Mr. Knightley was a man that always had the first word in everything, and generally the best of an argument--putting down anybody who differed from him in a quiet, superior sort of way.

He began now. 'Well, my men, I have come down to surrender, and I'm sorry to be obliged to do so. But we have fired our last cartridge--the doctor thought we had a thousand left--in which case, I may as well tell you, you'd never have had this pleasure. Captain Starlight, I surrender my sword--or should do so if I had one. We trust to receive honourable treatment at your hands.'

'I'm sure the Captain will never permit any harm to come to me,' says Mrs. Knightley, with a look in her eyes that, in spite of herself, said a deal more than words. 'Why, I danced "vis-a-vis" to him in a quadrille at the Turon ball.'

'I shall never forget the honour,' says Starlight, walking forward and bowing low. 'Permit me to offer you a chair, madam; you look faint.'

As he did so she sank down in it, and really looked as if she would faint away. It wouldn't have been much wonder if she had after what she'd gone through that night.

Then Mr. Knightley began again. He wanted to know how he stood. He didn't like the look of Moran and Wall--they were a deal too quiet for him, and he could read men's faces like a book. The other two prisoners were the German Dr. Schiller--a plucky old chap, who'd been a rebel and a conspirator and I don't know what all in his own country. He'd seen too much of that kind of thing to trouble himself over much about a trifle of this kind. The old woman was a family servant, who had been with them for years and years. She was a kind of worshipper of theirs, and was ready to live or die with her mistress.

Chapter 45

So Mr. Knightley stood up and faced them all like a man. He was one of those chaps that makes up their mind pretty quick about the sort of people they've got to deal with, and if there's anything to be said or done lets 'em have it 'straight from the shoulder'. As he stood there--straight and square--with his head thrown back, and his eyes--very bright and sharp they were--looking every man's face over as if he was reading a notice and had no time to spare, you couldn't have told, from his look, or voice, or manner, whether he was afraid that things would go wrong, or whether he was dead sure they'd go right.

Some men are like that. Others you can tell every thought that's pa.s.sing through their minds just as if it was printed in big letters on their b.r.e.a.s.t.s, like a handbill: '200 Pounds reward,' and so on.

Well, Mr. Knightley wasn't one of that sort, though I saw him keep his eye a trifle longer on Moran than the rest of 'em.

'Now then, boys,' he says, 'we've had our flutter out. I've done my best, and you've done yours. I've bagged one of your lot, and you've done your best to pot me. See here,' and he lifts up the collar of his coat and shows a hole through it, touches his head on the side, and brings away a red mark; and takes out his watch with the case all battered in by a revolver bullet. 'You can't say I hadn't cause to show fight,' and he points to his wife. 'Where's the man among you that wouldn't have done the same? An Englishman's house is his castle. What am I to expect?'

He looked over at Starlight, but he didn't take no notice, and made no sign. I saw Mrs. Knightley look over at him too. It was the first time I ever seen him look hard when there was a woman in the case, and such a one! But he kept his face set and stern-like.

Then Moran breaks in--

'Expect, be blowed! What the----do you expect now we've got yer to rights; are we going to let you off after knocking over Daly? No dashed fear, mister, we'll serve you the same way as you served him, as soon as we've had some grub and another gla.s.s or two of your grog. You've got some fairish stuff here.'

'Why, Moran,' says Mr. Knightley, still making believe to joke--and, by George! if he could laugh then, he could sing a song with a bullet through him--'you're getting bad-tempered since you used to be horsebreaking for Mr. Lowe. Don't you remember that chestnut Sir Henry colt that no one else could ride, and I backed you not to get thrown, and won a fiver? But I'm a man of the world and know how to play a losing game at billiards as well as most men. Look here now! Daly's dead. We can't bring him to life again, can we? If you shoot me, you'll be nothing to the good, and have every spare man in the three colonies at your heels. This is a game of brag, though the stakes are high. I'll play a card. Listen. You shall have a hundred fivers--500 Pounds in notes--by to-morrow at four o'clock, if you'll let Mrs. Knightley and the doctor ride to Bathurst for the money. What do you say?'

'D--n you and your money too,' growled Moran. 'We'll have your blood, and nothing else. D'ye hear that? You're a dead man now; if you're not buried by this time to-morrow, it won't be because you're not as ready for it as Patsey is.'

I saw Mrs. Knightley turn round and clasp her hands; her face grew as white as death, but she said nothing, only looked over at Starlight, and her eyes grew bigger and bigger, while her mouth trembled just the least bit.

'You're off your head, Moran,' says Mr. Knightley, pulling out a cigar and lighting it. 'But I suppose you're the chief man, and all the rest must do as you tell them.'

'Suppose we talk it over,' says Starlight, very quiet, but I knew by the first word that he spoke something was coming. 'Daly dropped, and it can't be helped. Accidents will happen. If you play at bowls you must take rubbers. It has been a fair fight; no one can say otherwise. Let us put it to the vote. I propose that Mr. Knightley's offer be accepted.

Not that I intend to take a shilling of the money.'

'Nor me either,' says I. 'So you three chaps will have it to share between you. I don't see that we can do better. A fight's a fight, and if Patsey got his gruel it might have happened to Mr. Knightley himself.

As for shooting in cold blood, I'm not on, and so I tell you.'

