A BILLABONG DAY.
ONE of the men had found an injured wallaby in an outlying paddock. It had caught in a sagging fence-wire, and broken its leg; the man, engaged in restoring the fence to tautness, had found it lying helpless and starving in a hollow. He was Murty O’Toole, and so he did not knock the soft-eyed little beast on the head, as most stockmen would have done. Murty had an Irishman’s tender heart. Besides, he knew Norah.
“Poor little baste!” he said, picking up the wallaby gently. It made no resistance, but its great eyes were terrified, and he could feel the thumping of its heart. He whistled over it. “Well, well—the treachery of that barbed-wire! Broken, is it then; and me with never a thing to mend ye! Well, Miss Norah ’ll be glad of the chance; she an’ Mr. Jim ’ll make a job of ye, an’ they afther learnin’ first-aid, near as good as doctors. Come along home now, an’ get fixed up.”
Norah had welcomed the invalid with enthusiasm. She had always kept tame wallaby, which make one of the best Bush pets; and this one was a very pretty specimen, the more attractive because of its helplessness and pain. Jim set the broken leg deftly, and Norah took over the care of the patient, which soon grew quite fearless and healed with the clean thoroughness characteristic of wild animals. Before long it could hop about the sheltered enclosure where it lived, never failing to limp to meet her when she came to feed it.
The wallaby’s midday dinner was late to-day, since a job of mustering in an outlying paddock had kept everyone out far beyond the usual luncheon hour. Norah had hurried through the meal, excusing herself before the others had finished, so that she might go to her patient. She was coming back through the sunny garden, swinging her empty milk-tin, when a curious sight met her gaze.
On the first verandah were two revolving figures; one immensely fat, the other so thin that he seemed lost in the capacious embrace of the first. As she came nearer, looking with puzzled eyes, it was evident that they were Mrs. Brown and Wally; and that Mrs. Brown was not, indeed, the embracer, but the most unwillingly embraced. From the open window of the smoking-room came the voice of the gramophone, playing a waltz in time more suited to an Irish jig; to which melody Wally was endeavouring to tune his laggard partner’s footsteps. The unfortunate Brownie, purple of face, did her best; but, for a lady weighing seventeen stone, the task of emulating Wally would not have been easy at any time—and just now Wally appeared to be compounded of quicksilver and electricity. His long legs fairly twinkled; he gambolled and caracoled rather than danced. Glimpses of his countenance, seen over Brownie’s shoulder as he twirled, showed a vision of delirious joy. At the window behind him was Jim’s face, scarcely less joyous. Mr. Linton, grinning broadly, was in a doorway.
“Oh, Wally, aren’t you an ass?” Norah ejaculated, helpless with laughter. “Brownie, dear, don’t let him kill you!”
“If she dies, it will be in a good cause,” Wally returned. “Nevertheless, a substitute will do, and you’re a light-weight, Norah. Thank you, ma’am”—to Mrs. Brown, whom he deposited in a chair, where she subsided gaspingly. “Come along, Norah—let her go, Jim!” He seized his hostess, and they spun up the verandah in a mad waltz, the wallaby’s milk-can, which she had not had time to drop, banging cheerful time.
The gramophone having come to the end of its tether, ended in a scratching howl, and Jim disappeared precipitately from the window. Wally came to a standstill regretfully.
“I could have gone on for quite a while,” he uttered. “Bother you, Jimmy—why couldn’t you keep her wound? Before we begin again, Norah, do you mind laying aside that tin? It’s full of corners.”
“I’m not going to begin again,” said Norah, firmly, “so don’t delude yourself. Now will you tell me why you’ve suddenly gone mad?” Then her eye caught a leather bag lying open on the floor, and her face suddenly flushed with delight. “Oh, Wally, it’s the mail—and you can go!”
“Of course it is,” Wally said, almost indignantly. “Do you think any other cause could have induced me to waltz with Brownie at this hour of day, no matter how much she wanted it?” There came a protesting gurgle from Brownie, to which no one lent hearing.
“Oh, I’m so glad!” Norah caught Wally’s hand, and they pumped each other enthusiastically. “I knew it must be all right, all the time, of course—but it’s lovely to be sure. Were they nice, Wally?”
