SHANTY-KEEPING, PROSPECTING, THORKILL'S DEATH.
Some time after this my friend and countryman came to me one evening
about nine o'clock with a very important air, and told me he had heard
of a new find of gold some thirty miles distant, and that there would be
sure to be a terrible rush as soon as it became generally known. As for
him, he would like to go if I would go with him and be his mate,
because, as he put it, he was sure I was lucky. He could not well have
made a greater mistake, but anyhow I was flattered and agreed to go.
Then I found he wanted to go at once. I had a few days' wages coming to
me, but I went to my employer's house at once and got my cheque. That we
changed in a public-house and went to our tents, saying nothing to
anybody about our intentions. Having got our swags ready, we, more like
thieves than anything else, knocked the one tent over and were off. My
friend's tent remained, and my horses were in a paddock with saddles and
belongings; there was no time to get them, and suspicion would have been
created had we tried.
We rather ran than walked, but we were scarcely a mile out of town
before we overtook some six or seven others bent on the same journey.
The first twenty miles ran on a good road; that would be as far as we
could go that night, because the next ten miles were only a blazed track
right through the bush made by the prospectors, and could only be safely
traversed in the daylight. On the whole journey we were both overtaken
ourselves, and overtook other people, until, when we arrived at the
camp, we numbered a score or more. Here we found another score of
diggers sleeping or smoking, waiting for daylight. It was a moonlight
night, and I could see that we had arrived at a place where a few
humpies stood in seeming disorder round about. There was also a
public-house, and it was in the street in front of that, that the whole
army halted. I was both hot and tired, and as my mate suggested that we
had better get an hour or two of sleep, I laid myself down and slept. I
woke up again as my mate was shaking me. It was just break of day; still
we seemed late, for everybody was up and stirring. There was no time for
a billy of tea, or for ever so slight a stretch: it was up and away. Oh,
how tired I was, and stiff, and footsore! I would not have minded if I
might have started quietly, but this seemed like a race. Although I lost
no time, yet I was the very last through the little street with the
heavy swag on my back. My mate was beckoning to me as he, also late, ran
a few hundred feet in front, and then disappeared amongst the trees. I
felt irritable, as I often do before I have had my breakfast. I came by
a baker's shop, over the door of which was written, "Cold refreshing
summer drinks sold here." The baker and his wife, and a young girl also,
were peeping out through the half-opened door, and seemed to enjoy the
spectacle of the crowd racing down the street. I said to myself, "Bother
running like a fool here, I am going for a bottle of beer."
The baker asked me if I was going to look for gold out there, or was I
looking for a job? "Because," said he, "if you think of finding gold in
that place you will be mistaken."
He then told me he had been on the spot the previous day, and that it
was a "duffer," but still there would be a rush, and he would much like
to get somebody to ride out with bread every day and sell it at the
place. I told him I could not leave my mate like that, but the baker
just invited me in to breakfast, and offered me the loan of a horse, and
said also that he himself would take bread out as soon as we could be
off. "Perhaps," said he, "if my mate did not like the place, as he was
sure he would not, I might take a job from him."
