"Shall I walk too?" she asked, wondering whether the act of walking would tend to steady her wavering fancies, and to stop that horrible tendency to light-headedness which bothered her so badly.

"I think not; you must be quite tired enough without adding to your fatigue by scrambling along this dusty track. Hullo!"

Nealie saw a sudden swerve on the part of Rocky, then the doctor's cane came cutting through the air, and there was a great wriggling and commotion on the dusty ground; but the doctor was so busy soothing the horse that he did not even answer when she called out to know what was the matter.

"Was it a snake?" she asked, as the cart was dragged forward at a jerk, and Rocky, prancing along on two legs, snorting and plunging, took all the doctor's skill to keep him from bolting in sheer fright.

"Yes; and I am very glad that you were not walking, for they are not pleasant creatures to meet," replied the doctor, thinking how fortunate it was that he happened to be on foot at the moment, and with a stick in his hand, for the snake was of a very deadly kind, and the horse would have stood no chance at all against the poison of its forked tongue.

Nealie shivered and sat suddenly straight up; it seemed as if the little shock had restored her in some strange way. The fiercest heat of the sun was past, and the raging of that terrible wind had dropped to a gentle breeze which blew cool and refreshing from another quarter.

Indeed she would have felt quite cheerful had it not been for the menace of that smoke haze lying in a cloud along the line of the hills.

Another half-hour and they were crossing the top of the ridge, while Latimer, most snugly placed, lay on the slope of the other side. But at first sight of the town both Nealie and the doctor had burst into exclamations of horror, for it looked as if it had been burned out. A cloud of smoke from the ruined houses hung thickly over the place, and Rockefeller, with a horse's objection to facing fire, turned about on the track and showed so much disposition to go back by the way he had come that the doctor had to get down again and lead the scared creature.

Presently they saw a man just ahead of them, the first human being they had glimpsed for hours, and calling to him the doctor asked what had happened.

"It has been a fire," said the man, which, considering the smoke rising in all directions from the ruins, was rather an unnecessary explanation.

"So I see; but what started it?" asked the doctor.

"No one will admit knowing much about that," replied the man grimly, "but we have our thoughts all the same. We have got smallpox in the town, you know, and one case was lodged in Jowett's hotel. The doctor that we fetched from Mostyn said pretty decidedly that the one at Jowett's was certainly not smallpox whatever the other two might be, but some people won't be convinced, try how you will. So when the doctor's back was turned it is supposed that someone, either by accident or design, set the place on fire where the sick man was lying. In a drought such as we are having now you may guess how the place burned. The doctor happened to catch sight of it starting; but though he ran at the top of his speed, all that he could do was to get there in time to see the place one ma.s.s of fire, and he might easily have been forgiven if he had turned his back on it then. He is made of brave stuff, though, and they said he dashed straight into that blazing place, and, with the flames and smoke all around him, he brought his patient out in the nick of time, for the whole show collapsed just as he got to the doorway, the sheets of red-hot corrugated roofing fell down upon him, and he was so badly burned that someone will have to go and find a doctor to cure up the one we've got, for I'm thinking that Latimer won't let a hero of that sort die without making an attempt to save him."

"I am a doctor; I can look after him. Just lead on, and show me where he is, will you, please?" said young Dr. Plumstead brusquely. He would have spared Nealie the ugly story if he could, but on the whole it was good for her to hear that her father had played the part of a hero. If he had only known it, the hearing was good for him too, for he had been very ready to despise the man who had given up his practice in Hammerville and rushed away because he had not the moral courage to live down a scandal. He had despised Nealie's father, too, because of his treatment of his children, and altogether had decided that the poor man was very much of a detrimental, so that this story of heroism had a mighty effect on him as he walked by the side of the loquacious person who had first given them the news; while Nealie sat perched up in the cart behind, straining her ears to catch what they were saying, and feeling so thankful that she had insisted on coming all the way that she could have shouted with joyfulness in spite of her anxiety.

The man told Dr. Plumstead that the fire had spread from building to building with such awful rapidity that it had been as much as anyone could do to get the people out of their houses, so many of them having gone to bed when the outbreak started.

"What about the smallpox patients?" asked the doctor.

"We have looked everywhere, but can't find a trace of them, and we should have thought that they had lost their lives in the fire, only the building where they lay was not touched, and they had not merely disappeared, but they had taken their clothes with them, and as much else as they could lay hands on," replied the man, and the doctor was so tickled that he burst out laughing at the story.

"It does not look as if the outbreak of smallpox could have been very serious," he remarked.

"Just what everyone is saying, and the boys are downright mad with old Mother Twiney because the old woman could not tell whether it was really smallpox or not; but, as I said, you could not expect an ignorant woman to know a disease of that sort, and we had better have a scare that ended in smoke than let the real thing gain ground without our taking any steps to stamp it out," said the man, and then he turned off short between two heaps of smoking ruins, and the doctor led Rocky, snuffing and snorting, past the smouldering fire to the cool shadow of the forest beyond.