“Sweet as old pie,” said Wally, happily. “Mr. Dimsdale had waited to communicate with Edward—and Edward was infesting a sugar mill somewhere in the cane districts, and appeared to have taken special precautions to dodge letters. However, he telegraphed to Mr. Dimsdale as soon as he did hear—and he’s sent me an awfully jolly letter, and one to your father. And old Dimmy’s written in his best style, giving me his blessing. And they’ve sent word to school—won’t the Head kick! And they’ve fixed up money. And everything’s glorious. Have another waltz, Brownie?”
“No, indeed, thank you kindly,” said Brownie, hastily, grasping the arms of her chair in the manner affected by those about to have a tooth pulled. “Me figure’s against it, Mr. Wally, my dear, and it isn’t hardly fair. If the day ever comes when you’re seventeen stone, you’ll know—not as it seems likely, but you can’t be sure, and I was thin once meself. Came on me like a blush—and me that active! Ah, well, I’ll be thin enough with worry by the time you’re all safe home again.”
“Rubbish, Brownie,” said Jim, and smiled at her affectionately. “You and Murty will be so busy managing the place that you won’t have time to think of worry.”
“And there’ll be letters every week,” Norah added. “We’ll have such heaps to tell you. And you’ll have to write to us.”
“Me!” said Brownie, visibly shuddering at the prospect. “Gettin’ letters’ll be all we’ll have to look forward to, Miss Norah, my dear—but when it comes to writing them, it’s another thing. I never was ’andy at the pen, as you know. In my day our mothers thought a sight more of making us ’andy about the house and with a cooking-stove. Girls is very different nowadays. Even Mary and Sarah, though goodness knows I’ve done me best with them.”
“Oh, they’re quite good girls,” said Mr. Linton. “They should be, too, after the years you’ve trained them.”
“And they’ll write and say all you want if you’re tired, Brownie darling,” Norah put in.
“I dunno,” said Brownie, despondently, “I’m stupid enough writing myself, but I’d be stupider yet dealing with a—what is it, Mr. Jim dear, when it’s someone as writes for you? Something about ham.”
“Amanuensis?” hazarded Jim.
“Yes, that’s it. No, I’ll have to do my own letters, an’ they’ll be bad enough. You’ll have to excuse them, dearie.”
“The only thing I wouldn’t excuse would be not getting them,” Norah answered. “I’ve had them whenever I was away at school, and you know I can’t do without them, Brownie. Why, you tell me things no one else even thinks of. And I’ll want home letters more than ever when I’m really away from Australia. It was bad enough when I was at school; but to be as far away from Billabong as England——” Norah stopped expressively.
“You’ll have all I can send you, my precious,” said Brownie tearfully. “I s’pose it’s no good for me to make up a hamper now and then? Me plum-cakes’ll keep a year!”
“I only wish it were,” said Jim. “Your hampers have brightened my life from my youth up, Brownie—not that I ever gave one of your cakes a chance to keep three days! But I expect we’ll have to wait until we come home again. One thing’s quite certain, we’ll all be ready for your cooking when we come back.”
“Bless his heart!” said Brownie. It was plain that comforting visions of a culinary orgie of welcome were already materialising in her mind. “It’ll be a great day for the station when we get you all again—and be sure you bring Mr. Wally too. I’ll have pikelets ready for you, Mr. Wally!”
“I’ll think of them, Brownie,” said Wally, his voice very kindly. “And anyhow, one of the best things about getting back will be to see your old face again. There now, I’ve made a sentimental speech. Take me away Jim, and give me some work.”
“Haven’t any,” Jim answered, lazily. “You forget I’ve been out since daylight, old man—at an hour when I believe you were snoring musically, I was giving the chestnut an early morning lesson. He went jolly well too; easy as a rocking-chair. Now it’s three o’clock and I’m thinking of claiming the eight-hours-day of the honest Australian working-man.”
“Well, it’s not often you limit yourself to it,” his father said.
“Don’t encourage him, sir,” Wally remarked. “Family affection doubtless blinds you to the idleness which has so long grieved me in your son’s character——”
“Losh!” said Jim, in astonishment. He rose, and fell upon the hapless Mr. Meadows, conveying him to the lawn, where they rolled over together like a pair of St. Bernard puppies. Finally Jim, somewhat dishevelled, sat up on the prostrate form of his friend.
