CHAPTER XI
LOST IN THE BUSH
Had Naomi seen him then she would have found some difficulty inrecognizing Hermann Engelhardt, the little piano-tuner whom already sheseemed to have known all her life. Yet she had made a singularly shrewdguess at his whereabouts. Top Scrubby held him fast enough. And whenNaomi stretched her arms toward the sunset, it is a strange fact thatshe also stretched them toward the lost young man, who was lying betweenit and her, not three miles from the spot on which she stood.
Within a mile of him ran the horse-paddock fence, which he had crossedby mistake at three o'clock that morning. He had never seen it again.All day he had wandered without striking track, or fence, or water.Once indeed his heart had danced at the sudden revelation of footprintsunder his very nose. They were crisp and clean and obviously recent. Allat once they took a fatally familiar appearance. Slowly he lifted hisright foot and compared the mark of it with the marks he had discovered.They were identical. To put the matter beyond a doubt he got both hisfeet into a couple of the old footprints. They fitted like pipes in acase. And then he knew that he was walking in circles, after the mannerof lost men, and that he stood precisely where he had been three hoursbefore.
That was a bitter moment. There were others and worse before sundown.The worst of all was about the time when Naomi flung out her arms andcried aloud in her trouble.
His staggering steps had brought him at last, near sundown, within sightof a ridge of pines which he seemed to know. The nearer he came to themthe surer did he become that they were the station pines themselves.Footsore and faint and parched as he was, he plucked up all hisremaining strength to reach those pines alive. If he were to drop downnow it would be shameful, and he deserved to die. So he did not dropuntil he gained the ridge, and found the pines merely the outer ranks ofa regular phalanx of mallee scrub. There was no mallee among the stationpines. Nor would it have been possible to get so near to the homesteadwithout squeezing through the wires of two fences at least. He had madea hideous and yet a fatuous mistake, and, when he realized it, he flunghimself on his face in the shade of a hop-bush and burst into tears. Tothink that he must perish miserably after all, when, not five minutessince, he had felt the bottle-neck of the water-bag against histeeth--the smell of the wet canvas in his nostrils--the shrinking andlightening of the bag between his palms as the deep draught of coldwater brought his dead throat to life.
It was all over now. He turned his face to the sand, and waited sullenlyfor the end. And presently a crow flew down from a pine, and hoppednearer and nearer to the prostrate body, with many a cautious pause, itswise black head now on one side, now on the other. Was it a dead body ora man asleep? There would have been no immediate knowing had not thecrow been advancing between the setting sun and the man. Its shadow wasa yard long when it came between Engelhardt's eyes, which were wideopen, and the patch of sand that was warm with his breath. An instantlater the crow was away with a hoarse scream, and Engelhardt was sittingup with a still hoarser oath upon his lips; indeed, he was inarticulateeven to his own ears; but he found himself shaking his only fist at thecrow, now a mere smut upon the evening sky, and next moment he wastottering to his feet.
He could hardly stand. His eyes were burning, his tongue swollen, hislips cracking like earth in a drought. He was aching, too, from head tofoot, but he was not yet food for the crows. He set his teeth, and shookhis head once or twice. Not yet--not yet.
The setting sun made a lane of light through the pines and mallee. Thepiano-tuner looked right and left along this lane, wondering which wayto turn. He had no prejudice in the matter. All day he had been makingcalculations, and all day his calculations had been working out wrong.Like the struggles of a fly in a spider's web, each new effort left himmore hopelessly entangled than the last. So now, without thinking, forthought was of no avail, he turned his face to the sunset, and, afterhalf an hour's painful stumbling, was a mile farther from the station,and a mile deeper in the maze of Top Scrubby.
Night had fallen now, and the air was cool and sweet. This slightlyrefreshed him, and the continual chewing of leaves also did him somelittle good, as indeed it had done all day. But he was becoming troubledwith a growing giddiness in addition to his other sufferings, and hewell knew that the sands of his endurance were almost run. When thestars came out he once more altered his course, taking a new line by theSouthern Cross; but it could not be for long, he was losing strengthwith every step. About this time it occurred to him to cut a branch fora staff, but when he took out his knife he was too weak to open theblade. A fatal lassitude was creeping over him. He could no longer thinkor even worry. Nothing mattered any more! Naomi--his mother--the plansand aspirations of his own life--they were all one to him now, and oflittle account even in the bulk. It had not been so a few hours earlier,but body and mind were failing together, and with no more hope there wasbut little more regret. His head and his heart grew light together, andwhen at last he determined to sit down and be done with it all, hisgreatest care was the choice of a soft and sandy place. It was as thoughhe had been going to lie down for the night instead of for all time. Andyet it was this, the mere fad of a wandering mind, that saved him; forbefore he had found what he wanted, suddenly--as by a miracle--he saw alight.
