Morton's Trip to Hentig's Grave--A further Discovery.
"When we left the lake that morning," began Morton, "we passed, of
course, over a few miles of good downs country before we came to the
edge of the desert, then we had nothing to do but keep straight on
the course we had selected until night, when we had to camp in the
spinifex. Next evening we came straight to the water-hole. It was a
splendid fluke, and I never expected such luck. There was a good
supply of water in the hole and fair grass, so we were not badly off.
I found the tree where Hentig was buried, although the cross that
Stuart cut had nearly grown out. The powder-flask, however, had been
only buried a short distance in the ground, and as the bush rats had
dug it up it had rusted and rotted almost to pieces. We found some
of the contents, but the writing is almost if not quite illegible, as
the paper has been soaked into pulp two or three times. As far as I
can make out, though, it was written by Leichhardt himself, and as
such will be valuable. Now I come to what detained me. Billy, whom
I told to look on all the trees about the waterhole for marks, found
a couple of initials on three of the trees. Of course the sides of
the bark had grown together, and could only be traced like a crack in
the bark. I made these initials out to be L.F. If you remember,
Stuart mentions that the two men who were lost never reached this
water, but one of them must have got in to it after Stuart left. I
say one of them, because the same initials were repeated. I lay
awake for a long time reasoning the thing out. When Stuart and the
others left there was no water in the hole, they used up the last of
it; therefore, this man must have come back after rain had fallen,
probably some months after, for he could not have stayed about
cutting his initials on trees without water. He must certainly have
found other water. Where was it? If I could find it I might get
further information.
"In the morning I sent Billy back along our tracks with a note in a
cleft stick, which he was to stick up right on our tracks. In the
note I told you to come on, as there was plenty of water in the hole.
Billy had instructions to ride till noonday, then stick the stick in
with a handkerchief tied to it, and come back again. All this he
did, meanwhile I went fossicking about. The hole was on the edge of
the plain, the same as the lagoons we were camped on so long. I went
north first, and presently was able to find a kind of water-course
skirting the forest. Once or twice I came to holes that should hold
water for some time, but they were all dry. At last I was rewarded.
I came to a fair-sized lagoon, with ducks and other waterfowl on its
surface. There was no sign of the place ever having been much
frequented by natives, at least I only saw some very old camps at
first. At the end of the hole opposite to me was an old shell of a
gum-tree, one of these desert gums that grow to a very old age and
become quite hollow. As I looked at this I saw something move, and
then, looking more intently, I could see some blue smoke stealing up.
Naturally I made for the place as soon as possible, wondering if I
was going to find a living white man. When I reached the spot I
found a small fire burning, and in the tree an ancient old gin was
squatting. She was almost blind, and could just make out that
something was moving about, for she snarled and struck out feebly but
viciously with a yam stick. Oh, she was a cheerful old lady!
"I was puzzling my brains how she lived, for she seemed too feeble to
move and was too blind to see anything distinctly; for all that there
were plenty of feathers around the camp, although she could never
have caught the birds. Presently the old dame, still growling to
herself, crawled out on her hands and knees to the fire, to which she
seemingly guided herself by the sense of smell. Here she squatted
down, and I hung my horse up and went to look at her lair in the
tree. There was an iron tomahawk shipped on to a black's handle, a
single-barrelled percussion shot-gun, and all sorts of little odds
and ends. Evidently this survivor must have found a lot of things
abandoned at the old camp at Hentig's grave. Just then my horse
shook himself, making the saddle rattle and jingle. On hearing this
the old gin set up the most awful screaming you ever heard. When she
quietened down someone called out to her from a short distance away,
and looking in the direction, I saw a light-coloured nigger limping
towards us. He stopped and had a good look at me before approaching;
I held up both my hands as a sign of amity, and he came on pretty
fearlessly. I then saw that he was a half-caste and a cripple. One
leg had been broken in childhood and he had grown up with it shorter
than the other, and much distorted. That he was a descendent of the
missing white man I had no doubt, but the old gin appeared too old to
be his mother. He came up to me, and when I spoke to him seemed
greatly pleased, and pointing to himself said "Lee-lee" two or three
times, indicating that that was his name. I gave him my name in
return, which he soon picked up. He then led me to the tree, and
taking the gun out put it to his shoulder and cried out in imitation
of a report, showing that he had often seen it used. I pointed to
the feathers, and he showed me two or three light boomerangs and a
fishing-net. I tried to find out if he knew anything of the lake,
but he seemed quite ignorant of its existence. I imitated death to
find out what had become of his father, and he led me to a place
where he indicated he was buried, but I could see no sign of a grave.
