CHAPTER XIX.
HOW THE BOYS RETURNED HOME.
But this unfair race could not be kept up; the horses that George and Murri rode, although going their very best, began to show signs of distress. It had been only the sheer pluck and spirit of the well-bred horses that had enabled them to hold their own for so long, and now the superior condition of the bush-rangers' untired horses was beginning to tell. Looking back the boys could see that Starlight was rapidly overhauling them, and that at this rate they must be overtaken before another mile was past. Some of the worst mounted men of the gang had tailed off from the main body, but were following up in a straggling line. Amber, whom Alec held tightly in hand, was going as strongly as ever; there was no signs of weakness as yet in his great stride, his ears were laid back, for he could hear the heavy thud of the galloping horses behind him, and the blood of his racing sires stirred in his veins and made him eager to outstrip them.
"I wish, I do wish, you'd push on, Alec. Amber has got it all in him. You could be home in five minutes."
"And leave you at Starlight's tender mercies, I suppose?"
"Not a bit more than I now am. It is our only chance. You may find some of the men about, and Vaulty," said he, laying his hand on the sweating neck of the roan he rode, "may possibly keep up till you can meet us."
"You know very well he's almost done up. How Murri has managed to keep that beast of his on his legs I can't think."
What Alec said was true; it was only too evident that Vaulty, sturdy nag though he was, had knocked up at last, and was quite on his last legs. It was heartrending work to be so near to succour and yet to be so entirely beyond its reach. Not a mile away was the head station, with all hands in for the night, and all ignorant how urgently their help was needed at only a few minutes' distance from the house. The agony that the two lads suffered was only intensified by their nearness to the refuge, which they both felt they could not possibly reach, for Alec could see by the way Vaulty stumbled that he could not hold out more than a minute longer; and George knew in his heart, even when he asked him to do it, that his brother would not leave him.
Nearer and nearer came the sound of the horses behind them; they could hear the muttered imprecations of the men, and once they heard Starlight give a lovable laugh as he said, "We shall overtake them by that black stump." Both the boys heard him, but they said nothing, though they looked at one another with a steady, loving glance, which seemed to say, "Well, whatever chance may befall us we have been staunch and true, and we'll die as we have lived—together." They must have been almost within pistol shot of the gang of bushrangers, when, through the thinly growing trees of the great paddock which lay between them and the house, they caught sight of the ruddy light of home. The wood fire and the lamp in the kitchen shone from the open door, and gleaming through the night seemed a bitter mockery of welcome to the two lads.
"Heaven help us, Alec!" said Geordie, and there was a sob in the poor boy's throat as he spoke; "this is very hard."
It almost seemed an answer to his prayer when, from the shadow of a stately gum, not a hundred yards away, a horseman rode out into the brilliant moonlight.