“I don’t mind your maligning me at all,” he said. “But when you take to talking like a copy-book, it’s time someone dealt with you, young Wally.” He shifted his position, thereby eliciting a smothered howl from the victim. “You needn’t think that because you’re going to the war you can make orations. Not here, anyhow.”
“Take him off, somebody—Norah!” came from the earth, in a voice much impeded by grass.
“Indeed, I won’t—you have me pained, as Murty says,” replied Norah callously. “He never did anything to you that you should talk in that awful way. You might be your own grandmother!”
“You’re not a nice family!” said Wally, gaspingly. He achieved a violent convulsion, and Jim, taken off his guard, lost his balance and fell over—of which his adversary was not slow to take advantage. The battle that followed was interrupted by the hasty arrival of Billy, his ebony countenance showing unusual signs of excitement. The tangled mass of arms and legs on the lawn resolved itself into its original parts, and Jim endeavoured to appear the manager of Billabong, even with much grass in his hair.
“What is it, Billy?”
“Murty him send me,” Billy explained. “Big pfeller shorthorn bullock him bogged in swamp—baal us get him out. Want rope an’ horses.”
“Where?”
“Far Plain. That pfeller silly-fool bullock—him just walk in boggy place. Big one—nearly fat.”
Jim whistled.
“Nice game getting him out will be. Well, you’ve got your job, Wally, old man, and if you take my advice, you’ll borrow some of my dungarees to tackle it. There’ll be much mud. Billy, you run up old Nugget and put a collar and trace chains on him, and lead him out. Take some bags—we’ll bring ropes. Tell one of the boys to saddle our horses—they’re in the stable.”
“Can I come, Jim?” Norah asked.
“Yes, of course; but you can’t very well help, so your habit will be all right; good thing you hadn’t got out of it,” said Jim casting a glance at his sister’s neat divided skirt and blue serge coat. “You might cut along, if you’re ready, and hurry up the horses; Wally and I must go and change.” The boys clattered into the hall and up the stairs.
Mr. Linton, who had retreated to his office, came out at the noise.
“Anything the matter, Norah?”
Norah explained briefly, securing her felt hat the while.
“H’m,” said her father. “No, I won’t come out, I think Jim and Murty can manage without me; and Green and I are up to our eyes in the books. Take care of yourself, my daughter.” He returned to the society of the warlike Green, while Norah raced across to the stables.
A rather small lad of sixteen, a newcomer whom Murty was endeavouring to train in the place of one of the enlisted stockmen, was trying to saddle Jim’s big bay, Garryowen—an attempt easily defeated by Garryowen by the simple process of walking round and round him. Norah came to his assistance, and the horses were ready by the time Jim and Wally, clad in suits of blue dungaree, ran over from the house.
“Good girl,” said Jim, well understanding that the new boy would not have finished the task unaided. He dashed into the harness-room, returning with two coils of strong rope, which he tied firmly to his saddle. Norah and Wally were already mounted and out of the stable-yard.
There was a keen westerly wind in their faces as they cantered steadily across the paddocks. Billabong was looking its worst; the drought had laid heavy hands upon it, and its beauty had vanished. On every side the plains stretched away, broken here and there by belts of timber or by the long, grey, snake-like lines of fencing. The trees were the only green thing visible, since Australian forest trees do not shed their leaves; but they looked old and faded, and here and there a dead one stood grey and lonely, like a gaunt sentinel. Grey too were the plains; their withered grass merged into the one dull colour. It was sparse and dry; even though the season was winter, a little cloud of dust followed the riders’ track.
They crossed the river by a rough log bridge, built by Mr. Linton and his men from trees felled by the stream. The dry logs clattered under the horses’ feet. Looking up and down stream the water showed only a shrunken remnant of its usual width, with boggy patches of half-dried mud between the thin trickle and the dusty banks, where withered docks reared gaunt brown stems. Even the riverside was dull and lifeless. But the wattle-trees, bravely defying the drought, already showed among their dark-green masses of foliage the buds that hinted at the spring-time shower of gold.
“This time last year,” said Jim, “the river came down in flood, and all but washed this bridge away.”
