 41 We hadn't been long at home, just enough to get tired of doing nothing, when we got a letter from Bella Barnes, telling us that she was going to get married the day after the touring races, and reminding Starlight that he had promised to come to her wedding. If he didn't think it was too risky, she hoped he would come. There was going to be a race-ball, and it was sure to be good fun. It would be a good wind-up, and Maddie was coming out a great swell. Another third man would be there, but there'd be such a crowd any body would pass muster, and so on. Yours sincerely, Isabella Barnes. P.S. there was a big handicap, with five hundred added. Hadn't we a good horse enough? Well done, Bella, says Starlight. I vote we go, Dick. I never went to a hop with a price on my head before—a thousand pounds, too. And a new sensation. It settles the question, and will enter Rainbow for the handicap. He ought to be good enough for anything they're likely to have. Captain Starlight's Rainbow, nine stone eight pounds, I said, with Dick Marston, to lead him up to the judge's box. How will that wash? And what are the police going to be about all the time? Bella's gone out of her senses about her marriage, and thinks we are, too. You're a good fellow, Richard, in staunch, but you're like your father. You haven't any imagination. I see a half a dozen ways of doing the whole thing. Besides, our honor's concerned. I never made a promise yet, for good or for evil, that I didn't carry out. And some have cost me dearly enough. God knows. Fancy, running our horses, and going to the ball under the noses of the police. The idea is delicious. I daresay you're about tired of your life, I said. I'm pretty sure I am. But why should we ride straight into the lion's mouth to please a silly girl? I can't see. I haven't over much sense. I know, or I shouldn't be here. But I'm not such a dashed fool, as all that comes to. My mind is made up, Richard. I have decided irrevocably. Of course you needn't come, if you see objections. But I'll bet you, my Dane and Adam's revolver, and the Navy Colt, against your repeating rifle, that I do all I've said, and clear out safe. Done, I said. I've no doubt you'll try. But you might as well try to pull down the walls of Burima Jail with a hay rake. You'll make Sir Ferdinand's fortune, that's all. He always said he'd die happy if he could only bag you in the Marstons. You'll be made Inspector General of Police. Starlight smiled in his queer, quiet way. If he doesn't rise to the top of the tree until he takes me alive, I mean he'll die a sub-inspector. But we'd better sleep on it. This is an enterprise of great pith and moment, and requires no end of thought. We must get your sister to come over. That will crown all. Good night, I said rather hasty. We'd better turn the hollow into Tarban Creek and advertise for borders. Next morning I expected he'd think better of it. We'd had a glass or two of grog, but no. He was more set on it than ever, and full of dodges to work it to rights. He certainly was wonderful clever in all sorts of ways, when there was any devilment to be carried out. Life as much in the straight way would have made a man of him. But that's the way of the world all over. He ain't the only one. As for father he was like me and looked on the notion as rank foolishness. He swore straight on end for about twenty minutes, and then said he expected Starlight would have his own way as usual, but he'd play at that game once too often. He's supposed he'd be left in the hollow all by himself with Warren Gale and the dog for company. Warren Gale goes with me, might want him, says Starlight. You're losing your nerve, Governor. Perhaps you'd like to go to the ball, too. Father gave a sort of a growl and lit his pipe and wouldn't say no more. Starlight and I regular talked it out, and after I heard all he had to say it didn't look quite so impossible as it did at first. We were to work apart. He was to get in with some of the bedding men, or sporting people that always came to the country races, and I was to find out some of our old digger mates and box up with them. Warren Gale was to shift for himself and look after the horses and have them ready in case we had to clear at short notice. And who was to enter Rainbow and look after him? Couldn't we get old Jacob Benton? He's the best trainer I've seen since I left home. Billy the boy told us the other day he was out of a job, and was groom at Jonathan's. He had been sacked for getting drunk and so on. He'll be all the more likely to keep sober for a month. The very man I said he can ride the weight and train, too. But we can't have him here, surely. No, but I can send the horse to him at Jonathan's, and he can get him fit there as well as anywhere. There's nearly a month yet. He's pretty hard, and he's been regularly exercised lately. Jacob Benton was a wizened, dried-up old Yorkshireman. He had been head-man in a good racing stable, but drink had been the ruin of him, lost him his place, and sent him out here. He could be trusted to go right through with a job like ours for all that. Like many men that drank hard, he was as sober as a judge between one burst and another. And once he took over a horse in training he touched nothing but water till the race was run and the horse back in his box. Then he most times went in an awful perisher. Took a month to it and was never sober day or night the whole time. When he'd spent all his money he'd crawl out of the township and get away into the country more dead than alive and take the first job that offered. But he was fonder of training a good horse than anything else in the world, and if he'd got a regular flier and was treated liberal, he hardly allowed himself sleep or time to eat his meals till he got him near the mark. He could ride to and was an out-and-out judge of pace. When we'd regular chalked it out about entering Rainbow for the Grand Tour in Handicap we sat Warren Gaul over to Billy the Boy and got him to look up old Jacob. He agreed to take the old horse the week before the races and give him a last bit of French polish if we kept him in steady work till then. From what he was told of the horse he expected he would carry any weight he was Handicap'd for and pull it off easy. He was to enter him in his own name, the proper time before the races. If he won he was to have ten percent on winnings. If he lost a ten-pound note would do him. He could ride the weight with some lead in his saddle and he'd never wet his lips with grog till the race was over. So that part of the work was chalked out. The real risky business was to come. I never expected we should get through all straight, but the more I hung back the more shook on it Starlight seemed to be. He was like a boy home from school sometimes, mad for any kind of fun with a spice of devilment in it. About a week before the races we all cleared out, leaving father at home and pretty sulky too. Warren Gaul led Rainbow. He was to take him to Jonathan Barnes's and meet old Jacob there. He was to keep him until it was time to go to Turin. We didn't show there ourselves this time. We were afraid of drawing suspicion on the place. We rode in the Turin, taking care to be well after dark. A real pleasure it was to see the old place again. The crooked streets, the lighted up shops. The crowd of jolly diggers walking about smoking or crowding round the public house bars. The row of the stampers and the quartz-crushing machines going night and day. It all reminded me of the pleasant year Jim and I had spent here. I wished we had never had to leave it. We parted just outside the township for fear of accidents. I went to a little place I knew where I put up my horse, could be quiet there, and asked no questions. Starlight as usual went to the best hotel where he ordered everybody about and was as big a swell as ever. He had been out in the Northwest country and was going to Sydney to close for a couple of stations that had been offered to him. That night he went to the barber, had his hair cut and his beard shaved, only leaving his mustache and a little bit of whisker like a ribbon. He put on a suit of tweed, all one color, and ordered a lot more clothes, which he paid for and were to be left at the hotel till he returned from Sydney. Next day he starts for Sydney. What he was going to do there he didn't say, and I didn't ask him. He'd be back the day before the races, and in good time for all the fun, and bella's wedding into the bargain. I managed to find out that night that Kate Mullickson had left her in. She and her husband had sold their place and gone to another digging's just opened. I was glad enough of this, for I knew that her eyes were sharp enough to spy me out whatever disguise I had on, and even if she didn't, I should always have expected to find her eyes fixed upon me. I breathed freer after I heard this bit of news. The gold was better even than when we had been there. A lot of men, who were poor enough when we were there, had made fortunes. The field never looked better, and the hard driving, well paid, jolly mining life was going on just the same as ever. Everyone, making money fast, spending it faster, and no one troubling themselves about anything except how much the wash dirt went to the load and whether the sinking was through the false bottom or not. When I first came I had a notion of mating in with some diggers, but when I saw how quiet everybody took it and what thousands of strangers there were all over the place I gave myself out for a speculator in mining shares from Melbourne, so I shaved off most of my beard, had my hair cut short, and put on a tall hat. I thought that would shift any sort of likeness there might be to my old self, and, though it was beastly uncomfortable, I stuck to it all the time. I walked about among the stables, and had a good look at all the horses that were in training. Two or three good ones as usual, and a lot of duffers. If Rainbow wasn't beat on his condition, he'd had pace and weight carrying for the best of them. I hardly thought he could lose it, or a bigger stake in better company. I was that fond of the horse. I thought he was good enough for the English derby. Well, I kept dark, you be sure, and mooned about, buying a share at low price, now and then, just to let him see I had money and meant something. My name was Mr. Bromford, and I lived in Petersham, near Sydney. The day before the races there was a lot of excitement in the town. Strangers kept pouring in from everywhere round about, and all the hotels were crammed full. Just as I was wondering whether Starlight was going to turn up till next day, I saw a foreign hand drag rattle down the streets to the principal inn, and a crowd gather round it as three gentlemen got out and went into the inn. You'll see after all our luggage, will you, Osler, says one of them, to the groom, and whatever you do don't forget my umbrella. Some of the diggers laughed. You know those coves I said to a man that stopped at the same house as I did? Don't you know? Them's the two Mr. Dawson's of wide view. Great sporting men, natives, and ever so rich. They have some horses to run to-morrow. That's a new chum from England that's come up with them. I hardly knew