As there was no saying when they might return, they did not go unprovided for a night or two out. In front of their saddles were strapped their opossum rugs, and they carried also a tin billy each, and provisions, in the shape of tea, damper, and cooked corned beef; nothing else, save a change of socks and their arms.
Bob bade his wife a hurried adieu, Archie waved his hand, and next minute they were over the paddocks and through the clearings and the woods, in which the trees had been ring-barked, to permit the grass to grow. And such tall grass Archie had never before seen as that which grew in some parts of the open.
"Is it going to be a long job, think you, Bob?"
"I hardly know, Archie. But Craig is here."
"Oh, yes, Gentleman Craig, as Mr. Winslow insists on calling him! You have seen him."
"Yes; I met him at Brisbane. And a handsome chap he is. Looks like a prince."
"Isn't it strange he doesn't rise from the ranks, as one might say; that he doesn't get on?"
"I'll tell you what keeps him back," said Bob, reining his horse up to a dead stop, that Archie might hear him all the easier.
"I'll tell you what keeps him back now, before you see him. I mustn't talk loud, for the very birds might go and tell the fellow, and he doesn't like to be 'minded about it. He drinks!"
"But he can't get drink in the Bush."