“It doesn’t look much like a flood now,” Wally remarked, surveying the apology for a river with disfavour.
“No—it’s hard to imagine that it was over the banks and half across these paddocks. By Jove, we had a busy time!” Jim said, reminiscently. “It came down quite suddenly; it was pretty high to begin with, and then a big storm brought a lot of snow off the mountains, and whish! down came the old river. We had sheep in these paddocks, and saving them wasn’t an easy job. Sheep are such fools.”
“Sheep and turkey-hens,” said Norah, “have between them an extraordinary amount of idiocy.”
“They have,” agreed her brother. “Our blessed old Shrops. decided that they would like to die—so, instead of clearing out on the rises at the far side of the paddocks, they camped on little hills near the river; and, of course, the water came all round them, and there they were, stranded on chilly little islands, surrounded by a healthy brown flood. Some slipped in and were drowned; the rest huddled together, and bleated in an injured way, as if they hadn’t had a thing to do with getting themselves into the fix.”
“Could you get them off?” Wally asked.
“Oh, most of them. Where the flood wasn’t very deep we just drove the big cart in and loaded them into it. It was too deep in a lot of places, and we had to get the old flat-bottomed boat from the lagoon near the house and go paddling over the paddocks. That was all right, but the stupid brutes wouldn’t let themselves be saved, if they could help it; whether it was cart or boat they disliked it equally, and we had to swim after half of them—they simply hurled themselves into the water rather than be rescued. And when it comes to life-saving in pretty turbulent flood-water, you can’t find anything much more unpleasantly awkward than a big woolly Shropshire, very indignant at not being allowed to drown.”
“Jolly sort of job,” commented Wally. “Water cold?”
Jim gave a shiver of remembrance.
“Well, it was chiefly snow-water,” he answered “I don’t want to strike anything much colder. We were in and out of it all day for three days and the wonder was that some of us didn’t die—poor old Murty finished up with a shocking bad cold. My share was earache, and that was bad enough. But we had a job the week after that was nearly as exciting.”
“What was that?”
“Well, the flood-water went back, leaving a line of débris right across the paddock—a solid belt of rubbish about six feet wide, made of reeds, and sticks and leaves, and all the small stuff the water could gather up as it came over the grass. Dry reeds were the basis of it—there must have been tons of them. Then we had a few days of early spring weather—you know those queer little bursts of almost hot days we get sometimes. I was standing still on this layer of rubbish one morning, looking at a bullock across the paddock when I felt something on my leg—looked down, and it was a tiger-snake!”
“Whew-w!” whistled Wally.
“Only a little chap—but any tiger-snake is big enough to be nasty,” Jim said. “It seemed puzzled by my leather gaiter; I kicked it off and picked up a stick to kill it. And I nearly picked up another snake!”
“Some people are never satisfied,” Wally said, severely. “Were you trying to qualify for a snake-charmer?”
“Not much—I can’t stand the brutes,” Jim answered. “I killed those two and then went hunting among the rubbish—and do you know, it was simply alive with snakes! The flood had brought them, I suppose, and the warm sun had encouraged them to come out; anyhow, there they were, and a nice job we had getting rid of them. I killed eight or ten more, and then it struck me that the occupation was likely to last some time, so I went home to lunch, and brought the men out afterwards. We had to turn over every bit of that rubbish with forks—it was too damp to burn—and I forget how many snakes we got altogether, but it was enough to stock a menagerie a good many times over. Beastly game—we all saw snakes for a week after it was finished, and I dreamed of them every night.”
“I should think you did,” Wally said, with sympathy. “Did any one get bitten?”
“No—they were all pretty small and very sleepy. I daresay they thought it was a little rough on them; after all, they hadn’t asked to be brought from their happy homes and dumped out on the plain. But a snake’s a snake,” finished Jim, emphatically. “It doesn’t pay you to show mercy to one because he’s small.”
“It does not; he grows up, and bites you,” said Wally, grimly, referring to a painful episode in his own career.
“Indeed, he doesn’t always wait until he grows up,” Norah put in. “Even a baby tiger-snake can be venomous enough to be unpleasant. I don’t know why snakes exist at all; they say everything has its uses, but I never can see what use there is in the snake tribe.”