him at first. His own mother wouldn't, I believe. He'd altered himself that wonderful, as I could hardly even think now that it was Starlight, and yet he wasn't a bit like the young Englishman he gammed to be last year, or the honorable Frank Houghton either. He had an eyeglass this time, and was a swell from top to toe. How and when he'd picked up with the Mr. Dawson's I couldn't tell, but he'd got a knack of making people like him, especially when they didn't know him. Not that it was worse when they did. It wasn't for that he was always the same. The whitest man I ever knew, or ever shall. That I say and stick to, but of course people can't be expected to associate with men that have done time. Well next day was the races. I never saw such a turnout in the colony before. Every digger on the field had dropped work for the day. All the farmers and squatters and country people had come in for miles round on all sides. The commissioners and the police were out in full uniform, and from the first moment the hotels were opened in the morning till breakfast time all the bars were full, and the streets crowded with miners and strangers and people that seemed to have come from the ends of the earth. When I saw the mob there was I didn't see so much to be jaren about, as it was fifty to one in favor of any one that was wanted. In the middle of such a queer muster of cattle as was going on at Turing that day. About eleven o'clock every one went out to the course. It wasn't more than a mile from town. The first race wasn't till be run till twelve, but long before that time the road was covered with horsemen, traps of every kind and sort, every horse and mayor in the whole district. Most of the miners went in four horse coaches and buses that were plying all day long from the town and back. Very few walked. The country people mostly drove in spring carts or rode on horseback. Any young fellows that had a good horse liked to show them off of course, the girls in habits of their own make, perhaps, and now and then a top hat, though they looked very well too. They could ride some of them, above a bit, and it made me think of the old days when Jim and I and Eileen used to ride into Bargo races together and how proud we were of her, even when she was a little thing, and we used to groom up the old pony till we nearly scrubbed the hide off him. It was no use of thinking of that kind of thing and I began to wonder how Starlight was getting on with his friends when I saw the Dawson's drag come up the straight with four upstanding ripping bay horses in top condition and well matched. There was Starlight on the box seat alongside of Jack Dawson, the oldest brother, who could handle the ribbons in style and was a man every inch of him, only a bit too fast, didn't care about anything but horses and dogs and lived every day of his life. The other brother was standing up behind, leaning over and talking to Starlight, who was in great form, as he used to say himself, and looked as if he had just come out of a band box. He had on a silk coat button round him, a white top hat with a blue silk veil. His eyeglass was stuck in his eye all the time, and he had kid gloves on that fitted his hands like wax. I really couldn't hardly take my oath he was the same man, and no wonder nobody else couldn't. I was wondering why Sir Ferdinand wasn't swelling about bowing to all the ladies and making that thoroughbred of his dance and arch's neck, when I heard someone say that he'd got news that Moran and the rest of him had struck up at a place about forty miles off, towards Forbes, and Sir Ferdinand had sworn out his luck for having to miss the races, but started off just as he was, and taken all the troopers but too with him. Who brought the news? Oh, a youngster called William Jones. Said he lived out there, a black boy came with him that couldn't hardly speak English, and he went with him to show the way. Well, how did they know it was true, says I? It might have been only a stall. Oh, the young fellow brought a letter from the overseer, saying they might hold out for a few hours, if the police came along quick. It's a good thing they started at once, says I. Them boys was very useful sometimes, and black fellows too. I went off then and had a laugh to myself. I was pretty middle and certain it was Billy the Boy and Warren Gull. Starlight had wrote the note before we started. Only I didn't think they'd be game to deliver it themselves. Now that the police was away, all but a couple of the young fellows, I went and had a look to make sure, that didn't know any of us by sight. I thought we might enjoy ourselves for once in a way without watching everyone that came nigh us. And we did enjoy ourselves. I did, I know, though you'd think as we carried our lives in our hands in a manner of speaking the fun couldn't have been much. But it's a queer world, men like us, that don't know what's to happen to them, from one day to another. If they can only see their way for a week ahead, often have more real pleasure in the bit of time they have to themselves than many a man has in a year that has no call to care about time or money or be afraid of anybody. As for Starlight, if he had been going to be hung next week it would have been all one to him. He would have put off thinking about it until about an hour before, and then would have made all his arrangements and done the whole business quietly and respectably, without humbug, but without any flashness either. You couldn't put him wrong, or make him do or say anything that was out of place. However, this time, nobody was going to be hung, or took, or anything else. We were as good as got a free pardon for the time being. Now the police was away. No one else would have meddled with us if we had had our names printed on our hats. So we made the most of it, I expect. Starlight carried on all sorts of high ropes. He was introduced to all the knobs, and I saw him in the grandstand and the saddling paddock, taking the odds in tens and fifties from the ringmen. He had brought a stiffish roll of notes with him, and backing the Dawson stable right out. It turned out afterwards that he had met them at an inn on the mountains, and helped them doctor one of their leaders that had been gripped. So they took a fancy to him, and being free-hearted sort of fellows asked him to keep them company in the drag, and let one of the grooms ride his horse. Once he started he kept them alive, you may be sure, and by the time they got to Turin they were ready to go round the world with him, and swore they'd never met such a man in their lives. Very likely they hadn't, either. He was introduced to the judge and the stewards, and the commissioner and the police magistrate, and as much fuss was made over him as if he was the governor's son. It was as good as a play. I got up as near as I dared once or twice, and I couldn't hardly keep from bursting out laughing when I saw how grave he talked and drawled, and put up his eyeglass, and every now and then made him all laugh, or said something reminded him of India, where he'd last come from. Well that was a regular fissure of a spree, if we never had another. The racing was very fair, and as luck would have it, the Dawson horses won all the big money, and as they started at longish odds they must have made a pot of money, and starlight too, as he had gone in a docker for their stable. This made them better friends than ever, and it was Dawson here and LaSalle's there all over the course. Well the day went over at last, and all of them that liked a little fun and dancing better than heavy drinking made it up to go to the race ball. It was a subscription affair, guinea tickets, just to keep out the regular ruffs, and the proceeds to go to the Turin Jockey Club fund. All the swells had to go of course, and though they knew it would be a crush and pretty mixed, as I heard starlight say, the room was large, the band was good, and they expected to get a fair share of dancing after an hour or so. Starlight and Dawson dined at the camp, and were made a good deal of, their health drunk and what not, and starlight told us afterwards he returned thanks for the strangers and visitors, said he'd been told Australia was a rough place, but he never expected to define so much genuine kindness and hospitality, and he might add so much refinement and gentlemanly feelings. Speaking for himself, he had never expected considering his being a total stranger to be welcomed so cordially and entertained so handsomely, more particularly at the mess of Her Majesty's gold field officials, whose attention on this occasion they might be assured he would never forget. He would repeat the events of this particular day would never be a face from his memory. Tremendous cheering. After dinner, and when the champagne had gone round pretty reasonable, the commissioners proposed they should all adjourn to the ball, when, if Mr. LaSalle's cared about dancing, he ventured to think a partner or two could be found for him. So they all got up and went away down to the hall of the Mechanics Institute, a tremendous big room that had been built to use as a theater and to give lectures and concerts in. These sorts of things are very popular at diggings. Miners like to be amused and have plenty of money to spend when times are good. There was hardly a week passed without some kind of show being on when we went there. I walked down quietly an hour or so before most of the people, so as to be in the way to see if Eileen came. We'd asked her to come on the chance of meeting us there, but we hadn't got any word and didn't know whether she could manage it nor whether George would bring her. I had a sort of half-and-half notion that perhaps Gracie might come, but I didn't like to think of it for fear of being disappointed and tried to make believe I didn't expect her. I gave in my ticket and walked in about eight o'clock and sat down pretty close to the door so that I could see the people as they came in. I didn't feel much up the dancing myself, but I'd have ridden a thousand miles to have had the chance of seeing those two girls that night. I waited and waited, while one after another came in. Till the big hall was pretty near filled, and at nine o'clock or so the music struck up and the first dance began. That left the seats pretty bare, and between listening to the music and looking at the people and thinking I was back again at the old claim and passing half an hour at a dance-house, I didn't mind the door so much, till I heard somebody give a sort of sigh not very far off, and I looked towards the door and saw two women sitting between me and it. They were Eileen and Gracie, sure enough. My head almost turned round, and I felt my heart beat in a way it never did when the bullets were singing and whistling all about. It was the suddenness of it, I expect. I looked at them for a bit, they didn't see me, and were just looking about them as I did. They were dressed very quiet, but Gracie had a little more ornament on her, and a necklace or something round her neck. Eileen was very pale, but her beautiful dark hair was dressed up a bit with one rosebud in it, and her eyes looked bigger and brighter than they used to do. She looked