"The doctor and his patient are in that hut yonder. It is where the smallpox patients were lying; but there was no other place, and so we had to put them there," said the man; and the doctor, turning round, said to Nealie:

"You had better get down now and wait here by the horse while I go and have a look at your father. Oh yes, I will come back for you in a few minutes, and then I shall be able to arrange with this good man about somewhere to shelter you for the night. I dare say the accommodation will not be very grand, seeing the condition of things here."

"I don't mind about accommodation, but I do want to go to my father,"

said Nealie, her voice breaking in a sob as she scrambled down from the cart, ignoring the hand her companion stretched out to help her, and then she stood beside Rocky leaning her head against his side, while her heart beat so furiously that it seemed to her the man who told them the news, and was still lingering near, must hear it thumping away against her side.

Would Dr. Plumstead never come? How could he be so cruel as to keep her waiting so long?

"Ah, what news have you for me?" she asked, as the doctor emerged from the hut with a quick step and a very grave face indeed.

"Nothing very good, I fear," he said quietly, and then turned to the man and asked him to see that the horse was fed and cared for without delay.

"Tell me, please, is Father very bad? I can bear anything better than suspense," she said, keeping her voice steady by a great effort.

"I think you can, and you have already proved yourself a girl of mettle; but you will want all your courage now, for I fear that you have found your father only to bid him goodbye," replied the doctor; and then he caught her by the arm and held her fast while the first dizziness of the shock was upon her.

"I am all right now," she said, moving forward in the direction of the door, and he walked beside her, still holding her arm, as if he doubted her strength to stand alone.

There was an old woman, very snuffy and dirty to look at, but with a face of genuine kindness, who came forward to meet her, and, leading her past the first bed, where a man was lying who had a much-bandaged head, she took her to another bed in the far corner, whispering: "That is your pa, Miss dear, and you had better speak to him quick, for we think that he is going fast, poor brave gentleman!"

Going fast, and she had only just found him!

Nealie gave a frightened gasp, and crept closer, falling on her knees by the bed, and trembling so that she could hardly clasp the fingers of the uninjured hand which lay outside the thin coverlet.

"Father, dear Father, I am Nealie, your own daughter, and I have come all the way from England to find you, and to help make home again! Oh, you cannot go away and leave me now!" she wailed in pa.s.sionate protest against his dying.

"Hush, Missy dear, it may scare him if you speak so loud!" said the old woman in a warning tone, for Nealie's voice had unconsciously risen almost to a scream.

The heavy eyelids opened, and the eyes looked straight into Nealie's face with blank amazement in their gaze.

"Who are you?" he asked, his voice so faint that it was hardly more than a whisper.

"I am your child, dear Father; I am Nealie! We have come to Hammerville to live with you. You should have had a letter weeks ago to warn you that we were all coming, only it was forgotten to be posted," she said, being determined to take half the blame of that omission on her own shoulders, for surely it was as much her fault as Rumple's, seeing that she had never thought to remind him of the letter or to ask if it had been safely posted.

"All seven of you?" he asked, and now there was a shocked expression in his face which cut Nealie to the heart; only, for once, she was quite mistaken as to its cause, and the shocked look did not mean that he was angry with them for coming, but was solely because of what their plight would be if he slipped out of life just then.

"Yes, we are all here," she admitted, feeling more guilty than in all her life before; and then, almost against her will, her voice rose again in a pa.s.sionate plea to him to get better. "Dear Father, do try and get better, for we all want you so badly!"

"I will try. All seven of you! I can't go and leave you yet!" he exclaimed, with so much more strength in his tone that Nealie was amazed at the change.

At that moment young Dr. Plumstead, who had come close to the bed, touched her on the shoulder, saying quietly: "Go and sit on that bench just outside the door until I call you in again. You have done him good already, and perhaps now we may pull him through, if G.o.d wills; but Mrs.

Twiney is going to help me dress his wounds properly now, and then perhaps he will be more comfortable."

And Nealie went obediently to sit on the bench outside the door, where the air was heavy with the tarry smell of burning pine and the strong eucalyptus odours; then, clasping her hands, she prayed fervently that her father might be restored to health, so that they might let him know how much they loved him.

CHAPTER XIX

The News

"Four days since Dr. Plumstead and Nealie went away, and never a word to say what has happened!" cried Sylvia as she came into Rupert's room to see how he had slept.

"I expect they have eloped," remarked Don calmly, as he sat up on his mattress and yawned widely, stretching first one leg and then another, in order to get them properly awake, as he said; for, being at the bottom, his legs always woke up last, according to his ideas.

"What do you mean?" demanded Sylvia, with a frown. She was feeling tremendously grown-up in these days, and did not permit overmuch levity on the part of her juniors.

"Isn't that what people do when they want to get married?" asked Billykins, who was also just awake, and put his question while Don was struggling to find a definition of the word.

"But Nealie does not want to marry that usurping doctor who has taken dear Father's place!" cried Sylvia hotly, the colour flaming over face and neck at the bare idea of such a thing.

"I expect they will want to marry each other. Mrs. Brown said so,"