“Neither can I—unpleasant brutes!” Wally agreed. “You get used to them, but you never learn to love them—unless you’re a freak. I knew an old swagman in Queensland who made pets of them, though. He had a collection of about a dozen, which he said were poisonous, but I believe, myself, he’d taken out their fangs.”
“If he hadn’t, it’s the sort of thing nobody waits to prove,” Jim said. “You have to investigate a snake pretty closely before you find out if he has fangs or not; and if he has, the enquiry is apt to be unhealthy for you.”
“That’s so,” agreed Wally. “No one ever waited to investigate old Moriarty’s serpents. He made them pay very well; he would run up a good big bill at a hotel, and borrow as much money as he could from men who were there, drinking; and then he would pull out his snakes in a casual way in a crowded bar-room. Well, it used to work like a charm—most men can tackle a snake or two in a room, but when it comes to seeing a dozen squirming in different ways, people are likely to get rattled. Old Moriarty could clear out a room in quicker time than any fire-alarm. The bar-lady, if she didn’t escape with the first rush, would faint, or have a ladylike fit of hysterics; and by the time anyone collected enough presence of mind to return, Moriarty would be far away, generally helping himself to a couple of bottles of whisky as he went.”
“Horrid old pig!” was Norah’s comment.
“He wasn’t a nice man,” Wally agreed. “Still I suppose you might call him a genius in his own particular line. Anyway, he travelled all over Southern Queensland, leaving behind him a trail of memories of serpents and missing cash.”
“What became of him?” Jim asked.
“What I believe becomes of every crank who goes in for snake-catching—he got bitten at last. He lost his snakes one by one; you see, quite often one or two would get killed when he let them loose in a bar, if they happened to wriggle up against a man who was sober and had his stockwhip handy. Then he tried the trick once too often; he came to a place where there was a drover who had seen him play his game in another township, and this fellow warned everyone else, and told them he was sure the snakes were really harmless. So when Moriarty let them go, everyone was ready, and nobody fled—but in about two minutes there wasn’t a live wriggler left of all his stock-in-trade.”
“That was awkward for Moriarty,” Jim remarked “What did he do? Was he wild?”
“I guess he was pretty wild. But from all we could hear, he hadn’t a chance to do anything, because things became so actively unpleasant for him. The drover was one from whom he’d borrowed money previously; and he knew there was no chance of getting it back, so he was annoyed. He told the story of Moriarty’s misdeeds until everyone else felt annoyed too, and they ducked the old sinner in a horse-trough outside, and then escorted him gently but firmly from the township, riding him on a fence-rail. It was summer, so it really didn’t hurt him, but it discouraged him.”
“Still, he went catching snakes again?” Norah asked.
“Oh, yes. I suppose he felt they were his only friends; they must have twin-souls to a certain extent. If a snake wasn’t your natural affinity you couldn’t go about with it in your pocket, could you?”
“I don’t expect you could,” said Jim, laughing. “I can’t imagine doing it under any circumstances whatever; but there’s no accounting for tastes, and your Moriarty seems to have been an unusual gentleman. I suppose he felt lonely without his pets. One would.”
“One certainly would,” Wally assented. “Fancy a dozen of ’em wriggling about you! Anyhow, Moriarty went off into the bush after more, and had pretty good hunting; he turned up on our station with five or six. Of course, he behaved all right there, and didn’t attempt to show them unless he was asked—and, of course, we youngsters were as keen as mustard to see them. We always enjoyed a visit from Moriarty, and he used to be very careful with the snakes, not to run any risks for us. He was really quite a decent old chap, except for whisky; when he couldn’t get any you might have easily mistaken him for a respectable citizen.”
“Is that the kind you keep in Queensland?” enquired Jim, grinning.
“Don’t know,” returned Wally, evenly—“they wouldn’t let me mix in respectable circles since I took to associating with you. However, Moriarty stayed with us a few days, and then went off into the bush again, saying he wanted more snakes. We never saw him again, poor old chap; but one of the boundary-riders came upon his body a few days later.”
“Dead?”
“Oh, yes, quite dead. He had evidently been bitten by a snake. He had a theory that if one did bite him, it wouldn’t hurt him, and he’d always said that he wouldn’t do anything to cure himself—that he was too tough for poison to hurt him. All these snake-charming idiots say that sort of thing. Well, old Moriarty found out his mistake, as they all do—too late.”