I therefore rode out with the baker after breakfast and found my mate,
who, as the baker predicted, was in no way enthusiastic about finding
anything as good as he had left, and before evening he was satisfied to
return to Ravenswood before any one could jump his claim there. As I did
not like going back, but wanted the change to ride up and down with
bread, I engaged with the baker for one pound ten shillings per week and
board. My duty now was to load a pack-horse every day with bread, and,
having another to ride, to take the bread to the "rush" and sell it. The
butcher at the "Twenty Mile" also engaged a man to ride up with beef,
and we generally rode in company. But it soon proved that it did not pay
our employers to keep us on, and after about three weeks' time we both
got notice to leave. That brought me to think that as there were many
men on the "rush," it might pay me to get my two horses up from
Ravenswood, and, buying myself both bread and meat together, sell it on
my own account. To that all parties were willing, and as one thing
brings another with it, I went to the Chinamen's shop with a view to
seeing what profit he would give me on groceries. As "Johnny" strongly
advised me to sell a little grog for him, I bethought myself that I had
while with the baker learned to make hop-beer and ginger-beer, and found
that I could make it for a penny a big glassful and charge a shilling. I
resolved, therefore, to take up that industry too. There was nobody at
all who had anything for sale at the "rush," and I determined to go out
and build a hut and start a general store and shanty. I now went out to
the "rush" again, and got two men to help me in the building. The hut I
put up was very primitive. Just one room about fourteen by twelve feet,
made of saplings, packing-cases, bark, or anything I could get at all
suitable. The roof was bark; the counter was bark also, and at night had
to serve for my bed. The door was an artistic piece of rubbish, if I
might use that term, but somehow it all hung together and could be
locked up. Outside I made a sunshade with tables and chairs under. That
was managed by four forked saplings put into the ground, and other
straight saplings resting as wall-plates in the forks. Again a row of
lighter sticks lay across them and leafy bushes on the top, and the
chairs were a lot of logs cross-cut at a height of eighteen inches. The
job was completed in three or four days; then I went up to Ravenswood
for my horses, and on my return got out a cask to make hop-beer in, some
buckets, and a few groceries. I was now my own "boss," and wonderfully
proud and happy I was in my little shanty. Besides my own two horses,
the butcher and baker each lent me a horse to carry the bread and meat
on, and I had quite enough to do--indeed my energy knew no bounds.
Just about the time I started, the Palmer diggings came to the front,
and a great rush set in to that place from the south. But as no one
seemed to know properly where the Palmer was, and as conflicting and
disparaging statements soon arrived from the Palmer, and the wet season
was coming on, the north was everywhere swarming with men who were ready
to camp and prospect anywhere, just to abide time. As soon, therefore,
as I started for myself, numbers of men would arrive every day, and I
had so much to do that I did not know sometimes how to fling myself
about quick enough. Long before daylight I was up and got my four horses
together. I had a little yard for them. Then, in a racing gallop, I had
to tear into the butcher's, baker's, and grocer's, at the "Twenty Mile."
My goods would stand ready for me when I came. I would just fling the
stuff on the horses, leave my orders for the next day, and be back again
in time to sell bread and meat for breakfast! When that was over I had
to carry water from the creek to brew a cask of hop-beer, clean up shop,
serve people with grog, and feed the horses, make breakfast for myself,
chuck out a loafer or two, and other matters, all at the same time. Thus
it went on all day. In the afternoon I had sometimes to send a man off
with the horses for more rations, and from five o'clock to ten, eleven,
twelve, and sometimes all night, there would be a lot of fellows
drinking outside the shanty.
[Illustration: THE BAKER'S CART.]
The reader may understand that I quickly gathered in money. Five pounds
a day was nothing. But what a life it was! I was never out of my
clothes, and I was very seldom dry. Sometimes for weeks together I would
be like one hauled out of the sea. That required stimulants, and they
were near and handy, nor was it practically possible to be a Good
Templar in my position. But all my better instincts were revolted. Still
another glass of grog would make me see things in a different light, and
somehow it never seemed to have any other effect on me than
sharpening my wits; indeed, although I know myself to be a temperate man
by nature, and but seldom touch spirits, I believe that if I had not
then freely indulged in the cup that cheers, I could never have stood
the strain on my constitution which this life necessitated. My troubles
were many. One was that fellows would get drunk and grow quarrelsome
every day; if they were not very big I did not much mind, but if they
were too big then I tried all devices to make them laugh and be in
good-humour, or I would sometimes even have to keep two retainers in
free grog to assist me in the "chucking out" business. I was often
knocked about myself. Another trouble or fight with my conscience, which
I successfully overcame, was the falsifying the spirits. The storekeeper
where I bought it, as well as one good friend after the other, would
show me how I could save two-thirds of the rum and still keep it
over-proof by mixing it with water and tobacco. So with brandy, all
sorts of vile poison and most disgusting stuff was offered me to mix it
with. I did not do that, although my advisers thought me very foolish. I
mixed my spirit with water of a necessity, but I saw enough to convince
me that few shanties or public-houses ever sell pure spirits. But my
greatest trouble was what to do with my fast-accumulating money. I did
not trust anybody about me. There was no bank nearer than Ravenswood.
