"And there," cried Mandeville, "it's a sight worse than at 'ome."
"That's where you hit it," said Tom. "So then I went to San Francisco, and there or thereabouts I stayed for two years, and this gold racket fetched me back."
"Do you know who Smith was afore he came out?" asked Mandeville.
Tom shook his head.
"He was a real gent; a clergyman's son, and 'ad a lot of money. Drink done him, and a woman, I daresay. But he's a rare good sort, and a good plucked un. 'E'd fight 'Icks if so be 'e sauced him. I've seed 'im fight till 'e was a red rag, and cryin' because the other licked him. And when 'e's drunk 'e's a terror, an 'oly terror, and it's stand from under when 'e flies 'igh."
For Mandeville adored Smith, and felt that it was a high privilege to be the friend of a clergyman's son. He always spoke as if such a parentage was a kind of profession.
At about ten o'clock they made camp by a thickish bit of mulga scrub, where there was a little grass newly sprung up about a small water-hole. They ate a lunch of mutton and bread.
"No more good bread," said Smith, "our baker will have to come down to Johnny cakes and flap-jacks."
"Never mind us," said the Baker, which was one of Mandeville's names. "I'm thinking of the 'orses. It's little there is to pick. And with this 'ere sun like a h'oven for 'eat, it'll dry it up in two days."
"Don't croak," growled Hicks, whose vast length was stretched under the only bit of shade thereabouts.