“Poor old chap!” said Norah.
“Yes—we were all jolly sorry for old Moriarty. Of course, he was really an absolute reprobate; but he always behaved decently on our station, and he used to be jolly kind to us boys. We were lonely kids, and the place was at the back of beyond—hardly a soul ever came there, and we welcomed Moriarty’s visits tremendously. He was such an unusual animal. Ah, well, rest his sowl, as Murty would say. I don’t suppose he’d have done any good with himself, so perhaps it was as well he went out.”
They had been riding through a belt of sparse growing timber, the track marked by the wheels of the bullock-drays that were sent to bring firewood to the homestead. Now they emerged upon an open plain, where quicker going was possible. Just ahead was Billy, jogging along upon the hated Bung-Eye, whose piebald sides bore many marks of his spurs. He was leading a heavy black horse; one of the generally useful “slaves” to be found on any station, capable of being used as hack or stock-horse, in buggy, cart, or plough, and equally handy in any capacity. It was said of Nugget that in an emergency he was quite agreeable to pulling a load with his tail; and it was known that by means of a halter fastened to that useful appendage he had once “skull-dragged” a jibbing horse home. Nothing came amiss to him. If he had a temper, it was never shown. In good seasons or bad, he throve, and under no circumstances was he sick or sorry. His breeding was extremely doubtful, but in all that matters he was a perfect gentleman.
Billy looked enviously at the unhampered riders as they swept past him. He hated slow progress; to him, as to most natives, a horse was a thing which should be kept at a high speed, and it was the sorrow of his life that the work demanded of him very often meant quiet going. It was bad enough to have to jog over the paddocks on lazy old Bung-Eye, leading Nugget, heavy-footed and with trace-chains clanking dismally, without being forced to watch these cheerful people tear by him on horses that he would have bartered most of his small worldly possessions to ride. He jerked Nugget’s leading-rein angrily, whereof the old black horse took not the slightest notice. Nugget was certainly not a cheerful proposition to lead; he went at his own pace or none, and at any attempt to hustle him he simply leaned heavily on the bit, becoming in Murty’s phrase, “as aisy as a stone wall.” At the moment. Billy was blind to all his undoubted moral excellences.
Half a mile across the paddock was a swampy lagoon. Ordinarily it was fringed with a thick belt of green rushes, which made splendid cover for black duck, and always gave good shooting in the season. Now, however, it was half dried up, and the rushes, withered and yellow, rattled cheerlessly in the keen wind. There was a wide expanse of dried mud near the bank; then another expanse, deep chocolate in colour, not yet quite dry. Beyond was the water, dotted with clumps of rushes, and looking rather like pea-soup. The mud was deeply indented with hoof-marks. A loud croaking of innumerable frogs filled the air.
A dozen yards from the edge stood a big shorthorn bullock, girth deep in water. He was hopelessly bogged. From time to time he made a violent struggle to free his legs from the mud that held them; but each attempt only left him sunk more deeply. It was quite evident that he fully understood the seriousness of his plight. His sides heaved with his panting breath; his great eyes were wild with fear. Now and then he gave a low bellow, full of anxiety.
“I’ll bet he’s cold!” said Jim, with emphasis. “The great stupid ass! Why couldn’t he have the sense to keep out of a bog-hole like that?” He jumped off, and proceeded to tie Garryowen’s bridle to a tree. “Been at him long, Murty?”
“Sure I kem upon him two hours ago, an’ I’ve been doin’ me endeavours to shift him ever since,” replied Mr. O’Toole, picking his way across the hoof-marked mud to meet the riders. His usually cheery countenance wore a doleful expression, and was obscured by many muddy streaks. Mud, in fact, clothed him from head to foot; in addition to which he was extremely wet. He cast a look at his hands, plastered and dripping. “Sorry I can’t take the pony for ye, Miss Norah.”
“It’s all right, thank you, Murty,” Norah answered, securing Bosun. “I wish I had known you’d been at this horrible job so long. I could have brought you out some tea. You must be frozen.”
“Don’t you worry; I’ve something better,” said Jim, producing a flask, at the sight of which Murty’s eyes brightened.
