth was now 
 second to none. He sat very close to him, 
 with a hellish scowl and a great hand held 
 ready to blast any attempt at escape. But 
 none was made. The piano-tuner stuck his 
 thumbs into his ears, covered his closed eyes 
 with his palms, and tried both to think and 
 to pray. He could not think : vague visions 
 of Naomi crowded his mind, but they formed 
 no thought. Nor could he pray for any- 
 thing but courage to meet his fate. Within a 
 few yards of him was the body of a dead man 
 murdered by these thieves among whom he 
 himself had fallen. He could not but doubt 
 that they were about to murder him too. His 
 last hour had come. He wanted courage. 
 That was all he asked for as he sat with 
 plugged ears and tight-shut eyes. 
 
 He was aroused by a smart kick in the ribs. 
 As he got up to go to his doom, Bill seized
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 203 
 
 him by the shoulders and pushed him roughly 
 towards the hanging rope ; it hung so low, it 
 bisected the rising moon. 
 
 " Let me alone," he cried, wriggling fiercely. 
 " I can get there without your help." 
 
 "Well, we'll see." 
 
 He got there fast enough. A little deeper 
 in the scrub he could see a shapeless mass 
 of moleskin and Crimean shirting, with a 
 spurred boot half covered by a stiff hand. 
 He was thankful to turn his face to the 
 blazing camp-fire, even though the noose went 
 round his neck as he did so. 
 
 " Now then," said Bill, hauling the rope 
 taut, " will you give us a song or won't you ? " 
 
 He could not speak, 
 
 " If you sing us a song we may give you 
 another hour," said the Bo's'n from the ground. 
 Simons and he had been whispering together. 
 Bill shook his head at them. 
 
 " That rests with me," said he to Engelhardt. 
 " Don't you make any mistake." 
 
 ''Another hour!" cried the young man 
 bitterly, as he found his voice. " What 's 
 another hour.-* If you're men at all put an 
 end to me now and be done with it."
 
 204 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "How's that?" said Bill, hauling him upon 
 tip-toe. '* No, no, sonny, we want our song 
 first," he added, as he let the rope fall slack 
 again. 
 
 "Sing up, and there's no saying what '11 
 happen," cried the Bo's'n cheerily. 
 
 "What shall I sing?" 
 
 " Anything you like." 
 
 " Something funny to cheer us up." 
 
 " Ay, ay, a comic song ! " 
 
 Engelhardt wavered— as once before under 
 the eyes and ears of a male audience. " I '11 
 do my best," he said at last. And Bo's'n 
 clapped. 
 
 A minute later the bushrangers' camp was 
 the scene of as queer a performance as ever 
 was given. A very young man, with a 
 pallid, blood-stained face, and a rope round 
 his neck, was singing a " comic " song to a 
 parcel of cut -throats who were presently to 
 hang him, as they had hanged already the 
 corpse at his heels. Meanwhile they sur- 
 rendered themselves like simple innocents 
 to a thorough enjoyment of the fine fun 
 provided. The replenished camp-fire lit their 
 villainous faces with a rich red glow. They
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 205 
 
 grinned, they laughed, they displayed their 
 pleasure and satisfaction each after his own 
 fashion. The fat man shook in his fat ; the 
 long man showed his grinning teeth ; the 
 sailor-man slapped his thighs and rolled on 
 the ground in paroxysms of spirituous mirth. 
 It must have been the humour of the situa- 
 tion, rather than that of the song, which so 
 powerfully appealed to them. The former 
 had the piquant charm of being entirely their 
 own creation. The latter was that poetic 
 paraphrase of the early chapters of the 
 Book of Genesis which the singer had tried 
 upon another back-block audience but a few 
 nights before. Of the two, this audience, as 
 such, was decidedly the better. At any rate 
 they let him get to the end. And when that 
 came, and Bo's'n clapped again, even the 
 other two joined in the applause. 
 
 " By cripes," said Simons, " that 's not so 
 bad ! " 
 
 " Bad ? " cried the enthusiastic Bo's'n. " It 's 
 as good as fifty plays. We '11 have some more, 
 and I '11 give you a song myself." 
 
 "Right!" said Bill. "The night's still 
 young. Stiffen me purple if we haven't forgot
 
 206 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 them weeds we laid in at the township! Out 
 with em, mateys, an' pass round the grog; 
 we'll make a smokin' concert of it. A 
 bloomin' smoker, so help me never!" 
 
 The cigars were unearthed from the pockets 
 of Bill himself He and Simons at once put 
 two of them in full blast. Meantime, Bo's'n 
 was trying his voice. 
 
 "Any of you know any sailors' chanties.?" 
 said he. 
 
 A pause, and then — 
 
 "Yes, I do." 
 
 The voice was none other than Engelhard t's. 
 
 ''Vou? The devil you do! How's that, 
 then?" 
 
 " I came out in a sailing ship." 
 
 "What do you know.?" 
 
 "Some of the choruses." 
 
 "'Blow the land down'.?" 
 
 "Yes— best of all." 
 
 " Then we '11 have that ! Messmates, you 
 join his nibs in the chorus. I sing yarn and 
 chorus too. Ready.? Steady! Here goes!" 
 
 And in a rich, rolling voice, that had been 
 heard above many a gale on the high seas, he 
 began with the familiar words —
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 207 
 
 " O where are you going to, my pretty maid ? — 
 Yo-ho, blow the land down I 
 O where are you going to, my pretty maid ? — 
 And give us some time to blow the land down I " 
 
 The words were not long familiar. They 
 quickly became detestable. The further they 
 went, of course, the more they appealed to 
 Simons, Bill, and the singer himself. As for 
 Engelhardt, obviously he was in no position to 
 protest ; nor could mere vileness add at all to 
 his discomfort, with that noose still round his 
 neck, and the rope-end still tight in Bill's clutch. 
 Then the refrain for every other line was no 
 bad thing in itself; at all events, he joined in 
 throughout, and at the close stood at least as 
 well with his persecutors as before. 
 
 It now appeared, however, that sailors' 
 chanties were the Bo's'n's weakness. He in- 
 sisted on singing two more, with topical and 
 impromptu verses of his own. As, for instance— 
 
 "The proud Miss Pryse may toss 'er 'ead — 
 An' they say so — ati we hope so — 
 The proud Miss Pryse will soon be dead — 
 The pore— old— gal I " 
 
 Or again, and as bad — 
 
 *' O, they call me Hanging Johnny — 
 Hurray / Pull away I 
 An' I '11 soon hang you, my sonny — 
 Hang — boys — hang /"
 
 2o8 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 These are but opening verses. There were 
 many more in each case, and they were bad 
 enough in all respects. And yet Engelhardt 
 chimed in at his own expense — even at 
 Naomi's — because it might be that his life 
 and hers depended upon it. He was begin- 
 ning to have his hopes, partly from the delay, 
 partly from looks and winks which he had 
 seen exchanged ; and his hopes led to ideas, 
 because his brain had never been clearer and 
 busier than it was now become. He was 
 devoutly thankful not to have been twice 
 forced to sing. The second time, however, 
 was still to come. It was announced by a 
 jerk of the rope that went near to dislocating 
 his neck. 
 
 " This image is doing nothink for 'is living, 
 an' yet we're letting 'im live!" cried Bill, in 
 a tone of injured and abused magnanimity. 
 " Sing, you swine, or swing ! One o' the 
 two." 
 
 "What sort will you have this time?" asked 
 Engelhardt meekly. His meekness was largely 
 put on, however. The black bottle had been 
 going round pretty freely ; in fact, it was quite 
 empty. Another had been broached, and the
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 209 
 
 men were both visibly and audibly in their 
 cups. 
 
 " Another comic ! " cried Simons and the 
 Bos'n in one breath. 
 
