Harry Heathcote of Gangoil

grass, he would soon be far away from Medlicot’s Mill and Gangoil. Harry felt that it would be a consolation to him in his trouble if he could get hold of this man, and keep him, and prosecute him, and have him hung. Even in the tumult of the moment he was able to reflect about it, and to think that he remembered that the crime of arson was capital in the colony of Queensland. He had endeavoured to be good to the men with whom he had dealings. He had not stinted their food, or cut them short in their wages, or been hard in exacting work from them. And this was his return! Ideas as to the excellence of absolute dominion and power flitted across his brain⁠—such power as Abraham, no doubt, exercised. In Abraham’s time the people were submissive, and the world was happy. Harry Heathcote, at least, had never heard that it was not happy. But as he thought of all this he worked away with his bush and his matches⁠—extinguishing the flames here and lighting them there⁠—striving to make a cordon of black bare ground between Boolabong and Gangoil. Surely Abraham had never been called on to work like this!

He and his men were in a line covering something above a quarter of a mile of ground, of which line he was himself the nearest to the river, and Medlicot and his foreman the farthest from it. The German and O’Dowd were in the middle, and Jacko was working with his master. If Harry had just cause for anger and sorrow in regard to Nokes and Boscobel, he certainly had equal cause to be proud of the stanchness of his remaining satellites. The men worked with a will, as though the whole run had been the personal property of each of them. Nokes and Boscobel would probably have done the same had the fires come before they had quarreled with their master. It is a small and narrow point that turns the rushing train to the right or to the left. The rushing man is often turned off by a point as small and narrow.

“My word!” said Jacko, on a sudden, “here they are, all o’ horseback!” And as he spoke, there was the sound of half a dozen horsemen galloping up to them through the bush. “Why, there’s Bos, his own self!” said Jacko.

The two leading men were Joe and Jerry Brownbie, who, for this night only, had composed their quarrels, and close to them was Boscobel. There were others behind, also mounted⁠—Jack Brownbie and Georgie, and Nokes himself; but they, though their figures were seen, could not be distinguished in the gloom of the night. Nor, indeed, did Harry at first discern of how many the party consisted. It seemed that there was a whole troop of horsemen, whose purpose it was to interrupt him in his work, so that the flames should certainly go ahead. And it was evident that the men thought that they could do so without subjecting themselves to legal penalties. As far as Harry Heathcote could see, they were correct in their view. He could have no right to burn the grass on Boolabong. He had no claim even to be there. It was true that he could plead that he was stopping the fire which they had purposely made; but they could prove his handiwork, whereas it would be almost impossible that he should prove theirs.

The whole forest was not red, but lurid, with the fires, and the air was laden with both the smell and the heat of the conflagration. The horsemen were dressed, as was Harry himself, in trousers and shirts, with old slouch hats, and each of them had a cudgel in his hand. As they came galloping up through the trees they were as uncanny and unwelcome a set of visitors as any man was ever called on to receive. Harry necessarily stayed his work, and stood still to bear the brunt of the coming attack; but Jacko went on with his employment faster than ever, as though a troop of men in the dark were nothing to him.

Jerry Brownbie was the first to speak. “What’s this you’re up to, Heathcote? Firing our grass? It’s arson. You shall swing for this!”

“I’ll take my chance of that,” said Harry, turning to his work again.

“No, I’m blessed if you do. Ride over him, Bos, while I stop these other fellows!”

The Brownbies had been aware that Harry’s two boundary riders were with him, but had not heard of the arrival of Medlicot and the other man. Nokes was aware that someone on horseback had been near him when he was firing the grass, but had thought that it was one of the party from Gangoil. By the time that Jerry Brownbie had reached the German, Medlicot was there also.

“Who the deuce are you?” asked Jerry.

“What business is that of yours?” said Medlicot.

“No business of mine, and you firing our grass! I’ll let you know my business pretty quickly.”

“It’s that fellow, Medlicot, from the sugar-mill,” said Joe; “the man that Nokes is with.”

“I thought you was a horse of another colour,” continued Jerry, who had been given to understand that Medlicot was Heathcote’s enemy. “Anyway, I won’t have my grass fired. If God A’mighty chooses to send fires, we can’t help it; but I’m not going to have incendiaries here as well. You’re a new chum, and don’t understand what you’re about, but you must stop this.”

As Medlicot still went on putting out the fire, Jerry attempted to ride him down. Medlicot caught the horse by the rein, and violently backed the brute in among the embers. The animal plunged and reared, getting his head loose, and at last came down, he and his rider together. In the meantime Joe Brownbie, seeing this, rode up behind the sugar planter, and struck him violently with his cudgel over the shoulder. Medlicot sank nearly to the ground, but at