“Well, I’ll not be sorry for a drink,” he said, gratefully. “Cold! It’d freeze a poley bear to be standin’ in that water; and that’s what I’ve been doin’ these two hours, coaxin’ of that onnatural baste. Thanks, Mr. Jim.” His teeth chattered against the silver cup as he drank.
“I knew you’d need it,” Jim said. “This isn’t a winter job. Mud deep, Murty?”
“Och, deep as you like!” said Murty lucidly. He handed back the cup. “ ’Tis good to feel that sendin’ a taste of a glow through a frozen man! The mud’s deeper than the water, Mr. Jim—there’s mighty little of that. Good sticky mud too; it takes a powerful grip of the boot.”
“Have you moved him at all?”
“I have not. He’s precisely where he was when I found him, barrin’ he’s sunk deeper. I tried driving and I tried pulling; Billy an’ I got our stirrup-leathers joined and did our divilmost to haul him out; and I’ve beaten the poor baste most unfeeling. There’s no stirring him. So I sent Billy in f’r ye, and I’ve been employing me time laying down logs an’ slabs all round him, the way he’ll get a howlt for his feet when we do move him—an’ have something f’r ourselves to stand on while we’re getting the tackling on to him. That same is needed.” Mr. O’Toole looked down ruefully at his mud-plastered feet and legs. “Near bogged I was meself, an’ I beltin’ him; a good thing f’r me I got a howlt on his tail, though I expect he thought it was a misfortunit thing for him. But it was him or me.”
“You certainly must have had a cheerful time,” Jim observed. “I’d sooner have lots of jobs than laying down a wood pavement under water in this weather.”
“Well, it passes the time away, an’ that’s about all you can say f’r it,” said Murty, grimly. “Here’s that black image. ’Twas all I wished wan of us had been on old Nugget—we’d have skull-dragged the baste out somehow, before he sank as deep as he is now. But we’ll manage it nice an’ pleasant, with all that tackling.”
“I hope so,” Jim said, surveying the muddy water a little doubtfully. “We’ll have a good try, anyhow. Better stay out of the water now, Murty; you’ve had quite enough. We can rope him.”
“Is it me?” queried Mr. O’Toole, indignantly. “ ’Tis only used to it I am—there’s no need f’r you to wet y’r feet at all. Billy an’ I can fix it.”
Jim laughed.
“I might have known you wouldn’t be sensible,” he said. “Come on, then, you obstinate old Irishman!” He picked up a coil of rope and some sacking and marched off into the water, followed by his henchmen.
The big shorthorn seemed to understand that the new arrivals were bent on helping him, for he showed no sign of fear as they waded across, stumbling in the boggy mud and tripping over Murty’s unseen and uneven pavement of logs. To stand on logs hidden under water is never the easiest of pursuits—the log possessing an almost venomous power of tipping up; and when such action on the part of the log renders its victim exceedingly likely to be dogged by plumping him violently into mud, the excitement becomes a trifle wearing. Norah, left alone on dry land beside Nugget, who slumbered peacefully, was divided between mirth and anxiety. To the looker-on there was much that was undoubtedly comical.
“Scissors!” ejaculated Wally, making a mis-step and losing his balance altogether. A violent splash resounded as he struck the water, disappearing momentarily in a cloud of spray that half drenched his companions. Mr. Meadows arose like a drowned rat, amidst unfeeling laughter.
“Can’t you stand up, you old duffer?” queried Jim—and promptly lost the use of one leg, which sank so far into the yielding mud that it was all its owner could do to avoid sitting down in the water. Prompt action rescued him, amidst jeers from Wally.
“Of all the evil places for a stroll!” ejaculated Jim. “What on earth possessed you to come in here at all, you owl?” This to the bullock, who very naturally made no reply.
“Contrary they do be, by nature,” said Murty, picking his way from log to log. “You’d wonder, now, what he’d expect to be finding; and any fool could have towld it’d be boggy. Well, he has his own troubles coming, an’ serve him right.”
The bullock snorted uneasily when he found himself the centre of attraction: a matter brought home to him sharply by the fact that Jim slipped on a log near him, and fell against him with a violence that would have disturbed anything less firmly bogged.
