' (Mac. carried a
canvas water-bag slung under his horse's neck), 'ride back to the track,
stop Mrs Spencer, and bring the waggonette here. Tell her it's only a
broken leg.'

Mac. mounted and rode off at a break-neck pace.

As he worked the doctor muttered: 'He shot his horse. That's what gits
me. The fool might have lain there for a week. I'd never have suspected
spite in that carcass, and I ought to know men.'

But as Job came round a little Doc. Wild was enlightened.

'Where's the filly?' cried Job suddenly between groans.

'She's all right,' said the doctor.

'Stop her!' cried Job, struggling to rise--'stop her!--oh God! my leg.'

'Keep quiet, you fool!'

'Stop her!' yelled Job.

'Why stop her?' asked the doctor. 'She won't go fur,' he added.

'She'll go home to Gerty,' shouted Job. 'For God's sake stop her!'

'O--h!' drawled the doctor to himself. 'I might have guessed that. And I
ought to know men.'

'Don't take me home!' demanded Job in a semi-sensible interval. 'Take me
to Poisonous Jimmy's and tell Gerty I'm on the spree.'

When Mac. and Mrs Spencer arrived with the waggonette Doc. Wild was in
his shirt-sleeves, his Chinese silk coat having gone for bandages. The
lower half of Job's trouser-leg and his 'lastic-side boot lay on the
ground, neatly cut off, and his bandaged leg was sandwiched between
two strips of bark, with grass stuffed in the hollows, and bound by
saddle-straps.

'That's all I kin do for him for the present.'

Mrs Spencer was a strong woman mentally, but she arrived rather pale and
a little shaky: nevertheless she called out, as soon as she got within
earshot of the doctor--

'What's Job been doing now?' (Job, by the way, had never been remarkable
for doing anything.)

'He's got his leg broke and shot his horse,' replied the doctor. 'But,'
he added, 'whether he's been a hero or a fool I dunno. Anyway, it's a
mess all round.'

They unrolled the bed, blankets, and pillows in the bottom of the trap,
backed it against the log, to have a step, and got Job in. It was a
ticklish job, but they had to manage it: Job, maddened by pain and heat,
only kept from fainting by whisky, groaning and raving and yelling to
them to stop his horse.

'Lucky we got him before the ants did,' muttered the doctor. Then he had
an inspiration--

'You bring him on to the shepherd's hut this side the station. We must
leave him there. Drive carefully, and pour brandy into him now and then;
when the