“Yes. It’s like this: I sent Jim out with a couple of ‘boys’ to see if any of our beasts had gone over the Murdaro boundary. Well, he writes to me he’s come across the tracks of a party of horsemen going north. Thinks it is that explorer fellow who was stopping with Giles.”
“By Jingo! they’ll have a dry trip of it,” observes Morth, who has just crossed a corner of the northern desert on his way to Borbong.
“Yes, but he’s picked up a Myall black,—to show him the water-holes, I suppose. Jim noticed the beggar’s tracks besides the horse’s hoof-marks, and guessed that it was a warragal, because if it had been a station black he’d have ridden one of the spare horses.”
“That was smart of Jim,” remarks the police officer.
“Oh, the young ’un has got his head screwed on level. But to continue: Jim ran the tracks back, and then sent for Bogie—the best tracker we have—to have a look at them. Bogie spotted where three niggers had come out of the scrub.”
“Ah!” interrupts Morth, with a laugh, “I’m glad I waited.”
“Bogie,” continues Mr. Browne, “knows every black’s track around, and he swears that one of those which Jim found is that of a nigger who cleared out from Murdaro lately; what was his name now? Never mind that, however.”
“Oh, you mean that boy of Dyesart’s,” observes the sub-inspector.
“No, I don’t mean Billy—that was the name of Dyesart’s boy.” The manager suddenly stops speaking, and smacks the palms of his hands together,—an impromptu manifestation of delight, for a new idea strikes him that satisfactorily clears up a mystery contained in his brother’s note. “Why, that explains it!”
“Explains what?”