Colonial Born: A Tale of the Queensland bush

by G. Firth Scott

It was such a season when some excuse was to be made for congregating at the Rest, and the advent of the diggers, with money to spend and a desire to entertain everybody who came within coo-ee of them, gave any excuse needed, not only to the selectors, but also to the men of Birralong.

Great things were going to be done as soon as the period of festivity was over, and the miners returned to the field and settled down steadily once more to toil and industry. Many a hard-working selector, who remembered his parched paddocks and bony stock, thought of throwing in his lot with the men he had formerly referred to as gully-rakers, when he saw the lavish expenditure, not only at the Rest, but at Marmot's, made possible by the gold they had won. Nor were the establishments at either end of the township alone in profiting. There would be a great demand for tools when the claims were started again, and Cullen had orders for picks by the ton; while the possibility of reefs being discovered, and tunnels and shafts being necessary to work them, filled Smart with enthusiasm at the amount of sawn timber which would be required in the early months of the coming year. It was evidently a period of boom in the history of the town, and to pass the time until the festive season was over, many a form of entertainment was suggested. A race meeting was absolutely necessary, everybody urged, the diggers for the fun of the thing, the selectors with an eye to business, for the diggers had no horses, and as they might like to run their own, sales were not improbable.

In the mean time some one suggested a euchre tournament and a billiard handicap, and, in a day, what attention every one of the miners could spare from the other attractions of the Rest, was absorbed in the double struggle. In a couple of days, as far as they were able to understand clearly, the majority of the men had lost a considerable portion of the gold they had brought in; but no one seemed to have won it. Tap, who had returned to the Rest, usually had a hand in the games that were going; and Gleeson, who mingled with the crowd as a stranger to the other, also joined in the fun, though mostly on the billiard-table. They were the only two who never lost.

There was a certain element of mystery about the billiard-table at the Rest, such as might reasonably be expected from cushions which had been subjected to ten years of the Birralong climate, and from balls which had been played with by such visitors as came to the Rest. A kerosene lamp with a tin reflector, standing over each corner pocket, is not the best light a billiard-table can have, more especially in a country where flies and other winged insects are numerous, and possessed of a habit of assembling largely round the lamps, and falling, more or less singed, on the cloth of the table. To these drawbacks Gleeson earnestly attributed the bad luck which usually attended the play of his opponents, and the extraordinary strokes with which he was able to win the hardest fought games; but not even these extenuating circumstances could quite reconcile the miners to the constant loss they suffered at his hands, and so it came about that he was the first one at whom they shied.

In this he was personally responsible to a very large extent, for being a man of exalted opinions as to his own importance, he could not long maintain the attitude of reserve and self-effacement which Barber had imposed as a condition of service under the scheme he had formulated. As soon as the miners began to fight shy of him as an opponent at the billiard-table, he forgot the necessity for caution, and ignored the gentle persuasive influence of an occasional defeat. Instead of the tact which animated the smooth-tongued Tap, he developed swagger and "side," and talked largely of his powers as a billiardist, and patronizingly to the men who made matches between themselves and declined even his bets. When the table was disengaged and there were onlookers in the room, he performed what they termed "flash" strokes, and challenged promiscuously any one and every one to play for large and larger stakes, until the souls of the miners were wroth within them, and the men of Birralong yearned in silence for the return of Tony, who alone of all the township had succeeded in mastering the intricacies of the table to anything like the degree Gleeson had.

But Tony had not yet returned from the diggings. He and his two companions, working more scientifically along the creek in the scrub than the others had done on Ripple Creek, had located the extent over which gold was to be found in the wash-dirt, and had then carefully and systematically worked through it, the division of labour enabling them to get over the ground quickly and effectively. As none of the men from the other creek visited them as they worked, they judged that their find was purely their personal concern and that no one else knew of its existence. Under the spell of excitement engendered by the find, Gleeson passed entirely out of memory, and the winning of all the gold in the creek before any one else could come and share the spoil was the one idea in their minds.

But if Gleeson was forgotten, he had not forgot. When he sneaked away after the thrashing that Palmer Billy had administered, he had no idea in his mind beyond getting out of reach of the vengeance of the men he believed he had fooled. He did not know exactly in what direction he journeyed, save that it was away from the scene of his humiliation, the thoroughness of which made him ache in every bone, joint, and muscle of his body. He kept moving, as fast as he could, away from the point of danger; and in accordance with that unexplained law which induces two bubbles on a tea-cup to run together, or two ships on the face of the boundless ocean to collide, or two buggies on a plain to run into one another, or a single horseman to get into difficulties through the one rabbit burrow in an area of twenty square miles of country, Gleeson, following his nose in the single-hearted desire to escape from honest associations, ran upon the temporary camp of Barber, and so became re-united with Tap. A rogue admires the rogue who can cheat him, and Gleeson fraternized with his old comrade and Barber at once.

Subsequent investigation revealed the fact that there really was gold in Ripple Creek, and with that resource which, more than necessity, is the mother of invention, communications were opened up with Walker, and the plan laid for the relieving of the successful miners of their stores of gold during the season of holiday and festivity. Learning the way Peters and his companions had gone, Barber had tracked them over the creek to the scrub, and had watched them, from a safe cover, as they worked the payable dirt. In order to include their winnings in the general haul it was intended to make, Walker was deputed to proceed to their camp, after the men had left Ripple Creek, and stay with them until, by fair means or foul, he had either induced them to proceed to Birralong and into the trap, or had succeeded in carrying off their gold single-handed. The latter was more than he could accomplish, so he had to stay with them and induce them to join in the festivities at the Rest, a proceeding which gave Gleeson time to use his skill in transferring a good deal of the gold from the miners to himself before the arrival of Palmer Billy and his mates—an incident he had neither the desire nor the intention to witness.

With that perversity which sometimes afflicts the issues of deep-laid schemes, the end of the drift on the creek by the scrub was reached several days sooner than was expected, and when the labour of an entire morning resulted in nothing, Palmer Billy grew impatient, and said it was a visitation upon them for working in the holiday season. He told the others they could stay, if they liked, but he was off to give the festivities at Birralong the benefit of his vocal art. Peters and Tony fell in with the proposal, and started off without giving Walker time to get ahead of them and warn Gleeson to keep out of sight.

They happened to come out about sunset upon the Birralong road near Marmot's store at a moment when some of the residents were mutually encouraging one another to lose their tempers over Gleeson's swagger in the billiard-room. The appearance of Tony was hailed as a god-send. The story of how the "flashy," as they termed Gleeson, was swelling his chest up at the expense of the township, was poured into the ears of the new-comers, and Tony was adjured, by all the ties of patriotism and loyalty, to "sail in and knock him cold," as one of the crowd expressed it.