"If I am in time to save my husband, I shall bless you all my life, Grif."
"You've got no call to, Ally," said Grif, half crying. "I'm not a bit of good, I ain't, and never shall be!"
"You are a dear true-hearted lad, and Heaven will reward you." And stooping hurriedly, she kissed Grif's cheek, and went to her bed of dry leaves.
Never before had Grif experienced such a delicious sensation as stole over him at that moment. He trembled with an exquisite pang of wondering happiness, and wrapping himself in a blanket which the bullock-driver had lent him, he lay awake for an hour, nursing the cheek which Alice had kissed, and which was wet with happy tears!
[CHAPTER XXIII.]
THE STORY OF SILVER-HEADED JACK.
It was the fourth day of their journey. Grif was trudging along by the side of the weary bullocks, and Alice was sitting upon the dray, under the friendly shade of the tarpaulin. The road seemed very long to Alice, who was pining for the end of her journey; she was sick almost to death. She had dreamed the previous night that she saw her husband with a knife in his hand, standing over her father: rushing forward, with a cry of terror, to arrest his arm, she awoke in an agony of fear and trembling. Thank God! it was but a dream. But if she should be too late! The thought brought such horror with it that she moaned, and pressed her nails into her tender palms, and felt no pain but that of her mental misery. How she envied the travellers on the coach, as it dashed along, with its six horses, at the rate of ten miles an hour--dashed along over the rough roads, winding its way through the forest of trees, until it disappeared from her sight, taking with it, as it seemed, all she had of hope, and leaving her helpless in her despair! The bullock-driver saw her distress; but he could not help her with money to enable her to travel more swiftly, for, indeed, he was poorer than herself. He was expressing his regret to her that they would have to part on the following morning, as their roads would then diverge.
"I cannot tell you," he said, "how grieved I am that I have not been overtaken by a friend who is travelling your road, and who could have taken you to within twenty miles of your journey's end. He ought to have been up with me this morning; and now it is nearly time to camp, and I don't hear any signs of him. He doesn't travel at this snail's pace, which I see is making you unhappy. He goes along bravely, does Old Jamie."
"I am very grateful to you," said Alice; "indeed, I cannot say how grateful, for you have been a friend to me when I most needed it. I am quite strong now, and shall be able to walk well in the morning. If I can ever repay you--"
"Tut! tut!" interrupted the bullock-driver. "Repay me! It is I who am debtor, not you. I was growing into a brute, and you have made me human again. I have almost made up my mind to go home, and confess what a bad boy I have been. They did love me, although I was a scamp! Thank you for that look. It is like wine to a man's tired spirit. Many of my old friends will jeer when they find I have come home worse off than when I left. No matter; I can't expect it all sweet. But that's not to the point, now. I wish there were fairies in the Australian woods, and that some gentle sprites would harness themselves to my friend's waggon, and drag it here with a whisk! But there are no fairies in these Antipodean wilds--nothing but dried-up creeks and leafless trees and ugly rocks; the fairies are too wise to make their haunts here. Queen Mab might do something with her team of little atomies. I would like to know of what use her whip of cricket's bone would be to me or old Jamie, and what kind of spring she had to her waggon! Hark!" he exclaimed, as a sound of tinkling bells fell on the ear. "By Jove! Queen Mab has done the trick! If that isn't Old Jamie, I'm a Dutchman!"