"Oh, no!" cried Nic, ready to blurt out everything now. "You see I like you, Leather."

The man's eyes flashed and then softened for a moment, while his lips quivered; but his hard, cynical, bitter aspect and tones came back--the manner born of years of misery and degradation, and he cried mockingly:

"Why? Because I behaved like a brute to you, and made believe to throw you down into that gully?"

"Don't bring that up," cried Nic angrily; "and don't talk in that way, Leather. It isn't you. It's only put on."

"Indeed," said the man bitterly. "Well, I didn't put it on, sir. It was fate."

"There, I didn't like to speak to you," continued Nic; "but I must now.

I've long wanted to, for of course I can't help seeing how different you are from Brookes and old Sam. You are always showing me that you are a man of good education, and what a deal you know. It makes me ashamed sometimes."

"Why?" said Leather sternly.

"To ask you to do all kinds of rough work when I feel that you are better educated than I am--that you must have been quite a gentleman."

"Ah, don't, boy!" cried Leather pa.s.sionately, and with his face convulsed. "For Heaven's sake hold your tongue."

"I can't now," cried Nic, as excitedly. "I feel as if I must know. I do like you, Leather--I do really; and it worries me. I think of it at night when I go to bed, and it makes me wild to hear Brookes talk to you as he does."

"Brookes is an honest man, sir; I'm a convict," said Leather bitterly.

"There you are, going back to your old way!" cried Nic; "and it isn't fair, after I've told you I liked you."

The convict caught the boy's hand, and his eyes softened again; but he dropped the hand and drew back, sending a pang through Nic, who felt that he must have been guilty of some terrible crime, and they stood looking in each other's eyes for some little time. Then the boy spoke in a husky whisper--for he said to himself, "Poor chap, he must be very sorry for it now,"--"What was it you did, Leather?"

"Nothing."

"Then why were you sent out here?"

Nic started, and repented having spoken, for the convict drew himself up, with his eyes flashing and his face convulsed by rage, scorn, and indignation.

"Why was I sent out here, boy?" he raged: "because a jury of my fellow-countrymen said I was guilty, and the judge told me that I deserved the greater punishment because I--a man of education, holding so high and responsible a position, and who ought to have known better-- was worse than a common ignorant thief; and that he must make an example of me, that the world might see how government servants found no favour when they sinned. He said I had had a fair trial, that my countrymen condemned me, and that he quite agreed with their verdict; and he sentenced me to twenty-one years' transportation,--he might as well have said for life."

Nic stood looking at him in pain and misery, and the convict began pacing up and down in the agony evoked by this dragging up of the past.

"I'm sorry I spoke," faltered Nic.

"No, no: I'm glad. It is like stabbing me, but if I bleed, boy, it is a relief. Transportation for twenty-one years, and to what a life of horror, misery, and despair! Companion to the greatest scoundrels and wretches that ever breathed; loathed and hated by them, because I was not what they, called their sort. Then, when sent out for good behaviour as an a.s.signed servant, hated and scorned and trampled upon by every honest man. You have seen--you know. The convict from the chain gang, a branded felon. Nic, boy!--I beg your pardon, sir," he cried bitterly--"Master, your slave wonders sometimes that he is alive. I tell you I've prayed night after night for death, but it would not come: no spear, no blinding stroke from the sun, no goring by the half-wild bullocks which have chased me; no fall when I have desperately climbed down the side of that gorge. No! spite of all risk I have grown stronger, healthier, as you see--healthier in body, but more and more diseased in mind."

He stopped and threw himself down upon his breast, to bury his face in his hands; and just then there came a low, chuckling sound, as of laughter, from one of the great grey kingfishers in the tree above them, followed by a wild, dissonant, shrieking chorus from a flock of parrots, as if in defiance at the cruel laugh.

"I don't mind your speaking to me as you did, Leather," said Nic at last, as he turned his head aside to hide his emotion, and he sat down to watch his beautiful horse quietly cropping the gra.s.s, thinking how much happier the dumb beast was. "I only mind when you talk in your bitter way.--I'm sorry for you."

"G.o.d bless you, my lad!" said the convict, in smothered tones: "I know it. You've shown it to me a score of times. My life has not been the same since you came here."

"And I can't help seeing that you are sorry too. How could you have done so bad a thing?"

"I? Did that!" cried Leather, springing up on one arm. "I tell you I am innocent as a child. Dominic Braydon, mine was a high position, and large sums of money pa.s.sed through my hands. There came a day when a heavy amount was missing. It was gone, I could not explain how.

Everything seemed against me. My explanations were ridiculed, and until I had been out here a couple of years I could not see the light. It came one day, though, like a flash--when it was too late."

Nic looked at him inquiringly.

"My subordinate was the guilty man: the meek, amiable wretch who broke down in the witness-box and wept at being forced to tell all he knew.

Even I believed and liked him at the time--poor weak fool that I was!

If it imposed on me, who listened to every word he spoke, seeking for some way of escape, how could I wonder that judge, jury, and counsel were deceived? But it was too late when I read the truth, and that to save himself he sacrificed me--me who had helped him in every way."

"Then you really did not take this money?" cried Nic.

"Not one penny. I? But, there, why did you drag this all from me, boy?

You made me speak. I do not say it to excite your sympathy. It is my fate, and I have tried to bear it like a man. I have borne it like a man, boy, though it has made me hard, callous, and brutal. Dead to all who knew and loved me, I have still lived, thinking that perhaps some day the truth may rise like the sun and throw its light around. Then I know it will be time to join the only one who believed me what I am."

"And who was that?" said Nic hoa.r.s.ely.

"She who was to have been my wife. It was her death."

There was the hot stillness of the Australian midday around them, and for some time neither spoke.

Then all at once Leather sprang to his feet.

"There, sir," he said, "you are the first who has heard my tale. The law has branded me a convict, and I can only say 'Please let all this be as if it had never been said.' And yet I don't know," he continued, with his eyes softening; "it has done me good. Still I don't ask you to believe me, sir. There is plenty of deceit out here, and I have met some clever actors of innocent parts in the different gangs."

"But I do believe you," cried Nic earnestly--"every word. Oh, I felt that you could not have been so bad."

"Thank you, my lad," said the convict, smiling; and Nic thought what a fine, handsome, manly fellow he was when his face lit up. "No: I cannot shake hands. Some day, perhaps. I should like to help you, not drag you down. It is master and servant, you know. Yes," he added, after a pause, as he gazed earnestly in Nic's eyes, "you do believe me. There, I shall work more easily now, for life is brighter than it was."

He sprang to his feet now, and moved to go, but came back.

"We were forgetting the execution of the poisonous snake, sir," he said, with a little laugh. "This way."

"No," said Nic quietly; "let it live another day."

He walked to his horse, lifted the rein and threw it over the animal's neck, then sprang upon its back.

"Master Nic!"

"Yes."

"This is our secret, sir, and you must keep your place."

"Secret? Why shouldn't I tell my mother and father that you were condemned for that which you did not do?"

"I'll tell you, sir," cried Leather. "Because they cannot listen with your ears, nor see me with your eyes."

"My father is everything that is just," said Nic proudly, "and my mother all that is gentle and true."

"G.o.d bless her! yes, my boy," said the convict softly; "but if you speak, Mrs Braydon, knowing me for what I am, will say, 'This man has wormed himself into my son's confidence--he has obtained an influence over him that is not healthy--he had better go,' and I should be exchanged, Master Nic, as they would exchange a horse or bullock. Don't speak, sir, and have me sent away!"