There was no police, and nowhere to put it. At last I hit on a plan.
Under the big cask in which I made beer I formed a hole in the ground,
and at night, when all at last was still, and the cask was empty enough
to move on edge, I, having first carefully ascertained that no one was
about, would thrust in all I had, and put things around it again so as
to prevent suspicion. This mode of banking did not altogether satisfy
me; indeed, I was always very anxious about it, but I could think of
nothing better. And so the time went on. The bucket which stood under
the cask came at last to be nearly full of money, and while on the one
hand it was my great consolation, it also caused me more anxiety than
all the rest of my work.
One day somebody came and told me that a countryman of mine was in his
tent, and was apparently hard up, as he had asked for something to do
whereby to earn a bit of rations. The man was, I understood, camped
somewhere about. I asked them to show him to me, that I might give him
what he wanted and have a talk with him. What was my surprise and joy to
find that the stranger proved to be no one less than my long-lost friend
and shipmate, the Icelander Thorkill. He seemed to be as glad to meet me
as I was to see him, and we exchanged our colonial experiences as far as
they had gone. It appeared that Thorkill had not stayed long on the
sugar plantation in Mackay, where he had first been engaged. That did
not surprise me. His employer, he said, had offered no opposition to
his agreement being cancelled, and with the money he had earned he had
bought a ticket for Sydney in one of the steamers. He had thought to get
something to do in Sydney more suitable to his ability, but for a long
time he failed, and was, through want of money, driven to all sorts of
extremities, even to sleeping out at night. Then he at last got a job to
drive a milk-cart into Sydney for fifteen shillings a week. He had also
tried other things, such as pick and shovel work; had been assistant in
a slaughter-yard, and more besides.
"But I do not like it," said he, "people seem so rude."
At last he had scraped enough together to come back to Queensland; he
had walked all the way from Townsville, and here he was. "And you are
going to look for gold now?" asked I. He scarcely knew; he was so glad
and surprised to see me again that he could think of nothing else.
"Well, Thorkill," said I, "do you remember you said once that you and I
would never part? Let us now renew that agreement. Last time it was,
perhaps, my fault we parted, but this time it shall be yours; and to
show you I am in earnest I will ask you, without further formality, to
consider yourself a part proprietor of this hotel and all there is in
it."
"Oh! what do you mean?" cried he. "You must be making a great deal of
money here and I have none; nor do I understand your work."
"Never mind," said I, "we are partners if you like; you do not know how
badly I am off for some one I can trust. Think of my being all alone
here; I cannot do it much longer."
But say what I would Thorkill would never hear of it, and so I in a sort
of way engaged him to do what he could for me. He carried water and
swept the floor, but the only time he tried to drive the horses to the
"Twenty Mile" he lost them both! He had his tent not far from the
shanty, but we had seldom time to speak. His heart was not in my work,
and I often, nay always, when I saw him, felt an uneasy sort of
conscience.
One Saturday night, or perhaps more correctly Sunday morning, when a lot
of men were drinking outside my hut under the sunshade, and when I
myself had imbibed more than was good for me, I began, against all the
rules of common prudence, to boast of my money. The party appeared as if
they did not believe me, on which I got excited, and called them all
into the hut. There I asked them to look under the cask while I tilted
it over. What a sight! A bucket was buried in the ground nearly filled
with silver, gold, and notes! How much there was I did not know myself,
but there was more than I liked to say for fear of being doubted. Now
began a drinking bout such as had never been before. Everybody had to
stand drinks all round. At last they went away, but my recollections
thereof are not clear; I only know that I slept on the counter, and that
some one was shaking me and grumbling in very unparliamentary language
over my not having been away after bread and beef. I sat up and looked
around. It was about the time I ought to be back from the Twenty Mile.