sad enough, but every now and then Gracie said something that made her smile a bit, and then I thought she was the handsomest girl in the room. Gracie had just the same, steady, serious kind of faces ever. She hardly changed a bit, and seemed pleased, just like a child at play, with all that was going on round about. There was hardly anybody near the corner where they were, so I got up and went over. They both looked at me for a minute, as if they'd never seen me before, and then Eileen turned as pale as death, and Gracie got all together as red, and both held out their hands. I sat down by the side of Eileen, and we all began to talk, not much at first and very quiet, for fear notice might be taken. But I managed to let them know that the police had all been called off in another direction, and that we should be most likely safe till to-morrow or the next day. Oh, dear, says Gracie, wasn't it awfully rash of you to come here and run all this risk just to come to Bella Barnes's wedding? I believe I ought to be jealous of that girl. All starlight's fault, I said, but anyhow it's through him we've had this meeting here. I was dead against coming all the time, and I never expected things to turn out so lucky as they have done. Will he be here tonight, Eileen says, very softly and timid-like? I almost wished I'd stayed away, but Gracie here would come. Young Cyrus Williams brought us. He wanted to show his wife the races and take her to the ball. There they are dancing together. George is away at the races. You will see starlight about ten or eleven o'clock, I expect, I said. He's dining with the commissioner and the camp officers. They'll all come together, most likely. Dining at the camps, as Eileen, looking regularly perished? You don't mean to say they've taken him? I mean what I say. He's here with the Mr. Dawson's of wide view, and has been hand in glove with all the swells. I hardly think you'll know him. It's as much as I did. Poor Eileen gave another sigh. Do you think you'll know me, she says? Oh, what a foolish girl I was, to think for a moment that he could care about a girl like me. Oh, I wish I had never come. Nonsense, says Gracie, who looked a deal brighter on it. Why, if he's the man you say he is, this will only bring him out a bit. What do you think, I mean Mr. Jones? That's right, Miss Dorfield says I. Keep to the company manners tonight. We don't know who may be listening, but I'm not much afraid of being bowled out this particular night. Somehow I feel ready to chance everything for an hour's happiness like this. Gracie said nothing but looked down, and Eileen kept turning towards the door, as if she half-toped and was half-afraid of seeing him come in. By and by we heard some one say, here comes the commissioner. All the camp will be here now. And there was a bit of a move to look at them as they came in. Chapter 42 of Robbery Under Arms This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Even by Richard Kilmer. Robbery Under Arms by Rolf Boldrewood. Chapter 42 A good many gentlemen and ladies that lived in the town and in the diggings or near it had come before this and had been dancing away and enjoying themselves, though the room was pretty full of diggers and all sorts of people. But as everybody was quiet and well-behaved, it didn't make much odds who was there. But of course the commissioner was the great man of the whole place and the principal visitors, like the Mr. Dawson's and some others, were bound to come along with him. Then there were the other government officers, the bankers and surveyors, lawyers and doctors and so on. All of them took care to come a little late with their wives and families so as to be in the room at the same time as the swell lot. Bella Barnes was going to marry a surveyor, a wildish young fellow, but a good one to work as ever was. She was going to chance his coming straight afterwards. He was a likely man to rise in his office, and she thought she'd find a way to keep him out of debt and drinking and gambling too. Well in comes the commissioner and his friends, very grand indeed, all dressed like swells always do in the evening. I believe black all over, white tie, shining boots, white kid-gloves, flower in their button-hole, all regular. People may laugh, but they did look different from the others, showed more blood-like. I don't care what they say, there is such a thing. Close by the commissioner laughing and talking was the two Mr. Dawson's, and I saw Eileen give a start, who should come next, cheek by jowl with the police magistrate, whom he'd been making laugh with something he'd said as they came in, but Starlight himself, looking like a regular prince. Their pictures anyhow, and talked out to the nines like all the rest of them. Eileen kept looking at him, as he lounged up the ballroom, and I thought she'd fall down in a faint or bring herself to people's notice by the wild earnest, that way she looked at him. However he'd got his clothes and the rest of it that fitted him like as if they'd been grown for him, I couldn't think, but of course he made all that right when he went to Sydney, and had him sent up with his luggage in Mr. Dawson's drag. Though he didn't seem to notice anything, I saw that he knew us. He looked round for a moment and smiled at Eileen. That's the pretty girl, he said to one of the young fellows, evidently from the country. I must get introduced to her. Oh, we'll introduce you, says the other man. They're not half bad fun, those bush girls, some of them. Well a new dance was struck up by the band just after they'd got up to the top of the room, and we saw Starlight taken up and introduced to a grand lady, the wife of the head banker. The commissioner and some of the other big wigs danced in the same quadrill. We all moved a bit higher to get a good look at him. His makeup was wonderful. We could hardly believe our eyes. His hair was a deal shorter than he ever wore, except in one place, and he'd shaved nearly all but his mustache. That was dark brown and heavy. You couldn't see his mouth except when he smiled, and then his teeth were as white as Warren Gall's nearly and as regular. There was a softness too about his eyes when he was in a good temper and enjoying himself that I hardly ever saw in a man's face, and I could see Eileen watching him when he talked to this lady and that, and sometimes she looked as if she didn't enjoy it. He was only waiting his chance, though, for after he'd had a dance or two we saw him go up to one of the stewards. They had big rosettes on, and presently they walked round to us and the steward asked the favour of Eileen's name, and then begged, by virtue of his office, to present Lieutenant LaSalle, a gentleman lately from India, who had expressed a wish to be introduced to her. Such a bow Starlight made too. We could hardly help staring. Poor Eileen hardly knew whether to laugh or to cry when he sat down beside her and asked her for the pleasure of a dance. She wouldn't do that. She only came there to see him, she said, and me. But he persuaded her to walk round the room, and then they slipped into one of the supper rooms where they were able to talk without being disturbed and say what they had in their hearts. I got greasy to take a turn with me, and we were able to have our little say. She was, like Eileen, miserable enough, and afraid to think of her ever having the chance of getting married and living happily like other people. But she told me she would wait and remain faithful to me, if it was to her life's end. And that, as soon as I could get away from the country and promise her to leave our wild lives behind, she was ready to join us and follow me all over the world. Over and over again she tried to persuade me to get away like Jim, and said how happy he was now, and how much better it was than stopping where we were, and running terrible risks every day and every hour. It was the old story over again, but I felt better for it, and really meant to try and cut loose from all this cross-work. We hadn't too much time. Eileen was fetched back to her seat, and then Starlight went off to his friends at the other end of the room, and was chafed for flirting with a regular currency lass by one of the Dawson's. I admire his taste, says the Commissioner. I really think she's the prettiest girl in the room, if she was well-dressed and had a little bit more animation. I wonder who she is. What's her name, LaSalle's? I suppose you know all about her by this time. Her name is Martin, or Marston, or some such name, answered Starlight, quite cool and pleasant. Deuced nice, sensible girl, painfully quiet, though, wouldn't dance, though, at all, and talked very little. Bye, Joe, I know who she is, says one of the young chaps. That's Eileen Marston, sisters to Dick and Jim. No wonder she isn't over-lively. Why, she has two brothers, Bush-Rangers, regular, out-and-outers. There's a thousand on each of their heads. Good gad, says Starlight. You don't say. Poor girl. What a most extraordinary country. You meet with surprises every day, don't you? It's a pity Sir Ferdinand isn't here, said the Commissioner. I believe she's an acquaintance of his. I've always heard she was a splendid girl, though. Poor thing, frets to death about her family. I think you seem to have cheered her up, though, to sales. She doesn't look half so miserable as she did an hour ago. Naturally, my dear fellows, as Starlight, pull in his mustache, even in this savage country, beg your pardon, one's old form seems to be appreciated. Pardon me, I must regain my partner. I am engaged for this dance. You seem disposed to make the most of your opportunities says the Commissioner. Dawson, you'll have to look after your friend. Who's the enslaver now? I didn't quite catch her name, says Starlight lazily. But it's that tall girl, near the pillar, with the pale face and dark eyes. You're not a bad judge for a new chum, says one of the Goldfield subs. Why, that's Maddie Barnes. I think she's the pick of all the downriver girls and the best dancer here, out and out. Her sister's to be married tomorrow, and we're all going to see her turned off. Really now, says Starlight, putting up his eyeglass. I begin to think I must write a book. I'm falling upon adventure hourly. Oh, the Morgan Blatter, what a treat. Schickenwals, do you think? Eutrius, says the young fellow. She's a regular stunner. It was a fine, large room, and the band, mostly German, struck up some outlandish queer sort of tune that I never heard anything like before. Whatever it was, it seemed to suit most of the dancing people. For the floor was pretty soon full up, and everybody twisting round and round, as if they were never going to stop. But to my mind, there was not a couple there that was a patch on Maddie and Starlight. He seemed to move round twice as light and easy as anyone else, and looked somehow different from all the others. As for Maddie, whenever she picked it up, she went like a bird, with a free, springy sort of sliding step, and all in time to the music anybody could see. After a bit, some of the people sat down, and I could hear them passing their remarks and admiring both of them to the music stopped. I couldn't make out whether Eileen altogether