IV

It was nearly midnight as Harrington took down the slip-rails and led

his horse through the paddock up to the house, which, except for a dimly

burning lamp in the dining-room, was in darkness. The atmosphere was

close and sultry, and the perspiration ran down his skin in streams as

he gave his horse to the head-stockman, who was sitting on the verandah

awaiting him.

“Terrible night, sir, but I'm thinking if it keeps on like this for

another hour or two we'll get a big thunderstorm. 'Sugar-bag'” (one of

the black boys) “was here just now and says that the ant-heaps about are

covered with ants--that's a sure sign, sir.”

“God send it so, Banks! If no rain comes within two days, you'll have to

start away for Cleveland Bay with Mrs. Harrington and Miss Alleyne and

the children. We must find horses somehow to take them there.”

Before Banks led the horse away for a drink, he stopped.

“Miss Alleyne went to Canton Reef, sir, this morning with little Sandy.

She ought to have been here before dark, but I expect the horses knocked

up. There's a couple of cows with young calves there, so Sandy says,

and Miss Alleyne said she would try and bring them in if I would let her

take Sandy. We've had no milk, sir, for the children since Tuesday, and

Miss Alleyne said that you would be vexed. I would have gone

myself, sir, but I couldn't well leave, and I know Miss Alleyne will

manage--it's only fifteen miles, and Sandy says that the two cows and

calves are pretty fat and can travel; there's a bit of feed at those

waterholes about the Canton. Most likely she and the little black boy

have yarded the cows at the Seven-mile Hut and are camping there for

the night But I'll start off now, sir. I've got Peter the Pig already

saddled.”

“Yes, yes, Banks, certainly. Why didn't you start long ago?”

“Mrs. Harrington said I must wait for you, sir,” the man answered

somewhat sullenly.

Harrington nodded. “Hurry up, Banks; but here, take a glass of grog

first.”

He watched the stockman disappear down the dusty track to the

slip-rails, then he went inside, and sitting down at the table buried

his face in his hands. Then, booted and dusty, and tired in mind and

body, he slept.

An hour had passed, and no sound disturbed the hot oppressive silence of

the night but the heavy breathing of the wearied man. Then through his

dreamless slumber came the murmur of voices, and presently three figures

walked quickly up from the milking-yard towards the house.

“He's asleep, miss,” whispered Banks, “he's dog tired But the news you

have got for him will put fresh life into him. Now just you go to him,

miss, and tell him, and then as soon as I have given them cows a drink,

I'll bring you in some tea. Sandy, you little black devil, light a fire

in the kitchen and don't make a noise, or I'll tan your hide, honest.”

For a minute or so the girl stood in the doorway of the dining-room,

holding a heavy saddle-pouch, in her hand, her frame trembling with

emotion and physical exhaustion; and trying to speak. As soon as she

could speak, she walked over to the sleeping man and touched him on

the shoulder He awoke with a start just as she sank on her knees, and

leaning her elbows on a chair beside him, burst into a fit of hysterical

weeping. He waited for her to recover herself.

“Oh, I am so glad, so glad, Mr. Harrington! Now you need not give up

Tinandra... and the drought doesn't matter... and oh, I thank God for

His goodness that He has let me help you at last!” She broke off with a

choking sob, and then, with streaming eyes, placed her hand in his.

Harrington lifted her up and placed her on a couch. “Lie there, Miss

Alleyne. I will call Mrs. Harrington----”

She put out her hand beseechingly. “Please _don't_, Mr. Harrington. She

is not at all strong, and I think I made her very angry this morning by

going away to look for the milkers.... But look, Mr. Harrington, look

inside the saddle pouch.” Then she sat up, and her eyes burnt with

feverish expectation, “Quick, quick, please,” and then she began to

laugh wildly, but clenching her hands tightly together she overcame her

hysteria, and attempted to speak calmly.

“I shall be better in a minute... empty it out on the table, please...

Banks says it is another outcrop of the old Canton Reef.”

Harrington picked up the saddle-pouch, and putting it on the table,

turned up the lamp, and unfastened the straps; it was filled with pieces

of rough weather-worn quartz thickly impregnated with gold. The largest

piece contained more gold than quartz, and an involuntary cry of

astonishment and admiration burst from his lips as he held it to the

light.

Nellie's eyes sparkled with joy. “Isn't it lovely! I can't talk, my lips

are so dry.”

Harrington dashed outside to the verandah filled a glass from the canvas

water-bag hanging from a beam overhead, and gave it to the exhausted

girl.

“Now don't you attempt to speak for five minutes.”

“No, I won't,” she said, with a faint smile, as she drank off the cold

water--and then at once began to tell him of her discovery.

“Sandy and I found the two cows and calves a mile this side of the

Canton Reef in a gully, but before we could head them off they had got

away into the ironbark ridges. Sandy told me to wait, and galloped after

them. I followed him to the top of the first ridge, and then pulled up,

and there, right under my horse's feet I saw a small 'blow' of quartz

sticking up out of the baked ground, and I saw the gold in it quite

plainly. Of course I was wildly excited, and jumped off. The stone was

quite loose and crumbly, and I actually pulled some pieces away with my

hands, and when I saw the thick yellow gold running all through it I sat

down and cried. Then I became so frightened that Sandy might not find

me again, for it would be dark in another hour, and so I ran up and down

along the ridge, listening for the sound of his stockwhip. And then I

went back towards the outcrop of the reef again, and half-way down I

picked up that big lump--it was half buried in the ground.... And

oh, Mr. Harrington, all that ridge is covered with it... I could have

brought away as much again, but Sandy had no saddle-pouch... and I was

dying to come home and tell you.”