The door was open, and nearly a score of men were coming along for bread
and meat. Now I remembered all about the previous night. My first
thought was my money. I went and peeped under the cask. The bucket was
gone!
I gave the cask a push that capsized it. "Thieves and robbers, who has
stolen my money? Speak!" There was lying a pair of hobbles on the
counter, and as one of the party began to laugh, I struck him with it.
This was the signal for a fearful orgie. The whole crowd flung
themselves forward and struck, kicked, and tore me until I fainted right
away. When I came to again they did not leave me alone. The whole shop
was sacked from end to end, and in their drunken frenzy they pulled it
down! In the midst of it all came Thorkill, and putting me on his back
carried me off into his tent. There I lay while he bathed my wounds and
consoled me as well as he could, assuring me it might have been all for
the best.
The next day the butcher and the baker came out and took their horses
away. They wanted me to start again, and both of them offered me money
and credit, but I was so disgusted with myself and the whole business
that I told them I would not be a shanty-keeper again for all the gold
in Queensland.
Thus was it with me. To lie in Thorkill's tent and listen to his quiet,
peaceful way of talking--how different was that from the noisy, drunken
orgies of which I had for about five months been a daily witness! I took
a violent dislike to the very place, but where to go I did not know. I
felt as if I only wanted to get away from everybody but Thorkill. I did
not care where I went. As for him, he thought he would like to go south
again. This place and these people were too much for him. He had now
learned to write pretty well in grammatical English, and he thought he
might get something to do in Brisbane. As for me I had never seen a
place yet where I could not get something to do; so far as that went I
did not care, but I thought of him that he came straight from Sydney,
where he had not been successful. He had such a mild, pedantic air about
him, which no doubt would look well in an antiquary, but which would
scarcely prove a recommendation for a grocer's clerk, or, indeed, for
any other position for which I could think him eligible. So I said to
him one day, as we were again talking about going away, "I am sick and
tired of looking at anybody but yourself. What do you say if we go
prospecting for twelve months? I have got thirty pounds in Townsville
bank, and thirty pounds in Ravenswood, besides a few pounds here. You
have got twelve pounds you earned while with me. Then we have the
horses, and you have got the tent. It is sufficient for a twelvemonth's
trip. I am now a pretty good bushman, and if we only get to where there
is gold I think we shall find it. If we don't I do not care. What do you
say?"
This proposal met at once with Thorkill's approval, and we both went
into Ravenswood, where I drew out my money. Here we loaded up the horses
with as many rations as they could carry, also pick, shovel, basin, and
other necessary things. Then we went back the same way we had come,
until we arrived at Condamine Creek, twenty-five miles out. From there
we ran up the creek, as near as I can guess about forty miles,
prospecting all the time. Then we turned northward, up another creek,
and knocked about so that it would be difficult to describe where we
went. But we did not care. I was as happy as a bird, and so was
Thorkill. We had our guns with us, and we could every day shoot as many
birds as we could eat, and kangaroos besides. Sometimes we would camp,
and Thorkill would fish while I prospected about. When it rained we
would lie in the tent and talk about Denmark and Iceland. That was a
theme on which Thorkill never could be tired, and he had such a fund of
genuine information on that subject that I was never tired of listening
to him.
