CHAPTER XXIV.
Fire to the East—Brown returns to the Spring—More Dry Creeks Discovered.
Brown stood patiently waiting for some minutes, and then the truth struck him. It was not the moon rising; it was a bush fire, a long distance away.
"Deuced queer," he thought, as he took out his compass, struck a match, and took the bearing of the glow. "It's too far for me to do anything, even if I felt so inclined, which I don't. Hullo! what's this?"
A bright light suddenly gleamed through the trees a little to the south of the other. This, however, was the moon in reality, and Brown turned his willing horse's head towards home, marvelling much at what he had seen.
"Fires travel any distance in this unoccupied country," he thought, "and that one may have come a hundred miles or more."
He reached the water-bags at sunrise, and gave his horse their contents, then, having strapped them on to his saddle, rode on and arrived at the camp at the spring about noon.
Morton could only account for the fire in the same way that Brown did; that it must have travelled a long distance, and that its presence did not denote the existence of water. On his part Morton was able to inform him that they had found another outcrop of the reef that morning, nearly a quarter of a mile to the south, and it appeared as rich as the one they had discovered first.
The waste ahead, however, still sternly confronted them.
"I wonder whether there is another creek further south that this one runs into," said Morton; "or there may be one it joins to the north."
"Very likely; this creek that has been humbugging us does not look to me like a main one, It nearly lost itself several times yesterday, and when I camped it looked very sick."
"We can easily settle the question in a day; to-morrow one go north and one south, as before."
"May I go this time?" said Charlie.
"You go north, and I'll go and crack stones at the new reef," returned Brown.
So it was settled, and they spent a lazy afternoon.
In the morning the two started in opposite directions, and Brown went off to inspect the new find.
Charlie, having been strictly cautioned to trust to his compass only, went due north, and for ten or twelve miles was surrounded by scrub. Then he emerged in a strip of open country, and to his great joy saw creek timber ahead. This water-course was quite different to the one they had been on—it was more like a chain of shallow lagoons, but all were dry and parched. Charlie followed it for some distance, but there was no sign of moisture, and, elated at having something to report, he made his way back to the spring. Strange to say, when Morton came in he too had found a similar creek to the south, but also waterless. Brown worked out the courses on a bit of paper.
"It strikes me," he said, "that these two creeks, if they run on as they were running where you struck them, must junction in with the creek I was on, not many miles below where I camped."
"Supposing we split up," said Morton. "Say you and Charlie, with half the spare horses, follow down the creek he found, and I and the boys will follow down the one I found, with the rest of the horses. We shall meet at the junction, if your theory is correct. The party who gets there first to wait for the others."
"But supposing there is no water in either of the creeks?"
"We can get back here."
"If your creek junctions in above ours, or vice versa, how is the party who arrives at the lower junction to know that the other party is waiting at the upper one?"
"Hum!" said Morton; "that rather capsizes the notion. But I think we can fix it by running the creek up and down a bit."
"Well, I'm willing," returned Brown. "I don't think we are such duffers as to miss each other if we get anywhere within a few miles."
In the morning the plan mooted was carried out, and they left the spring, as they hoped, for good that journey. The creek Brown and Charlie followed proved to be very serpentine in its course. When they stopped for a mid-day spell Brown worked out the dead reckoning, and came to the conclusion that although they had come over fifteen miles in distance, they had not made more than ten in a direct course. Still the creek, on an average, was bearing in towards the other one, and they reckoned they must strike it late in the afternoon.
As they went on the flat grew wider and the empty water-holes further apart, but everything bore the look of a prolonged drought. At four o'clock they sighted the other creek ahead, but there were no signs of the others.
"Wonder how your cousin got on?" Brown said to Charlie. "Hurrah! there he is!" he returned, as a horseman came into sight riding down the bank of the old creek.
Morton pulled up when he caught sight of them, and waited.
"Any water?" he asked when they came up.
"Not a drop. I don't think there has been any in it since the time of Noah's flood. How did you get on?"
"There was no water in the creek we followed, but there is a decent hole where it junctions with this one, about two miles up from here."
"Salt?"
"No, quite drinkable—a slight sweet taste about it."
"I expect there's more water in it than when Stuart was here: these holes get salter as they dry up. Do you think it is the hole he was at?"
