Robbery Under Arms [235]
stayed at George's new house last night. Wasn't he at Rocky Flat to-day?'
`Yes, but he won't be back for a week. He told Aileen here he wouldn't.' Here I looked at them both.
`Aileen's carrying on quite a flirtation with Sir Ferdinand,' says Gracey. `I don't know what some one else would say if he saw everything.'
`Doesn't he talk to any one when he comes here, or make himself pleasant?' I said. `Perhaps there's more than one in the game.'
`Perhaps there is,' says Gracey; `but he thinks, I believe, that he can get something out of us girls about you and your goings on, and where you plant; and we think we're quite as clever as he is, and might learn something useful too. So that's how the matter lies at present. Are you going to be jealous?'
`Not a bit in the world,' I said, `even if I had the right. I'll back you two, as simple as you look, against any inspector of police from here to South Australia.'
After this we began to talk about other things, and I told Gracey all about our plans and intentions. She listened very quiet and steady to it all, and then she said she thought something might come of it. Anyhow, she would go whenever I sent for her to come, no matter where.
`What I've said to you, Dick, I've said for good and all. It may be in a month or two, or it may be years and years. But whenever the time comes, and we have a chance, a reasonable chance, of living peaceably and happily, you may depend upon my keeping my word if I'm alive.'
We three had a little more talk together, and Aileen and I mounted and rode home.
It was getting on dusk when we started. They wanted us to stop, but I daren't do it. It was none too safe as it was, and it didn't do to throw a chance away. Besides, I didn't want to be seen hanging about George's place. There was nobody likely to know about Aileen and me riding up together and stopping half-an-hour; but if it came to spending the evening, there was no saying who might have ears and eyes open. At home I could have my horse ready at a minute's warning, and be off like a shot at the first whisper of danger.
So off we went. We didn't ride very fast back. It was many a day since we had ridden over that ground together side by side. It might be many a day, years perhaps, before we did the same thing again. Perhaps never! Who was to know? In the risks of a life like mine, I might never come back -- never set eyes again upon the sister that would have given her life for mine! Never watch the stars glitter through the forest-oak branches, or hear the little creek ripple over the slate bar as it did to-night.
Chapter 48
We rode along the old track very quiet, talking about old times -- or mostly saying nothing, thinking our own thoughts. Something seemed to put it into my head to watch every turn in the track -- every tree and bush by the roadside -- every sound in the air -- every star in the sky. Aileen rode along at last with her head drooped down as if she hadn't the heart to hold it up. How hard it must have seemed to her to think she didn't dare even to ride with her own brother in the light of day without starting at every bush that stirred -- at every footstep, horse or man, that fell on her ear!
There wasn't a breath of air that night. Not a leaf stirred -- not a bough moved of all the trees in the forest that we rode through. A 'possum might chatter or a night-owl cry out, but there wasn't any other sound, except the ripple of the creek over the stones, that got louder and clearer as we got nearer Rocky Flat. There was nothing like a cloud in the sky even. It wasn't an over light night, but the stars shone out like so many fireballs, and it was that silent any one could almost have fancied they heard the people talking in the house we left, though it was miles away.
`I sometimes wonder,' Aileen says, at last, raising up her head, `if I had been a man whether I should have done the same things you and Jim have, or whether I should have lived honestly and worked steadily like George over there. I think I should
`Yes, but he won't be back for a week. He told Aileen here he wouldn't.' Here I looked at them both.
`Aileen's carrying on quite a flirtation with Sir Ferdinand,' says Gracey. `I don't know what some one else would say if he saw everything.'
`Doesn't he talk to any one when he comes here, or make himself pleasant?' I said. `Perhaps there's more than one in the game.'
`Perhaps there is,' says Gracey; `but he thinks, I believe, that he can get something out of us girls about you and your goings on, and where you plant; and we think we're quite as clever as he is, and might learn something useful too. So that's how the matter lies at present. Are you going to be jealous?'
`Not a bit in the world,' I said, `even if I had the right. I'll back you two, as simple as you look, against any inspector of police from here to South Australia.'
After this we began to talk about other things, and I told Gracey all about our plans and intentions. She listened very quiet and steady to it all, and then she said she thought something might come of it. Anyhow, she would go whenever I sent for her to come, no matter where.
`What I've said to you, Dick, I've said for good and all. It may be in a month or two, or it may be years and years. But whenever the time comes, and we have a chance, a reasonable chance, of living peaceably and happily, you may depend upon my keeping my word if I'm alive.'
We three had a little more talk together, and Aileen and I mounted and rode home.
It was getting on dusk when we started. They wanted us to stop, but I daren't do it. It was none too safe as it was, and it didn't do to throw a chance away. Besides, I didn't want to be seen hanging about George's place. There was nobody likely to know about Aileen and me riding up together and stopping half-an-hour; but if it came to spending the evening, there was no saying who might have ears and eyes open. At home I could have my horse ready at a minute's warning, and be off like a shot at the first whisper of danger.
So off we went. We didn't ride very fast back. It was many a day since we had ridden over that ground together side by side. It might be many a day, years perhaps, before we did the same thing again. Perhaps never! Who was to know? In the risks of a life like mine, I might never come back -- never set eyes again upon the sister that would have given her life for mine! Never watch the stars glitter through the forest-oak branches, or hear the little creek ripple over the slate bar as it did to-night.
Chapter 48
We rode along the old track very quiet, talking about old times -- or mostly saying nothing, thinking our own thoughts. Something seemed to put it into my head to watch every turn in the track -- every tree and bush by the roadside -- every sound in the air -- every star in the sky. Aileen rode along at last with her head drooped down as if she hadn't the heart to hold it up. How hard it must have seemed to her to think she didn't dare even to ride with her own brother in the light of day without starting at every bush that stirred -- at every footstep, horse or man, that fell on her ear!
There wasn't a breath of air that night. Not a leaf stirred -- not a bough moved of all the trees in the forest that we rode through. A 'possum might chatter or a night-owl cry out, but there wasn't any other sound, except the ripple of the creek over the stones, that got louder and clearer as we got nearer Rocky Flat. There was nothing like a cloud in the sky even. It wasn't an over light night, but the stars shone out like so many fireballs, and it was that silent any one could almost have fancied they heard the people talking in the house we left, though it was miles away.
`I sometimes wonder,' Aileen says, at last, raising up her head, `if I had been a man whether I should have done the same things you and Jim have, or whether I should have lived honestly and worked steadily like George over there. I think I should