to the flush that told she had heard the cheer for "his red rose,"
she waved her handkerchief to him. With eager hands he tore the fastening
of a fantastically-shaped little nugget that hung on his watch-chain and
flung it towards her. He saw her stoop to pick it up. Then the train
swept on past a switch-house and he saw her no more, save in the picture
gallery of his memory stored with priceless paintings of the face he
loved; and in the little photo that he conned till his fellow-passengers
nudged each other.

* * * * *

At Newcastle he left the train to stretch himself and get a cup of tea.
As he stepped from the carriage a man came along who peered inquisitively
at the travellers. He was a medium-sized man, with a trimmed beard,
wearing a peaked cap pulled over his forehead. This inquisitive man
looked at Ned closely, then followed him past the throng to the end of
the platform. There, finding the bushman alone, he stepped up and,
clapping his hand on Ned's shoulder, said quietly in his ear:

"In the Queen's name!"

Ned swung round on his heel, his heart palpitating, his nerves shaken,
but his face as serene as ever. It had come, then. After all, what did it
matter? He would have preferred to have reached his comrades but at least
they would know he had tried. And no man should have reason to say that
he had not taken whatever happened like a man. At the time he did not
think it strange that he was not allowed to reach the border. The
squatters could do what they liked he thought. If they wanted to hang men
what was to stop them? So he swung round on his heel, convinced of the
worst, calm outwardly, feverish inwardly, to enquire in a voice that did
not shake:

"What little game are you up to, mister?"

The inquisitive man looked at him keenly.

"Is your name Hawkins?" he asked.

"Suppose it is! What does that matter to you?" demanded Ned, mechanically
guarding his speech for future contingencies.

"It's all right, my friend," replied the other, with a chuckle. "I'm no
policeman. If you're Hawkins, I've a message for you. Show me your
credentials and I'll give it."

"Who're you, anyway?" asked Ned. "How do I know who you are?"

The inquisitive man stopped a uniformed porter who was passing. "Here,
Tom," he said, "this gentleman wants to know if I'm a union man. Am I?"

"Go along with your larks!" retorted the man in uniform. "Why don't you
ask me if you're alive?" and he passed on with a laugh as though