[Illustration: BREAKFAST IN THE GOLD FIELDS]
We had been out prospecting in this way for about three months, and were
now in the vicinity of Cape gold-field, when we struck a place where we
thought there was payable gold. We had for several days been following
on, through a very mountainous country, a river, the name of which we
did not know, until we reached the place of which I now write, where it
ran through a valley, hemmed in on all sides by big mountains. The river
was still of considerable volume. Here we found a nugget of gold about
an ounce in weight the first time we tried, and although our good luck
did not repeat itself, yet we decided, as it was such a beautiful spot,
that we would camp for a month or two there, so at least to give the
place a fair trial. We pitched our tent, therefore, on a little knoll
not far from the creek, and made ourselves comfortable. The next
fortnight we washed for gold from morning to night, and each made about
an ounce per week. We considered this very satisfactory, and were
talking often about what name we should call this new field when we
could not conceal it any longer and a "rush" should set in; because we
knew very well that if we, as strangers, by and by rode into the Cape,
or any other place, to buy some rations, and there try to get our bit of
gold changed, that we should be tracked back to where we had got it,
unless we were far more clever than I gave myself credit for being. But
neither of us minded that. We were, on the contrary, quite proud of
having to figure as successful explorers, and it used to be one of our
recreations of an evening to sit and talk about what name to give the
place. Thorkill was of opinion that we ought to find a name which should
remind all who came here of both Denmark and Iceland, but as it did not
seem possible for us to invent such a name, at last I accepted
Thorkill's suggestion to call it Thingvallavatu, that being the name of
a large lake and river in Iceland not far from his home, and as it
seemed a well-sounding name, I thought it suitable; and although I do
not know if ever a white man has been there before or since that time,
yet as often as I think of the place I remember the name we gave the
river--Thingvallavatu.
On one evening that is for ever engraven on my memory, we were lying in
our tent--Thorkill and I. It had been raining heavily all day, and we
had not been able to be about. We felt pretty miserable, our usual stock
of conversation seemed to be exhausted, but far out in the evening it
revived again, so much indeed that Thorkill began to tell me of things
of which he had never spoken before. He told me of his parents, of his
brother and his sister, and explained to me where their farm in Iceland
was, giving me the address, describing the road leading to it, and every
detail, until I said to him that if we were lucky enough now to get a
bit of gold we would both go home to Iceland and settle down there. From
that conversation drifted to other things, and was at last almost at a
standstill, when he called me by name, and, in a bashful sort of way,
observed, "I say, were you ever in love?"
This was a theme on which we had never enlarged: partly because there
had not been much opportunity yet for either of us in Queensland to
indulge in such a luxury, and partly because I do not know, to the best
of my recollection, that it had ever been mentioned between us, so, as I
recognized that he wanted to tell me something, I said, a little
surprised, "Why do you ask?"
"I have," said he. "While I was overseer on that farm in Alo, I knew a
girl. Oh, how good she was, and how beautiful! I sometimes would go and
visit her in the evening. She was only a servant girl, and her father
was working there too. One evening I kissed her."
"I am afraid," said I, "you have not forgotten her yet."
"No; her I can never forget."
"Why did you not marry her?" said I. "I suppose as you went visiting
her, she would have had no objection?"
"How could I?" replied he. "If only I had been an ordinary working man I
would willingly have asked her; but I was not that. Her father always
spoke to me as if I owned a mansion, and yet I had scarcely sufficient
salary to pay for my own clothes. No, I never asked her."
"Does she know you are out here?" inquired I.
"No, neither she nor my parents, nor anybody; they must think I am
dead."
I had nothing to say. I was lying thinking about matters of my own. A
little after this I thought I heard him crying. Was it possible? I did
not like the idea. I listened again. Yes! there was no mistake. Thorkill
was really crying. Deep, big, stifled sobs. I asked what was the
matter. Two or three times I asked before he answered. At last he said,
"I could not help it; I cried because I know very well I shall never see
Reikjavik" (the only town in Iceland) "again."
After that I kept talking for some time to him in a sort of overbearing
way about that, saying we need not cry, surely, about that, if that was
our only trouble; that we had money enough to get home now, and if we
had not, what then? As for myself, if I set my mind on going home,
rather than cry over it I would stow away on a ship or work my passage.
But I got no answer from Thorkill. I could not sleep, and soon after the
day broke. The rain had by this time ceased, and as I saw that Thorkill
had now fallen asleep, I thought it a pity to waken him, and crept as
quietly as I could out of the tent to make a fire and get a drop of tea
for breakfast. As I sat by the fire an hour after, eating my breakfast,
I saw Thorkill coming, creeping on his hands and feet out of the tent,
with his head screwed round, looking up in the air over the tent. I
somehow thought he was looking at a bird, and wondered he had not got
the gun, so I sat still and said nothing, but kept watching him. When he
was a long way out of the tent he got up, and, still looking up in the
air, pointed fixedly at something and cried, "See! oh, look there!" I
stole behind him and looked, but could see nothing, so I asked, "What is
it?"