'I suppose you think you and Starlight's going to boss the lot of us, because you've been doing it fine at the Turon races along with a lot of blasted swells as 'ud scrag us if they had the chance, and we're to take so much a head for our dashed lives, because we're only working chaps.

Not if Dan Moran knows it. What we want is satisfaction--blood for blood--and we're a-goin' to have it, eh, mates?'

Wall and Hulbert hadn't said anything before this. They were not bad chaps underneath, but Moran was such a devil when he was raised that they didn't like to cross him. Besides, they had a down on Mr.

Knightley, and wanted to sheet it home to him somehow. They had got to the brandy too, and it didn't make matters any better, you take my word for it.

Starlight didn't speak for a minute or two. I couldn't think what he was at. If Jim had been there we should have been right, three to three. Now we were two to three. I knew Starlight had a good card to play, and was ready to play it, but he was waiting on the deal. Mr. Knightley must have had some sort of notion of the hand; he was wonderful quick at picking up the points of the game.

He said nothing, and looked as cool as you please, smoking his cigar as if he had nothing on his mind and wanted a rest. The lady sat quite still and pale, but her beautiful eyes kept wandering round from one to another, like some pretty creature caught in a trap. Dr. Schiller found it hard lines on him to keep quiet all this time--he couldn't hold it in no longer.

'Good heafens!' he says, 'are you men, and will not say nodings when you haf such an ovver as dis? Subbose you shood us all, what then? Will not the whole coundry rice and hund you down like mat docks?'

'That won't make it any better for you, mate,' says Moran, with a grin.

'When you and he's lying under that old tree outside, it'll make no odds to yer whether our rope's a long or a short 'un.'

'Quite right, Moran,' says Mr. Knightley. 'Doctor, he has you there.'

Starlight moved a step or two over towards him, as if he was uncertain in his mind. Then he says to Wall and Hulbert--

'See here, men; you've heard what Moran says, and what I think. Which are you going to do? To help in a brutal, cowardly murder, and never be able to look a man in the face again, or to take this money to-morrow?--a hundred and seventy each in notes, mind, and get away quietly--or are you going to be led by Moran, and told what you are to do like children?'

'Oh come, Dan, let's take the stuff,' says Wall. 'I think it's good enough. What's the use of being contrary? I think the Captain's right.

He knows a dashed sight more than us.'

'He be hanged!' says Moran, with eyes glaring and the whole of his face working like a man in a fit. 'He's no Captain of mine, and never was.

I'll never stir from here till I have payment in blood for Daly's life.

We may as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. I've sworn to have that man's life to-night, and have it I will.'

'You'll have ours first, you bloodthirsty, murdering dog,' says Starlight; and, as he spoke, he slipped his revolver into Mr.

Knightley's hand, who covered Moran that moment. I drew mine, too, and had Wall under aim. Starlight's repeating rifle was up like lightning.

Mrs. Knightley covered her eyes, the old woman screamed, and the doctor sat down on a chair and puffed away at his meerschaum pipe.

'We're three to three, now,' says Starlight; 'you've only to move a finger and you're a dead man. Wall and Hulbert can have a hand in it if they haven't had shooting enough for one evening. Do your worst, you black-hearted brute! I've two minds to take you and run you in myself, if it's only to give you a lesson in manners.'

Moran's face grew as black as an ironbark tree after a bush fire. He raised his revolver, and in one second we should have been in the middle of a desperate hand-to-hand fight; and G.o.d knows how it might have ended hadn't Hulbert struck up his arm, and spoke out like a man.

'It's no use, Dan, we won't stand it. You're a dashed fool and want to spoil everything for a bit of temper. We'll take the notes and let Mrs.

Knightley and the doctor clear out for Bathurst if you'll say honour bright that you'll be at the Black Stump by to-morrow evening at five, and won't give the police the office.'

Moran, slow and sulkily, put down his hand and glared round like a dingo with the dogs round him--as if he didn't know which to snap at first.

Then he looked at Mr. Knightley with a look of h.e.l.lish rage and spite that ten devils couldn't have improved upon, and, throwing himself down on a chair, drank off half a tumbler of brandy.

'Settle it amongst yourselves, and be----to you,' he said. 'You're all agin me now; but, by----, I'll be square with some of ye yet.'

It was all over now. Mr. Knightley took a match out of the silver match-box at his watch-chain, and lit another cigar. I saw the tears trickling through Mrs. Knightley's fingers. Then she turned away her head, and after a minute or two was as calm and quiet as ever.

'You know your way about the place, Wall,' says Mr. Knightley, as if he was in his own house, just the same as usual; 'run up the horses, there's a good fellow; they're in the little horse paddock. Mrs.

Knightley's is a gray, and the doctor's is a mouse-coloured mare with a short tail; you can't mistake them. The sooner they're off the sooner you'll handle the cash.'

Wall looked rather amused, but went out, and we heard him rattle off to go round the paddock. The doctor went upstairs, and buckled on a long-necked pair of old-fashioned spurs, and Mrs. Knightley walked away like a woman in a dream to her own room, and soon afterwards returned in her riding-habit and hat.

I foraged about and found the side-saddle and bridle in the harness-room. Everything was in tip-top order there--gla.s.s sides for keeping the dust off the four-in-hand harness and all that kind of thing. All the bits and stirrup-irons like silver. There wasn't much time lost in saddling-up, you bet!