Dick Lester of Kurrajong

by Mary Grant Bruce

"Then, mad with pain and terror,
the great horse charged forward."

The plain danced before their tired eyes. They were out of the timber, and galloping towards home, with no hideous lurking dangers ahead—only the long stretch of thick grass over which the wheel-tracks made a pathway. Conqueror was settling down to a steady gallop—the reins were loose on his neck, for Merle had no strength left to guide him; she could only cling to the pommel, her breath coming in short gasps. The pain in Dick's shoulder suddenly flashed into burning life; he put up one hand, and could feel the haft of a spear. There was blood on his hand when he took it away; he looked at it curiously, as if wondering if it could be really his own. Then a sick faintness came over him, and he could only cling to Merle's belt and struggle for self-command.

Ahead, a blur showed on the grass—the ration cart, which had come out of the trees at a different angle, and was now jogging slowly homeward, with Downes riding beside it. He turned at the sound of the galloping hoofs; and then shouted in horror, as Conqueror came up, drew level, and then thudded past. It was as though neither horse nor riders saw them.

"Harry—it's the kids! And did you see Dick's shoulder? There's a spear in it!"

"Keep as close as you can without racing them," the old man cried. "The boy may fall off any minute."

Downes set off in pursuit. Conqueror was still galloping hard, but without his first terror—only with his smarting ear and flank, and the memory of the yelling black figures to spur him on. The reins flapped on his neck; he missed the light touch of a hand on his bit, the sensitive pressure of the knees—all that makes horse and rider seem as one. This dead weight on his back, that neither spoke, nor moved, nor guided him—what was it? Something was all wrong; there was nothing to do but gallop forward, since ahead lay home and his stable, and behind was the yelling, hideous terror of the scrub.

A clump of trees was before him. He rounded them in his gallop, and then shied violently at a new horror—the black pony, lying dead across the track, with the cruel spear still sticking in his neck. The sudden movement was too much for Dick. The sick faintness had been creeping steadily over him, and the quick wrench, twisting the spear in his wound, brought an agony beyond endurance. Consciousness slipped from him as his fingers loosed their hold. He had a sudden vision of the earth rushing up to meet him. Then he was falling—falling—through an eternity of space, and the world was blotted out in blackness.