“Found the brute, have they?” Jim exclaimed. “What did he have to say, Dad? Did they hurt him?”
“Harvey had had luck,” said Mr. Linton, slowly. “He’d hurt himself first.”
“How? Tell us, Dad.”
“Well, they hunted most of the day before they got him. They had every road searched before noon, the police were in communication with all the townships in the district, and there was no sign of him. Then the men left the roads and went across country, hunting up the river and along any creek, and through scrub. But I don’t think Mr. Harvey would have trusted himself in scrub without a horse.”
“Not he!” Jim agreed.
“Murty found him. He was riding across the Duncans’ big plain, and thought he heard a coo-ee; but there was no cover anywhere, and he couldn’t see a man wherever he looked. But he rode about, and found him at last in a little bit of a hollow. Murty said you might have ridden past it a hundred times and never have seen anyone. Harvey had shouted once, but when he saw that it was Murty he was afraid to call again, and tried to lie low.”
“Couldn’t he walk?”
“He broke his leg last night,” Mr. Linton answered. “The poor wretch has had a pretty bad time. He was jumping over a log, he says, and came down with one leg in a crab-hole, and it twisted, and threw him down. He didn’t know it was broken at first, but he found he couldn’t use it. So he crawled away from the log, being afraid of snakes, and got a couple of hundred yards into the paddock. Since then he’s kept still.”
“What—out in the open?” Jim asked.
“Yes; not a scrap of cover. And think of the day it’s been—it was 112° in the shade in Cunjee—and Harvey wasn’t in the shade. He told Murty he was badly thirsty before he got hurt, and had been looking for water. His leg is in a bad state, and he must have had a terrible day. Murty came in for the doctor, and we went for him in the car—of course, Murty could do nothing on horseback. Harvey was a bit delirious by the time we got to him. Anderson says he’ll be three months in hospital.”