"I think it must be," returned Morton, as they turned and rode up the creek. "We ought to be able to get through to the mountain now, even if we don't come across that clay-pan."
"That's good news, at any rate. Did you see anything of that fire?"
"There appears to be a heavy bank of smoke to the eastward, but we must try and find a tree this evening to have a look-out from."
The camp was a fairly good one, although the grass was somewhat dry. After some searching Brown and Morton found a gum-tree which they could climb, but it was not of a sufficient height to afford them a good view of the surrounding country. They made out, however, that an extensive bush fire was raging to the eastward, and when it fell dark the glow was plainly visible. Brown said it was not as bright as when he saw it, as though the fire was now working away from them.
The following day they started on a straight course for the mountain on the creek, and rode the whole day through a barren region of scrub. That night the horses had to be tied up to trees, for there was neither grass nor water for them. However, they felt sure of arriving at the creek the next day.
"We ought to be getting to that big plain pretty soon," said Morton in the morning, as they were making an early start. "That is, if our reckoning is anyway near the mark."
They had scarcely been travelling an hour, when they suddenly rode from the scrub on to the plain, and before them in the distance, with a black haze of smoke as a background, was the mountain they were making for. The fire was seemingly beyond the mountain, as the plain, although covered with dry grass which would have burnt freely enough, had not been burnt.
Once out of the scrub they travelled more rapidly, and in the afternoon once more camped at the base of the mountain. All the eastern side of the creek was burnt bare, and when they ascended the hill they could see that the fire had ravaged most of the spinifex scrub and burnt up the country to the north. The outlook was even drearier than before, for the heat and flames had scorched the leaves of the low trees, and nothing but an expanse of dead foliage was beneath them.
Fortunately there was good feed for their horses on the bank of the creek and the islands in its bed, and as the last two days had been rather severe on them, they decided to rest for a few days and inspect the surrounding country, although it held out little inducement. However, they preferred stopping at where they were to going back to their old camp at the lagoons, where probably all the grass was burnt. The first thing to do was to jot down the whole of their course since leaving the lagoons and correct it, which they were now able to do, as they had arrived back at a known point. They found that the dead reckoning had been very well kept, and that their work closed in a satisfactory manner.
An excursion down the creek on the following day convinced them that it ran out and was hopelessly lost in the sandy scrub that stretched south and east. Next morning Morton was up early at break of day, and climbing up the hill to reach the summit before sunrise, which is the best time to see long distances. To the east the fire was still burning in the distance, but was evidently now in a dying state. Morton had his glasses with him, and commenced to carefully scan the country. At last his attention became fixed on one particular spot to the south. He took a compass-bearing and descended the hill. The others were up, and about to commence breakfast.
"I've spotted that rock hill," said Morton.
"What! The one Stuart says the old blackfellow told him about?"
"I think so. You can't pick it out with the naked eye, but with the glasses I can make it out quite distinctly. A brown naked cone rising out of the scrub."
"How far away is it?"
"Not more than fifteen miles, I should say. I wonder that none of the niggers were able to take Stuart to it."
"Do you intend going?"
"We may as well. I should like to know all about the place before we go home."
"Well, I'm with you, old man."
Next morning they started on Morton's compass-bearing. The distance was about what he judged, and they made a very fair course.
The rock, surrounded by a small area of open country, rose in a round-topped peak to an altitude of about one hundred and fifty feet. The granite sides were smooth and naked, and the two white men, after hanging their horses to a small cork-tree, climbed to the summit. Brown, who had been in Western Australia before, had seen these granite formations peculiar to that colony, but to Morton they were a new phenomenon. From the top they had a good clear view all round. Scrub, east and south, still stretched before them. Presently they both at the same time noticed a clear space west of south, in which there was a sparkle like a reflection from the sun. Morton turned the glasses on it.
"Salt lake," he said, after a pause.
Brown took the glasses and looked.
"Yes, another salt lake, there's no doubt. We'll take the bearings and apparent distance; it's just as well to have all these things down."
"Not worth while going over to it," said Morton.
They descended the hill and rode round it to see if there were any of the holes on the base of the mound, such as are often found. In this case there were two or three, but all small and dry.
"I don't see any good in going into that scrub to the east," said Morton as they rode home; "we'll make a start the day after to-morrow."
Brown agreed with him, and they reached camp in good time.