only came yesterday afternoon," said Peter. "Here, you had best
take this and give me the cheque;" and Peter laid a five-pound note
on the bar. Thomas bucked at first, but in the end he handed over the
cheque--he had had several warnings from the police. Then he suddenly
lost all control over himself; he came round from behind the bar and
faced Peter.

"Now, look here, you mongrel parson!" he said. "What the ---- do you
mean by coming into my bar and, interfering with me. Who the ---- are
you anyway? A ----!" He used the worst oaths that were used in the bush.
"Take off your ---- coat!" he roared at last, shaping up to Peter.

Peter stepped back a pace and buttoned his coat and threw back his head.

"No need to take off my coat, Thomas," he said, "I am ready."

He said it very quietly, but there was a danger-signal--a red light in
his eyes. He was quiet-voiced but hard-knuckled, as some had reason to
know.

Thomas balked like a bull at a spread umbrella. Jack lurched past me
as I stood in the parlour door, but I caught him and held him back; and
almost at the same moment a wretched old boozer that we called "Awful
Example," who had been sitting huddled, a dirty bundle of rags and beard
and hair, in the corner of the bar, struggled to his feet, staggered
forward and faced Thomas, looking once again like something that might
have been a man. He snatched a thick glass bottle from the counter and
held it by the neck in his right hand.

"Stand back, Thomas!" he shouted. "Lay a hand--lay a finger on Peter
M'Laughlan, and I'll smash your head, as sure as there's a God above us
and I'm a ruined man!"

Peter took "Awful" gently by the shoulders and sat him down. "You keep
quiet, old man," he said; "nothing is going to happen." Thomas went
round behind the bar muttering something about it not being worth his
while to, etc.

"You go and get the horses ready, Joe," said Peter to me; "and you sit
down, Jack, and keep quiet."

"He can get the horses," growled Thomas, from behind the bar, "but
I'm damned if he gets the saddles. I've got them locked up, and I'll
something well keep them till Barnes is sober enough to pay me what he
owes me."

Just then a tall, good-looking chap, with dark-blue eyes and a long,
light-coloured moustache, stepped into the bar from the crowd on the
veranda.

"What's all this, Thomas?" he asked.

"What's that got to do with you, Gentleman Once?" shouted Thomas.

"I think it's got somethin