n the distance, Solo walked quietly to the
corner of the orchard opposite to that from which the black boy had
started, where a horse was standing. This was Wallaroo. The saddle had
been hastily thrown on to the entire's back, and the bridle was looped
over a post. Ryder fastened the girths, buckled the bridle securely, and,
mounting the horse, walked him to the slip panels, keeping well under
cover of the trees. When about a quarter of a mile off, he stirred
Wallaroo to a canter, but kept to the track thickly seared with new
hoof-prints, so that it should be impossible for any but a clever tracker
to follow him. After riding for about three miles, he bore to the right
along the course of a small creek, and made his way into the ranges up a
deepening gorge, the sides of which were clothed with heath and scrub,
and ribbed thickly with the trunks of tall gums as straight as lances,
shooting high into the air, and spreading their branches in the moonlight
over two hundred feet above him. He turned from this gorge into a
narrower ravine, which widened into a gully. Ryder continued for another
half-mile to where three or four gigantic rocks thrown together formed a
sort of natural stronghold with a rampart of white gums. Here he
dismounted. Having rolled a boulder from a niche in the rocks, he drew
out a rope, and with this tethered Wallaroo. Then, after removing the bit
from his mouth and loosening the girths, he left the horse to graze.

The niche in the rocks was well stocked with food, and contained a rug, a
bottle of brandy, several small parcels of ammunition, two revolvers, a
few other articles, a miner's 'rig-out,' and the false beards Ryder had
been in the habit of using as disguises.

Having removed the suit he was wearing, Ryder bathed and dressed the
wound in his shoulder as best he could. He put on the digger's clothes,
and, wrapping himself in the rug, lay under the sloping rock on a couch
of dry bracken, and slept as if in a comfortable bed and at peace with
the world.

The sun was throwing oblique rays into the heath on the side of the gully
when Ryder awoke. He found his bridle-arm very stiff and painful, and
dressed the wound again. He breakfasted on biscuits and smoked fish, and
drank water flavoured with brandy. The greater part of that day he spent
collecting fodder for Wallaroo, and leading the horse about to those
spots where the grass was most luxuriant. He was waiting with absolute
confidence and t