CHAPTER XVII

In the Thick of It

A hundred miles or more from Mostyn, right out on the sandy plains, beyond the gap in the mountains which they called the Devil's Bridge, there had been a gold find. A gold prospector had been found lying in the mulga scrub with a big nugget in his hand, while his swag, when unrolled, had shown a whole handful of lesser nuggets.

The poor wretch had found gold, but had died of thirst, and those who found him came perilously near to sharing the same fate, so keenly anxious were they to make the dead yield up the knowledge of his find, by tracing his poor wandering footprints round and round and in and out among the hillocks of sand, the clumps of spinifex, and the mulga scrub.

But one man, more human than the rest, elected to dig a grave where the dead might rest secure from the ravages of the wandering dingo, and although the others laughed at him, calling him names, and going away leaving him to do his work of mercy alone, he stuck grimly at his task, probing down between the roots of the mulga bushes to make a hollow deep enough to form a decent resting place for the nameless dead.

He was quite alone now, save for the quiet figure on the ground and a hoodie crow which was perched on a swaying branch at a little distance, watching the living and the dead with anxious beady eyes.

Down under the top layer of sand the ground was stony, and the man who dug was weak from long tramping in search of the gold he could not find.

Of choice he would have gone away and left the still figure where he had found it, but it might be that some day he too would lie like this, with staring eyes that could not see the sun, and then, surely, it would be good if some kind hand would make a hole in the hot, dry ground, where his body might lie at rest until the day of days, when the dead shall rise and the earth and the ocean give back that which they have taken.

What was that?

The prospector's shovel struck something hard, something which was so much heavier than ordinary stone, and that had a peculiar ring when struck by the shovel.

He leaned forward then, and picked it up, casting a scared look round, fearful lest any of his chums had repented and come back to help him.

But no, he was alone, save for the dead; even the hoodie crow had flown away because it did not seem of any use waiting any longer, and instinct had told the creature that a horse was dying by a dried-out water-hole some two miles away.

The man dug another hole after that, at some little distance, and, dragging the body there, gave it decent burial, even kneeling with clasped hands and closed eyes for a few minutes when his task was done, trying to remember "Our Father", which was the prayer he had learned at his mother's knee many years before. It was the only prayer that occurred to him then, and it was not so inappropriate as it seemed. Then he went back to the first hole that he had dug, and, carefully filling it in, made a little cross of plaited sticks, which he planted at the head of the grave that held no dead.

"I guess that will about do," he muttered to himself, and then, with a final look round, he picked up his swag, and, hoisting it to his back, set his face towards the hills and civilization once more. Tucked away in his belt he carried fragments of the stone he had taken from that first grave he had started to dig, and he meant to raise money on his expectations, then come back with horses and tools to dig up the fortune upon which he had stumbled when performing that act of mercy to the nameless dead.

He was worn out and half-starved; he had been so near to despair, too, that this tremendous find proved too much for him, and when three days later he staggered into the main street of Latimer, which was a township some fifty miles from Mostyn, he was too ill to tell anyone of what he had found, or even to get the help for himself that he so sorely needed.

Most likely he would have lain on a dirty bed at the one hotel until he died, and so the secret of that empty grave on the sandy plain would have never been revealed; but it so fell out that two other men in the township were ill with a mysterious disease which looked so much like smallpox that a doctor was sent for in all haste because of the danger to other people.

The nearest medical man lived at Mostyn, and he had not been there long, and was indeed on the point of going somewhere else, because the people of Mostyn seemed to have no use for doctors, and only died of drinking bad whisky.

With so little chance of work the doctor was in a fair way of being starved out; so when the call came for him to go to Latimer, eager though he was for work, he had to admit that he had no horse to ride and no money with which to hire one.

But when men are desperate enough to ride fifty miles on the off chance of finding a doctor it is not likely that a trifle of this kind will turn them from their purpose. A horse for the doctor was quickly forthcoming, and he rode out of Mostyn in the company of his escort, just as the cart which was bringing the weekly mail entered the town.

"Would you like to wait and claim your mail, doctor?" asked the man who rode on his right hand.

"No, thanks; I do not expect any letters," replied the man of medicine, and a pang stole into his heart as he thought of the big family of seven motherless children in far-away England, whom he had virtually cast off, just because he was writing himself down a failure, and would not be an object of pity to his friends and relations.

If only he had known it, there was a letter for him by that mail, a letter which had come from England, written by Mr. Runciman, and posted on the very day the children sailed for Sydney. The writer confessed that he ought to have followed his first letter with a second long before this; perhaps he ought to have waited until a letter came from Dr. Plumstead before letting the children start, but there had been so many difficulties in the way of taking care of them in England, and so on, and so on, which in plain English meant that as Mrs. Runciman was not willing to have them under her roof, the hara.s.sed guardian had not known what to do with them.

But it was a long time before that letter really reached the hands for which it was intended, and then it was Nealie who handed it to her father, and at his request read it to him.

It was a horrible journey for the doctor and his escort. The demon drought was stalking through the land, there were wicked little whirlwinds to raise the sand and fling it in blinding showers on to the unlucky travellers, water-holes had dried to mud puddles, and the broad lagoons, beloved of waterfowl, were thickets of wilted reeds, with never a trace of moisture to be found anywhere.

The travellers pressed on as fast as they could go, for who could tell what grim tragedies were taking place in Latimer since the two had ridden forth to find a doctor? There were stories of whole townships having been wiped out in ten days or a fortnight by smallpox, when no doctor had been forthcoming to tend the patients and insist on isolation and sanitation, with all the other precautions that belong to law and order.

