“I know now,” cried Nic eagerly. “I’ve heard—I was told on board. You are sent up the country for good behaviour. Then you are my father’s assigned servant?”
The man stood looking down at him for a moment or two with his face full of wrinkles. Then he turned quickly and walked hurriedly away, never once looking back as Nic watched him till he was out of sight.
Then the boy shuddered.
“How horrible!” he thought. “He might have thrown me down. No, it was only a mad trick. But what a man to have about the place! I ought to have bullied him well; but I can’t go near him again. I wish I had not shown the white feather so.”
Ten minutes later Nic had forgotten his adventure, as he lay there upon his chest close to the edge, gazing down from the Bluff into the tremendous gully, rapt in amazement by its wonders, fascinated by its beauties. He stayed for hours tracing the river, and as his eyes grew more accustomed to the depth he made out the animals grazing below and looking like ants.
“Yes, it is glorious!” he said at last; and he turned his head to look around and rest his eyes upon the green on the other side, when he felt as if turned to stone. He had escaped one danger, and another seemed to have sprung up, for peering out at him from a dense patch of grass was a black face with glittering eyes and a surrounding of shaggy hair, while the gun was lying between them, and just beyond his reach.