The Lust of Hate, Guy Newell Boothby [essential books to read .txt] 📗

on the point of the jaw and he went down all of a heap

and lay like a log, just as he had fallen, breathing heavily. The

overseer went across to him, and kneeling by his side, lifted his

head.

 

“I believe you’ve killed him,” said he, turning to me with an evil

look upon his face.

 

“Don’t you believe it,” I answered. “It would have saved the

hangman a job if I had, for, you take my word for it, he’ll live to

be hung yet.”

 

I was right in my first assertion, for in a few moments the

manager opened his eyes and looked about him in a dazed fashion.

Seeing this I went off to the stock yard and saddled my horses, then,

with a last look at the station and my late antagonist, who at that

moment was being escorted by the overseer to his own residence, I

climbed into my saddle, and, taking the leading rein of the pack

horse from the black boy’s hand, set off over the sand hills in the

direction taken by the cart containing poor Ben.

 

Beaching the Mail Change—a miserable iron building of four rooms,

standing in the centre of a stretch of the dreariest plain a man

could well imagine—I interviewed the proprietor and engaged a room

in which to nurse my sick friend back to life. Having done this I put

Ben to bed and endeavoured to discover what on earth was the matter

with him. At that moment I verily believe I would have given anything

I possessed, or should have been likely to possess, for five minutes’

conversation with a doctor. I had never seen a case of the kind

before, and was hopelessly fogged as to what course I should pursue

in treating it. To my thinking it looked like typhoid, and having

heard that in such cases milk should be the only diet, I bespoke a

goat from the landlord’s herd and relegated her to Ben’s exclusive

use.

 

My chief prayer for the next month was that it might never be

necessary for me to pass through such an awful time again. For three

weeks I fought with the disease night and day, one moment cheered by

a gleam of hope, the next despairing entirely of success. All the

time I was quite aware that I was being spied upon, and that all my

sayings and doings were reported to the manager by my landlord when

he took over the weekly mail bag. But as I had no desire to hide

anything, and nothing, save Ben’s progress, to tell, this gave me but

the smallest concern. Being no longer in his employ, Bartrand could

do me no further mischief, and so long as I paid the extortionate

charge demanded by the proprietor of the shanty for board and

residence, I knew he would have no fault to find with my presence

there.

 

Somewhere or another I remembered to have read that, in the malady

from which I believed my old friend was suffering, on or about the

twenty-first day the crisis is reached, and afterwards a change

should be observable. My suspicions proved correct, for on that very

day Ben became conscious, and after that his condition began

perceptibly to improve. For nearly a week, though still as feeble as

a month-old child, he mended rapidly. Then, for some mysterious

reason he suffered a relapse, lost ground as fast as he had gained

it, and on the twelfth day, counting from the one mentioned above, I

saw that his case was hopeless, and realised that all my endeavours

had been in vain.

 

How well I remember that miserable afternoon! It had been

scorchingly hot ever since sunrise, and the little room in which I

watched beside the sick man’s bed was like a furnace. From my window

I could see the stretch of sunbaked plain rising and falling away

towards the horizon in endless monotony. In the adjoining bar I could

hear the voices of the landlord and three bushmen who, according to

custom, had come over to drink themselves into delirium on their

hard-earned savings, and were facilitating the business with all

possible despatch. On the bed poor Ben tumbled and tossed, talking

wildly to himself and repeating over and over again the same words I

had heard him utter that afternoon at Markapurlie—“five hundred

paces north-west from the creek, and just in a line with the Hasted

gum.” What he meant by it was more than I could tell, but I was

soon to discover, and that discovery was destined to bring me as near

the pit of damnation as it is possible for a man to get without

actually falling into it.

 

A little before sundown I left the bedroom and went out into the

verandah. The heat and the closeness of the sick room had not had a

good effect upon me, and I felt wretchedly sick and ill. I sat down

on a bench and took in the hopeless view. A quarter of a mile away

across the plain a couple of wild turkeys were feeding, at the same

time keeping a sharp look-out about them, and on the very edge of the

north-eastern horizon a small cloud of dust proclaimed the coming of

the mail coach, which I knew had been expected since sunrise that

morning. I watched it as it loomed larger and larger, and did not

return to my patient until the clumsy, lumbering concern, drawn by

five panting horses, had pulled up before the hostelry. It was the

driver’s custom to pass the night at the Change, and to go on again

at daylight the following morning.