"Oh, don't you see? See! a large Russian emigrant ship flying through
the air."
"Are you going altogether insane?" cried I, beating him on the back. The
next moment with a deep groan he fell right into my arms. I asked him
what was the matter. Was he sick? Was he bitten by a snake? I do not
know half I asked him, but all the reply I got as I laid him in his bunk
again, was, "Go for a minister."
My mate was dying, and I knew it now. Dear reader, whoever you may be,
if you have seen your nearest friend die, then you know how bitter it
is. But if you at such time have been among others who have shared your
grief, and had a doctor to take the responsibility off your hands, then
you may only guess at what _I_ felt when I saw Thorkill lying there
perfectly unconscious. We had as it were for a long time been everything
to each other, and the disappointments and mishaps we both, so far, had
suffered in Queensland, had, it seemed at that moment, made him simply
indispensable to my existence. How could I go for a parson? I jumped out
of the tent and ran round it three or four times before I recollected
that I did not know of any human habitation within fifty miles! Then I
went in again and spoke to him. There was no answer; not a movement in
his body. He lay as if in a heavy sleep, a high colour in his face. One
of his arms was hanging out over the bunk, and would not rest where I
put it, so I took a saddle and placed that underneath it, and as it was
not yet high enough, I put a pint pot on that again. There I balanced
it, and there it remained. I had not much medicine, only some quinine.
That was no good. Then I thought he must have been taken by an
apoplectic fit. I took the scissors and cut off all his hair and beard.
Then I went outside and worked desperately at making a sunshade over the
tent, because the sun was beating down on us so fiercely; next in again,
and out. I did not know what to do. I could not for a moment remain
still. Sometimes I carried water from the creek and bathed his head with
it. Then I feared I was only tormenting him, and knocked it off again.
As I sat looking at him in the afternoon I could not avoid thinking
about how he had in his last hour of good health made such a complete
confession about matters he always before had been so reticent about.
Why? I ask the question now. Can any one answer it. It is _not_
fashionable in our age to believe more than can be rationally explained,
but I believe most people in their lives have had similar strange
experiences. If I make the remark that I am superstitious, then I know I
shall lay myself open to ridicule, and yet it is only a form of
admitting that I do not know all that passes in heaven and on earth.
In the afternoon, as Thorkill still lay in the same immovable trance, I
thought I must find out whether he was conscious of my being there or
not, so I knelt down and spoke in his ear, and called him by name.
"Thorkill," cried I, "if you _can_ hear me and know that I am here, try
to give me some sign." Then as I watched him I thought he breathed
extra deep, but I was never certain. Anyhow, although I had myself no
Bible, and never had used one before, I got his out of his swag and
began reading at the commencement and kept on until it was too dark to
read any more. During the night the rain and storm began again. I could
hear in Thorkill's altered breathing that the end was near, but I had no
other light but a match I struck occasionally, and it seemed to frighten
me when I struck one and saw his altered face. At last I knew he was
dead, and in an agony of sorrow and excitement I began praying to
Balder, our ancient god of all that was noble and good, to come and
fetch his own. I was fearfully agitated, and remember well how I walked
outside the tent singing the old "Bjarkamsal," and almost fancying I saw
all the ancient gods coming through the air. It is a common saying of a
person who has died, that he was too good to live, but if ever that
saying was true of any one, it was true of Thorkill. A pure descendant
from the ancient Vikings, yet how different was he from his forefathers.