 " No, something serious, this trip," Bill said, 
 contradictiously. " You know warri mean, you 
 lubber — somethin' soothin' for a night- cap — 
 somethin' Christy- mental. Go ahead an be 
 damned to ye ! " 
 
 Engelhardt had no time to consider, to 
 reflect, to choose. The signal to start instandy 
 was given by a series of sharp, throttling jerks 
 at the rope. Almost before he was himself 
 aware of it, he was giving them the well- 
 known " Swannee River." It was the first 
 " Christy- mental " song that had risen to his 
 mind and lips. Moreover, he gave it with all 
 the pathos and expression of which he was 
 capable, and that, as we know, was not incon- 
 siderable. They did not join in the chorus. 
 This made it the easier. He tried to forget 
 that these men were there, and, throwing his 
 gaze aloft, sung softly — even sweetly — to the 
 stars. Doubtless it was all acting, and by a 
 cunning instinct that he went so slow in the 
 final chorus : — 
 
 p
 
 2IO THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Oh, my heart is sad and weary, 
 Everywhere I roam ; 
 Oh, darkies, but my heart is weary, 
 Far from the old folks at home." 
 
 And yet one knows that it is possible to 
 act and to feel at one and the same time ; 
 and, incredible as it may seem in the circum- 
 stances, Engelhardt found it so just then. He 
 did think of the dear old woman at home ; 
 and being an artist to his boots, he gave his 
 emotions their head, and sang to these black- 
 guards as he would have sung to Naomi 
 herself And the effect was extraordinary — if 
 in part due to the whisky. When the young 
 man lowered his eyes there was the maudlin 
 Bo's'n snivelling like a babe, and the other 
 two sucking their cigars to life with faces as 
 long as lanterns. 
 
 "Lads," said Bill, "the night's still young. 
 What matter does it make when we tackle 
 the station? It'll keep. We on'y got to get 
 there before mornin'. 'Taint midnight yet." 
 His voice was thickish. 
 
 "If the moon gets much higher," hiccupped 
 the Bo's'n, " we '11 never get there at all. 
 We'll never find it!" And he dried his eyes 
 on his sleeve.
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 211 
 
 Bill took no notice of this. But he shook 
 up his companions, linked arms between the 
 two, and halted them in front of Engelhardt. 
 They all three swayed a little as they stood, 
 yet all three were still dangerously sober ; and 
 the second bottle was empty now ; and there 
 was no third. Engelhardt confronted them 
 with hope, but not confidence, and listened, 
 more eagerly than he dared to show, to Bill's 
 harangue. 
 
 " Young man," said he, " you 're not such a 
 cussed swine's I thought. Sing or swing, says 
 I. You sings like a man. So you shan't swing 
 at all — not yet. No saying what we'll do in 
 an hour or two. P'r'aps we 're going to take 
 you along with us to the station, to show us 
 things, an' p'r'aps we ain't. You make your 
 miseral life happy, to go on with. You bloomin' 
 beggar, you, we respite you ! Bo's'n, take the 
 same rope an' lash the joker to that tree." 
 
 Bill stopped to see it done. He was quite 
 sober enough to be sufficiently particular in 
 this matter ; as was Bo's'n, to perform his part 
 in sailor-like fashion. In five minutes the thing 
 was done. 
 
 "What do you think of that?" cried the
 
 212 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 seaman, with a certain honest sort of deep-sea 
 pride. 
 
 " It '11 do, matey." 
 
 " By cripes, he '11 never get out o' that ! " 
 
 In fact, from his chin to his knees, the 
 poor piano -tuner was encased in a straight- 
 waistcoat of rope — the rope that had been 
 round his neck for the last half- hour. Even 
 the injured arm was inside. Nor could he 
 move his feet, for they were tied separately 
 at the ankles. Otherwise there was only one 
 knot in what was indeed a masterpiece of its 
 kind. 
 
 " I hope you '11 be comfortable," said the 
 Bo's'n with a quaint touch of remorse, " for 
 split me if you didn't sing like a blessed 
 cock-angel ! And never you fear," he added 
 under his breath, " for we ain't agoin' to hang 
 you. Not us! And if there's anything we 
 can do for you afore we take our spell, say 
 the word, messmate, say the word." 
 
 The piano-tuner shook his head. 
 
 '* Then so long and " 
 
 " Stop ! you might give us a cigar." 
 
 It was given readily. 
 
 " Thanks ; and now you might light it."
 
 A SMOKING CONCERT. 213 
 
 This also was done, with a brand from the 
 dying fire. 
 
 •' Good-night," said Bo's'n. 
 
 "And thank you," added Engelhardt. 
 
 The sailor stopped to give a last admiring 
 glance at his handiwork ; then he joined his 
 companions, who were already spread out 
 upon the broad of their backs ; and Engel- 
 hardt was left to himself at last — unable to 
 move hand or foot — with a corpse at hand 
 and the murderers under his eyes — with the 
 risen moon shining full upon his face, and 
 the vilest of vile cigars held tight between 
 his teeth. 
 
 And he was no smoker ; tobacco made him 
 sick. 
 
 Nevertheless, he kept that bad weed alight, 
 and very carefully alight, for ten minutes by 
 guess -work. Then he depressed his chin, 
 knocked off an inch of ash against the top- 
 most coil, applied the red end to the rope, 
 and sucked and puffed for his life and Naomi's.
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 
 
 THOSE same dark hours of this eventful 
 night, were also the slowest and the 
 dreariest on record in the mind of Naomi 
 Pryse. She too had waited for the moon. 
 At sundown she had stabled her horse, and 
 left it with a fine feed of chaff and oats as 
 priming for the further work she had in view. 
 This done, she had consented, under protest, 
 to eat something herself; but had jumped up 
 early to fill with her own hands a water-bag 
 and a flask of which she could have no need 
 for hours. It made no matter. She must be 
 up and doing this or that; it was intolerable 
 sitting still even to eat and drink. Besides, 
 how could she eat, how could she drink, when 
 he who should have shared her meal was 
 perhaps perishing of hunger and thirst in 
 
 Top Scrubby } It was much more comforting 
 214
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 215 
 
 to cut substantial slices of mutton and of bread, 
 to put them up in a neat packet, and to set 
 this in readiness alongside the flask and the 
 water - bag. Then came the trouble. There 
 was nothing more to be done. 
 
 It was barely eight o'clock : and no moon 
 for two hours and a half. 
 
 Naomi went round to the back verandah, 
 picked up the book she had been reading the 
 day before, and marched about with it under 
 her arm. She had not the heart to sit down 
 and read. Her restless feet took her many 
 times to the kitchen and Mrs. Potter, who 
 shook her good gray head and remonstrated 
 with increasing candour and asperity. 
 
 " Go to look for him .'* " she cried at last. 
 " When the time comes for that, you '11 be 
 too dead tired to sit in your saddle, miss. If 
 you start before the moon's well up, there '11 
 be no telling a hoof- mark from a foot -print 
 without getting off every time. You've said 
 so yourself, Miss Naomi. Then why not go 
 straight to your bed and lie down for two 
 or three hours .■* I '11 bring you a cup of tea 
 at half- past eleven, and you can be away by 
 twelve."
 
 2l6 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Naomi sighed. 
 
 " It is so long to wait — doing nothing! He 
 may be dying, poor fellow ; and yet what can 
 one do in the dark ? " 
 
 " Lie down and rest," said Mrs. Potter, dryly. 
 
 "Well, I will try, but not on my bed — on 
 the sitting-room sofa, I think. Will you light 
 the lamp there, please ? And bring the tea 
 at eleven ; I '11 start at half-past." 
 
 Naomi took a short stroll among the dark- 
 ling pines — the way that she had taken the 
 piano - tuner in the first moments of their 
 swift friendship — the way that he had taken 
 alone last night. She reached the sitting-room 
 with moist, wistful eyes, which startled them- 
 selves as she confronted the mirror over the 
 chimney-piece whereon stood the lamp. She 
 stood for a little, however, looking at her- 
 self — steadfastly — inquisitively — as though to 
 search out the secrets of her own heart. She 
 gave it up in the end, and turned wearily 
 away. What was the use of peering into her 
 own heart now, when so often aforetime 
 she had seemed to know it, and had not ? 
 There was no use ; and as it happened, no 
 need. For the first thing her eyes fell upon,
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 217 
 
 as she turned, was the pile of music lying yet 
 where Engelhardt had placed it, on the stool. 
 The next was his little inscription on the 
 uppermost song. She knelt to read it again ; 
 when she had done so the two uncertain, left- 
 handed, pencilled lines were wet and blotched 
 with her tears, and she rose up knowing what 
 she had never known before. 
 