liked it or not, anyhow she didn't say anything. About an hour afterwards, the camp party left the room and took Starlight with them. Someone said there was a little lew and hazard at the commissioner's rooms. Cyrus Williams was not in a hurry to go home, or his young wife either, so I stayed and walked about with the two girls, and we had ever so much talk together and enjoyed ourselves for once in a quiet way. The good crowd was sure to be at Bella Barnes's wedding, next day. It was fixed for two o'clock, so as not to interfere with the races. The big handicap was to be run at three, so we should be able to be at the church when Bella was turned off and see Rainbow go for the great race of the day afterwards. When that was run, we intended to clear, it would be time for us to go then. Things were middling straight, but it mightn't last. Next day was the great excitement of the meeting. The big money was all in the handicap, and there was a big field with two or three cracks up from Sydney and a very good local horse that all the diggers were sweet on. It was an open race, and every man that had a note or a fiver laid it out on one horse or another. Rainbow had been entered in proper time and all regular by old Jacob under the name of Darkie, which suited him in all ways. He was a dark horse, sure enough, dark in color, and dark enough as to his performances. Nobody knew much about them. We weren't going to enter him in his right name, of course. Old Jacob was a queer old fellow in all his ways and notions, so we couldn't stable him in any of the stables in Turin for fear of his being Godat or something. So when I wanted to see him the day before, the old fellow grinned and took me away about a mile from the course, and there was old Rainbow snug enough in a tent above all places, but as fine as a star, and as fit as ever a horse was brought to the post. What's the fun of having him under canvas, I said? Who ever heard of a horse being trained in a tent before? Not but what he looks first chop. I've seen horses trained in more ways than ones, says he, and I can wind him up in the stable or out of it, as mighty few in this country can, that is, when I put the muzzle on. There's a deal in knowing the way a horse is brought up. Now this here is an excitable horse in a crowd. You see, I said, why he's as cool and steady as an old trooper, when? When powder's burning and bullets as flying, says the old chap, grinning again, but this here's a different crowd. When he's got a training saddle and seven or eight stone up, and there's two or three hundred horses rattling about this side on him and that, it brings out the old racehorse feelings that's in his blood, and never had a chance to show itself a four. I see, and so you want to keep him quiet to the last minute? That's just it, says he. I've got the time to a second. Here he pulls out a big old turnip of a silver watch, and I'll have him up just ready to be weighed out last. I never was late in my life. All right, I said, but don't draw it too fine. Have you got your weight all right? Right to the ounce, says he. Nine stone four, they put on him, and him an untried horse. I told him it was weighing him out of the race, but they laughed at me. Never you mind though, he can carry weight and stay too. My ten percent's as safe as the bank. He'll put the stunts on all them knobs, too. That thinker racehorse must always come out of one of their training stables. Well, goodbye, old man, says I, and good luck. One of us will come and lead you into the weighing yard. If you pull it off and chance the odds, if Sir Ferdinand himself was at the gate. All right, Sissy, I'll look out for you, and off he goes. I went back and told Eileen and Gracie, and we settled that we were to drive out to the course with Cyrus Williams and his wife. I rode, thinking myself safer on horseback for fear of accidents. Starlight, of course, went in the Dawson's drag and was going to enjoy himself to the last minute. He had his horse ready at a moment's notice, and Warren Gaw was not far off to give warning or to bring up his horse if we had to ride for it. Well, the first part of the day went well enough, and then about half past one we all went down to the church. The young fellow that was to marry Bella Barnes was known on the field and well liked by the miners, so a good many of them made it up to go and see the wedding. They heard of Bella and Maddie and wanted to see what they looked like. The church was on the side of town next to the racecourse, so they hadn't far to go. By and by has the crowd moved that way, Starlight says to the commissioner, where are all these good folks making for him? Why the fact is there's to be a wedding, he says, and it excites a good deal of attention as the young people are well known on the field and popular. Bella Barnes and her sister are very fine girls in their way. Suppose we go and look on too. There won't be anything now before the big race. By Jove, a first-rate idea, says Starlight. I should like to see an Australian wedding above all things. This will be the real thing then, says Mr. Jack Dawson. Let's drive up to our hotel, put up the horses, and have a devil and a glass of champagne, and we can be back easy in time for the race. So away they went. Cyrus drove the girls and his wife and his dog cart, so we were there already to see the bride come up. It looked a regular grand affair, my word. The church was that crammed. There was hardly a place to sit or stand in. Every woman, young and old, in the countryside was there, besides hundreds of diggers who sat patiently waiting as if some wonderful show were going to take place. Eileen and Gracie had come in early and got a pew next to the top almost. I stood outside. There was hardly a chance for anyone else to get in. By and by, up comes old Jonathan, driving a respectable-looking carriage with his wife and Bella and Maddie, all in white silk and satin, and looking splendid. Out he gets and takes Bella to walk up the middle of the church. When he went in with Bella, Maddie had one look in, and it seemed so crammed full of people that she looked frightened and drew back. Just then, up comes the Mr. Dawson's in Starlight, with a commissioner and a few more. Directly he sees Maddie draw back. Starlight takes the whole thing in and walks forward. My dear young lady, says he, will you permit me to escort you up the aisle? The bride appears to have preceded you. He offered her his arm, and if you'll believe me, the girl didn't know him a bit in the world and stared at him like a perfect stranger. It's all right, Miss Maddie, says the commissioner. He had a way of knowing all the girls, as far as a laugh or a bit of chafe went, especially if they were good-looking. Mr. LaSalle's is an English gentleman, newly arrived and a friend of mine. He's anxious to learn Australian ways. She took his arm and then walked on, never looking at him, but quite shy-like, till he whispered a word in her ear, which brought more color into her face than anyone had seen there before for a year. My word, LaSalle's knows how to talk him up, says Jack Dawson. He's given that girl a whip that makes her brighten up. What a chafe he is. You can't lick him. Pretty fair all around, I should say, says the other brother, Bill. Hello. Are we to go on the platform with the parson and the rest of them? The reason was that as we went up the church altogether, all in a heap with the barns and the bride, they thought we must be related to them, and the church being chock-full, they shunted us onto the place inside the rails, where we found ourselves drafted into the small yard with the bridegroom, the bride, the parson, and all that mob. There wasn't much time to spare, what with the racing and general bustle of the day, the miners gave a sort of buzz of admiration as Bella and Maddie and the others came up the aisle. They looked very well. There's no manner of doubt. They were both tallish girls, slight, but well put together, and had straight features and big bright eyes, with plenty of fun and meaning in them. All they wanted was a little more color-like, and between the hurry for time, and Bella getting married, a day's work that don't come often in any one's life, and having about a thousand people to look at them, both girls were flushed up a good deal. It set them off first rate. I never saw either of them look so handsome before. Old barns had come down well for once, and they were dressed in real good style, hadn't overdone it neither. When the tying up faking was over, everything went off at first rate. The bridegroom was a hearty looking, upstanding young chap that looked as if work was no trouble to him. Next to a squatter, I think a government surveyors the best billet going. He can change about from one end of the district to another. He has a good part of his time, the regular free bush life, with his camp and his men, and the harder he works, the more money he makes. Then when he comes back to town, he can enjoy himself and no mistake. He is not tied to regular hours like other men in the service, and can go and come when he likes pretty well. Old barns would be able to give Bella and her sister a tidy bit of money some day, and if they took care, they'd be comfortable enough off after a few years. He might have looked higher, but Bella would make any man she took to a slashing good wife. And so she did him. So the parson buckles them too, and the last words were said. Starlight steps forward and says, I believe it's the custom in all circles to salute the bride, which I now do. And he gave Bella a kiss before everyone in the most high and mighty and respectful manner, just as if he were a prince of the blood. At the same time he says, I wish her every happiness and good fortune in her married life, and I beg of her to accept this trifling gift as a souvenir of the happy occasion. Then he pulls off a ring from his little finger and slips it on hers. The sun glittered on it for a moment. We could see the stones shine. It was a diamond ring everyone could see. Then the commissioner steps forward and begs to be permitted the same privilege, which made Bella laugh and blush a bit. Directly after, Mr. Chainwood, who had stood quite enough alongside his wife, tucked her arm inside of his and walked away down the church, as if he thought this kind of thing was well enough in its way, but couldn't be allowed to last all day. When they got into the carriage and drove off, the whole church was cleared, and they got such a cheer as you might have heard at Tamborora. The parson was the only living soul left near the building in five minutes. Everybody was in such a hurry to get back to the course and see the big race of the meeting. Starlight slipped away in the crowd from his two friends and managed to get a quiet few minutes with me and Gracie and Eileen. She was scolding him between jest and earnest for the kissing business and said she thought he was going to leave off all these sorts of attentions to other girls. Not that she knew you at first. A bit in the world, Eileen says. I watched her face pretty close, and I'm sure she thought you were some grand gentleman, a friend of the commissioners, and the Mr. Dawson's. My