here, and if we manage that
all right I think the greatest part of the danger will be over. I
shall get right across by Dandaloo to the back blocks of the West
Bogan country, between it and the Lachlan. There are tracks through the
endless mallee scrub, only known to the tribes in the neighbourhood, and
a few half-castes like Warrigal, that have been stock-riding about them.
Sir Ferdinand and his troopers might just as well hunt for a stray Arab
in the deserts of the Euphrates. If I'm alive--mind you, alive--I'll be
at Cunnamulla on the day I mean. And now, good-bye, old fellow. Whatever
my sins have been, I've been true to you and your people in the past,
and if Aileen and I meet across the seas, as I hope, the new life may
partly atone for the old one.'

Chapter 49

He shook hands with me and dad, threw his leg over Rainbow, took
Locket's bridle as if he was going for an easy day's ride, and cantered
off.

Warrigal nodded to both of us, then brought his pack-horse up level, and
followed up.

'There goes the Captain,' says father. 'It's hard to say if we'll ever
see him again. I shan't, anyhow, nor you either, maybe. Somehow I've
had a notion coming over me this good while as my time ain't going to be
long. It don't make no odds, neither. Life ain't no great chop to a man
like me, not when he gets the wrong side o' sixty, anyhow. Mine ain't
been such a bad innings, and I don't owe much to any man. I mean as I've
mostly been square with them that's done me a bad turn. No man can say
Ben Marston was ever back'ard in that way; and never will be, that's
more. No! them as trod on me felt my teeth some day or other. Eh, old
man?' Crib growled. He understood things regular like a Christian, that
old dog did. 'And now you're a-goin' off and Jim's gone--seems only
t'other day as you and he was little toddlin' chaps, runnin' to meet me
when I come home from work, clearin' that fust paddock, and telling me
mammy had the tea ready. Perhaps I'd better ha' stuck to the grubbin'
and clearin' after all. It looked slow work, but it paid better than
this here in the long run.' Father turns away from me then, and walks
back a step or two. Then he faces me. 'Dash it, boy, what are ye waitin'
for? Shake hands, and tell Jim the old man han't forgot him yet.'

It was many a day since I'd felt father's hand in kindness; he didn't
do them sort of things. I held out mine and his fingers closed on it one
minute, like a vice--bles