he pursuers, though once Bradby caught a
glimpse of smoke far away to the east, smoke that he fancied came from
the mid-day fire of the troopers.

They halted at sunset in the shadow of a clump of red gums and made the
first meal since morning. As a result of a hurried consultation they
decided to press on until midnight. But the horses were wearied with the
rough and constant travelling, and it took the better part of two hours
for them to cover a little under three miles.

"They've got to have a rest and so have we," Bradby said finally. "The
pace is killing, and I'm quite satisfied that the police are taking it
fairly easy. We've got scared over nothing. They might not even be on
our track. At any rate I suggest we finish for the night and get what
sleep we can."

Abel Cumshaw raised no objection to this--as a matter of fact he was
almost falling from his mount out of sheer saddle-weariness--so a halt
was called, the horses were unsaddled, the men unrolled their blankets
and settled down to slumber just as the silver ghost of the moon flooded
the place with its cool white light.

It was broad daylight when they awoke, and the sun was already high up
in the heavens.

"Somewhere about nine or ten o'clock," Cumshaw guessed. "We've slept in,
Jack."

Bradby ruefully admitted that this was so, but excused it on the ground
that they would be better fitted for the day's work.

"I'm hanged if I like this game," Cumshaw growled as they made a meagre
breakfast on almost the last of their rations. "The food's running
short, and it's only a matter of time until they wear us down. You know
what it means for us, Jack, if they catch us with the gold. Now I've got
an idea, and if we carry it out I see a chance of escaping scot-free.
The gold's weighing us down, so what we've got to do is to get rid of
it."

"You're surely not going to throw it away after all we've gone through,"
said Bradby, aghast at the proposal.

"No, I'm not," Cumshaw told him. "What I suggest is that we hide it
somewhere handy, make a note of the spot, and then clear out of this
particular section for a time. We can easily keep afloat for a couple of
months, and when the hue and cry has died down, we can come back and dig
it up at our leisure. We'll gain nothing by sticking to it now and we'll
run a chance of losing everything."

"Not a bad idea," Bradby agreed. "But the trouble's to find a suitable
spot."

"We passed dozens of such places already