 At eleven-thirty — she had set her heart 
 upon that extra half hour if let alone — Mrs. 
 Potter rattled the tea-tray against the sitting- 
 room door and entered next moment. She 
 found her mistress on the sofa certainly, but 
 lying on her back and staring straight at the 
 ceiling. Her face was very white and still, 
 but she moved it a little as the door opened. 
 She had not slept ? Not a wink. Her book 
 was lying in her lap ; it had never been 
 opened. Mrs. Potter was not slow to exhibit 
 her disappointment, not to say her disgust. 
 But Naomi sprang up with every sign of 
 energy, and finished her tea in five minutes. 
 In ten she had her horse saddled. In twelve 
 she had cantered back to the verandah, and 
 was receiving from Mrs. Potter the water-bag, 
 the flask, and the packet of bread and meat.
 
 2l8 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Have his room nice and ready for him," 
 said the girl excitedly, "and the kettle boiling, 
 so that we may both have breakfast the instant 
 we get in. It will be a pretty early breakfast, 
 you '11 see ! Do you think you can do without 
 sleep as long as I can ? " 
 
 •' Well, I know I shan't lie down while 
 you 're gone, miss." 
 
 *' Then I '11 be tremendously quick, I will 
 indeed. I only wish I 'd started long ago. 
 The moon is splendid now. You can see 
 miles 
 
 " Then look there, Miss Naomi ! " 
 
 *' Where ? " 
 
 " Past the stables — across the paddock — 
 towards the fence." 
 
 Naomi looked. A black figure was running 
 towards them in the moonlight. 
 
 "Who can it be, Mrs. Potter? Not Mr. 
 Engelhardt " 
 
 " Who else ? " 
 
 " But he is reeling and staggering ! Could 
 it be some drunken rousabout ? And yet 
 that 's just his height — it must be — it is — 
 thank God ! " 
 
 Her curiosity first, and then her amazement,
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 219 
 
 kept Naomi seated immovable in her saddle. 
 She wondered later why she had not cantered 
 to meet him. She did not stir even when his 
 stertorous breathing came painfully to her ears. 
 It was only when the quivering, spent, and 
 speechless young man threw his arms across 
 the withers of her horse, and his white face 
 fell forward upon the mane, that Naomi silently 
 detached the water-bag which she had strapped 
 to her saddle, and held it to his lips with a 
 trembling hand. At first he shook his head. 
 Then he raised his wild eyes to hers with a 
 piteously anxious expression. 
 
 " You have heard — that they are coming ?" 
 
 "No— who.?" 
 
 " You have heard, or why are you on horse- 
 back ? " 
 
 " To look for you. I was on the point of 
 starting, I made sure you must be bushed." 
 
 " I was. But I got to a camp. They looked 
 after me ; I am all right. And now they are 
 coming in here — they 're probably on their 
 way ! " Each little sentence came in a fresh 
 gasp from his parched throat. 
 
 " But who ? " 
 
 " Those two tramps who came the other
 
 220 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 day, and Simons, the ringer of the shed 
 Villains — villains every one ! " 
 
 "Ah! And what do they want?" 
 " Can't you guess ? The silver ! The silver ! 
 That fat brute who insulted you so, who do 
 you suppose he is? Tigerskin's mate — just out 
 of prison — the man whose finger your father 
 shot off ten years ago ! You remember how 
 he kept his hands in his pockets the other 
 day? Well, that was the reason. Now there 
 isn't a moment to lose. I listened to their 
 plans. Half an hour ago — or it may be an 
 hour — they lay down for a spell. They were 
 drunk, but not very. They only meant to rest 
 for a bit ; then they 're coming straight here. 
 They left me tied up — they were going to 
 bring me with them — I '11 tell you afterwards 
 how I got loose. I daren't stop a moment, 
 even to cut adrift their horses. I just bolted 
 for the moon — I 'd heard them say the station 
 lay due east — and here I am. Thank God 
 I've found you up and mounted! It couldn't 
 have been better; it's providential. Now you 
 mustn't get off at all ; you must just ride right 
 on to the shed." 
 
 "Must I?" said Naomi, with a tight lip and
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 221 
 
 a keen eye, but a touch of the old banter in 
 her tone. 
 
 "We could follow on foot. Meanwhile you 
 would rouse them out at the shed " 
 
 " And my silver ? " 
 
 Engelhardt was silent. The girl leant 
 forward in her saddle, and laid a hand upon 
 his shoulder. 
 
 "No, no, Mr. Engelhardt! Captains don't 
 quit their ships in such a hurry as all that. 
 I 'm captain here, and I '11 stick to mine. It 
 isn't only the silver. Still my father smelt 
 powder for that silver, and the least I can do 
 is to follow his lead." 
 
 She slid to the ground as she spoke. 
 
 " You will barricade yourself in the store ? " 
 said Engelhardt. 
 
 " Exacdy. It was fixed up for this very 
 kind of thing, after the first fuss with Tiger- 
 skin. They'll never get in." 
 
 "And you mean to stick to your guns inside?" 
 
 "To such as I have — most certainly." 
 
 " Then I mean to stick to you." 
 
 " Very well." 
 
 " But think — think before it 's too late ! 
 They are devils, Miss Pryse — beasts I I have
 
 2 22 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 seen them and heard them. Better a hundred 
 times be dead than at their mercy. For God's 
 sake, take the horse before they are upon us ! " 
 
 " I stop here," said Naomi, decidedly. 
 
 " Yet Mrs. Potter and I could hold the store 
 as easily as you could. They shall not get 
 your silver while I 'm alive." 
 
 " My mind is made up," said the girl, in a 
 voice which silenced his remonstrances ; " but 
 I agree with you that somebody ought to start 
 off for the shed. I think that you should, Mr. 
 Engelhardt, if you feel equal to it." 
 
 " Equal to it ! It 's so likely I would ride 
 off and leave two woman to the mercy of those 
 brutes! If it really must be so, then I think 
 the sooner we all three get into the store " 
 
 It was Mrs. Potter who here put in her 
 amazing word. While the young people stood 
 and argued, her eyes had travelled over every 
 point of the saddled horse. And now she 
 proposed that she should be the one to ride 
 to the shed for help. 
 
 " You ! " the two cried in one breath, as they 
 gazed at her ample figure. 
 
 "And why not.-*" said the hardy woman. 
 " Wasn't I born and bred in the bush ?
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 223 
 
 Couldn't I ride — bareback too — before either 
 of you was born ? I 'm not so light as I used 
 to be, and I haven't the nerve either ; but 
 what I have is all there in the hour of need, 
 Miss Naomi. Let me go now. I 'm ready 
 this minute." 
 
 Naomi had seemed lost in thought. 
 
 "Very well!" cried she, whipping her eyes 
 from the ground. " But you don't know the 
 way to the shed, and I must make your direc- 
 tions pretty plain. Run to the back of the 
 kitchen, Mr. Engelhardt, you'll see a lot of 
 clothes-props. Bring as many as you can to 
 the store verandah." 
 
 Engelhardt darted off upon his errand. 
 Already they had wasted too many minutes in 
 words. His brain was ablaze with lurid visions 
 of the loathsome crew in Top Scrubby ; of the 
 murderous irruption imminent at any moment ; 
 of the unspeakable treatment to be suffered at 
 those blood-stained hands — not only by himself 
 • — that mattered little — but by a woman — by 
 Naomi of all women in the world. God help 
 them both if the gang arrived before they were 
 safe inside the store ! But until the worst 
 happened she need not know, nor should she
 
 224 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 guess, how bad that worst might be. Poor 
 Rowntree's fate, and even his own ill-usage by 
 those masterless men, were things which 
 Enorelhardt was not the man to tell to women 
 in the hour of alarm. He was clear enough as 
 to that ; and having done up to this point all 
 that a man could do, he jumped at the simple 
 task imposed by Naomi, and threw himself 
 into it with immense vigour and a lightened 
 heart. As he dropped his first clothes -prop 
 in the store verandah, Naomi and the house- 
 keeper were still talking, though the latter 
 was already huddled up in the saddle. When 
 he got back with a second, both women were 
 gone ; with a third, Naomi was unlocking the 
 store door ; with the fourth and last, she had 
 lit a candle inside, and was sawing one of the 
 other props in two. 
 
 "That'll do," she said, as her saw ran through 
 the wood. " Now hold this one up for me." 
 
