ed. "It's always
best--it's always best to keep the last point to--the last."

"Oh, Lord! Well, out with it! _Out with it_!"

"_Macquarie's dead_! That--that's what it is!"

Everyone moved uneasily: Sally Thompson turned the other side to the
bar, crossed one leg behind the other, and looked down over his hip at
the sole and heel of his elastic-side--the barman rinsed the glasses
vigorously--Longbones shuffled and dealt on the top of a cask, and some
of the others gathered round him and got interested--Barcoo thought he
heard his horse breaking away, and went out to see to it, followed by
Box-o'-Tricks and a couple more, who thought that it might be one of
their horses.

Someone--a tall, gaunt, determined-looking bushman, with square features
and haggard grey eyes--had ridden in unnoticed through the scrub to the
back of the shanty and dismounted by the window.

When Barcoo and the others re-entered the bar it soon became evident
that Sally Thompson had been thinking, for presently he came to the
general rescue as follows:

"There's a blessed lot of tommy-rot about dead people in this world--a
lot of damned old-woman nonsense. There's more sympathy wasted over dead
and rotten skunks than there is justice done to straight, honest-livin'
chaps. I don't b'lieve in this gory sentiment about the dead at the
expense of the living. I b'lieve in justice for the livin'--and the dead
too, for that matter--but justice for the livin'. Macquarie was a bad
egg, and it don't alter the case if he was dead a thousand times."

There was another breath of relief in the bar, and presently somebody
said: "Yer tight, Sally!"

"Good for you, Sally, old man!" cried Box-o'-Tricks, taking it up. "An',
besides, I don't b'lieve Macquarie is dead at all. He's always dyin', or
being reported dead, and then turnin' up again. Where did you hear about
it, Awful?"

The Example ruefully rubbed a corner of his roof with the palm of his
hand.

"There's--there's a lot in what you say, Sally Thompson," he admitted
slowly, totally ignoring Box-o'-Tricks. "But--but---'

"Oh, we've had enough of the old fool," yelled Barcoo. "Macquarie was a
spieler, and any man that ud be his mate ain't much better."

"Here, take a drink and dry up, yer ole hass!" said the man behind the
bar, pushing a bottle and glass towards the drunkard. "D'ye want a row?"

The old man took the bottle and glass in his shaking bands and painfully
poured out a drink.

"There