kept a shanty a piece along the road from their camp
towards Mulgatown. He was called "Poisonous Jimmy" perhaps on account
of his liquor, or perhaps because he had a job of poisoning dingoes on a
station in the Bogan scrubs at one time. He was a sharp publican. He had
a girl, and they said that whenever a shearing-shed cut-out on his side
and he saw the shearers coming along the road, he'd say to the girl,
"Run and get your best frock on, Mary! Here's the shearers comin'." And
if a chequeman wouldn't drink he'd try to get him into his bar and shout
for him till he was too drunk to keep his hands out of his pockets.

'"But he won't get us," said another of the drovers. "I'm going to ride
straight into Mulgatown and send my money home by the post as soon as I
get it."

'"You've always said that, Jack," said the first drover.

'We yarned a while, and had some tea, and then me and Jim got on our
horses and rode on. We were burned to bricks and ragged and dusty and
parched up enough, and so were our horses. We only had a few shillings
to carry us four or five hundred miles home, but it was mighty hot and
dusty, and we felt that we must have a drink at the shanty. This was
west of the sixpenny-line at that time--all drinks were a shilling along
here.

'Just before we reached the shanty I got an idea.

'"We'll plant our swags in the scrub," I said to Jim.

'"What for?" said Jim.

'"Never mind--you'll see," I said.

'So we unstrapped our swags and hid them in the mulga scrub by the
side of the road; then we rode on to the shanty, got down, and hung our
horses to the verandah posts.

'"Poisonous" came out at once, with a smile on him that would have made
anybody home-sick.

'He was a short nuggety man, and could use his hands, they said; he
looked as if he'd be a nasty, vicious, cool customer in a fight--he
wasn't the sort of man you'd care to try and swindle a second time.
He had a monkey shave when he shaved, but now it was all frill and
stubble--like a bush fence round a stubble-field. He had a broken nose,
and a cunning, sharp, suspicious eye that squinted, and a cold stony eye
that seemed fixed. If you didn't know him well you might talk to him for
five minutes, looking at him in the cold stony eye, and then discover
that it was the sharp cunning little eye that was watching you all the
time. It was awful embarrassing. It must have made him awkward to deal
with in a fight.

'"Good day, mates," he said.

'"Go