As is my custom, when recording the conversation of this class of worthies, I suppress the expletives, thereby shortening them by nearly one half, and depriving the public of much valuable information.
"Well, old man," began Hawker, "is the coast clear?"
"No one here but myself," replied the other. "I'm hut-keeping here for one Bill Lee, but he is away. He was one of the right sort once himself, I have heard; but he's been on the square for twenty years, so I don't like to trust him."
"You are about right there, Moody, my lad," said Hawker. "I've just looked up to talk to you about him, and other matters,—I'll come in. When will he be back?"
"Not before night, I expect," said the other.
"Well," said Hawker, "we shall have the more time to talk; I've got a good deal to tell you. Our chaps are all safe and snug, and the traps are off. Only two, that's you and Mike, stayed this side of the hill; the rest crossed the ranges and stowed away in an old lair of mine on one of the upper Murray gullies. They've had pretty hard times, and if it hadn't been for the cash they brought away, they'd have had worse. Now the coast is clear, they're coming back by ones and twos, and next week we shall be ready for business. I'm going to be head man this bout, because I know the country better than any; and the most noble Michael has consented, for this time only, to act as lieutenant. We haven't decided on any plans yet, but some think of beginning from the coast, because that part will be clearest of traps, they having satisfied themselves that we ain't there. In fact, the wiseacres have fully determined that we are all drowned. There's one devil of a foreign doctor knows I'm round though: he saw me the night before you came ashore, and I am nigh sure he knew me. I have been watching him, and I could have knocked him over last week as clean as a whistle, only, thinks I, it'll make a stir before the time. Never mind, I'll have him yet. This Lee is a black sheep, lad. I'm glad you are here; you must watch him, and if you see him flinch, put a knife in him. He raised the country on me once before. I tell you, Jerry, that I'd be hung, and willing, to-morrow, to have that chap's life, and I'd have had it before now, only I had to keep still for the sake of the others. That man served me the meanest, dirtiest trick, twenty years ago, in the old country, that ever you or any other man heard of, and if he catches sight of me the game's up. Mind, if you see cause, you deal with him, or else,——" (with an awful oath) "you answer to the others."
"If he's got to go, he'll go," replied the other, doggedly. "Don't you fear me; Moody the cannibal ain't a man to flinch."
"What, is that tale true then?" asked Hawker, looking at his companion with a new sort of interest.
"Why, in course it is," replied Moody; "I thought no one doubted that. That Van Diemen's Land bush would starve a bandicoot, and Shiner and I walked two days before we knocked the boy on the head; the lad was getting beat, and couldn't a' gone much further. After three days more we began to watch one another, and neither one durst walk first, or go to sleep. Well, Shiner gave in first; he couldn't keep his eyes open any longer. And then, you know, of course my own life was dearer than his'n."
"My God! That's worse than ever I did!" said Hawker.