dearest girl says he, it was a promise I made months since that I should attend Bella's wedding, and I never break my word, as I hope you will find. These girls have been good friends and true to us in our need. We all owe them much. I don't suppose we shall cross each other's path again. There wasn't much more time. We both had to move off. He had just time to catch his drag, and I had to get my horse. The Dawson's bullied him a bit for keeping them waiting and swore he had stayed behind to flirt with some of the girls in the church after the wedding was over. You're not to be trusted when there's temptation going, Jack Dawson said. Saw you talking to that Marston girl. If you don't mind, you'll have your head knocked off. There are a lot to deal with, I can tell you. I must take care of myself, he said, laughing. I have done so in other lands, and I suppose yours is no exception. This is a dashed queer country in some ways and with deuced, strange people in it too. As you'll find by the time you've had your colonial experience, said Bill Dawson, but there goes the saddling bell. The course had 20,000 people on it now if there was one. About a dozen horses stood stripped for the race and the bedding men were yelling out the odds as we got close enough to the stand to hear them. We had a good look at the lot. Three or four good-looking ones among them and one or two flyers that had got in light as usual. Rainbow was nowhere about. Darky was on the card, but no one seemed to know where he was or anything about him. We had expected he'd start at 20 to one, but somehow it had leaked out that he was entered by old Jacob Benton and that acted as a damper on the layers of the odds. Old Jake's generally there or thereabouts. If he's a duffer, it's the first one he's brought to post. Why don't the old varmint show up? This was what I heard about and round and we began to get uneasy ourselves for fear that something might have happened to him or the horse. About eight or nine to one was all we could get and that we took over and over again. As the horses came up the straight one after the other, having their pipe openers, you'd have thought no race had been run that week to see the interest all the people took in it. My word, Australia is a horsey country and no mistake, with the exception of Arabia perhaps, as they tell us about. I can't think as there's a country on the face of the earth where the people's fonder of horses. From the time they're able to walk, boys and girls, they're able to ride and ride well. See the girls jump on bare-backed with nothing but a gunny bag under them and ride over logs and stones through scrub and forest down gullies or along the side of a mountain. And a horse race, don't they love it? Wouldn't they give their souls almost and they do often enough for a real flyer, a thoroughbred able to run away from everything in a country race. The horse is a fatal animal to us natives and many a man's ruin starts from a bit of horse flesh not honestly come by. But our racing ain't going forward and the days passing fast. As I said, everybody was looking at the horses, coming along with the rush of the thoroughbred when he's on his top for condition, his coat like satin and his legs like iron. There were lots of bush girls on horseback and among them I soon picked out Maddie Barnes. She was dressed in a handsome habit and hat. How she had had time to put them on since the wedding I couldn't make out but women managed to dress faster sometimes than others. She wasted no time anyhow. She was mounted on a fine tall upstanding chestnut and Joe Morton was riding alongside of her on a good looking bay, talked out very superior also. Maddie was in one of her larking humours and gave Joe quite enough to do to keep time with her. I don't see my horse here yet. She says to Joe loud enough for me to hear but she knew enough not to talk to me or pretend to know me. I want to back him for a fiver. I hope that old Jacob hasn't gone wrong. What do you call your horse says Joe? I didn't know your father had one in the race. No fear says Maddie. Only this horse was exercised for a bit near our place. He's a regular beauty and there isn't a horse in this lot fit to see the way he goes. Who to see belong to says Joe. That's a secret at present says she but you'll know someday when you're a bit older if you behave yourself. He's Mr. Jacob Benton's darkie now and you bet on him to the coat on your back. I'll see what I think of him first says Joe who didn't fancy having a horse rammed down his throat like that. If you don't like him, you don't like me says Maddie. So mind that Joe Morton. Just as she spoke there was a stir in the crowd and old Jacob came along across the course leading a horse with a sheet on just as easy going as if he had a day to spare. One of the stewards rode up to him and asked him what he meant by being so late. The old chap pulls out his watch. You'll stick to your advertised time, won't you? I've timed the way, timed the pull off the Sarah's sheet and my overcoat. Timed them out and a minute to spare. I was never late in my life Governor. Most of the riding mob was down with the race horses a distance or so from the stand where they was to start the course being over two miles. So the way in yard and stand was pretty well empty which was just what old Jacob expected. The old man walks over to the scales and has himself weighed all regular declaring a pound overweight for fear of accidents. He gets down as quiet and easy as possible to the starting point and just in time to walk up steadily with the other horses when down goes the starter's flag and off was the word. Starlight and the Dawson's were down there waiting for him. As they went away one of the ringman says, "'Tend the one against Darkie, I lay Darkie.' "'Done,' says Starlight. "'Will you do it in tens?' "'All right,' says the book. "'I'll take you,' says both the Dawson's and he enters their names. They'd taken all they could get the night before at the hotel and has no one knew anything about Darkie and he had top weight. He hadn't many backers." End of Chapter 42. Recording by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas. Chapter 43 of Robbery Under Arms. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Richard Kilmer. Robbery Under Arms by Rolf Bolderwood. Chapter 43. Mr. Dawson drove pretty near the stand then and they all stood up in the drag. I went back to Eileen and Gracie's store field. We were close by the winning post when they came past. They had to go another time round. The Sydney horses were first and second. The Diggers' favorite third, but Old Rainbow, lying well up, was coming through the ruck, hard-held, and looking full of running. They passed close by us. What a sight it is to see a dozen blood horses in top condition come past you like a flash of lightning. How their hoofs thunder on the level turf. How the jockeys silk jackets rustle in the wind they make. How muscle and sinews strain as they pretty near fly through the air. No wonderous young fellows and the girls, too, feel it worth a year of their lives to go to a good race. Yes, and will to the world's end. Oh, you darling rainbow, I heard Eileen say. Are you going to win this race and triumph over all these grand horses? What a sight it will be. I didn't think I could have cared for a race so much. It didn't seem hardly any time before they were half way round again, and the struggle was on, in good downright earnest. One of the Sydney horses began to shake his tail. The other still kept the lead. Then the Turin favorite, a real game pebble of a little horse, began to show up. Hotspur, Hotspur, no, Bronzewing has it, Bronzewing. It's Bronzewing's race. Turin forever, the crowd kept yelling. Oh, look at Rainbow, says Eileen, and just then, at the turn, old Jacob sat down on him. The old horse challenged Bronzewing, passed him, and collared Hotspur. Darky, darky, shouts everybody. No, Hotspur, darky's coming, darky, darky, I tell you, darky. And as old Jacob made one last effort and landed him a winner by a clear head, there was a roar went up from the whole crowd that might have been heard at Nula Mountain. Starlight jumps off the drag and leads the old horse into the weighing-yard. The steward says, dismount. No fear of old Jacob getting down before he heard that. He takes a saddle in his lap and gets into the scales. Wait, says the clerk. Then the old fellow mounts and rides past the judge's box. I declare Mr. Benton's horse, Darky, to be the winner of the Touran Grand Handicap. Bronzewing, second horse, Hotspur, third, says he. Well there was a great cheer-in and hollering, though none knew exactly whose horse he was or anything about him. But an Australian crowd always likes to see the best horse win, and they like fair play. So Darky was cheered over and over again, and old Jacob too. Eileen stroked and petted him, and patted his neck and rubbed his nose. Then you'd really thought the old horse knew her. He seemed so gentle like. Then the commissioner came down and said Mrs. Hotley, the police magistrate's wife and some other ladies wanted to see the horse that had won the race. So he was taken over there and admired and stroked till old Jacob got quite crusty. It's an odd thing Dawson says to the commissioner. Nobody here knows this horse, where he was bred or anything about him. Such a grand animal, as he is too. I wish Morenger could have seen him. He's always raving about horses. How savage he'll be to have missed all the fun. He's a horse you don't see every day, says Bill Dawson. I'll give a couple hundred for him right off. Not for sale at present, says old Jacob, looking like a cast-iron image. I'll send you word when he is. All right, says Mr. Dawson. What a shoulder. What legs. What loins he has. All well. He'll be weighed out now, and you will be glad to sell him soon. Our heads won't ache then, said Jacob, as he turns round and rides away. Very neat animal, shows form, draws Starlight. Worth three hundred in the shires for a hunter, if he can jump, perhaps more. But depends on his manners. Must have manners in the hunting field, Dawson, you know. These are not, says Bill Dawson. It's my opinion he could have won that race in a counter. I must find out more about him, and buy him, if I can. I'll go halves if you like, says Starlight. I really believe him to be a good animal. Just then up rides Warngall. He looks at the old horse, as if he had never seen him before, nor us neither. He rides close by the heads of Mr. Dawson's team, and as he does so his hat falls off, by mistake of course. He jumps off and picks it up, and rides slowly down towards the tent. It was a signal to clear, something was up. I rode back to town with Eileen and Gracie. Said good-bye, a hard matter it was, too, and sloped off to where my horse was, and was out of sight of Turin in twenty minutes. Starlight hails a cabbie, he told me this afterwards, and gets him to drive him over to the inn where he was staying, telling the Dawson's he'd have the wine put in ice for the dinner, and that he wanted to send off a letter to Sydney by the post, and he'd be back on the course in an hour in good time for the last race. In about half an hour back comes