 

When I had seen the horses unharnessed and had spoken to the

driver, who was an old friend, I made my way back to Ben’s room. To

my delight I found him conscious once more. I sat down beside the bed

and told him how glad I was to see that his senses had returned to

him.

 

“Ay, old lad,” he answered feebly, “I know ye. But I shan’t do so

for long. I’m done for now, and I know it. This time tomorrow old

Ben will know for hisself what truth there is in the yarns the

sky-pilots spin us about heaven and hell.”

 

“Don’t you believe it, Ben,” I answered, feeling that although I

agreed with him it was my duty to endeavour to cheer him up. “You’re

worth a good many dead men yet. You’re not going out this trip by a

great deal. We shall have you packing your swag for a new rush before

you can look round. I’ll be helping sink a good shaft inside a

month.”

 

“Never again,” he answered; “the only shaft I shall ever have

anything to do with now will be six by two, and when I’m once down in

it I’ll never see daylight again.”

 

“Well you’re not going to talk any more now. Try and have a nap if

you can. Sleep’s what you want to bring your strength back.”

 

“I shall have enough and to spare of that directly,” he answered.

“No, lad, I want to talk to you. I’ve got something on my mind that I

must say while I’ve the strength to do it.”

 

But I wouldn’t hear him.

 

“If you don’t try to get to sleep,” I said, “I shall clear out and

leave you. I’ll hear what you’ve got to say later on.. There will be

plenty of time for that by and bye.”

 

“As you please,” he replied resignedly. “It’s for you to choose.

If you’d only listen, I could tell you what will make you the richest

man on earth. If I die without telling you, you’ll only have yourself

to thank for it. Now do you want me to go to sleep?”

 

“Yes, I do!” I said, thinking the poor fellow was growing

delirious again. “I want you to try more than ever. When you wake up

again I’ll promise to listen as long as you like.”

 

He did not argue the point any further, but laid his head down on

his pillow again, and in a few moments was dozing quietly.

 

When he woke again the lamp on the ricketty deal table near the

bed had been lit some time. I had been reading a Sydney paper which I

had picked up in the bar, and was quite unprepared for the choking

cry with which he attracted my attention. Throwing down the paper I

went across to the bed and asked him how he felt.

 

“Mortal bad,” was his answer. “It won’t be long now afore I’m

gone. Laddie, I must say what I’ve got to say quickly, and you must

listen with all your ears.”

 

“I’ll listen, never fear,” I replied, hoping that my acquiescence

might soothe him. “What is it you have upon your mind? You know I’ll

do anything I can to help you.”

 

“I know that, laddie. You’ve been a good friend to me, an’ now,

please God, I’m going to do a good stroke for you. Help me to sit up

a bit.”

 

I lifted him up by placing my arm under his shoulders, and, when I

had propped the pillows behind him, took my seat again.

 

“You remember the time I left you to go and try my luck on that

new field down South, don’t you?”

 

I nodded.

 

“Well, I went down there and worked like a galley slave for three

months, only to come off the field a poorer man than I went on to it.

It was never any good, and the whole rush was a fraud. Having found

this out I set off by myself from Kalaman Township into the West,

thinking I would prospect round a bit before I tackled another place.

Leaving the Darling behind me I struck out for the Boolga Range,

always having had a sort of notion that there was gold in that part

of the country if only folk could get at it.”

 

He panted, and for a few moments I thought he would be unable to

finish his story. Large beads of perspiration stood upon his

forehead, and he gasped for breath, as a fish does when first taken

from the water. Then he pulled himself together and continued:

 

“Well, for three months I lived among those lonely hills, for all

the world like a black fellow, never seeing a soul for the whole of

that time. You must remember that for what’s to come. Gully after

gully, and hill after hill I tried, but all in vain. In some places

there were prospects, but when I worked at them they never came to

anything. But one day, just as I was thinking of turning back, just

by chance I struck the right spot. When I sampled it I could hardly

believe my eyes. I tell you this, laddie,” here his voice sunk to a

whisper as he said impressively, “there’s gold enough there to set us

both up as millionaires a dozen times over.”

 

I looked at him in amazement. Was this delirium? or had he really

found what he had averred? I was going to question him, but he held

up his hand to me to be silent.

 

“Don’t talk,” he said; “I haven’t much time left. See that there’s

nobody at the door.”

 

I crossed and opened the door leading into the main passage of the

dwelling. Was it only fancy, or did I really hear someone tip-toeing

away? At any rate whether anybody had been eavesdropping or not, the

passage was empty enough when I looked into it. Having taken my seat

at the bedside again, Ben placed his clammy hand upon my