The night wind was soughing mournfully through the dark line of she-oaks
fringing the banks of a small, swiftly-running creek, when Sheila was
awakened by some one calling to her from outside the little tent in
which she was sleeping. She sat up and looked out.
“Did you call me, Mr. Grainger?”
“Yes. There is a storm coming down from the ranges. Sorry to awaken you,
but we want to make your tent more secure.”
Aided by Scott, whose giant figure Sheila could scarcely discern--so
dark was the night--Grainger soon had the tent prepared to resist the
storm. As they worked, there came such an appalling thunderclap that
it shook the ground beneath her, and for some minutes she was unable to
hear even the droning roar of the rain-laden tornado that came tearing
down from the mountains, snapping off the branches of the gum-trees,
bending low the pliant boles of the moaning she-oaks, and lifting the
waters of the creek up in sheets.
A hand touched her face in the Cimmerian darkness, and Dick Scott's
voice (he was shouting with all the strength of his mighty lungs) seemed
to whisper--
“Lie down, miss; lie down, and don't be afeerd. The tent will stand, as
we are pretty well sheltered here, and------”
Another fearful thunderclap cut short his words, and she instinctively
clutched his hand. She was used to terrific thunderstorms in New South
Wales, but she had neyer heard anything so awful as this--it seemed as
if the heavens had burst.
“Where is Mr. Grainger?” she asked, putting her lips to Dick's ear and
speaking loudly.
“Here, beside me, miss.”
“And poor Jacky! Where is he?”
“We'll find out presently, miss. Most likely the horses have cleared
out, and he's gone after 'em,” shouted Scott.
For another five minutes the howling fury of the wind and the hissing
of the rain rendered any further conversation impossible. Then came a
sudden lull of both. Grainger struck a match and lit a small lantern he
was holding, and Sheila felt a great satisfaction as the light showed
upon his face---calm and quiet as ever--as he looked at her and smiled.
“You must pardon us coming into the tent, Miss Carolan, but we wanted to
light and leave the lantern with you. I'm afraid the horses have bolted
for shelter into the sandalwood scrub lower down the creek, or into the
gullies, and Jacky has gone after them. Will you mind staying here alone
for an hour or two whilst Scott and I help him to find them?”
“Not at all,” she replied bravely, “and I really do not need the light.
I am not at all afraid.”
“I know that, Miss Garolan. But it will serve to show us the way back.”
(This was merely a kindly fiction.) “And if, during a lull in the rain,
you should hear any of the horses' bells, will you fire two shots from
that Winchester rifle there beside you? It is possible that they may
be quite near to us. Old Euchre” (one of the pack-horses) “has as much
sense as a Christian, and it is quite likely that whilst Scott, Jacky,
and I are looking for them in the scrub, he will lead them back here.”
Then placing the lantern beside her, and partly shielding it with a
saddle cloth to protect it more folly from the gusts of wind, he and
Scott went out into the blackness.
She heard Scott a minute or two later give a loud _Coo-ee!_ for Jacky,
and fancied she heard an answering cry from the blackboy, a long
distance away. Then the rain again descended in a torrential downpour,
and drowned out all other sounds.
*****
Two weeks had passed since Sheila had left Townsville with Grainger
and the hard-riding old Warden and the swarthy-faced Lamington and his
savage-eyed, half-civilised troopers. At Chinkie's Flat they had learnt
that there were now three hundred white miners at the new rush on
Banshee Creek, but that everything was quiet, and that no disputes of
any kind had occurred, and all that Charteris would have to do would be
to visit the place, and, according to the “Gold-fields Act,” proclaim
Banshee Creek to be a new gold-field. So, after spending a night
at Grainger's new house, built on the ridge overlooking the “Ever
Victorious” battery, with its clamorous stampers pounding away night and
day, the Warden bid Sheila and Grainger goodbye, and rode off with his
hardy white police, leaving Lamington and his black, legalised murderers
to go their own way in pursuit of Sandy and Daylight, and “disperse” the
myalls--if they could find them--such dispersion meaning the shooting of
women and children as well as men.
Now, the truth is, that Grainger should have gone on with the Warden
to the new rush, where his prospecting party was anxiously awaiting his
arrival; but he was deeply in love with Sheila Carolan, and she with
him, although she did not know it. But she was mightily pleased when the
“Ever Victorious” Grainger told her that he was going to take her all
the way to Minerva Downs, as he “wanted to see Farrow about buying a
hundred bullocks to send to the new rush at Banshee Creek.” (This was
perfectly true, but he could very easily have dispatched a letter to
Farrow, who would have sent the bullocks to the meat-hungry diggers as a
matter of business.)
As she had stood on the verandah of Grainger's house in the early
morning, watching Charteris and his troopers depart, and listening to
the clang and thud of the five-and-twenty stampers of the new battery
of the “Ever Victorious” pounding out the rich golden quartz, handsome,
swarthy-faced Sub-Inspector Lamington ascended the steps and bade her
good morning.
“So you and Grainger travel with me for another ninety miles or so, Miss
Carolan,” he said with undisguised pleasure. “Will you be ready soon?”
“In half an hour.”
“Ah, that's right. My boys and I are anxious to get to work,” and he
went on to the horse yard.
