The National tribune., 1882-03-11
THE L
GULLY OF BLUEMANSDYKE,
AN AUSTRALIAN STORY.

l.
Broadhurst's store was closed but the
little back room looked very comfortable
that night. The fire cast ruddy glow on
ceiling and walls, rejecting itself cheerily
on the polished TASKS and shot-guns which
adorned them. Yet gloom rested on the
two men who sat at either side of the
hearth, which neither the fire nor the black
bottle upon the table could alleviate.
NTwelve o'clock" said old Tom, the store
man, glancing up at the wooden timepiece
which had come out with him in ~. "It'S
queer thing, George, they haven't come"
It's a dirty night, said his companion,
reaching out his arm for a plug of tobacco.
"The Wawirra's in flood, maybe, OF maybe
their horses is broke down, or they've put it
of, perhaps. Great Lord, how it thunders
Pass us over a coal, Tom"
He spoke in a tone which was meant to
appear easy, but with a painful thrill in it
which was not lost upon his mate. He
glanced uneasily at him from under his
grizzled eyebrows.
"You think it's all right, George?" he
said, after pause"
"Think what's all right?"
"Why, that the lads are safe"
"Safe! OF course they're safe. What the
devil is to harm them?"
20, nothing; nothing, to be sure" said
old Tom. "Y0u see, George, since the old
woman died, Maurice has been all to me;
and it makes me kinder anxious. It's a
week since they started from the mine, and
you'd la thought they'd be here now. But
~ aoihing unusual, s'pose; nothing at all
nav darned folly"
,i lBts TO harm them" repeated George
again, arguing to convince himself
than his c0mrade. ITS straight road
the diggin's to Bathurst, and then
Egh the hills past Bluemansdyke, and
= the Wawirra by the ford, and SO down to
i,..ajgar by the bush track There's
nDtlrin' deadly in all that, is there? Ny son
Al!an's as dear to me as Maurice can be to
YOU, Iatte," he continued; but they know
the ford well, and there's no other bad
place They'll be here tomorrow night,
certain"
Please God they may!" said Broadhurst; !;
and the two men lapsed into silence for some
time moOdily staring into the glow Of the
fire and pulling at their short clays
Il was indeed, as Hutton had said, dirty
night. The wind was bowling down
through the gorges of the western noun
tains, and whirling and eddying among the
streets of Trafalgar; whistling through the
chinkS in the rough wood cabins, and tear
ing away the fraI shingles which formed
the roofs. The streets were deserted save
for one Or two stragglers from the drinking
shanties, who wrapped their cloaks around
them and staggered home through the wind
and rain towards their own cabins.
The silence was broken by Broadhurst,
who was evidently still i'll at ease.
"Ssy, George" he said, whats become
of Josiah Mapleton?"
"Went to the diggin's"
GAY, but he sent word he was coming
back"
"But he never came"
"An' what's become Of JOS Humphrey?"
he resumed, after pause.
"He went diggin', too"
"WelI, did he come back?"
drop it, Broadhurst; drop it, say" said
Hutton, springing TO his feet and pacing up
and down the narrow room. YOU'RE trying
to make a coward of mel You know the
men must have gone up country prospectin'
or farmin' maybe. What is it to US where
they went? You don't think have register
of every man in the colony, as Inspector
Burton has Of the lags."
"Sit down, George, and listen," said old
Tom. "Theres something queer about that
road; something / don't understand and
don't like. Maybe you remember how Ma
lOney, the one-eyed scoundTel, made his
money in the early mining days. He'd
half way drinking shanty on the main road
up on a kind Of bluff, where the Lena comes
GVvn from the hills. You've heard, George,
how they found a sort Of wooden slide from
Iis little back room down 10 the river; an
how it came out that man after man had
had his drink doctored, and been shot down
ITO eternity ike bale Of goods. No one
a.8 ever know how many were done away
l there. Ihy were all supposed TO be
"fnua and prospectin' and the like, till
bodies were picked ont Of the rapids
r use mincinG matters, George; We'll
ne troopers along to the diggins if those
.a ay3t turn up tomorrow night"
Won ike, Tom" said Hutton.
~ tne way, talking of Maloney-it's
90 thing" said Broadhurst, "that Jack
Iiaauc swears that he saw a man as like
Nsloney with ten years added TO him as
1oud be. 1t was in the bnsh On Monday
morning. Chance, / suppose; but you'd
hardly think there could be two pair of
shoulders in the world carrying such viii
famous mugs on the top of them"
Jack Haldane's a fool, growled Hutton,