He knew two or three words of English,--water, gun, tree, and bird;
and I think he must at one time have known much more, but had
probably lost them since his father's death, who, I think, must have
been a man of the same intellectual calibre as Murphy, and quite
uneducated. He explained by signs that his leg had been broken by a
branch breaking when he was climbing a tree as a little fellow.
Suddenly it struck me that there might be more in the family, and
after some trouble he led me to believe that there were, but they had
gone away with the tribe to the north. He limped heavily to show me
that he had been left behind because he could not travel fast enough,
and I concluded that the old gin who had been left was no relation of
his, but had stayed behind from infirmity. Lee-lee seemed very
active and clever, considering the disadvantage he laboured under,
and I made up my mind to bring him in to the lake. He, however, did
not seem anxious to go at first, but I showed him the empty gun, of
which he was very proud, and made him understand that if he came with
me I would make it alive again, which he seemed to approve of highly.
Fortunately there were some boxes of caps amongst his belongings, as
ours are all breech-loaders. He knew the hole where I was camped,
and intimated that he would come down in the morning. All this took
some time, and it was late at night when I got back to camp, where I
found Billy blubbering under the impression that I was not coming
back again. Lee-lee duly turned up the next morning, and Billy tried
to talk to him, but did not make much of a fist at it. He said that
he thought some of the words were the same as those used by the lake
natives. Lee-lee knew nothing of the Warlattas; and, if you
remember, the defunct Columbus told us that there were no natives to
the north. I gave him sugar, which he highly appreciated, then we
saddled up and went up to his lagoon, which I reckoned to be nearly
fifteen miles away, so that he must have started pretty early in the
night to come to us. I fixed him up on one of the pack saddles, and
he got on very well considering.
"The forest bears to the westward, and I intended to start straight
to the lake from Lee-lee's lagoon. The difficulty was about the old
gin. If left behind she would starve, and I did not see how we were
to get her across the desert. I explained the dilemma to Lee-lee,
who seemed to understand. Suddenly a bright idea struck him. He
picked up his nulla-nulla and indicated that the easiest way to
settle the question was by knocking her on the head. He appeared
rather surprised at my objecting somewhat angrily to this simple and
easy method, and I am not sure that Billy did not agree with him.
"I thought that as your ideas have been so brilliant lately, that we
might devise some means of getting the old gin safely across the
desert, and making these fellows and Lee-lee friends, so that, if we
make up our minds to take him back with us, the old woman would not
starve, for there is plenty of food about here. I gave Lee-lee to
understand that I would be back in three days; but, of course, that
is knocked on the head, we must get Charlie well first. Now, old
man, you've had no sleep for two nights. I will sit by Charlie, and
you can have a snooze until daylight. Watching is far more tiring
than riding."
As Brown really felt somewhat tired out, he adopted the suggestion
and retired to his blankets.
Charlie was no better in the morning, and Morton felt quite cast down
at the sad fate now looming, only too plainly, before his young
relative, for whom he entertained a great liking. About mid-day
Brown suddenly arose as though filled with a new idea. He went off
in the direction of the hill where the blacks were camped, and Morton
did not see him for nearly two hours, then he said he had only been
over to see how the niggers were getting on, and was silent and
abstracted until darkness fell, when he persuaded Morton to go and
rest while he kept watch by the invalid.
Morton, who had been riding and watching all the night before, slept
late. When he awoke he saw Brown standing by the fire smoking.
"How is he?" he asked, as he took his towel to go for a swim in the
lake.
"Better, I think; he has been sleeping quietly all night without
talking. When he wakes up he will be sensible, I think."
"That's good news," returned Morton. "I shall be glad to see the boy
up again. What a blessing it was that this thing happened in a good
camp with plenty of game of all sorts! We must feed Charlie up well
now."
Brown puffed on, looking steadily in the fire.
"I suppose you will think me no end of a fool for what I have done,"
he went on at last. "But I have not been able to help associating
Charlie's illness with my opening that grave and taking out that
devilish old plate. I have had that same dream that Charlie had, and
could plainly see the plate and the inscription on it about the
Spirit of Evil. I believe if I had not done what I have done not one
of us would have got back alive."
"What was that?" asked Morton.
"Took it back to the grave yesterday and filled the whole thing up,
and now Charlie is going to get better. What's the verdict?"
"Well, I was going to call you a thundering old idiot, but in view of
the circumstances I won't. It must have been a tribe of devil
worshippers who originally squatted down here."
"That's a weight off my mind. I thought you would have cut up rusty,
for there's no doubt of the value of that relic. But we have copies
of all the inscriptions."
Charlie awoke conscious, and soon began to mend so quickly, that in a
few days they were talking of going back to bring Lee-lee in.