 She pointed to another of the stout poles. 
 She made him hold it with one end inside, 
 and the other protruding through the opening. 
 Then she made a mark on the prop at the 
 level of the door, sawed it through at her 
 mark, and cut down the other two in the
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 225 
 
 same fashion. In less than five minutes the 
 four poles had become eight, which cumbered 
 the floor within. Then Naomi rose from her 
 knees, flung the saw back into the tool-box, 
 and made a final survey with the candle, A 
 few flakes of sawdust lay about the shallow 
 verandah. She fetched a broom from a corner 
 of the store and whisked them away. Then 
 she removed the key to the inside, and was 
 about to lock the door upon herself and 
 Engelhardt when he suddenly stopped her. 
 
 " Hold on ! " he cried. " I want your boots." 
 
 " My boots ? " 
 
 " Yes, those you 've got on — with the dust 
 on 'em, just as they are. They must be left 
 outside your door, and your door must be 
 locked ; you must keep the key." 
 
 Naomi gave him a grateful, an admiring 
 smile. 
 
 *' That is a happy thought. I '11 get it 
 myself. While I 'm gone you might fetch 
 in the axe from the wood-heap ; I 'd almost 
 forgotten it." 
 
 They ran off in different directions. Next 
 minute they were both back in the store, 
 Engelhardt with the axe. Naomi took i 
 
 Q
 
 226 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 from him, and set it aside without a word. 
 Her face was blanched. 
 
 " I heard something," she whispered. " I 
 heard a cry. Oh, if they 've seen me ! " 
 
 " We '11 lock the door as quietly as possible." 
 
 This was done. 
 
 ** Now the props," said Naomi. 
 
 Engelhardt had guessed what they were 
 for. He helped her to fix them, with one end 
 wedged between floor and counter, and the 
 other pressing the heavy woodwork of the 
 door. It now appeared how craftily Naomi 
 had cut her timbers. They met the door, 
 two at the top, two at the bottom, and four 
 about the centre. Still the brave engineer 
 was distressed. 
 
 " I meant to hammer them down," she 
 murmured. "Now I daren't." 
 
 "We'll put all our weight on them instead," 
 said Engelhardt. They did so with a will, 
 until each prop had creaked in turn. Then 
 they listened. 
 
 " Out with the light," said Naomi. " There 
 are no windows to give us away — but still ! " 
 
 He blew it out. As yet his own ears had 
 heard nothing, and he was beginning to wonder
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 227 
 
 whether Naomi had been deceived. They 
 listened a little longer. Then she said : 
 
 "We're provisioned for a siege. Did you 
 see the flask and things on the counter ? " 
 
 " I did. How in the world did you find 
 time to get them ready ? " 
 
 " I had them ready before you came. They 
 were for you." 
 
 The two were crouching close together 
 between the props. It was a natural though 
 not a necessary attitude. The moon was 
 shining through the skylight upon one of the 
 walls ; the multifarious tins and bottles on the 
 shelver made the most of the white light ; and 
 faint reflections reached the faces of Naomi 
 and the piano-tuner — so close to each other, so 
 pale, so determined, and withal so wistful as 
 their eyes met Engelhardt first looked his 
 thanks, and then stammered them out in a 
 broken whisper. Even as he did so the girl 
 raised a finger to her lips. 
 
 " Hark ! There they are." 
 
 " Yes, I hear them. They won't hear us yet 
 a bit." 
 
 " They mustn't hear us at all ; but off with 
 your boots — we may have to move about."
 
 2 28 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 She had already kicked off her shoes, and 
 now, because he had only one of his own, she 
 pulled off his boots with her two hands. 
 
 " You should not have done that ! " 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 "It's dreadful! Just as though you were 
 my servant." 
 
 " Mr. Engelhardt, we must be everything to 
 each other " 
 
 She shot up her hand and ceased. The 
 voices without were now distinguishable. 
 
 " To-night ! " he muttered bitterly, before 
 heeding them. 
 
 Naomi, on the other hand, was at the last 
 pitch of attention ; but not to him. She in- 
 clined her head as she knelt to hear the better. 
 The voices were approaching from one side. 
 
 "Ay, that's where he dropped — just there!" 
 said one. It was Tigerskin's mate, Bill. 
 
 " Take the key from the door ! " Engelhardt 
 whispered to Naomi, who was the nearer it. 
 They had forgotten to do this. For one wild 
 moment the girl hesitated, then she cautiously 
 reached out her hand and withdrew the key 
 without a scratch. 
 
 "So this is the crib ! ** they heard Bo s'n say.
 
 THE RAID ON THE STATION. 229 
 
 " The same old crib," said Bill. " Same as 
 it was ten year ago, only plastered up a bit. 
 I suppose it is locked, mate } " 
 
 The handle was tried. The door shook 
 ever so little. The two inside gazed at the 
 props and held their breath. If one of them 
 should be shaken down ! 
 
 " Ay, it 's locked all right ; and I reckon it 's 
 true enough about the girl sleeping with the 
 key under her pillow, and all." 
 
 " Blast your reckonings ! " said Bill. " Make 
 sure the key ain't in the door on t' other 
 side." 
 
 The thimbleful of starlit sky which Naomi 
 had been watching for the last minute and a 
 half was suddenly wiped away. She heard 
 Bo's'n breathing hard as he stooped and 
 peered. The key grew colder in her hand. 
 
 " No, there ain't no key, Bill." 
 
 '* That 's all right. They 're both in their 
 beds then, and that little suck-o'-my-thumb 
 hasn't got here yet. When he does, God 
 'elp him!" 
 
 The voices were those of Bill and Bo's'n. 
 For the moment these two seemed to be alone 
 together.
 
 230 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "Ay, ay, we'd string the beggar up fast 
 enough another time ! " 
 
 " String him up ? Yes, by his heels, and 
 shoot holes through him while he dangled." 
 
 " Beginning where you don't kill. Holy 
 smoke! but I wish he'd turn up now." 
 
 "So do I — the swine! But here comes the 
 ringer. What cheer, matey?" 
 
 " It's right," said Simons. "The little devil's 
 locked her door ; but there are her boots out- 
 side, same as if she was stoppin' at a blessed 
 'otel. A fat lot she cared whether her pre- 
 cious pal was bushed or whether he wasn't! 
 We thought you was telling us lies, mother, 
 but, by cripes, you wasn't ! " 
 
 " I should think not ! " said a fourth voice. 
 " She wouldn't believe he was lost, but I knew 
 he was ; so I just saddled the night-horse after 
 she was in bed and asleep, and was going 
 straight to the shed to raise a search-party ! " 
 
 The pair within were staring at each other 
 in dumb horror. That fourth voice was but 
 too well known to them both. It was Mrs. 
 Potter's.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE NIGHT ATTACK. 
 
 " QEE here, mother!" said Bill. "There's 
 
 wZy one or two things we want to know. 
 Spit out the truth, and that'll be all right. 
 Tell us one lie, and there'll be an end of 
 you. U nderstand ? " 
 
 " I ought to." 
 
 " Right you are, then ; now you know. 
 What about this key.?" 
 
 " She keeps it in her room." 
 
 " Under her pillow, eh ? " 
 
 " That I can't say ; but she will tell you." 
 
 "So we reckon. Now look here. Will 
 you take your oath there's not another soul 
 on the premises but you and her.?" 
 
 The pair within again held their breath. 
 
 They must be discovered ; but the longer they 
 
 could postpone it the shorter would be their 
 
 231
 
 232 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 danger. Mrs. Potter's heart was stout, how- 
 ever, and her tongue ready. 
 
 " I swear it," she cried heartily. 
 
 " What makes you so cussed sure ? " " 
 
 " Why, it stands to reason. By rights there 
 ought to be four of us. That's with Sam 
 Rowntree and Mr. Engelhardt. Sam's gone 
 off on his own hook somewhere" — Bill 
 chuckled — "but nobody knows where. Mr. 
 Engelhardt 's lost, as I told you. So there's 
 nobody left but mistress and me. How could 
 there be.?" 
 
 " I don't know or care a curse how there 
 could be. I only know that if there is, you'll 
 have a pill to take without opening your 
 mouth for it. About this chap that's lost: 
 you '11 take your oath he didn't turn up before 
 you left the station just now ? " 
 
 " I told you he hadn't, as soon as ever you 
 overtook me." 
 
