An Outback Marriage, Banjo Paterson [top ten books of all time .TXT] 📗

to Carew. It was several weeks old, and was from Pinnock, the solicitor. It read as follows⁠—“William Grant died suddenly yesterday. Will made years ago leaves everything to his wife. Reported that he married Margaret Donohoe, and that she is still alive. Am making all inquiries. Wire me anything you know.”

Charlie’s face never changed a muscle.

“That’s lively!” he said. “He never married that woman; and, if he did, she died long ago.”

As he spoke, the lady passenger, having had some talk with the hotel people, came over to him with a beaming smile. “And ye’re Charlie Gordon,” she said with a mellifluous mixture of brogue and bush-drawl. “An’ ye don’t know me now, a little bit? Ye were a little felly when we last met. I’m Peggy Donohoe that was⁠—Peggy Grant now, since I married poor dear Grant that’s dead. And, sure, rest his sowl!”⁠—here she sniffed a little⁠—“though he treated me cruel bad, so he did! Ye’ll remember me brother Mick⁠—Mick with the red hair?”

“Yes,” said Charlie, slowly and deliberately, “I remember him well; and you too. And look here, Peggy Donohoe⁠—or Peggy Keogh, whichever you call yourself⁠—you and Red Mick will have the most uphill fight you ever fought before you get one sixpence of William Grant’s money. Why, your real husband is here on the coach with us!”

He turned and pulled Considine forward, and once more husband and wife stood face to face. Considine, alias Keogh, smiled in a sickly way, tried to meet his wife’s eyes, and failed altogether. She regarded him with a bold, unwinking stare.

“Him!” she said. “Him me husban’! This old crockerdile? I never seen him before in me life.”

A look of hopeless perplexity settled on Considine’s features for a moment, and then a ray of intelligence seemed to break in on him. She repeated her statement.

“I never seen this man before in me life. Did I? Speak up, now, and say, did I?”

Considine hesitated for a moment in visible distress. Then, pulling himself together, and looking boldly from one to the other, he replied⁠—

“Now that you mention it, ma’am, I don’t think as ever you did. I must ha’ made some mistake.”

He walked rapidly away, leaving Gordon and Peggy face to face.

“There y’are,” she said, “what did I tell ye? Husban’? He’s no husban’ o’ mine. Ye’re makin’ a mistake, Charlie.”

Charlie looked after the retreating bushman, and back at the good lady who was beaming at him.

“Don’t call me Charlie,” he said. “That old man has come in for a whole lot of money in England. His name is Considine, and he pretends he isn’t your husband so that he can get the money and leave you out of it. Don’t you be a fool. It’s a lot better for you to stick to him than to try for William Grant’s money. Mr. Carew and I can prove he said you were his wife.”

“Och, look at that now! Said I was his wife! And his name was Considine, the lyin’ old vaggybond. His name’s not Considine, and I’m not his wife, nor never was. Grant was my husban’, and I’ll prove it in a coort of law, so I will!” Her voice began to rise like a southeasterly gale, and Charlie beat a retreat. He went to look for the old man, but could not find him anywhere.

Talking the matter over with Carew he got no satisfaction from the wisdom of that Solon. “Deuced awkward thing, don’t you know,” was his only comment.

Things were even more awkward when the coach drew up to start, and no sign of the old man could be found. He had strolled off to the back of the hotel, and vanished as absolutely as if the earth had swallowed him.

The Chinese cook was severely cross-questioned, but relapsed into idiotic smiles and plentiful “No savee’s.” A blackfellow, loafing about the back of the hotel, was asked if he had seen a tall, thin old man with a beard going down the street. He said, “Yowi, he bin go longa other pub;” but as, on further questioning, he modified his statement by asserting that the man he saw was young, short and very fat, no heed was paid to his evidence⁠—it being the habit of blacks to give any answer that they think will please the questioner.

“He’ll play us some dog’s trick, that old fellow,” said Charlie. “I can’t wait here looking for him, though. I’ll find him when I want him if he’s above ground. Now let’s go on. Can’t keep the coach waiting forever while we unearth him. Let’s get aboard.”

Just as the coach was about to start a drover came out of the bar of the hotel, wiping his lips with the back of his hand. He stared vacantly about him, first up the street and then down, looked hard at a post in front of the hotel, then stared up and down the street again. At last he walked over, and, addressing the passengers in a body, said, “Did any of you’s see e’er a horse anywheres? I left my prad here, and he’s gorn.”

A bystander, languidly cutting up a pipeful of tobacco, jerked his elbow down the road.

“That old bloke took ’im,” he said. “Old bloke that come in the coach. While yous was all talking in the pub, he sneaks out here and nabs that ’orse, and away like a rabbit. See that dust on the plain? That’s ’im.”

The drover looked helplessly out over the stretch of plain. He seemed quite incapable of grappling with the problem.

“Took my horse, did he? Well, I’m blowed! By Cripes!”

He had another good stare over the plain, and back at the party.

“My oath!” he added.

Then the natural stoicism of the bushman came to his aid, and he said, in a resigned tone,

“Oh, well, anyways, I s’pose⁠—s’pose he must have been in a hurry to go somewheres. I s’pose he’ll fetch him back some time or other.”

Gordon leant down from the box of the coach.

“You tell him,” he said,