Some effort was made, in a half-sullen, half-apologetic way, by Abraham Freeman to remove the ban under which the whole settlement lay. But Ernest was fixed and implacable in righteous disapproval. He gave strict orders that no stock of the offending co-operatives was to be permitted to graze upon the Rainbar run; that the boys were to be told that they would be summoned for trespass if they were found riding over the run or driving stock off without notice. War was declared in form. The strayed cattle belonging to the smaller graziers were placed in the Rainbar yard from time to time, and kept there till taken away by their owners. They were not permitted to purchase any articles from the station store. And, in fine, a blockade cordon was morally drawn round that nucleus of agricultural co-operative progress which had called forth so many sanguine prophecies. Mr. Neuchamp was sternly immutable and indignant of attitude. Slow to arouse and difficult to persuade of intentional wrongdoing, he was very loath to retreat from any gage of battle thus produced.
Both Charley Banks and Jack Windsor regarded this latter step with disapprobation. It had been ridiculously credulous and weak, according to their mode of thought, to invite the Freemans to settle on Rainbar. It was lamentably imprudent to quarrel openly with them now they were settled.
The second brother assented without much hostile observation, regretting that they had fallen out for nothing, as he expressed it; and Mr. Joe Freeman smiled in a scarcely reassuring manner, as Charley Banks thought, and said if it came to a pounding match, the cove would find that they could do him a deuced sight more hurt than he could do them.
Mr. Windsor, who had seen more of the ways of small freeholders, and understood their modes of feeling and action better than did Charley Banks, much less Mr. Neuchamp, did not regard this open declaration of hostilities as likely to add to their comfort, profit, or advantage.
‘Mr. Neuchamp did a soft thing in bringing these chaps here, and now he’s acting far from wise in letting ’em know what he thinks of ’em. He ought to have kept in with ’em and watched ’em, and if they went “on the cross” about the stock, he’d have had ’em safe and sound in Drewarrina Gaol some fine day.’
This was Jack’s idea of justifiable free-selectoricide. It might occasionally miss fire, but in the long-run it was very likely to bag the ‘picker-up of unconsidered trifles’ in the shape of unbranded stock.
‘Those chaps can do the boss a deuced sight more damage than he can do them if they’re drove to it,’ continued Mr. Windsor. ‘They watch him when he isn’t thinkin’ of them, and if our cattle ain’t on their land, they can make ’em trespass any night they please. I know the likes of them well, and I’d rather take ’em quiet than hustle ’em any day.’
‘You’re not far wrong, Jack,’ assented Mr. Banks. ‘We must keep these new cattle close, or they’ll have a lot ready for Drewarrina pound some fine morning, as sure as my name is Charley Banks.’
By careful watching, by riding early and riding late, this highly probable outcome of the feud between Mr. Neuchamp and his late protégés was for a time avoided. But
There never yet was human power