"There are only eight hundred people all told in Latimer, and we may easily find half of them dead," said one man, with a pant of hurry in his voice, as the tired horses toiled up the last long hill into Latimer.

"But how many sick did you say there were when you left the town on the day before yesterday?" asked the doctor, who privately believed the men to be panic-stricken.

"There were two that had spots, and then there was that prospector who came in from the track across the sandy plain. He dropped like a felled ox in front of Jowett's saloon, and so they took him in there, because Jowett had a bed to spare and there was not another in the township,"

said the other man, who was tall and gaunt, and only about half as frightened as his companion, who was a small fat man with a tendency to profuse perspiration.

"Had he--this prospector, I mean--any spots on him also?" asked the doctor, frowning heavily. He had had more than one fight with smallpox in mining camps, and he knew by sad experience that the terror was worse to combat than the disease.

"I don't know. Folks were too scared to look, I fancy; but old Mother Twiney, who doesn't seem to be afraid of anything, said that she would see that he had food and drink until we got back, and Jowett will let the man have houseroom, for the simple reason that he is afraid to turn him out," returned the tall man.

Fully half the population of Latimer gathered to welcome the doctor when at last he rode up to the open s.p.a.ce in front of Jowett's saloon, and half of these demanded that their tongues should be looked at and their pulses felt without delay.

But the doctor had always been impatient of shams; indeed more than one candid friend had told him that in this matter he had done himself much harm from a professional point of view, as a doctor who wants to get on can do it most quickly by trading upon the fears of the foolish.

Pushing the candidates for examination to right and left as he went, he sternly demanded to be taken at once to the sick--those who had the dreaded spots most fully developed--and, as he was not a man to be gainsaid or put aside, old Mother Twiney was at once pushed forward to take him to the patients.

Snuffy and dirty though the old crone was, there was a gleam of true kindliness in her eyes hidden away behind bushy grey eyelashes, and she hobbled off in a great hurry to a wooden building standing remote from the houses, and which had formerly been used as a store for mining plant.

"Are all the patients here?" asked the doctor, as he followed her across the parched and dusty gra.s.s.

"All but the man who was taken into Jowett's, your honour," she answered; then, sidling a little closer to him, she said in an undertone: "It is not smallpox at all; I am quite sure of it. Why, the two men are not even ill, only nearly scared to death."

"Then why was I sent for such a long way, and for nothing too?" he asked angrily, knowing well that his fee would be according to the need there was for his services.

"Hush!" breathed the old woman, and now there was keen anxiety in her manner. "Whatever you do, don't let anyone know for a few days that it is not smallpox. These men are not ill, and the spots are only a sort of heat rash, I think, but the poor fellow at Jowett's is real bad, and he would have died if he could not have had a doctor. He may even die now, in spite of all you can do. I knew that no one in the town would send for a doctor to come so far on account of a man who was ill from a complaint that was not infectious, so when I saw the other two with the spots, I just made the most of it, and because all the well people were afraid that they would catch the disease, there was no time lost in sending for you. Now you must just put them into strict quarantine, and make as much fuss as possible; then they will let you stay here long enough to pull the poor fellow round who is lying at Jowett's, and they will pay you according to the trouble you put them to," said the old woman, with a sagacious nod of her head.

The doctor frowned, but there was sound reason in her arguments, and he decided to see all the patients before committing himself to any course of action concerning them.

The two men with spots were in a state of terror that was pitiable to see, and from outward appearances might be said to be suffering from a very bad form of the dreaded scourge. True to the lines he had laid down for himself, however, he said nothing to allay their fears, only looked very grave, issued a hundred commands for safeguarding the rest of the community, and then demanded to be taken to the other sick man, who was lodged at Jowett's.

The prospector's quarters were not sumptuous. He was merely laid in a shed recently tenanted by calves, and which had been hastily cleared for his use. The man was very ill, and Mother Twiney had not exaggerated about the gravity of his condition.

Here indeed was scope for the doctor, and instead of wearing a face of gloom, as when he examined the men with spots, his face was bright, and his tone so brisk and cheerful that it looked as if he were going to enjoy the tussle that was in front of him.

"Can you pull me through, Doctor?" asked the sufferer, looking at the doctor with lack-l.u.s.tre eyes.

"I am going to try, but I don't mind admitting that I shall have my hands full," replied the doctor, who had never been in the habit of hiding from his patients the gravity of their condition.

"Well, if you do get me on my feet, I promise you a 10-per-cent commission on all I can make during the next year," said the sick man, with a sudden burst of energy, and then he called on the old woman to witness to what he had said, after which he sank into a condition of apathy, looking as if he might die at any moment.

Never since he was a young man and just starting in his profession had the doctor worked harder than for the next few days. He was happier, too, than he had been for years, and in the hush of the quiet nights, when he watched alone by the man who was really ill, he thought of his children and resolved that no longer would he shut them out of his heart and out of his life just because he had been a victim to circ.u.mstances.

He was thinking of them one night, as he strode across to the shed where the two victims from spots were beginning to recover, when suddenly he noticed another odour on the hot air; usually it was the pungent smell of eucalyptus leaves, but now it was the reek of burning timber that smote upon his senses, and turning sharply in the track he saw to his horror that there was a red glow in the sky over Jowett's. The place was on fire.

"It will blaze like matches," he groaned, and then turned to run, thinking of his patient.

But, despite his haste, the flames were shooting out through the holes in the roof of the shed where the sick man lay, by the time the doctor turned the corner by the store.