Concerning Rayon, whose real name was never clearly made out, this much was known—that he was English-born, had been very well educated travelled as courier in France with some of the best families. Having learnt French perfectly, he had settled in Paris, but eventually ran away from there, owing to his being found out at card-sharping. He next turned up in London, and, being an accomplished penman, had forged whilst there the name of one of his former patrons for a large sum of money; was tried, convicted, and transported for life to Botany Bay, and escaped.
As we have seen, he was now captured again, and doomed to pass the rest of his life, this time on a well-known island, whose sole sentries consisted of swarms of gigantic sharks, which had already snapped up more than one unlucky prisoner upon his attempting to swim to the mainland.
Our forester was surprised on his return to Bulinda after the rescue of Annie, not to hear any news of Tim. The squire, too, could not make it out, but said,—
“I expect he did not start from the ‘Downs,’ as he said he intended to when he wrote; so, as we have not done with this police business yet, having to go to headquarters again soon, supposing we make a start to-morrow to Sydney; we may then hear news of Tim.”
Mat gladly agreed to this proposal, and as Parson Tabor also wished to visit the capital, the three men started the next day.
Passing the station where Tim had “spelled” before starting on his moonlight walk, the travellers were astonished to find that Tim had been there, and as they had heard no tidings of his being about Bulinda, they thought that he must have forgotten something important, and returned to Sydney. So, without further delay, they put spurs to their horses, and galloped into the town.
Leaving their horses in a stable, they were walking down one of the chief streets when a man accosted Mat with,—
“Beg pardon, how is your brother to-day?”
“Brother!” replied Mat, “why, where is he?”
“I know it’s your brother,” replied the man, “I saw you both at the School of Arts, at your lecture, he’s ill in the hospital, so they say.”