 " You 've got to swear it ! " said Bill savagely. 
 
 " I swore it then." 
 
 " So she did," said Simons, who had been 
 grumbling openly during this cross-examin- 
 ation. "What's the good of going over 
 the same track twice, mate? Let her give
 
 THE NIGHT ATTACK. 233 
 
 US the feed she promised, and then let 's get 
 to work." 
 
 "And so say I !" cried the Bo's'n. 
 
 *' You shall have your supper in five minutes," 
 said Mrs. Potter, " if you '11 let me get it." 
 
 "All right, missus," said Bill after a pause. 
 ** Only mind, if we catch you in any hanky- 
 panky, by God I '11 screw your neck till I put 
 your face where your back-hair ought to be. 
 Don't you dare get on the cross with us, or 
 there '11 be trouble ! Come on, chaps. You 
 show the way to the dining-room, mother, 
 and light up ; then we '11 . . ." 
 
 The rest sounded indistinct in the store. 
 The low crunching of the foot -falls in the 
 sandy yard changed to a crisp clatter upon 
 the homestead verandah. Naomi waited for 
 that sign ; then with a white face and eager 
 hands she began to tear down, prop by 
 prop, the barricade on which their very lives 
 depended." 
 
 " She shall not suffer for this, whoever else 
 does," she muttered. "At least she shan't 
 suffer alone." 
 
 " You mean to open the door ? " 
 
 ** Yes, and catch her as she passes. To get
 
 234 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 to the kitchen she must pass close to the store. 
 We '11 open the door, and if she 's wise she '11 
 pass three or four times without turning her 
 head; she'll wait till they're well at work; 
 then she '11 come back for something else — 
 and slip in." 
 
 As she spoke Naomi went round to the 
 gun-rack, took down the Winchester repeating- 
 rifle, loaded it and came back to the front of 
 the store. Then she directed Engelhardt to 
 unlock the door, she helping him to be gentle 
 with the key. The lock was let back by 
 degrees. A moment later the door was wide 
 open, with Naomi standing as in a frame, the 
 Winchester in her hands. 
 
 The station yard lay bathed and purified in 
 the sweet moonlight. The well-palings oppo- 
 site, and the barracks beyond, were as though 
 newly painted white. The main building 
 Naomi could not see without putting out her 
 head, for it ran at right angles with the 
 store, and she was standing well inside. But 
 the night wind that blew freshly in her face 
 bore upon it the noise of oaths and laughter 
 from the dining-room, and presently that of 
 footsteps too. At this Naomi laid a finger on
 
 ' THE NIGHT ATTACK. 235 
 
 the trigger and stood like a rock, with the 
 piano-tuner, like its shadow, at her side. But 
 it was only Mrs. Potter who stepped into the 
 moonlight. So far all was as Naomi had 
 hoped and calculated. 
 
 But no further. When the poor soul saw 
 the open door she stopped dead, hesitated half 
 a second, and then ran like a heavy doe for it 
 and Naomi. The latter had made adverse 
 signals in vain. She drew aside to let the 
 woman in, and was also in time to prevent 
 Engelhardt from slamming the door. She 
 shut it gently, turned the key with as much 
 care as before, and with a sternly-whispered 
 " hush ! " kept still to listen. The other two 
 stood as silent, though Mrs. Potter, in the 
 moment of safety and of reaction, was heaving 
 and quivering all over, shedding tears like rain, 
 and swaying perilously where she stood. But 
 she kept her feet bravely during that critical 
 minute ; it was but one ; the next, a shout of 
 laughter from the distance made it clear that 
 by a miracle the incident had passed un- 
 observed and unsuspected. 
 
 "We may think ourselves lucky," said 
 Naomi severely. Next moment she had
 
 236 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 thrown her arms round the old woman's neck, 
 and was covering her honest wrinkled face 
 with her tears and kisses. 
 
 The practical Engelhardt was busily engaged 
 in replacing the props against the door. His 
 one hand made him slow at the work. Naomi 
 was herself again in time to help him, and 
 now there was sturdy Mrs. Potter to lend her 
 weight. The supports were soon firmer than 
 ever, with gimlets and bradawls driven into 
 the door above those at the greatest slant, 
 which were thus in most danger of being 
 forced out of place. Then came a minute's 
 breathing-space. 
 
 " I had just got through the first gate," 
 Mrs. Potter was saying, " when I heard a 
 galloping, and they were on me. Nay, Miss 
 Naomi, it isn't anything to be proud of. I 
 just said the first things that came into my 
 head about you both ; there was no time 
 to think. It's only a mercy it's turned out 
 so well." 
 
 "It was presence of mind," said Naomi. 
 "We have scored an hour through it, and 
 may another if they are long in missing you. 
 If we can hold out till morning some one
 
 THE NIGHT ATTACK 237 
 
 may ride in from the shed. Don't you hear 
 them talking still ? " 
 
 ** Yes ; they 're more patient than I thought 
 they 'd be." 
 
 " They think you *re busy in the kitchen. 
 When they find you 're not, they '11 waste 
 their time looking all over the place for you 
 — everywhere but here." 
 
 "Ay, but they'll come here in the end, and 
 then may the Lord have mercy on our souls ! " 
 
 " Come, come. They 're not going to get 
 in as easily as all that. And if they do, what 
 with the Winchester " 
 
 "Hush!" said Engelhardt. He was kneel- 
 ing among the props, with his ear close to the 
 bottom of the door. 
 
 All three listened. The voices were louder 
 and more distinct. The men had come out- 
 side. 
 
 " I don't believe she 's there at all," said 
 one. " I see no light." 
 
 "Go you and have a look, Bo's'n. Prick 
 the old squaw up with the p'int o' your knife. 
 But if you find her trying to hide, or up to 
 any o' them games, I 'd slit her throat and 
 save the barney."
 
 238 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " By cripes, so would I ! ' 
 
 " Ay, ay, messmates, but we '11 see — we '11 
 
 see." 
 
 All the voices were nearer now. Naomi 
 had taken Mrs. Potter's hand, and was 
 squeezing it white. For some moments they 
 could make out nothing more. Bo's'n had 
 evidently gone over to the kitchen. The other 
 two were talking in low tones somewhere near 
 the well-palings. Suddenly a muffled shout 
 from the kitchen reached every ear. 
 
 " She 's not here at all." 
 
 " Not there ! " 
 
 " Come and look for yourselves." 
 
 " By gock," cried Bill, " let me just get my 
 grip on to her fat neck ! " 
 
 A moment later the three could be heard 
 ransacking the kitchen, and calling upon the 
 fugitive to come out, with threats and im- 
 precations most horrible to hear even in the 
 distance ; but as they drew nearer, working 
 swiftly from out-building to out-building, like 
 ferrets in a rabbit-warren, the ferocity of their 
 language rose to such a pitch that the hunted 
 woman within fell back faint and trembling 
 upon the counter. Naomi was quick as thought
 
 THE NIGHT ATTACK. 239 
 
 with the flask ; but her own cool hand and 
 steady eyes were as useful as the brandy, and 
 the fit passed as swiftly as it had come. While 
 it lasted, however, the only one to follow every 
 move outside was the assiduous Engelhardt. 
 He had not yet risen from his knees ; but he 
 raised himself a little as Mrs. Potter stood 
 upright again, supported by Naomi. 
 
 "It's all right," he whispered. "They've 
 no idea where you are. Simons has had a look 
 in the barracks, and Bo's'n in the pines. But 
 they've given you up now. They're holding 
 a council of war within five yards of us ! " 
 
 "Let's listen," said Naomi. "Their language 
 won't kill us." 
 
 They had quite given up Mrs. Potter. This 
 was evident from the tail-end of a speech 
 in which Bill bitterly repented not having 
 "stiffened" both her and Engelhardt at sight. 
 
 "As for getting to the shed," said Simons, 
 who was the obvious authority on this point, 
 " that '11 take her a good hour and a half on 
 foot. It'd be a waste of time and trouble to 
 ride after her, though I 'd like to see Bill at 
 work on her — I should so ! If she had her 
 horse, it'd be another thing."
 