In a flash the man was alive and electrified. All the nerves in his bodytightened like harp-strings, and the breath of life swept over them,leaving his heart singing of Naomi and his mother and the deeds to bedone in this world. And the thrill remained; for the light was nophantom of a rocking brain, but a glorious reality that showed brighterand lighter every moment.
Yet it was a very long way off. He might never reach it at all. But herushed on with never a look right or left, or up or down, as if his onechance of life lay in keeping his grip of that light steadfast andunrelaxed. His headlong course brought him twice to his knees with athud that shook him to the very marrow. Once he ran his face into atangle of small branches, and felt a hot stream flowing over his lipsand chin; he sucked at it as it leapt his lips, and reeled on, thankingheaven that he could still see out of his eyes. The light had grown intoa camp-fire, and he could hear men's voices around it. Their faces hecould not see--only the leaping, crackling fire. He tried to coo-ee, butno sound would come. The thought crossed him that even now, within sightand ear-shot of his fellow-men, he might drop for good. His heart keptthrobbing against his ribs like an egg boiling in a pan, and his everybreath was as a man's last gasp. He passed some horses tethered amongthe trees. Then before the fire there stood a stout figure with shadedeyes and pistols in his belt; another joined him; then a third, with arifle; and the three loomed larger with every stride, until Engelhardtfell sprawling and panting in their midst, his hat gone, his long hairmatted upon his forehead, and the white face beneath all streaming withsweat and blood.
"By God, he's dying!" said one of the men, flinging away his fire-arm."Yank us the water-bag, mate, and give the cuss a chance."
Engelhardt looked up, and saw one of his two enemies, the swagmen,reaching out his hand for the bag. It was the smaller and quieter of thepair--the man with the weather-beaten face and the twinkling eye--andas Engelhardt looked further he saw none other than Simons, thedischarged shearer, handing the dripping bag across. But a third handstretched over and snatched it away with a bellowing curse.
"What a blessed soft pair you are! Can't you see who 'e is? It's 'isbloomin' little nibs with the broke arm, and not a damned drop does heget from me!"
"Come on, Bill," said the other tramp. "Why not?"
"He knows why not," said Bill, who, of course, was the stout scoundrelwith the squint. "Don't you, sonny?" And he kicked Engelhardt in theside with his flat foot.
"Easy, mate, easy. The beggar's dying!"
"All the better! If he don't look slippy about it I'll take an' slit histhroat for him!"
"Well, give him a drop o' water first."
"Ay, give 'im a drink, whether or no," put in Simons. "No tortures,mate! The plain thing's good enough f
or me."
"And me, too!"
"Why, Bo's'n," cried Bill, "you've got no more spunk than a blessed oldewe! You sailors and shearers are plucky fine chaps to go mates with ina job like ours! You wouldn't have done for poor old Tigerskin!"
"To hell with Tigerskin," said Simons, savagely. "We've heard more thanenough of him. Give the beggar a drink, or, by cripes, I'm off it!"
"All right, boys, all right. You needn't get so scotty about it, matey.But he sha'n't drink more than's good for 'im, and he sha'n't drink muchat a time, or 'e'll burst 'is skin!"
As he spoke Bill uncorked the water-bag, hollowed a filthy palm, floodedit, and held it out to the piano-tuner, who all this time had beensitting still and listening without a word.
"Drink out o' my hand," said he, "or not at all."
But Engelhardt could only stare at the great hairy paw thrust under hisnose. It had no little finger. He was trying to remember what thismeant.
"Drink out o' that, you swine," thundered Bill, "and be damned to you!"
Human nature could endure no more. Instead of drinking, Engelhardtknocked the man's hand up, and made a sudden grab at the water-bag. Hegot it, too, and had swallowed a mouthful before it was plucked awayfrom him. The oaths came pouring out of Bill's mouth like sheep racingthrough a gate. But the piano-tuner had tasted what was more to him thanblood, and he made a second dash at the bag, which resulted in aquantity of water being spilled; so without struggling any more, he fellupon his face with his lips to the wet sand.
"Let the joker suck," said Bill; "I'll back the sand!"
But Engelhardt rolled over on his left side and moved no more.
Simons knelt over him.
"He's a stiff 'un, mates. My blessed oath he is! That's number two, an'both on 'em yours, Bill."
Bill laughed.
"That'll be all right," said he. "Where's my pipe got to? I'm weakenin'for a smoke."
The Boss of Taroomba Page 11