the same cab man, and puts a note into Bill Dawson's hand. He looks at it, stares, swears a bit, and then crumples it up, and puts it into his pocket. Just as it was getting dark, and the last race just run, back comes Sir Ferdinand and all the police. They'd ridden hard, as their horses showed, and Sir Ferdinand, they say, didn't look half as good-natured as he generally did. You've lost a great meeting, Morenger, says to Commissioner. Great pity you had to be off just when you did. But that's just like these infernal scoundrels of Bushrangers. They always play up at the most inconvenient time. How did you get on with them? Get on with them, Roars, Sir Ferdinand, almost making a hole in his manners. He was that tired out and done, he could hardly sit on his horse. Why, we've been sold as clean as a whistle. I believe some of the brutes have been here all the time. That's impossible, says the Commissioner. There's been no one here that the police are acquainted with, not that I suppose Jackson and Murphy know many of the crossboys. No strange men nor horses, no disguises, says Sir Ferdinand. Here he brings out a crumpled bit of paper written on. If Sir Ferdinand makes haste back, he'll be in time to see Starlight's rainbow win the handicap. I firmly believe that young scoundrel, who will be hanged yet, strung us on after more and ever so far down south, just to leave the coast clear for the Marston's and then sent me this too late to be of any use. Quite likely, but the Marston's couldn't be here, let alone Starlight, unless by Jove. But that's impossible, impossible. Here, Jack Dawson, where's your Indian friend? Going back to the Inn couldn't stand the course after the handicap. You're to dine with us, Commissioner. You too, Scott, kept the place, Sir Ferdinand, for you on the chance. One moment, pardon me, who's your friend? Names of sows, just from home, came by India. Splendid fella, backed darky for the handicap. We did too, won a pot of money. What sort of horse is this darky? Very grand animal, old fella, had him a tent about a mile down the creek, dark bay, star, in forehead. Haven't seen such a horse for years, like the old immigrant lot. Sir Ferdinand beckoned to a senior constable. There's a tent down there near the creek, I think you said, Dawson. Bring up the racehorse you'll find there and any one in charge. And now I think I'll drive in with you, Dawson, dismounting and handing this horse to a trooper. I suppose a decent dinner will pick me up, though I feel just as much inclined to hang myself as to anything else at present. I should like to meet this traveled friend of yours. Strangers are most agreeable. Sir Ferdinand was right in thinking it was hardly worth going through the form of seeing whether we had waited for him. Lieutenant LaSalle's on leave from his regiment in India had taken French leave. When inquiry was made at the hotel where dinner had been ordered by Mr. Dawson and covers laid for a dozen, he had just stepped out. No one seemed to know exactly where to find him. The hotel people thought he was with the Mr. Dawson's and they thought he was at the hotel. When they surrounded the tent and then rushed in, all that it contained was the body of old Jacob Benton lying dead drunk on the floor. A horse rug was over him, his racing saddle under his head and his pockets stuffed with five pound notes. He had won his race and got his money so he was not bound in honor to keep sober a minute longer. Rainbow was gone and there was nothing to be got out of him as to who had taken him or which way they had gone. Nobody seemed to have dropped to me. I might have stayed at Turin longer if I'd liked but it wasn't good enough by a long way. We rode away straight home and didn't lose time on the road, you bet. Not out and out fast either, there was no need for that. We had a clear two hour start of the police and their horses were pretty well knocked up by the pace they'd come home at so they weren't likely to overhaul us easy. It was a grand night and though we didn't feel up to much in the way of talking, it wasn't bad in its way. Starlight rode Rainbow, of course and the old horse sailed away as if a hundred miles or a thousand made no odds to him. Warren Gull led the way in front. He always went as straight as a line, just the same as if he'd had a compass in his forehead. We never had any bother about the road when he led the way. There's nothing like adventures as Starlight at last. As someone says, who would have thought we should have come out so well? Fortune favors the brave in a general way. There's no doubt. By George, what a comfort it was to feel oneself a gentleman again and to associate with one's equals. Ha, ha, how savage Sir Ferdinand is by this time and the commissioner. As for the Dawson's, they'll make a joke of it. Fancy my dining at the camp. It's about the best practical joke I ever carried out and I've been in a good many. The luckiest turn we ever had, says I. I never expected to see Gracie and Eileen there, much less go to a ball with them and no one to say no. It beats the world. It makes it all the rougher going back. That's the worst of it, says he. Good God, what fools, idiots, raving lunatics we've all been. Why, but for our own internal folly, should we be forced to shun our fellow men and hide from the light like beasts of prey? What, are we better? Better, may. A hundred times worse. Someday I shall shoot myself, I know I shall. What a moth, Sir Ferdinand must be. He's missed me twice already. He rode on and never opened his mouth again till it began to rise to slope at the foot of Nullamountain. When the dark fit was on him, it was no use talking to him. He'd either not seem to hear you or else he'd say something which made you sorry for opening your mouth at all. It gave us all we could do to keep along with him. He never seemed to look where he was going and rode as if he had a spare neck at any rate. When we got near the pass to the mountain, I called out to him that he'd better pull up and get off. Do you think he'd stop or make a sign he heard me? Not a bit of it. He just started the old horse down when he came to the path in the cliff as if it was the easiest road in the world. He kept staring straight before him while the horse put down his feet, as if it was regular good fun treading, up rugged sharp rocks and rolling stones, and turf wasn't worth going over. It seemed to me as if he wanted to kill himself for some reason or other. It would have been easy enough with some horses, but you could have ridden rainbow down the roof of a house and jumped him into the front balcony, I firmly believe. You couldn't throw him down. If he'd roped into a well, he'd have gone in straight and landed on his legs. Dad was glad enough to see us. He was almost a civil, and when he heard that Rainbow had won the big money, he laughed till I thought he'd do himself mischief, not being used to it. He made us tell him over again about Starlight and I going to the ball, and I were seeing Eileen and Gracie there. And when he came to the part where Starlight made the bride a present of a diamond ring, I thought he never would have done chuckling to himself. Even old Cribb looked at me as if he didn't use to think me much of a fellow, but after this racket had changed his mind. Won't there be a jolly row in the papers when they get all these different characters played out by one chap, and that man, the captain, says he. I knew he was clever enough for anything, but this beats all. I don't believe now, captain, you'll ever be took. Not alive, says Starlight, rather grim and gloomy looking, than he walks off by himself. We stabled Rainbow, of course, for a week or two after this. Being in training, it wouldn't do to turn him out straight at once. Hardy as he was, no horse could stand that altogether, so we kept him under shelter in a roughish kind of loose box we had knocked up, and fed him on bush hay. We had a small stack of that in case we wanted to keep a horse in, which we did sometimes. In the daytime he was loose in the yard. After a bit, when he was used to the weather, he was turned out again with his old mob, and was never a hair the worse for it. We took it easy ourselves, and sent out Warangal for the letters and papers. We expected to knock a good bit of fun out of them when they came. Sure enough, there was deduce in all to pay when the big Sydney papers got hold of it, as well as the little Turin Star and the Banner. Was it true that the police had again been hoodwinked, justice derided, and the law set at defiance by a gang of ruffians, who could have been run down in a fortnight, had the police force been equal to the task entrusted to them? Was the moral sentiment of the country population so perverted, so obliterated, that robbers and murderers could find safe harborage, trustworthy friends, and secret intelligence? Could they openly show themselves in places of public resort, mingle in amusements, and frequent the company of unblemished and distinguished citizens? And yet more, after this flagrant insult to the government of the land, to every sacred principle of law and order, they could disappear at will, apparently invisible and invulnerable, to the officers of the peace and the guardians of the public safety. It was incredible, it was monstrous, degrading, nay, intolerable, and a remedy would have to be found, either in the reorganization of an inefficient police force, or in the resignation of an incapable ministry. Good for the Sydney monitors as starlight, that reporter knows how to double shot his guns, and winds up with a broadside. Let us see what the star says. I had a bet with the editor, and paid it as it happened. Perhaps he'll temper justice with mercy. Now for a start. That we have had strong casts from time to time, and exciting performances at our local theaters, no one will deny, but perhaps, the inhabitants of Turin never witnessed a more enthralling melodrama than was played during the first two days of our race meeting before a crowded and critical audience, and never. We can state from a somewhat extended experience of matters dramatic did they gaze on a more finished actor than the gentleman who performed the leading part. Celebrated personages have air now graced our provincial boards. On the occasion of the burning of the theater royal in Sydney we were favored with the presence in our mists of artists who rarely, if ever before, had quitted the metropolitan stage. But our genuine premiere, in one sense, has eclipsed every darling of the tragic or the comic muse. Where is there a member of the profession who could have sustained his part with faultless ease and self-possession, being the whole time aware of the fact he smiled and conversed, danced and diced, dined and slept, ye gods did he sleep, with a price upon his head. With the terrible doom of dishonor and inevitable death hanging over him, consequent upon a detection which might occur at any moment. Yet was there a stranger guest among us who did all this and more with unblanching brow, unruffled self-possession, unequaled courtesy, who, if discovered, would have been arrested and consigned to a lock-up, only to be exchanged for the gloom and the manacles of the