The Germ Growers: An Australian story of adventure and mystery

An Australian Story of Adventure and Mystery.
BY ROBERT EASTERLEY AND JOHN WILBRAHAM.
“His . . . . . . . .
Prosequitur dictis portaque emittit eburna.”
It was delicious weather, warm enough for light silk coats in the daytime, and cold enough for two pairs of blankets at night. We had riding and sea-bathing to our hearts’ content, and even a rough kind of yachting and fishing. The ocean was before us—we heard its thunder night and day; and the lakes were behind us, stretching away to the promontory which the Mitchell cuts in two, and thence to the mouth of the Latrobe, which is the highway to Sale. Three times a week a coach passed our door, bound for the Snowy River and the more savage regions beyond. Any day for a few shillings we could be driven to Lake Tyers, to spend a day amidst scenery almost comparable with the incomparable Hawkesbury. Last of all, if we grew tired of the bell-birds and the gum-trees and the roar of the ocean, we were within a day’s journey of Melbourne by lake and river and rail.
“No,” said he, “it may have been fifty miles or more away, their knowledge is loose, and their description looser, but it must be somewhere in the neighbourhood, and I suppose they are sure to find it.”
“I do not know,” said I; and after a pause I added, “Jack, it seems to me they might pass all over the place and see nothing of what we saw.”
“God knows,” he muttered, and then he sat down on a hummock of sand and I beside him. Then he said, “Why have you never told the story, Bob?”
“Don’t you know why, Jack?” I answered. “They would lock me up in a madhouse; there would be no one to corroborate me but you, and if you did so you would be locked up along with me.”
“That might be,” said he, “if they believed you; but they would not believe you, they would think you were simply romancing.”
“What would be the good of speaking then?” said I.
“Well,” said I, “let it be a joint concern between you and me, and I’ll do my best.”