 240 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Ay, ay," cried the Bo's'n. " Let the old 
 gal rip." 
 
 Bill had been of the same opinion a moment 
 before; but this indecent readiness to be beaten 
 by an old woman was more than he could share 
 or bear. He told his mates so in highly abusive 
 terms. They retorted that he was beaten by 
 that same old woman himself. Bill was not so 
 sure of that : what about the bedroom with 
 the boots outside ? Nobody had looked in 
 there. 
 
 A brisk debate ensued, in which the voice 
 of Simons rose loudest. Bill, on the other 
 hand, spoke in a much lower tone than usual ; 
 his words did not penetrate into the store ; it 
 was as though they were meant not to. And 
 yet it was Bill who presently cried aloud : 
 
 " Then that 's agreed. We all three go 
 together to rouse her up anyhow, whether the 
 old gal 's there or whether she isn't. Come on!" 
 
 Apparently they went then and there. 
 
 "Nice for me!" whispered Naomi. "Nice 
 for us both, Mrs. Potter, if we weren't 
 safe " 
 
 A bovine roar seemed to burst from their 
 very midst. It was Bill outside the door.
 
 f THE NIGHT ATTACK. 24 1 
 
 " Tricked em, by God ! " he yelled. " Here 
 they are. Never mind that room. I tell you 
 they 're here — both of 'em ; I heard 'em 
 whispering." 
 
 " Bill, you 're a treat," said the Bo's'n, run- 
 ning up. " I never see such a man " 
 
 " Where 's Simons ? " 
 
 " He was bound to have a look for hisself. 
 Here he comes. Well, messmate, where is 
 she ? " 
 
 " Not there," cried Simons with an oath. 
 " The room 's as empty as we are. There 's 
 been no one in it all night." 
 
 Bill laughed. 
 
 "I knew that, matey. You might have 
 saved yourself the trouble when I sang out. 
 She's — in — here." And he kicked the store 
 door three times with all his might. 
 
 "Who is ?" said Simons. 
 
 " Both on 'em. What did I tell you ? 
 They started whisperin' the moment they 
 thought we'd sheered off." 
 
 "They're not whisperin' now," said Simons 
 at the keyhole. " By cripes, let 's burst the 
 door in ! " 
 
 " Hold on," said Bill. " If they're not born 
 
 R
 
 242 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 fools they'll listen to reason. Out o' the light, 
 matey. See here, ladies, if you walk out now 
 you may live to spin the yarn, but if you 
 
 don't " He broke away into nameless 
 
 blasphemies. 
 
 The cruel voice came hoarse and hot through 
 the keyhole. Engelhardt opened his mouth to 
 reply, but Naomi clapped a warm palm upon 
 it, and with the other hand signalled silence 
 to Mrs. Potter. 
 
 "We've given 'em their chance," said Bill 
 after a pause. "Come on, chaps. One, two, 
 all together — now ! " 
 
 There was a stampede of feet in the shallow 
 verandah, and then a thud and a crash, as the 
 three men hurled themselves against the door. 
 But for their oaths outside, in the store it was 
 as though nothing had happened. Not a 
 timber had given, not a prop was out of place. 
 Naomi's white face wore a smile, which, how- 
 ever, was instantly struck out by a loud report 
 and a flash through the keyhole. 
 
 Engelhardt crouched lower, picked some- 
 thing from the floor, and passed it up to 
 Naomi in his open hand. 
 
 She carried it into the moonlight. It was
 
 ^ THE NIGHT ATTACK. 243 
 
 a wisp of the musician's long hair, snipped 
 out by the bullet. 
 
 They stood aside from the keyhole. More 
 bullets came through, but all at the same 
 angle. The women caught up a sack of flour, 
 rolled it over the counter, and with Engel- 
 hardt's help jammed it between the props, so 
 that the top just covered the keyhole. Next 
 moment there was a rush against the door, 
 and for the second time all the harm was 
 done to the besiegers, not the besieged, 
 
 "We'll be black and blue before we've 
 anything to show for it ! " they heard the 
 Bo's'n groaning. 
 
 "There's more than women in this," said 
 Bill. "There's that spawn that I should have 
 strung up if it hadn't been for you two white- 
 feathers. It 's yourselves you 've got to thank 
 for this. I might have known it the moment 
 I caught sight o' that lump o' lard on horse- 
 back. The swine's been in here all the time !" 
 
 " He has ! " shouted Engelhardt at the top 
 of his excited voice; "and it's where you'll 
 never get, not a man of you ! You take 
 that from me ! " 
 
 For a short space there was a hush out-
 
 244 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 side. Then arose such a storm of curses and 
 foul threats that the women within put their 
 fingers in their ears. When they withdrew 
 them all was silence once more, and this time 
 it lasted. 
 
 " They must have gone for something ! " 
 exclaimed Naomi. 
 
 "They have," said the piano -tuner coolly. 
 " A battering-ram ! " 
 
 "Then now's our time," cried the girl. 
 "It's absurd to think of our being cooped 
 up here with any quantity of fire-arms, and 
 no chance of using one of them ! First we 
 must light up. Chop that candle in two, 
 Mrs. Potter. It'll see us through to day- 
 break, and there's nothing to keep dark any 
 longer, so the more light now the better. 
 Ah, here 's the tool-box, and yes ! here 's the 
 brace and bits. Now this is my little plan." 
 
 She took the brace, fitted it with the largest 
 bit, and was making for the door. 
 
 " What are you going to do ? " said Engel- 
 hardt. 
 
 " Make a loophole to fire through." 
 
 " And for them to fire through too ! " 
 
 "Well, that can't be helped."
 
 ^ THE NIGHT ATTACK. 245 
 
 " Excuse me, I think it can. I 've been 
 puzzling the thing out for the last hour I Ve 
 a better plan than that ! " 
 
 " Let me hear it." 
 
 " A tomahawk ! " 
 
 She gave him one from the tool-box. 
 
 *' May I hack the roofing a bit.'* " 
 
 "As much as ever you like." 
 
 " Now a pile of boxes — here — just at the 
 left of the door — and four feet high." 
 
 The women had it ready in a twinkling. 
 They then helped him to clamber to the 
 top — no easy matter with an arm that was 
 not only useless, but an impediment at every 
 turn. When he stood at his full height his 
 head touched the corrugated iron some twenty 
 inches from the obtuse angle between roof and 
 wall. 
 
 He reached out his hand for the tomahawk, 
 and at the height of his eyes he hacked a slit 
 in the iron, prising the lower lip downward 
 until he could see well out into the yard. Then, 
 a handbreadth above the angle, he made a 
 round hole with the spike of the tomahawk, 
 and called for a revolver. Naomi produced a 
 pair. He took one, and worked the barrel
 
 246 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 in the round hole until it fitted loosely enough 
 to permit of training. Then he looked down. 
 There was no sign of the thieves. 
 
 " Have you plenty of cartridges, Miss 
 Pryse ? " 
 
 "Any amount." 
 
 "Well, I don't expect to spill much blood 
 with them ; but on the other hand I 'm not 
 likely to lose any myself." The work and the 
 danger had combined to draw his somewhat 
 melancholy spirit out of itself. Or perhaps it 
 was not the danger itself, but the fact that he 
 shared it with Naomi Pryse. Whatever the 
 cause, the young man was more light-hearted 
 than was his wont. " They '11 fire at the spot I 
 fire from," he explained with a touch of pride ; 
 "they '11 never think of my eyes being two feet 
 higher up, and their bullets must strike the 
 roof at such an angle that no charge on earth 
 would send them through. Mind, it'll be the 
 greatest fluke if I hit them ; but they aren't to 
 know that ; and at any rate I may keep them 
 out of worse mischief for a time." 
 
 "You may and you will," said Naomi en- 
 thusiastically. " But still we shall want my 
 loop-hole ! "
 
 ^ THE NIGHT ATTACK. 247 
 
 " Why so ? " 
 
 " The verandah ! " 
 
 For some moments Engelhardt said nothing. 
 When at last he found his voice it was to 
 abuse himself and his works with such un- 
 necessary violence that again that soft warm 
 palm lay for an instant across his lips. His 
 pride in his own ingenuity had been cruelly 
 humbled, for he had to confess that he had 
 entirely forgotten to reckon with the store- 
 verandah : a perfect shelter against even the 
 deadliest fusillade from his position. 
 
