“I should say so. The poor brute must have lain there in agony for a good many days—the ground about him was ploughed up with his struggles, and the leg was in a fearful state. He was nearly dead; the bullet only hastened things a very little.”
“And Harvey’s been out here every day,” uttered Jim.
“Yes—with nothing to do but ride round and see that those cattle were all right. Of course he couldn’t have helped the accident, but he could have saved that poor helpless brute days of agony. It’s quite near one of the tracks, too; there can be no excuse for missing it.”
“I don’t think Mr. Harvey ever did much riding round,” Jim said. “Going to sleep under a log is more his form.”
“Or if he did see it he wouldn’t bother his head about it,” his father answered. “Well, I’m not likely to see Harvey again, thank goodness, and that is fortunate for him!” In which, as it happened, David Linton was very far from the truth.
There were plenty of cattle to be seen in the paddock they had now entered. The ground was gently undulating, with clumps of trees here and there, and in two or three places a blue flash that spoke of water. Bullocks were feeding in every direction—some quiet and half fat, while others were raking, long-horned fellows, gaunt and shy, who threw up their heads and their heels and lumbered off at a gallop at sight of the intruders. This had generally the effect of making the quieter bullocks gallop too, and Mr. Linton groaned at the spectacle of so much good beef deteriorating by unseemly and violent exercise.
“I had cherished foolish hopes of cutting them out here and coaxing them back to their own home,” he said. “But there’s not a chance of that—it will have to be a general muster.”
“Where do we take them, Mr. Linton?” Jean asked. It was evident that she did not share any of her host’s troubles—her face was eager and merry, her eyes dancing as they met Norah’s, who, needless to say, was equally cheerful over the prospect before them. Mr. Linton laughed as he looked from one to the other.
“Pretty sympathizers you are for a worried man,” he said. “I believe you’re in league with Harvey—are you sure you didn’t bribe him to leave down the rails? Does it matter at all to you that I drafted out these bullocks very carefully not long ago—and that now I’ve the job all over again?”
“It would matter to me horribly if I were at school and heard about it in a letter,” said Norah, laughing. “I would be awfully worried and cross over it—to think of you having such a time! And I would tell Jean all about it, and she’d be cross and worried, too. But as it is—when we’re both here, and can relieve you of quite half your anxiety by helping——!” Whereat Jim and Wally became a prey to great laughter, in which Jean and Norah joined after a fruitless attempt to ignore them haughtily.