ecollect how you breathed soul into them when they shrank back that day?
They moved, Geisner. They moved. We felt them move. They will move again,
some day, dear heart. They will move again." Then, choking with sobs, she
laid her head on his knees. He put his arms tenderly round her and they
saw that this immovable little man was weeping like a child. One by one
the others went softly out to the verandah. Only Ned remained. He had
buried his face in his hands and sat, overwhelmed with shame, wishing
that the floor would open and swallow him. From outside came the
ceaseless lap-lap-lapping of water, imperceptibly eating away the granite
rock, caring not for time, blindly working, destroying the old and
building up the new.

The touch of a hand roused Ned. He looked up. Mrs. Stratton had gone
through the door concealed by the hangings. Geisner stood before him,
calmly lighting another cigarette with a match. There was no trace of
emotion on his face. He turned to drop the match into an ash tray, then
held out both hands, on his face the kindly smile that transfigured him.
Ned grasped them eagerly, wringing them in a grip that would have made
most men wince. They stood thus silently for a minute or two, looking at
one another, the young, hot-tempered bushman, the grey-haired,
cool-tempered leader of men; between them sprang up, as they stood, the
bond of that friendship which death itself only strengthens. The
magnetism of the elder, his marvellous personality, the strength and
majesty of the mighty soul that dwelt in his insignificant body, stole
into Ned's heart and conquered it. And the spirit of the younger, his
fierce indignation, his angry sorrow, his disregard for self, his truth,
his strong manhood, appealed to the weary man as an echoing of his own
passionate youth. Then they loosened hands and without a word Geisner
commenced to walk slowly backwards and forwards, his hands behind him,
his head bent down.

Ned watched him, studying him feature by feature. Yes, he had been
handsome. He was ugly only because of great wrinkles that scored his
cheeks and disfigured the fleshless face and discoloured skin. His
eyebrows and eyelashes were very thin, too. His hair looked dried up and
was strongly greyed; it had once been almost black. His lips were thin,
his mouth shapeless, only because he had closed them in his fight against
pain and anguish and despair and they had set thus by the habit of long
years. His nose was s