First in the Field: A Story of New South Wales

by George Manville Fenn

The position was startling in the extreme, and all the tales he had heard on shipboard and at home, as well as in the letters he had received from his sisters, respecting the blacks, flashed into his mind. He knew how dangerous they were, and the enmity some of them bore toward the white invaders of their shores; and though he could see nothing but the man’s face, he felt certain that, hidden by the grass, the black would have his spear with its hardened point—a weapon these men could throw as unerringly as the peculiar boomerang which would be stuck in his waistband to balance the deadly nulla-nulla—the melon-shaped club carved from a hard-wood root, whose stem formed the handle.

And as these thoughts ran through Nic’s mind he kept his eyes fixed upon the bright dark eyes of the black, every nerve upon the strain, every muscle strung, and ready for action. For in those painful moments Nic had determined to “die game,” as he called it in schoolboy parlance, living as he did in days when a brutal sport was popular. At the first movement made by the black Nic meant to spring upon his gun, and have one shot for his life; but he remained motionless, trying to stare the man down, and in the faint hope that Leather might come back, and the black shrink from attacking one who faced him.

“Wild beasts shrink away, so why should not wild men?” thought Nic.

And so they lay there each upon his chest, watching one another, Nic having a fine opportunity for studying the native’s rugged features and shaggy hair and beard. Every now and then there was a rapid winking of the eyes; but their fierce stare seemed to be uninterrupted, and caused a peculiar kind of aching and twitching at the back of Nic’s eyeballs, as moment by moment he expected the man would attack.

At last the strain began to be greater than the boy could bear. He had developed an intense friendship all at once for Leather, and looked vainly again for his presence there; he would have shouted for him, but he felt that in the immense space around his feeble cry would not be heard, and that out there in that savage land he was, early as it seemed, to have his first lesson in the settler’s duty—namely, to fend for himself.

For Nic could bear the horrible state of suspense no longer. He felt that he must fight for his life, and that after all the odds were fair. His enemy was a full-grown, sturdy savage, doubtless well armed, while he was only a boy, but he had the help of one of civilised man’s most deadly weapons to balance matters.

Then he felt that there was no balance in the matters for the black had his weapons ready, while he had left his gun out of his reach.

“Only let me escape this time,” thought Nic, in a despairing way, “and I’ll never do such a foolish thing again.”

The sun beat down upon him, the air around quivered in the heat, and the locusts kept up a loud chirruping, jarring note which grew maddening. Then from far away there came faintly the melancholy baa of a sheep calling plaintively to its missing companions, and directly after what Nic took to be the call of some wild bird in the distance—coo-way—coo-way—and this was answered faintly from farther off.

The next moment Nic had grasped the fact that it was no bird-call; for the black’s face was puckered up, his eyes nearly closed as his mouth opened, and he repeated the cry in a wild, shrill, ringing tone twice more, and then his mouth shut with an audible snap, and he remained perfectly still again, watching the boy.