“No good trying to move him by ourselves, I suppose, Murty?” queried Jim, recovering himself.
“Not a bit—we’ll help the ould horse, but ’tis Nugget that’ll pull him out,” rejoined the stockman. “I doubt if we’d shift him in a month of Sundays. Let ye be catching that rope, Mr. Jim, when I pass it under him.”
To adjust the tackling was a matter requiring care, in order to avoid injury to the bullock. They padded him with sacking wherever a rope was likely to cut when the strain came upon it, with due regard that no knots should press unduly. It took time—standing as the workers were on slippery hidden logs that moved and squelched under them like living things, and in icy water that chilled them through and through, and numbed their fingers as they wrestled with the hard rope. When it was done Norah led Nugget in to the edge of the boggy mud, and the trace-chains attached to his collar were joined to the tackling on the bullock.
“Lead him on, and we’ll see if he can shift him, Nor,” Jim called.
“Come up, Nugget,” responded Norah. She took the black horse by the head; and Nugget, suddenly realising that great things were demanded of him, woke up and went forward with a steady strain. The bullock, finding himself more uncomfortable than he had ever dreamed of being, bellowed indignantly. But nothing happened. The prisoner did not budge an inch.
“No good,” Jim sang out. “Back, Nugget,” and Nugget stopped and backed with thankful promptness. “We’ll have to rig up some more tackling.”
The broad leather saddle-girths made an excellent foundation for side-ropes. Jim and Billy took one, Murty and Wally the other. They waded out until they were on firm ground. The bullock stood glaring at them, wild-eyed.
“Now, Nor—and all together!”
The tackling tightened. On either side, the rope-holders threw their weight on the stiffening cords, like men in a tug of war. Norah, stumbling on the hoof-printed mud, urged Nugget by voice and hand. There was a minute’s hard pulling.
“Slack off,” Jim commanded. “Back him, Norah.” Men and horse panted in unison, getting their breath anew.
“I believe he came a little,” Wally said.
“Something came,” Jim agreed. “Let’s hope it wasn’t the tackling giving. We’ll know this time, anyhow. Ready, boys?”
Once more the strain came. The four rope-holders struggled together, their muscles standing out like knotted cords. Nugget, knowing his business just as well as they, put his head down and leaned against the strain, gaining foot by foot. An anguished bellow broke from the bullock. There came a sucking, squelching sound.
“He’s coming!” Norah gasped. “Pull, boys!”
A final struggle, and the strain eased suddenly. The mud gave—the bullock, feeling himself freed from the horror that had gripped his legs, plunged stiffly forward, tripped, and fell bodily into the water. They dragged him out on his side, a pitiful, mud-plastered object. It required considerable coaxing to get him upon his feet, and then he stood still, too numbed and confused to move, while the tackling was removed.
“There you are,” Jim said at last, dealing him a hearty blow with a girth. “Move on—you can’t stand there all night, you know.” But it was only after repeated blows that the rescued one obeyed, stumbling across the mud to the safety of the bank, where he stood, trembling with cold.
“We can’t leave him here,” Jim said. “He’s too cold altogether—he’ll have to be housed to-night. Billy, you bring him in slowly—hitch old Nugget to him if he won’t travel.”
“Plenty,” said Billy, lugubriously. He also was cold, and the prospect of tailing in behind the numbed bullock was anything but pleasant. He began his slow journey as the other four cantered off across the paddock.
Mr. Linton came out to the stable yard to greet them. He had been watching for some time before he heard the beat of far-off hoofs, and the echo of young voices, singing in the dusk.
“Well, you seem cheerful enough,” he said. “Job tough?” The light from the stables fell on his mud-covered son, and he laughed a little. “It was as well you put on dungarees, Jim.”
“Just as well,” said Jim, laughing. “Got him out, anyhow.”
“You’ve had a long day,” said his father.
“Have I?” Jim asked. “Oh, I suppose I have! Nothing to growl at, at any rate.” He straightened his broad shoulders as they walked across to the house. “Billabong days never do seem long, somehow. I wonder if——” Whatever the conjecture was, it went no further. His hand fell on Norah’s shoulder as they went in together.
“ ‘He’s coming!’ Norah gasped. ‘Pull, boys!’ ”
| From Billabong to London] | [Page 89 |