The Boss of Taroomba

by E. W. Hornung

  CHAPTER X

  MISSING

  Naomi's room opened upon the back veranda, and in quitting it nextmorning it was not unnatural that she should pause to contemplate theplace where so many things had lately happened, which, she felt, mustleave their mark upon her life for good or evil. It was here that shemight have seen the danger of unreserved sympathy with so sensitive andenthusiastic a nature as that of the piano-tuner. Indeed, she had seenit, and made suitable resolutions on the spot; but these she had broken,and wilfully shut her eyes to that danger until the young man had toldher, quite plainly enough, that he loved her. Nay, she had made him tellher that, and until he did so she had purposely withheld from him theknowledge that she was already engaged. That was the cruel part of it,the part of which she was now most sincerely ashamed. Yet some powerstronger than her own will had compelled her to act as she had done, andcertainly she had determined beforehand to take the first opportunity ofsevering all ties still existing between herself and Monty Gilroy. Andit was here that she had actually broken off her engagement with himwithin a few minutes of her announcement of it to Hermann Engelhardt.Still she was by no means pleased with herself as she stepped out intothe flood of sunshine that filled the back veranda of a morning, and saweverything as it had been overnight, even to the book she had laid asideopen when Gilroy rode up. It was lying shut in the self-same spot. Thislittle difference was the only one.

  She went round to the front of the house, looking out rather nervouslyfor Engelhardt on the way. Generally he met her in the front veranda,but this morning he was not there. Mrs. Potter was laying thebreakfast-table, but she had not seen him either. She looked searchinglyat her young mistress as she answered her question.

  "Are you quite well, miss?" she asked at length, without preamble. "Youlook as though you hadn't slep' a wink all night."

  "No more I have," said Naomi, calmly.

  "Good gracious, miss!" cried Mrs. Potter, clapping down the plate-basketwith a jingle. "Whatever has been the matter? That nasty toothache, I'llbe bound!"

  "No, it wasn't a tooth this time. I may as well tell you what it was,"added Naomi, "since you're bound to know sooner or later. Well, then,Mr. Gilroy has left the station for good, and I am not ever going tomarry him. That's all."

  "And I'm thankful----"

  Mrs. Potter checked herself with a gulp.

  "So am I," said her mistress, dryly; "but it's a little exciting, and Ilet it keep me awake. You are to pack up his boxes, please, so that Imay send them to the township in the spring-cart. But now make hastewith the tea, for I need a cup badly, and I'll go and sing out to Mr.Engelhardt. Did you call him, by the way?"

  "Yes, miss, I called him as usual."

  Naomi left the breakfast-room, and was absent some three or fourminutes. She came back looking somewhat scared.

  "I've called him, too," she said, "at the top of my voice. But there'sno making him hear anything. I've hammered at his door and at hiswindow, too; both are shut, as if he wasn't up. I do wish that you wouldcome and see whether he is."

  A moment later Mrs. Potter was crossing the sandy yard, with Naomialmost treading on her ample skirts until they reached the barracks,which the elderly woman entered alone. No sooner, however, had sheopened Engelhardt's door than she called her mistress to the spot. Theroom was empty. It was clear at a glance that the bed had not been sleptin.

  "If he hasn't gone away and left us without a word!" cried Mrs. Potter,indignantly.

  "I am looking for his valise," said Naomi. "Where has he generally keptit?"

  "Just there, underneath the dressing-table. He has taken it with him.There's nothing belonging to him in the room!"

  "Except that half-crown under the tumbler, which is evidently meant foryou. No, Mrs. Potter, I'm afraid you're right. The half-crown settlesit. I should take it if I were you. And now I'll have my breakfast, ifyou please."

  "But, miss, I can't understand----"

  "No more can I. Make the tea at once, please. A little toast is all thatI require with it."

  And Naomi went slowly back toward the house, but stopped half way, withbent head and attentive eyes, and then went slower still. She haddiscovered in the sand the print of feet in stockings only. Thesetracks led up to the veranda, where they ended opposite the sitting-roomdoor, which Naomi pushed open next moment. The room wore its ordinaryappearance, but the pile of music which Engelhardt had brought with himfor sale had been removed from the top of the piano to the music-stool;and lying conspicuously across the music, Naomi was mortified to find asilk handkerchief of her own, which the piano-tuner had worn all theweek as a sling for his arm. She caught it up with an angry exclamation,and in doing so caught sight of some obviously left-handed writing onthe topmost song of the pile. She stooped and read:

  "_These songs for Miss Pryse, with deep gratitude for all her kindness to Hermann Engelhardt._"

  It was a pale, set face that Mrs. Potter found awaiting her in thebreakfast-room when the toast was ready and the tea made. Very little ofthe toast was eaten, and Mrs. Potter saw no more of her young mistressuntil the mid-day meal, to which Naomi sat down in her riding-habit.

