er heard the word before, but they understood
what it meant by the white man's tone and gesture of command. They
instantly obeyed. Before the sound of Stobart's voice had come back in
echo from the mountains, every spear was lowered.

The white man backed his horse and looked down at the native whose life
he had saved. The man was grovelling in the sand in abject fear and
gratitude. Stobart motioned to him to get up and return to the others.
He did so, and as he slunk away, the drover noticed that the middle two
fingers of his left hand were missing.

CHAPTER XXIII

A Friend and a Foe

Boss Stobart had had too much experience with blacks to think that he
was safe. He had escaped instant death and seemed to have gained some
sort of control over those savage minds, but he knew that at any time
the long quivering spears, which had just been lowered at his command,
might be hurled at him and bury their poisonous heads in his body. So
he continued to sit on his horse and look steadily at the naked savages.

When they had got over their surprise, both at the white man having
power to turn aside a boomerang--as they thought--and at his saving the
life of his enemy, they began to yabber and gesticulate. They pointed
to the seven dead men and then at Stobart with fear in their faces;
they looked round at the slaughtered cattle and wondered what revenge
this supernatural man would take; the sound and smell of cooking meat
grew very tantalizing, but they did not dare to continue the feast till
the white man made some sign of anger or pleasure.

The drover did not turn his head. There were those in the crowd who
had not come under the spell of his authority, and he knew it;
therefore he kept on facing them. He looked steadily at one man in
particular; a tall, well-proportioned native with a commanding head and
features. Through the septum of the man's nose a little bundle of thin
bones had been thrust, and this, together with a particular design
painted on his chest, proclaimed him to be a man of power, the doctor
of the tribe. He regarded Stobart with a scowl of hatred, and went
about amongst his companions telling them that there was no difference
between this white man and other men of his colour, and that he would
be as easy to kill as the poor sick Irishman who was now lying so
quietly in the sand. The natives, however, did not know what to do.
Stobart's life hung by a thread.

This state of uncertain