She breathed pantingly for a few minutes.

“It was nearly dark when Sandy came back. He had run the cattle on to a

camp about three miles away.... I don't know which pleased me most,

to get the cows so that poor Mable and Harry can have some milk in the

morning, or the gold.... Banks met us half-way from the Seven-mile Hut,

and took me off my horse and put me in front of him.”

Banks came to the door, carrying a tray with a cup of tea and some food.

“Here ye are, Miss Alleyne; ye're a born stockman, an' a prospector,

an'--God bless you, miss, _you've brought the rain as well_.”

For as the rough, hairy-faced stockman began to speak, a low rumbling

sound of thunder smote the silence of the night, followed by a loud

appalling clap, and then another, and another, and presently a cooling

blast of wind came through the open door, and stirred and shook the

Venetian blinds hanging outside. Banks almost dropped the tea-tray, and

then darting outside, dashed his cabbage-tree hat on the ground, and

began to dance as the first heavy drops of the coming deluge fell upon

his head.

In less than ten minutes, Harrington, with silent joy in his heart, was

standing at the doorway, watching the descending torrents of rain--that

rain which to his bushman's heart meant more than all the gold which lay

beneath the earth. He had, as it first began to fall, rushed into his

wife's bedroom, and kissed her and the terrified children.

“The rain has come, Myra, thank God,” he said, and then he added

quietly, “I have more good news for you in the morning.”

Mrs. Harrington said she was quite aware of the rain having come--the

disgusting noise of the thunder had made the children scream. Had Miss

Alleyne come back? And brought the cows? His other good news could keep

till the morning.

Harrington turned away from her with a feeling of dulled resentment.

_He_ knew what the girl had suffered, and his wife's heartlessness cut

him to the quick.

As he stood watching Banks and the black boys filling every available

tank and cask on the station from the downpour off the roof, Nellie rose

from the couch on which she had been lying, and touched his arm timidly.

“Don't you believe in God's goodness _now_, Mr. Harrington? See, He has

sent the rain, and He has granted my daily prayer to Him that I, too,

might help you. And Banks says that this is not a passing thunderstorm,

but that the drought has broken up altogether--for see, the wind is from

the south.”

Harrington raised her hand to his lips. “I have always tried to believe

in God and in His mercy, Miss Alleyne.”

“Not always, Mr. Harrington,” she said softly. “Don't you remember when

all the Big Swamp! mob were bogged and dying, that you said that if

He would not hear the moans and see the agonies of the beasts He had

created, that He would not listen to the prayers of human beings who

were not suffering as they suffered? And to-day, as Sandy and I rode

along to the Canton Reef, I prayed again and again, and always when I

passed a dying beast I said, '_O God! have mercy upon these Thy dumb

creatures who suffer much agony!_”

Harrington's chest heaved. “And I prayed as you prayed, Miss Alleyne;

but I said, 'O God! if there is a God.'”

She put out her hand to him and her dark eyes filled with tears. “He has

answered our prayers.... And now, good night... I wish I could go out

into the rain; I feel I could dance for joy.... Mr. Harrington, _do_

let me go to the Canton Reef with you to-morrow. Everything will be

all right to-morrow, won't it? But there, how thoughtless I am.... I

am going to milk those two cunning cows till they are dry; poor little

Harry does so want some fresh milk. Good night, Mr. Harrington; I shall

sleep happily to-night--everything will be all right to-morrow.”

At breakfast-time next morning the rain was still falling steadily, and

Mrs. Harrington decided to join her husband at the morning meal.

Harrington rode up to the door and smiled brightly at his wife. “Waiting

for me, dear? I won't be long. The river is running now, Myra--running

after two years! I'm off to Miss Alleyne's reef as soon as I've had a

bit of tucker. Where is she?”

“In bed, I presume,” said Mrs. Harrington acidulously. “She might

have remembered that I was very much upset last night by that horrible

thunder, and have risen earlier and attended to the children.”

A look of intense disgust came over her husband's face.

“Myra, the girl was done-up, dead beat! Won't you go and see if she is

able to get up?”

Mrs. Harrington rose stiffly. “Oh, certainly, if you wish it. But I

think it is a great mistake. She really ought to have considered the

children, and----”

The head stockman's wife met her at the door, and looking past her

mistress, spoke to Harrington in terrified tones-----

“Miss Alleyne is dead, sir!”

Harrington sprang from his chair. “Dead, Mrs. Banks!”

“Yes, sir. I was only just in time. She on'y sez, 'Tell Mr. Harrington

that I am so glad that everythink will be all right now.' An' then she

smiled, sir, and sez as I was to kiss Master Harry and Miss Mabel for

her, as she was agoin'. And then she sez, 'Isn't God good to send

the rain, Mrs. Banks? Everything will be all right now for poor Mr.

Harrington--rain and gold.' Then she just laid quiet for a minute, an'

when I looked at her face again, I saw she was dead.”

*****

A year later, Jack Harrington, again one of the wealthiest cattle men in

North Queensland, and the owner of one of the richest gold mines in the

colony, was riding home to his station. Behind him he heard the clatter

and clash of the twenty-stamper battery that on the “Canton Ridge” was

pounding him in so many thousands of pounds a month; before him lay

the sweeping grassy downs and thickly timbered creeks of a now smiling

country. His wife and children had long before returned to the cooler

South, and in his heart was a great loneliness. Not, perhaps, for them,

but because of the memory of the girl whose prayer to the Almighty had

been answered, and who was resting on the bank of the Gilbert under the

shade of a big Leichhardt tree.