  "Just wait, Mrs. Potter," said she, hastily helping herself to a chop."Take a chair yourself. I want to speak to you."

  "Very good, miss," said the old lady, sitting down.

  "I want to know when you last set eyes on Sam Rowntree."

  "Let me see, miss. Oh, yes, I remember; it was about this timeyesterday. He came to the kitchen, and told me he was going to run up afresh mob of killing-sheep out of Top Scrubby, and how much meat could Ido with? I said half a sheep, at the outside, and that was the last Isaw of him."

  "He never came near you last night?"

  "That he didn't, miss. I was looking out for him. I wanted----"

  "You didn't see him in the distance, or hear him whistling?"

  "No, indeed I didn't."

  "Well, he seems to have vanished into space," said Naomi, pushing awayher plate and pouring out a cup of tea.

  "It's too bad," said Mrs. Potter, with sympathy and indignation in equalparts. "I can't think what he means--to go and leave us alone likethis."

  "I can't think what Mr. Chester meant by not telling me that he wasgone," remarked Naomi, hotly.

  "I 'xpect he knew nothing about it, miss. He went off before daylight,him and the two men that come in with the sheep they was to take on tothe shed."

  "How can you know that?" inquired Naomi, with a touch of irritation. Hertea was very hot, and she was evidently in a desperate hurry.

  "Because Mr. Chester asked me to put his breakfast ready for himovernight; and I did, too, and when I got up at six he'd had it and gonelong ago. The teapot was cold. The men had gone, too, for I gave 'emtheir suppers last night, and they asked for a snack to take beforetheir early start this morning. They must all have got away by five.They wouldn't hardly try to disturb Sam so early as all that; so theyweren't to know he wasn't there."

  "Well, he wasn't," said Naomi, "and it's disgraceful, that's what it is!Here we are without a man on the place, and there are nearly a hundredat the shed! I have had to catch a horse, and saddle it for myself." Asshe spoke Naomi made a last gulp at her hot tea, and then jumped up fromthe table.

  "You are going to the shed, miss?"

  "No; to the township."

  "Ah, that's where you'll find him!"

  "I hope I may," said Naomi, softly, and her eyes were far away. She wasin the veranda, buttoning her gloves.

  "I meant Sam Rowntree, miss."

  Naomi blushed.

  "I meant Mr. Engelhardt," said she, stoutly. "They are probably boththere; but I have no doubt at all about Mr. Engelhardt. I am going tofetch the mail, but I hope I shall see that young gentleman, too, sothat I may have an opportunity of telling him what I think of him."

  "I should, miss, I should that!" cried Mrs. Potter, with virtuous wrath."I should give him a piece of my mind about his way of treating themthat's good and kind to him. I'm sur
e, miss, the notice you took of thatyoung man----"

  "Come, I don't think he's treated _you_ so badly," interrupted Naomi,tartly. "Moreover, I am quite sure that he must have had some reason forgoing off so suddenly. I am curious to know what it was, and also whathe expects me to do with his horse. If he had waited till this morning Iwould have sent him in with the buggy, and saved him a good old tramp.However, you don't mind being left in charge for an hour or so--eh, Mrs.Potter? No one ever troubles the homestead during shearing, you know."

  "Oh, I shall be all right, miss, thank you," Mrs. Potter said,cheerfully; and she followed Naomi out into the yard, and watched her,in the distance, drag a box out of the saddle-room, mount from it, andset off at a canter toward the horse-paddock gate.

  But Naomi did not canter all the way. She performed the greater part ofher ride at a quiet amble, leaning forward in her saddle most of thetime, and deciding what she should say to the piano-tuner, while shesearched the ground narrowly for his tracks. She had the eagle eye forthe trail of man or beast, which is the natural inheritance of allchildren of the bush. Before saddling the night-horse, she had made ither business to discover every print of a stocking sole that had beenleft about the premises during the night; and there were so many thatshe had now a pretty definite idea of the movements of her visitor priorto his final departure from the station. He had spent some time inaimless wandering about the moonlit yard. Then he had stood outside thekitchen, just where she had left him standing on the night of hisarrival; and afterward had crossed the fence, just where they hadcrossed it together, and steered the very same course through the pineswhich she had led him that first evening. Still in his stockings,carrying his boots in his one hand and his valise under that arm (forshe came to a place where he had dropped one boot, and, in picking itup, the valise also), he had worked round to the back veranda, and satlong on the edge, with his two feet in the soft sand, staring out overthe scrub-covered, moonlit plain, just as he had sat staring many a timein broad daylight. Of all this Naomi was as certain as though she hadseen it, because it was child's play to her to follow up the trail ofhis stockinged feet and to sort them out from all other tracks. But itought to have been almost as easy to trace him in his boots on thewell-beaten road to the township, and it was not.