 "Very well," he cried at last. "We'll drill 
 a hole through the door, but we must drill it 
 near the top, and at an angle, so that they 
 can't put a bullet through it at a distance." 
 
 " Then let me do it," said Naomi. She 
 sprang upon the flour bag, and the hole was 
 quickly made. Still the men did not return. 
 " Lucky thing I remembered the axe in time ! " 
 she continued, remaining where she was. 
 " They would have hacked in the door in no 
 time with that. I say, Mr. Engelhardt, this 
 is my post. I mean to stick here." 
 " Never !" he cried. 
 " But you can't work both revolvers.'
 
 248 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " Well, then, let us change places. You '11 
 probably shoot straighter than I should. I '11 
 stand on the Hour-bag with the barrel of the 
 other revolver through the hole you've made. 
 
 If any one of them gets in a line with it 
 
 well, there '11 be a villain less ! " 
 
 "And Mrs. Potter shall load for us," cried 
 Naomi, " Do you know how ?" 
 
 " Can't say I do, miss." 
 
 " Then I '11 show you." 
 
 This was the work of a moment. The old 
 bush-woman was handy enough, and cool 
 enough too, now that she was getting used 
 to the situation. It was her own idea to 
 bring round the store-keeper's tall stool, to 
 plant it among the props, within reach of 
 Naomi on the boxes and of Engelhardt on 
 the flour - bag, and to perch herself on its 
 leather top with the box of cartridges in her 
 lap. Thus prepared and equipped, this strange 
 garrison waited for the next assault. 
 
 "Here they come," cried Naomi at last, with 
 a sudden catch in her voice. "They're carry- 
 ing a great log they must have fished out 
 from the very bottom of the wood-heap. All 
 the top part of the heap was small wood, and
 
 ^ THE NIGHT ATTACK. 249 
 
 I guess they 've wasted some more time in 
 hunting for the axe. But here they are ! " 
 She pushed her revolver through the slit in 
 the roof, and the sharp report rang through 
 the store. 
 
 " Hit anybody ? " said Engelhardt next 
 moment. 
 
 '* No. They 're stopping to fire back. Ah, 
 you were right." 
 
 As she spoke there was a single report, 
 followed by three smart raps on the sloping 
 roof. The bullet had ricochetted like a flat 
 stone flung upon a pond. Another and 
 another did the same, and Naomi answered 
 every shot. 
 
 "For God's sake take care!" cried the 
 piano tuner. 
 
 " I am doing so." 
 
 " Hit any one yet?" 
 
 "Not yet; it's impossible to aim; and 
 they 've never come nearer than the well- 
 palings. Ah ! " 
 
 "What now?" 
 
 " They 're charging with the log." 
 
 Engelhardt slipped his revolver into his 
 pocket, and grasped the shelf that jutted out
 
 250 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 over the lintel. He felt that the shock would 
 be severe, and so it was. It came with a rush 
 of feet and a volley of loud oaths — a crash that 
 smashed the lock and brought three of the 
 clothes-props clattering to the ground. But 
 those secured by gimlet and bradawl still held ; 
 and though the lower part of the door had 
 given an inch the upper fitted as close as 
 before, and the hinges were as yet uninjured. 
 
 "One more does it!" cried Bill. "One 
 more little rush like the last, and then, by God, 
 if we don't make the three of you wish you 
 was well dead, send me to quod again for ten 
 year ! Aha, you devil with the pistol ! Very 
 nice you 'd got it arranged, but it don't cover 
 us here. No, no, we 've got the bulge on you 
 now, you swine you ! And you can't hit us, 
 neither ! We 're going to give you one chance 
 more when we 've got our breath — just one, 
 and then " 
 
 By holding on to the shelf when the crash 
 came Engelhardt had managed to stand firm 
 on the flour-baor. Seeinor that the door still 
 held, though badly battered, he had put his 
 eye to the loop-hole bored by Naomi, and it 
 had fallen full on Bill. A more bestial sisfht
 
 ^ THE NIGHT ATTACK. 25 1 
 
 he had never seen, not even in the earlier hours 
 of that night. The bloated face was swimming 
 with sweat, and yet afire with rage and the 
 lust for blood. The cross-eyes were turned 
 towards the holes in the roof, hidden from 
 them by the verandah, and the hairy fist with 
 the four fingers was being savagely shaken 
 in the same direction. The man was standing 
 but a foot from the door, and when Engel- 
 hardt removed his eye and slipped his pistol- 
 barrel in the place, he knew that it covered his 
 midriff, though all that he could see through 
 the half-filled hole was a fragment of the 
 obscene, perspiring face. It Wcis enough to 
 show him the ludicrous change of expression 
 which followed upon a sudden lowering of 
 the eyes and a first glimpse of the protrud- 
 ing barrel. Without a moment's hesitation 
 Engelhardt pressed the trigger while Bill was 
 stupidly repeating — 
 
 " And then — and then " 
 
 A flash cut him short, and as the smoke and 
 the noise died away, Engelhardt, removing the 
 pistol once more and applying his eye, saw the 
 wounded brute go reeling and squealing into 
 the moonshine with his hand to his middle
 
 252 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 and the blood running over it. To the well- 
 paHngs he reeled, dropping on his knees when 
 he got there, but struggling to his feet and 
 running up and down and round and round 
 like a mad bull, still screaming and blas- 
 pheming at the top of his voice, and with 
 the blood bubbling over both his hands, which 
 never ceased to hug his wound. His mates 
 rushed up to him, but he beat them off, 
 cursing them, spitting at them, and covering 
 them with blood as he struck at them with 
 his soaking fists. It was their fault. They 
 should have let him have his way. He would 
 have done for that hell-begotten swine who 
 had now done for him. It was they who had 
 killed him — his own mates — and he told them 
 so with shrieks and curses, varied with sobs 
 and tears, and yet again with wild shots from a 
 revolver which he plucked from his belt. But 
 he dropped the pistol after madly discharging 
 it twice, and clapping his hand to his middle, 
 as though he could only live by pressing the 
 wound with all his force, he rushed after them, 
 foaming at the mouth and squirting blood at 
 every stride. At last he seemed to trip, and he 
 fell forward in a heap, but turned on one side,
 
 THE NIGHT ATTACK. 253 
 
 his knees coming up with a jerk, his feet 
 treading the air as though running still. And 
 for some seconds they so continued, like the 
 screws of a foundering steamer ; then he rolled 
 over heavily; his two companions came up 
 at a walk ; one of them touched him with his 
 foot ; and Engelhardt stepped down from the 
 flour-bag with a mouth that had never relaxed, 
 and a frown that had never gone. 
 
 Naomi was no longer standing on the boxes; 
 but she was sitting on them, with her face in 
 her hands ; and in the light of the two candle- 
 ends, Mrs. Potter was watching her with a 
 white dazed face. 
 
 "Cheer up!" said Engelhardt. "The worst 
 is over now." 
 
 "Is he dead?" said Naomi, uncovering her 
 face. 
 
 " As dead as a man can be." 
 
 " And you shot him ? " 
 
 She knew that he had ; but the thing seemed 
 incredible as she sat and looked at him ; and 
 by the time it came fully home to her, the little 
 musician was inches taller in her eyes. 
 
 " Yes, I shot the brute ; and I '11 shoot that 
 shearer too if I get half a chance."
 
 254 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Naomi felt nervous about it, and sufficiently 
 shocked. She was dubiously remarking that 
 they had not committed murder, when she 
 was roughly interrupted. 
 
 " Haven't they ! " 
 
 " Whom have they murdered ? " 
 
 " You '11 see." 
 
 " I know ! " cried Mrs. Potter, with sudden 
 inspiration ; but even as they looked at her, 
 a voice was heard shouting from a respectful 
 distance outside. 
 