condemned cell. He indeed, after taking a prominent part in all the humors of the vast social gathering by which the Turan miners celebrated their annual games, disappeared with the almost magical mystery which has already marked his proceedings. Who could we possibly allude to but to celebrate the illustrious we grieved to be compelled to add the notorious Starlight, the hero of a hundred legends, the Australian Claude Duvall. Yet almost incredible as it may seem to our readers and persons at a distance imperfectly acquainted with exceptional phase of colonial life. The robber-chief, and for all we know, more than one of his aids de-camp, was among us, foremost among the bedding men, the observed of all observers in the grandstand, where, with those popular country-gentlemen, the Messers Dawson, he cheered the winners in the two great races, both of which, with demoniac luck, he had backed heavily. We narrate, as a plain, unvarnished truth, that this accomplished and semi-historical personage raced a horse of his own, which turns out now to have been the famous rainbow, an animal of such marvelous speed, courage, and endurance, that as many legends are current about him, as of Dick Turpin's well-known steed. He attended the marriage in St. Matthew's Church of Miss Isabelle Barnes, the daughter of our respected neighbor, Mr. Jonathan Barnes, when he presented the bride with a costly and beautiful diamond ring, completing the round of his vagaries by dining on invitation with a commissioner at the camp mess, and, with that high official, honoring our race-ball with his presence, and sunning himself in the smiles of our fairest maidens. We are afraid that we have exhausted the fun of human credulity, and added a fresh and original chapter to those tales of mystery and imagination of which the late Edgar Allan Poe was so masterly a delineator. More familiarly rendered, it seems, that the fascinating Captain Starlight, as a mild-mannered man, like Lambray, has ever scuttled a ship or cut a throat, presented himself, opportunately, at one of the mountain hosteries. To the notice of our good-hearted squires of wide view, messers William and John Dawson, one of their wheelers, lay at the point of death, a horse of great value, when the agreeable stranger suggested remedy which affected a sudden cure. With all their generous instincts stirred, the messers Dawson invited the gentleman to take a seat in their well-appointed drag. He introduced himself as Mr. LaSalle's, holding a commission in an Indian regiment of irregular horse, and now on leave, traveling chiefly for health. Just sufficiently sunburned, perfect in manner, full of information, humorous and original in conversation, and with all the prestige of the unknown, small wonder that the Captain was regarded as a prize socially considered and introduced right and left. Ha-ha! what a most excellent jest, albeit rather keen, as far as Sir Ferdinand is concerned. We shall never, ever cease to recall the humorous side of the whole affair. Why, we ourselves, our august editorial staff, actually had a bet in the stands, with the audacious pretender, and one at two. Did he pay up? Of course he did. A pony to wit, and on the nail. He does nothing by haves. Notre, Capitan. We have been less promptly reimbursed indeed not paid at all by a gentleman boasting a fairer record. How graciously he smiled and bowed as, with his prim rose kid-gloves, he disengaged the two tenors and a five-pound note from his well-filled receptacle. The last time we had seen him was in the dock at Noma, the entride in the great cattle-case, the cause Celebrae. To do him justice he was quite as cool and unconcerned there, and looked as if he was doing the amateur casual business without alterier liabilities. Had you fairly well starlight, bold rover of the waist, we feel inclined to echo the lament of the ancient Lord Douglas. To his pity of him too he cried, bold can he speak and fairly ride. I warrant him, a warrior tried. It is in the interest of justice doubtless that thou be hunted down and expiate by death doom the crimes which thou and thy mere middens have committed against society in the sight of God and man, but we cannot for the life of us take a keen interest in thy capture. We owe thee much star light, many a slashing leader, many a spicy paragraph, many a stately reflection on contemporary morals as thou furnished us with. Shall we haste to the slaughter of the rarest bird, golden overreed? We trow not. Get thee to the wilderness and repent thee of thy sins. Why should we judge thee? Thou haste, if such dubious donation may avail, an editor's blessing, depart, and stick up no more. Well done, the turned star, says starlight, after he read it all out. I call that very fair. There's a flavor of good feeling underneath much of that nonsense, as well as of porter and oysters. It does a fellow a deal more good than slanging him to believe that he's human after all, and that men think so. Do you reckon that chap was sober when he wrote that, says father? Blessed if I can make heads or tails of it. Half of what the fellow puts down is regular rot. Why couldn't he have cut it a bit shorter, too? End of CHAPTER 43 RECORDING by Richard Kilmer, Rio Medina, Texas The banner comes next, says starlight, tearing it open. We shall have something short and sweet after the star. How's this? Starlight again. This mercurial brigand, it would appear, has paid Toran another visit, but with the exception of what may be considered the legalized robbery of the betting ring, has not levied contributions. Rather the other way, indeed. A hasty note for Mr. Dawson, whom he had tricked into temporary association by adopting one of the disguises he can so wonderfully assume, requested that gentleman to receive the handicap stakes, one by his horse, Darky, alias Rainbow, and to hand them over to the treasurer of the Toran hospital, which was accordingly done. Sir Ferdinand and the police had been decoyed away previously nearly 100 miles by false intelligence as to Moran and his gang. Our town and treasure were thus left undefended for 48 hours, while a daring criminal and his associates mingled unsuspected with all the classes. We have always regarded the present system, fasticiously called police protection as a farce. This latter fiasco would probably confirm the idea with the public at large. We, unlike a contemporary, have no morbid sympathy with crime. Embroidered or otherwise, our wishes as loyal subjects are confined to a short shrift and a high gallows for all who dare to obstruct the queen's highway. That's easy to understand, barren a word here and there, says father, taking his pipe out of his mouth and laying it down. That's the way they used to talk to us in the old days. Dashed if I don't think it's the best way after all. You know where you are. The rest's flummary. All on us, as takes to the cross, does it with our eyes open and deserves all we gets. I'm afraid you're right, governor, but why didn't these moral ideas occur to you, for instance, and the others earlier in life? Why, says father, getting up and glaring with his eyes, because I was a blind ignorant dog when I was young, as had never been taught nothing and know nothing, not so much as him, they are pointing to crib, for he knows what his business is, and I didn't. I was thrashed and starved, locked up in a gaol, chained and flogged after that, and half the time for doing what I didn't know was wrong, and couldn't know more than one of them four year old cults out there that knocks his head again the yard when he's roped, and falls backwards and breaks his neck if he ain't watched. Whose business was it to have learned me better? That I can't rightly say, but it seemed it was the business of the government people to gaol me, and iron me, and flog me. Was that justice? Any man's sense, I'll tell him it wasn't. It's been them and me for it since I got my liberty. And if I had had a dozen lives, they'd all have gone the same road. We none of us felt in the humor to say much after that. Father had got into one of his tantrums, and when he did, he was fit to be tied. Only I'd not have took the contract for something. Whatever it was that had happened to him in the old times when he was a government man, he didn't talk about. Only every now and then he'd let out just as he did now, as if nothing could ever set him straight again, or keep him from fighting against them, as he called the swells in the government, and everybody almost that was straight going and honest. He'd been at it a good many years one way or another, and anyone that knew him didn't think it likely he'd change. The next dust we got into was all along of a Mr. Knightley, who lived a good way down to the south, and it was one of the worst things we ever were mixed up in. After the tour on races and all that shine, somehow or other, we'd found that things had been made hotter for us than ever since we first turned out. Go where we would. We found the police always quick on our trail, and we had two or three very close shaves of it. It looked as if our luck was dead out, and we began to think our chance of getting across the border to Queensland and clear out of the colony that way looked worse every day. Dad kept foraging about to get information, and we sent Waragull and Billy Boy all over the country to find out how it was things were turning out so contrary. Sir Ferdinand was always on the move, but we knew he couldn't do it all himself unless he got the office from someone who knew the ropes better than he did. Last of all, we dropped on to it. There was one of the Goldfield commissioners, a Mr. Knightley, a very keen, cool hand. He was a great sporting man and a dead shot like Mr. Hamilton. Well, this gentleman took it into his head to put on extra steam and try and run us down. He'd lost some gold by us in the escort robbery and not forgotten it. So it seems he'd been trying his best to fit us ever since. Just at first he wasn't able for much, but later on he managed to get information about us and our bead. Whenever we left the hollow and and he put two and two together and very nearly dropped on us, as I said before, two or three times. We heard, too, that he should say he'd never rest till he had starlight and the Marston's and that if he could get picked police, he'd bring us in within a month, dead or alive. We didn't care much about blowing of this sword in a general way. But one of dad's telegraphs sent word in that Mr. Knightley had a couple of thousand pounds worth of gold from a new diggin's lodged at his private residence for a few days till he could get the escort to call for it, that there was only him and a German doctor, a great scholar he was named Schiller in the house. Moran and Daly knew about this and they were dead on for sticking up the place and getting hold of the gold. Besides that, we felt savage about his trying to run us in. Of course, it was his duty and that of all magistrates and commissioners in a general way. But he wasn't an officer of police and we thought he was going outside of his line. So when all came to all, we made up our minds to learn him a lesson, to stick to his own work. Besides, a thousand ounces of gold was no