  The girl grew uncomfortable as she rode on and on without ever strikingthe trail; and the cutting sentences which she had prepared for thepiano-tuner escaped her mind long before she reached the township, andfound, as she now expected, that nobody answering to his description hadbeen seen in the vicinity.

  Naomi was not the one to waste time in a superfluity of inquiries. Shesaw in a moment that Engelhardt had not been near the place, and asimilar fact was even more easily ascertained in the matter of SamRowntree. The township people knew him well. His blue fly-veil had notenlivened their hotel verandas for a whole week. So Naomi received hermail-bag and rode off without dismounting. A glimpse which she hadcaught of a red beard, at the other side of the broad sandy road, andthe sound of a well-known voice shouting thickly, added to her haste.And on this journey she never once drew rein until her horse canteredinto the long and sharp-cut shadows of the Taroomba stables.

  As Naomi dismounted, Mrs. Potter emerged from the homestead veranda. Thegood woman had grown not a little nervous in her loneliness. Her looksas she came up were in striking contrast to those of her mistress. Theone was visibly relieved; the other had come back ten times more anxiousthan she had gone away.

  "No one been near you, Mrs. Potter?"

  "Not a soul, miss. Oh, but it's good to see you back! I thought theafternoon was never coming to an end."

  "They are neither of them at the township," said Naomi, with a miserablesigh.

  "Nor have they been there at all--neither Mr. Engelhardt nor SamRowntree!"

  Mrs. Potter cudgelled her poor brains for some--for any--kind ofexplanation.

  "Sam did tell me"--she had begun, when she was promptly shut up.

  "Who cares about Sam?" cried Naomi. "He's a good bushman; he can takecare of himself. Besides, wherever he is, Sam isn't bushed. But anythingmay have happened to Mr. Engelhardt!"

  "What do you think has happened?" the old lady asked, inanely.

  "How am I to know?" was the wild answer. "I have nothing to go on. Iknow no more than you do."

  Yet she stood thinking hard, with her horse still bridled and the reinsbetween her fingers. She had taken off the saddle. Suddenly she slippedthe reins over a hook and disappeared into the saddle-room. And in a fewmoments she was back, with a blanched face, and in her arms a packedvalise.

  "Is this Mr. Engelhardt's?"

  Mrs. Potter took one look at it.

  "It is," she said. "Yes, it is his!"

  "Take it, then," said Naomi, mastering her voice with difficulty, "whileI hunt up his saddle and bridle. If they are gone, all the better. ThenI shall know he has his horse; and with a horse nothing much can happento one."

  She disappeared again, and was gone a little longer; but this time shecame back desperately self-possessed.

  "I have found his saddle. His bridle is not there at all. I know it'shis saddle, because it's a pretty good one, and all our decent saddlesare in use; besides, they all have the station brand upon them. This onehas no brand at all. It must be Mr. Engelhardt's; and now I know exactlywhat he has done. Shall I tell you?"

  Mrs. Potter clasped her hands.

  "He has taken his bridle," said Naomi, still in a deadly calm, "and hehas set out to catch his horse. How he could do such a thing I can'tconceive! He knows the run of our horse-paddock no more than you do. Hehas failed to find his horse, tried to come back, and got over the fenceinto Top Scrubby. You don't know what that means! Top Scrubby's theworst paddock we have. It's half-full of mallee, it's six mileswhichever way you take it, and the only drop of water in it is the tankat the township corner. Or he may be in the horse-paddock all the time.People who don't know the bush may walk round and round in a singlesquare mile all day long, and until they drop. But it's no good ourtalking here; wherever he is, I mean to find him."

  As she spoke she caught her saddle from the rail across which she hadplaced it, and was for flinging it on to her horse again, when Mrs.Potter interposed. The girl was trembling with excitement. The sun wasfast sinking into the sand and scrub away west. In half an hour it wouldbe dark.

  "And no moon till ten or eleven," said Mrs. Potter, with suddenforesight and firmness. "You mustn't think of it, miss; you mustn't,indeed!"

  "How can you say that? Why should you stop me? Do you mean me to leavethe poor fellow to perish for want of water?"

  "My dear, you could do no good in the dark," said Mrs. Potter, speakingas she had not spoken to Naomi since the latter was a little girl."Besides, neither you nor the horse is fit for anything more untilyou've both had something to eat and drink."

  "It's true!"

  Naomi said this in helpless tones and with hopeless looks. As she spoke,however, her eyes fastened themselves upon the crimson ball just clearof the horizon, and all at once they filled with tears. Hardly consciousof what she did or said, she lifted up her arms and her voice to thesunset.

  "Oh, my poor fellow! My poor boy! If only I knew where you were--if onlyI could see you now!"