And all Icelanders are more or less the same. Honest, frank, and kind,
he could not understand why everybody else was not also honest and good,
and I know very well he declined the contest of life; he could not match
his simple faith with the cunning and brutality of the ordinary set of
people one meets with when the pocket is empty. Better, perhaps, he
should have died then and there. Why was I sorry? Why did I not
rejoice? Who knew but that I some day might not die in great deal more
lonely and in much more friendless way than he? He had lost nothing, and
it was I who was the loser; but for his sake I would be glad. In this
strain of mind I passed the remainder of the night, but when at last
daylight came it brought with it the grim reality of death such as it
is, and life such as it is, and also a sense of what was now the only
favour I could show the remains of my friend. It was three or four
o'clock that afternoon before I had managed, as decently as I could, to
bury the body, and then all my energy was expended. Yet as I sat resting
myself for a moment, I was aware that I must be off somewhere before
evening, far from that spot. I had a splitting headache; my legs seemed
unable to carry me. Yet I must be off to get the horses. I found them,
but when I came home with them it was evening and I had to let them go
again. I could do no more, and not altogether with an uncomfortable
feeling was it that I that evening laid myself down in Thorkill's bunk,
thinking that perhaps after all we need not part. I was sick now myself,
and fancied I saw fearful visions all night. The next morning I could
scarcely raise myself to a sitting posture, but during the day I managed
with the instinct of self-preservation to carry some water up from the
creek and to bake a damper. My recollections for some time after this
are very indistinct. It may have been a week or it may have been two
weeks. All that I remember of that time are glimpses of myself sitting
by Thorkill's grave, singing, or playing the flute. The first clear
recollection of that time which I have, was one afternoon when I was
lying in the bunk watching, in a lazy sort of way, some rats nibbling at
the flour-bag, which had somehow fallen down from its place. The flour
lay scattered about the tent, and everything seemed in glorious
disorder. I lay a long time looking at the rats, and wondering where
Thorkill was--whether he was making breakfast, for I felt very hungry. I
had no remembrance whatever of his being dead. I called him; my voice
seemed curious and weak. I grabbed a poker to strike at the rats with
it--how heavy it felt! Then I got up and went outside, and stood staring
for a long time at the grave before I recollected that he was dead, and
that I myself was or had been sick. Everything outside the tent bore
evidence of having been thrown about as if by a maniac, and I felt a
thrill of horror running through me as I thought of myself, how perhaps
I had walked about here at night alone, sick and delirious. I felt quite
myself, however, although very weak. I was hungry, and felt that I must
have something to eat, get it where I could. I staggered about looking
for food. Not a vestige of tea could I find; there was no meat except a
few nasty bones which I found in the billy, and had to throw away; then
I discovered a little sugar, and I scraped together some flour. My next
trouble was that I had no fire and no dry matches. It took me all my
time to get a fire, by rubbing a hard and soft stick together, but at
last I succeeded, and then made a johnny-cake in the fire. Out of sugar
I made my supper, and sat by the fire dreaming and living it all over
again. With the help of my gun I got some birds the next day, and stewed
them in the billy with flour and figweed. I also found the horses all
right, but I was too weak to think of shifting my quarters just then,
much as I would have liked to do so, because there seemed to me to be a
sort of haunted air about the whole place. I busied myself all day, when
I was not hunting for food, with repairing my clothes, but I had a great
longing to see somebody of my own species again, and to sit there every
day talking to or thinking about a dead man had something sickly in it
that I did not like. I could not for a couple of days find either my
money or the bit of gold we had got. Whatever I had done with it was to
me a complete blank. I found it all at last in this way: that somehow my
hat did not seem to fit me, and when I looked it over, there was all the
money stuck under the lining, but I never had any recollection of
putting it there.
I read all Thorkill's letters and took them with me when I left. They
were from his parents and his sister, addressed to him while he was in
Denmark, telling him of all sorts of small home-news, and hoping soon to
see him again. These he had been carrying with him everywhere, and I
had often seen him reading them. There were also photographs of all his
family, and I made them all up into a small parcel intending some day
soon to write to his people.
I confess I never did write. I could not bring myself to do it. I
thought of what he had said--that they must think him dead. Why, then,
reopen their wound? Let him remain "a missing friend." As I had no
settled abode for a long time after this, I carried his papers with me
everywhere for many years. One photograph, of his sister, a very
handsome girl, I had until after I was married, and treasured it
greatly. I think Mrs. ---- must know what became of it at last.