foolish touch and we could kill two birds with one stone. Moran, Daly, and Joe Wall were to be in on it besides. We didn't like working with them. Starlight and I were dead against it, but we knew they'd tackle it by themselves if we backed out. So we agreed to make one thing of it. We were to meet at a place about ten miles off and ride over there together. Just about ten, we closed in on the place and left Billy the Boy and Waragul with the horses while we sneaked up. We couldn't get near, though, without his knowing it, for he always had a lot of sporting dogs, pointers, retrievers, kangaroo dogs, no end. They kicked up a deuce of a row and barked and howled enough to raise the dead before we got in a quarter of a mile of the house. Of course, he was on his guard then and before long the bullets began to fly pretty thick among us and we had to take cover to return fire and keep as dark as we could. No doubt this Dr. Schiller loaded the guns and handed them to him, else he couldn't have made such a play as he did. We blazed away, too, and as there was no stable at the back, we surrounded the house and tried hard to find an opening. Devil a chance there seemed to be. None of us dared show, so sure as we did, we could hear one of those Winchester rifle bullets sing through the air almost on top of us. We all had a close shave more than once for being too fast. For more than half the night, he kept cannonading away and we didn't seem to be able to get any nearer the place. At last we drew lots which should try and get up close to the place, so as to make a rush while we poured in our broadside and open a door to let us in. The lot fell upon Patsy daily. Goodbye all, he said. I'm dashed if I don't think Knightley will bag me. I don't have like charging him and that's God's truth. Anyhow, I'll try for that barrel there and if I get behind it, I can fire from short range and make him come out. He made a rush half on his hands and knees and managed to get behind this barrel, where he was safe from being hit as long as he kept well behind it and he peppered away right and left. On the left of the veranda, there was a door stood partly open and after a bit, a man in a light overcoat and a white hat like Mr. Knightley always wore showed himself for a second. Daily wraps away at this and the man staggers and falls. Patsy shows himself for a moment from behind the cask, thinking to make a rush forward. That minute, Mr. Knightley, who was watching him from a window, the other was only an image. Let's drive at him, cool and steady and poor Patsy drops like a cock and never raised his head again. He was shot through the body. He lingered a bit, but in less than an hour, he was a dead man. We began to think at last that we had got in for a hot thing and that we should have to drop it like Moran's mob at Kadombla. However, Starlight was one of those men that wouldn't be beat and he kept getting more and more determined to score. He crept away to the back of the building where he could see to fire at a top window close by where the doctor and Mr. Knightley had been potting at us. He kept it going so lively that they began to be hard pressed inside and had to fire away twice as much ammunition as they otherwise would. It always beat me how they contrived to defend so many points at once. We tried back and front, doors and windows. Twenty times we tried to rush, but they were always ready so it seemed and their fire was too hot for us to stand up to unless we wanted to lose every second man. The shooting was very close. Nearly every one of us had a scratch. Starlight, rather the worst, as he was more in the front and showed himself more. His left arm was bleeding pretty free, but he tied a handkerchief over it and went on as if nothing had happened. Only I could see that his face had that set look he only got now and then. And his eyes began to show out a fierce light. At last we began to see that the return fire was slacking off while ours was as brisk as ever. Paras said Starlight, I believe they'll give in soon. If they had any cartridges they would have had every man of us in that last rush. Let's try another dodge. Here goes for a battering ram, Dick. He pointed to a long heavy sapling, which had been fetched in for a sleeper or something of that sort. We picked it up and taking a run back brought it with all its weight against the front door. And it went like a sheet of bark. We almost fell as we went forward and found ourselves in a big, dark hall. It seemed very queer and strange. Everything was so silent and quiet. We half expected another volley, but nothing came. We could only stand and wait. The others had gone around the side of the house. Get to a corner, Dick. They're always the safest places. We must mind it isn't an ambush. What the devil's the matter? Are they going to suicide like the people in the round tower of Johnsey? There are no women here, I said. There's no saying what Mr. Knightley might do if his wife had been here. Thank God she's away at batter, said Starlight. I hate seeing women put out. Besides, everybody bows down to Mrs. Knightley. She's as good as she's handsome, I believe. And that's saying a great deal. Just then, Moran and Wall managed to find their way into the other side of the house. And they came tearing into the hall like a pair of cults. They looked rather queer when they saw us three and no one else. What in thunder's up, said Moran? Are they all gone to bed and left us the spare rooms? Poor Patsy won't want one anyhow. Better make some search upstairs, said Starlight. Who'll go first? You make a start, Moran. You like fighting people. I couldn't think of going before the captain, said Moran with a grin. I'll follow where you lead. All right, said Starlight. Here goes. And he started to walk upstairs when all of a sudden he stopped and looked up as if something had surprised him above a bit. Then he stepped back and waited. I noticed he took off his hat and leaned against the wall. It was an old fashioned house for that part of the world, built a good many years ago by a rich settler who was once the owner of all that side of the country. The staircase was all stone. Ornamented every way it could be. Three or four people could walk a breast easy enough. Just about halfway up a broad landing and on this all of a sudden appeared four people inclined by their ways to come down to where we were. While we were all wondering for a reason you'll see afterwards. It was Mr. Knightley who took the ladies arm. It was his wife and she had been there all the time firing at us like is not or at any rate helping. The others followed and they all walk quite solemn and steady like down the stairs together. It was a strange sight. There we were standing and leaning about the dark halls staring and wondering and these people walking down to meet us like ghosts without speaking or anything else. Mr. Knightley was a tall handsome man with a grand black beard that came down to his chest. He walked like a Lord and had that kind of manner with him that comes to people that have always been used to be waited on and have everything found for them in this world. As for his wife she was given in to be the handsomest woman in the whole countryside. Tall and graceful with a beautiful smile and soft fair hair. Everybody liked and respected her. Gentle and simple. Everybody had a good word for her. You couldn't have got anyone to say different for a hundred pounds. There are some people here and there like this among the gentlefolk and say what you like it does more to make coves like us look a little closer at things and keep away from what's wrong and bad than all the Parsons talk twice over. Mrs. Knightley was the only woman that ever put me in mind of Miss Falkland and I can't say more than that. So as I said before it was quite a picture to see them walk slowly and proudly down and sweep into the hall as if they'd been marching into a ballroom. We had both seen them at the ball at the tour on and everybody agreed they were the handsomest couple there. Now they were entering their own hall in a different way. But you couldn't have told much of what they felt by their faces. He was a proud man and felt bitterly enough that he had to surrender to a gang of men that he hated and despised that he'd boasted he could run down and capture in a month. Now the tables were turned. He and his beautiful wife were in our power and to make matters worse one of our band laid dead beside the inner wall killed by his hand. What was to be his doom and who could say how such a play might end. I looked at our men as they stepped onto the floor of the hall and looked round. Mrs. Knightley smiled. She looked to me like an angel from heaven that had come by chance into the other place and hadn't found out her mistake. I saw Starlight start as he looked at her. He was still leaning against the wall and there was a soft sorrowful look in his eyes like I remember noticing once before while he was talking to Aline about his early days. A thing he never did but once. Part of her hair had straggled down and hung in a sort of ringlet by her face. It was pale but clear and bright looking and there was a thin streak of blood across her forehead that showed as she came underneath the lamplight from the landing above. I looked over at Moran. He and Wall sat in a corner looking as grim and savage as possible while his deadly black eyes had a kind of gloomy fire in them that made him look like a wild beast in a cage. Mr. Knightley was a man that always had the first word in everything and generally the best of an argument. Putting down anybody who differed from him in a quiet, superior sort of way. He began now. Well, my man, I have come down to surrender and I'm sorry to be obliged to do so but we have fired our last cartridge. The doctor thought we had a thousand left in which case I may as well tell you you'd never have had this pleasure. Captain Starlight, I surrender my sword or should do so if I had one. We trust to receive honorable treatment at your hands. I'm sure the captain will never permit any harm to come to me, said Mrs. Knightley with a look in her eyes that, in spite of herself, said a deal more than words. Why I danced vis-à-vis to him in a quadril at the Touran Ball. I shall never forget the honor, says Starlight, walking forward and bowing low. Permit me to offer you a chair, madam. You look faint. As he did so, she sank down in it and really looked as if she would faint away. It wouldn't have been much wonder if she had after what she'd gone through that night. Then Mr. Knightley began again. He wanted to know how he stood. He didn't like the look of Moran and Wall. They were a deal too quiet for him and he could read men's faces like a book. The other two prisoners were the German Dr. Schiller, a plucky old chap who'd been a rebel and a conspirator and I don't know what all in his own country. He'd seen too much of that kind of thing to trouble himself over much about a trifle of this kind. The old woman was a family servant who had been with them for years and years. She was a kind of a worshipper of theirs and was ready to live or die with her mistress. End of chapter 44. Recording by Tom Lennon. www.trlennon.com