 " We 're going," it cried. " We 've had 
 enough of this, me and Simons have. Only 
 when they find that chap in the paddock, 
 recollect it was Bill that hung him. But for 
 us he 'd have hung you too ! " 
 
 They listened very closely, but they heard 
 no more. Then Naomi stood up to look 
 through the slit in the roof 
 
 " The yard is empty," she cried. ** Their 
 horses are gone ! Oh, Mr. Engelhardt — Mr. 
 Enoelhardt — we are saved!"
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 IN THE MIDST OF DEATH, 
 
 THE candle-ends had burnt out in the 
 store ; the moon no longer shone in 
 through the skylight ; but the latter was taking 
 new shape, and a harder outline filled with an 
 iron -gray that whitened imperceptibly, like a 
 man's hair. The strange trio within sat still 
 and silent, watching each other grow out of 
 the gloom like figures on a sensitive film. The 
 packet of meat and bread was reduced to a 
 piece of paper and a few crumbs ; the litde 
 flask was empty, and the water-bag half its 
 former size ; but, now that all was over, the 
 horror of the night lay heavier upon them 
 than during the night itself. It was Naomi 
 who broke the long silence at last. 
 
 "They have evidently gone," she said. 
 "Don't you think we might venture now.?" 
 
 " It is for you to decide," said Engelhardt. 
 
 2SS
 
 256 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 "What do you think, Mrs. Potter?" 
 
 "If you ask me, Miss Naomi, I think it's 
 beneath us to sit here another minute for a 
 couple of rascals who will be ten miles away 
 by this time." 
 
 "Then let us go. I will take the 
 Winchester, and if they are still about we 
 must just slip in again quicker than we came 
 out. But I think it 's good enough to 
 chance." 
 
 " So do I," said the piano-tuner, " most 
 decidedly." 
 
 " Then down with the props. They have 
 served us very well, and no mistake ! You 
 must keep them in your kitchen, Mrs. Potter, 
 as a trophy for all time." /( 
 
 The old woman made no reply. Of what 
 she was thinking none ever knew. Her life 
 had run in a narrow, uneventful groove. Its 
 sole adventure was probably the one now so 
 nearly at an end. Ten years ago she had been 
 ear-witness of a somewhat similar incident. 
 And now she had played a part, and no small 
 part, in another and a worse. At her age she 
 might have come out shaken and shattered to 
 the verge of imbecility, after such a night. Or
 
 IN THE MIDST OF DEATH. 257 
 
 she might have feh inordinately proud of her 
 share in the bushrangers' repulse. But when 
 at last the battered door stood wide open, 
 and the keen morning air chilled their faces, 
 and the red morning sky met their eyes, the 
 old woman looked merely sad and thoughtful, 
 and years older since the day before. Her 
 expression touched Naomi. Once more she 
 threw her young arms about the wrinkled 
 neck, and left kisses upon the rough cheek, 
 and words of grateful praise in the old ears. 
 Meanwhile Engelhardt had pushed past 
 them both and marched into the middle of 
 the yard. 
 
 "It's all right, I think," said he, standing 
 purposely between the women and the hideous 
 corpse by the well- palings. "Yes, the coast is 
 clear. But there's the horse you rode, Mrs. 
 Potter, and Bill's horse too, apparently, tied 
 side by side to the fence." 
 
 *' May God forgive them all," said Mrs. 
 Potter, gravely, as she walked across the yard 
 at Naomi's side. 
 
 They were the last words she ever uttered. 
 As she spoke, the crack of a rifle, with the 
 snap of a pistol before and after, cut the early 
 
 s
 
 258 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 Stillness as lightning cuts the sky. Naomi 
 wheeled round and levelled her Winchester at 
 the two men who were running with bent 
 backs from a puff of smoke to a couple of 
 horses tethered among the pines bev^nd 
 kitchen and wood -heap. She sighted the 
 foremost runner, but never fired. A heavy 
 fall at her side made her drop the Winchester 
 and turn sharply round. It was Mrs. Potter. 
 She was lying like a log, with her brave old 
 eyes wide open to the sky, and a bullet in 
 her heart. 
 
 " Take me away,** said the girl faintly, as 
 she got up from her knees. " I can bear no 
 more." 
 
 "There are the horses," answered the piano- 
 tuner, pointing to the two that were tied up to 
 the fence. "I should dearly like to give chase!" 
 
 " No, no, no ! " cried Naomi, in an agony. 
 " Hasn't there been enough bloodshed for one 
 night? We will ride straight to the shed. 
 They have taken the very opposite direction. 
 Let us start at once ! " 
 
 " In an instant," he said, and ran indoors for 
 something to throw over the dead woman.
 
 IN THE MIDST OF DEATH. 259 
 
 The girl was again kneeling beside her, when 
 he came back with a table-cloth. And she was 
 crying bitterly when, a minute later, he slipped 
 his left hand under her foot and helped her 
 into the saddle. 
 
 They never drew rein until the long, low 
 wool-shed was well in sight. The sun was up. 
 It was six o'clock. They could see the shearers 
 swarming to the shed like bees to a hive. 
 The morning air was pungent as spiced wine. 
 Some colour had come back to Naomi's cheeks, 
 and it was she who first pulled up, forcing 
 Engelhardt to do the same. 
 
 "Friday morning!" she said, walking her 
 horse. " Can you realise that you only came 
 last Saturday night ? " 
 
 " I cannot." 
 
 "No more can I ! We have been through 
 so much — " 
 
 " Together." 
 
 " Together and otherwise. I think you 
 must have gone through more than I can 
 guess, when you were lost in Top Scrubby, 
 and when you fell in with those fiends. Will 
 you tell me all about it some time or other ? "
 
 26o THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " I 'm afraid there will be no opportunity," 
 said Engelhardt, speaking with unnatural 
 distinctness. " I must be off to-day." 
 
 " To-day ! " 
 
 Her blank tone thrilled him to the soul. 
 
 " Of course," he said less steadily. " Why 
 not ? I did my best to get away the night 
 before last. Thank God I didn't succeed in 
 that ! " 
 
 " Why did you go like that ? " 
 
 "You know why." 
 
 " I know why ! What do you mean ? How 
 can I know anything ? " 
 
 " Very easily," he bitterly replied, staring 
 rigidly ahead with his burning face. " Very 
 easily indeed, when I left you that letter ! " 
 
 "What letter, Mr. Engelhardt?" 
 
 " The awful nonsense I was idiot enough 
 
 o 
 
 to slip into your book ! " 
 
 " The book I was reading ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Then I have never had your letter. I 
 haven't opened that book since the day 
 before yesterday, though more than once I 
 have taken it up with the intention of doing 
 so."
 
 i IN THE MIDST OF DEATH, 261 
 
 " Well, thank heaven for that ! " 
 
 " But why ? " 
 
 " Because I said " 
 
 " Well, what did you say ? " 
 
 She caught his bridle, and, by stopping both 
 horses, forced him to face her at last. 
 
 " Surely you can guess ? I had just got to 
 know about Tom Chester, and I felt there was 
 no hope for me, so I thought " 
 
 " Stop ; what had you got to know about 
 Tom Chester, please ? " 
 
 " That he cared for you." 
 
 "Indeed! To me that's a piece of news. 
 Mind, I care for him very much as a friend — 
 as a hand," 
 
 *' Then you don't " 
 
 *' No, indeed I don't." 
 
 "O Naomi, what am I to say? In that 
 letter I said it all — when I had no hope in my 
 heart. And now " 
 
 " And now you have called that letter awful 
 nonsense, and yourself an idiot for writing it!" 
 
 She was smiling at him — her old, teasing 
 smile — across the gap between their horses. 
 But his eyes were full of tears. 
 
 "O Naomi, you know what I meant!"
 
 262 THE BOSS OF TAROOMBA. 
 
 " And I suppose it has never occurred to you 
 what I mean ?" 
 
 He stared at her open-eyed. 
 
 " Will you marry me ?" he blurted out. 
 
 "We'll see about that," said Naomi, as he 
 took her hand and they rode onward with 
 clasped fingers. " But I '11 tell you what I a7n 
 on to do. I 'm on to put Taroomba in the 
 market this very day, and to back you for all 
 that it fetches. After that there's Europe 
 — your mother — Milan — and anything you 
 like, my dear fellow, for the rest of our two 
 lives."
 
 THE RXVBRSIDE PRESS LIMITED, EDINBURGH.
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 Los Angeles 
 
 This book is DUE on the hist date stamped below. 
 
 ntCD LDURC 
 
 N0V17?983 
 
 Form L9-Series 4939
 
 PR6015, H784B0 
 
 llij; SOUTHFRN REGIOfJAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 AA 000 384 514