Sheila could not help a slight shudder as she heard the soft-voiced,
_debonnair_ Lamington speak of his “work.” She knew what it meant--a
score or two of stilled, bullet-riddled figures of men, women, and
children lying about in the hot desert sand, or in the dark shades of
some mountain scrub.
Charteris had told her Lamington's story. He was the only survivor of an
entire family who had been massacred by the blacks of Fraser's Island,
and had grown up with but one object in life--to kill every wild black
he came across. For this purpose alone he had joined the Native Police,
and there were dark tales whispered of what he had done. But the
authorities considered him “a good man,” and when he and his fierce
troopers rode into town and reported that a mob of wild blacks had been
“dispersed,” no one ventured to ask him any questions, but every one
knew what had occurred.
So with Lamington and his silent, grim Danites, Sheila, Grainger, Scott,
and Jacky travelled together for nearly a hundred miles, and then the
two companies separated--Lamington heading towards that part of the
forbidding-looking mountain range where he hoped to find his prey, and
Grainger and his party keeping on to the west.
“It's dangerous country, Grainger,” the police officer said as he bade
them goodbye. “There are any amount of niggers all around, so you will
need to be careful about your fire at night. Shift your camp a good half
mile after you have lit your fire and had supper.”
Grainger smiled. “I've been through the mill, Lamington. But I don't
think we shall have any trouble unless you head them off and send Sandy
and his friends down on to us.”
“I do mean to head them off, and drive them down from the range into
the spinifex country about thirty miles from here, when I can round
them up,” said Lamington softly, as if he were speaking of driving game.
“Sorry you won't be with me to see the fun. The £500 reward for the
production of Messieurs Sandy and Daylight--alive or dead--I already
consider as mine. It will give up a trip to Melbourne to see the Cup
next year.”
“But you can't claim the money--you're an official.”
“This is an exceptional case, and no distinction is to be made
between civilians and policemen--the Government does sensible things
_sometimes_.”
* * * * *
Two hours passed, and Sheila, anxiously awaiting the sound of the
horses' bells, or the reappearance of Grainger and Scott, began to feel
that something had gone amiss. The storm had ceased, and when she rose
and stepped outside she saw that a few stars were shining. Seating
herself upon a granite boulder, she listened intently, but the only
sound that broke the black silence of the night was the rushing of the
waters of the creek.
She placed her hands to her mouth, and was about to give a loud
_Coo-ee!_ when her pride stopped her.
“If they hear me,” she thought, “they will think I am frightened.”
She went back into the tent and again lay down, and tried by the light
of the lantern to read a book which Myra Grainger had given her. Her
watch had stopped, and when she put the book aride she knew that the
dawn was near for the harsh cackle of a wild pheasant sounded from the
branches of a Leichhardt tree near by, and was answered by the shrill,
screaming notes of a flock of king-parrots which the storm had driven to
settle amidst the thick, dense scrub on the bank of the creek.
Quite suddenly she became aware that something was moving about in the
grass outside the tent, and a thrill of alarm made her instinctively
clutch the Winchester rifle beside her. Surely there was some one there,
whispering! Very quietly she sat up and waited. Yes, there certainly
were people outside, and a cold chill of terror possessed her when
the whisperings changed to a rapid and louder muttering in an unknown
tongue, and she knew that her visitors were blacks!
Unable to even speak, she heard the soft rustle of footsteps drawing
nearer and nearer, and then the closed flap of the tent was pulled
slowly aside by a long black hand, and the wicked eyes of the bearded
face of a huge aboriginal, naked to the waist, gazed into hers. For a
second or two he looked at her, watching her terrified expression as a
snake watches the fascinated bird; then he drew back his lips and showed
two rows of gleaming teeth in a fierce smile of exultation. By a mighty
effort she tried to raise the Winchester, and in another moment the
blackfellow sprang at her, covered her head with a filthy kangaroo skin
and silently bore her outside.
For quite ten minâtes she felt herself being carried swiftly along, till
her captor came to the creek, which he crossed. Then he uncovered her
face and spoke to her in English.
“If you make a noise I will kill you, and throw your body in the creek.
I am Sandy the Trooper.”
She gazed at him mechanically, too horrified at her surroundings
to utter a sound. For dawn had just broken and she saw that she was
standing in a small open space in the midst of a sandalwood scrub, and
encircled by twenty or thirty ferocious-looking myall blacks all armed
with spears and waddies. The strong ant-like odour which emanated from
their jet-black skins filled her nostrils and, putting her hands to her
eyes, she shuddered and fell upon her knees with a choking sob.
“Come, none of that, missie,” said another voice in English, and her
hands were rudely pulled aside; “you must get up and walk. Perhaps we
won't hurt you. But if you make a noise I'll give you a tap on the head
with this waddy,” and the speaker flourished a short club over her head.
“Come! get up!”
She obeyed him, rose slowly to her feet, and in another instant darted
aside, and, breaking through the circle of myalls, plunged into the
scrub towards the creek. But before she had gone twenty yards one of
them had seized her by her loosened hair, and a long pent-up scream
burst from her lips.
Again the filthy skin was thrown over her head, then her hands were
quickly tied behind her with a strip of bark.
Sandy lifted her up in his arms, and he, Daylight, and their followers
plunged into the forest and set off towards the mountains.