“Gour-gour-gah-gah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-ah!” laughed the three trapped birds, but this time they were laughing at their own silliness in being caught so easily.
“They shall just stay there until I have been down the river and back again; but to go down the river I must have something to sail or row in. King Barak said that a knife was the thing to use instead of powder for that work. Now for making a canoe with the Magic Gun,” said Tom, at the same time placing an open penknife in the gun. Once more he raised it to his shoulder, but this time he fired at a great gum tree. The knife shot forth, struck the tree, and, as if guided by an invisible hand, cut the bark to the exact size and shape of a canoe. Tom gave a strong tug and pulled the bark clean away from the tree. There it lay, a very strong canoe, and in a short time Tom had dragged it across to the river, launched it, sprang in, and using the gun as a paddle, sailed gaily down the river.
It was so jolly! Of course it would have been better fun if some one had been with him, but then, none of the others really believed in the power of the Magic Gun, and King Barak said that if an unbeliever were present when he tried to use it, nothing could come of it.
Down the river went the canoe, nearing the dreadful place where the undercurrents met, the undercurrents which no one would face, not even the blacks, except in a magic canoe. Tom could now see the bridge which was just the other side of the dreaded part, where anything that was thrown in got sucked down. As he looked his blood froze in his veins, and his heart seemed to stop beating with fear of what he saw. From under the bridge came an awful shapeless mass, the only distinct part about it being a head with glaring eyes and big horns.
“The Bunyip,” wailed Tom, trying now to paddle to the shore and so escape the horrid thing coming towards him. Suddenly, a happy thought struck him. Why, of course, the Magic Gun could kill even a “Bunyip.”
With trembling hands he placed his knife in the muzzle of the gun, fired, and saw the knife describe a circle over the Bunyip’s head and fall into the water. Hurriedly he took some nails from his pocket and charged the gun with them, fired, and was horrified to see that when the nails struck the Bunyip, fire and smoke came from every hole made by them. Nearer and nearer came the horrid flame-belching creature until it touched the boat, and at the same instant Tom sprang overboard, swam to the shore, and fled, followed by the awful Bunyip.
Faster and faster went Tom, until at last he dropped to the ground because his legs refused to carry him any further. Then he felt the creature catch hold of him, and he sprang up wildly to fight it. But instead of the awful Bunyip, he saw his father, who gazed at his small son in surprise, and wanted to know why he had gone off alone so early in the morning, why he had borrowed Barak’s silly old gun, and what he meant by sleeping in the sun at that time of day.
Tom denied that he had been asleep. He looked at the Magic Gun. It was certainly rusty, as if it had been in the water, and he determined to get his father to go with him up the banks of the Yarra until they should come to the tree where he knew they would find the kangaroo skin nailed with the nails from the Magic Gun, and the three kookooburras caught in the split branch of the same tree; then he would be compelled to believe in its power.
