his eyes, and when he looked again it was no longer
coming up from the trees, but was rising up and up and fading away
against the flawless blue of the sky. He was about to call Vaughan's
attention to it when his horse stumbled and nearly fell. Next time he
looked to the north the smoke was again rising from the trees, and then
again it was cut off, and floated away and was lost.

His curiosity was thoroughly roused. "Mick!" he shouted, for by this
time the boys had dropped the "Mr." when speaking to their drover
friend. "Mick! Is that _smoke_ over there in the trees?"

"Sure it's smoke," he answered. "And so's that ahead there." He
pointed across the plain, where the heat was dancing, to a little hill.
It must have been eight miles away, and from it rose a thin coil of
smoke. At first Sax thought it was merely the effect of the sun
causing everything in the distance to quiver and take on fantastic
shapes, but he trusted the bushman's eyes, and at last convinced
himself that it was indeed smoke.

"Then somebody must be camped there," said Vaughan.

"Is it a station, Mick, or just chaps travelling like ourselves?" asked
Sax.

"It's niggers, lad. They're signalling to one another."

The columns of smoke were at once invested with a new interest to the
two boys. Natives were near them, unseen, sending messages to other
natives at a distance. The simplicity of this bush telegraphy was
fascinating.

"What are they saying, Mick, d'you know?" asked Vaughan eagerly.

"This lot," said the drover, "is telling that other lot over there that
we're coming. So many white men, so many blacks, and so many horses.
We're getting into nigger country now."

"Will we see them?" asked the boys.

"No chance in life," replied the drover. "These niggers are wild and
scared to death of white men. They're different from the camp blacks
who hang round stations. They'll likely be station blacks themselves
some day, for the wild nigger's dying out. But just now, they keep
away and live their own lives. We call them warraguls."

CHAPTER VII

Stealthy Foes

Next morning, when the horses came in, two were missing. "Which way
them two horses sit down?" Mick asked one of the boys. "What for you
no bring um in?"

"Him dead," was the answer.

"Dead!" exclaimed the drover. "How dead?"

"Him speared," explained Yarloo.

"Which way? You show um me." The drover saddled his horse and went
away with Yarloo, whil