Beyond it the land was level for a distance, but between the trees they could see where it was densely wooded, as though a creek flowed in the vicinity.
"There"s broken country ahead, if I"m not mistaken," Peters said. "It"ll be as well to push on beyond the scrub, or up to it, before we camp."
Palmer Billy looked round at Peters.
"There"s a creek through the scrub, or I ain"t no singer," he remarked.
"And if there"s a creek through the scrub, there"s gold in the creek, and it"s good enough to have a look at it before going on."
"There"s no gold in it," Gleeson exclaimed.
"You say you"ve been there?" Peters asked.
"No, I don"t; but I say there"s no gold in it. No more than there is in the creek way-back. There"s no gold in the country. Let the others find it out for themselves; but now Walker"s turned up no good, and we"re all mates in the swim, I"ll tell you straight. The whole game was a bit of bluff."
"Here, steady, young feller," Palmer Billy said, as he swung his swag to the ground and faced Gleeson. "Let"s have a plain talk about this.
What"s _your_ game, anyhow?"
"You told me----" Peters began, when Gleeson interrupted him.
"You want the yarn, and I"ll tell you," he said.
"What"s the good of waiting here?" Tony exclaimed. "It"s nearly time for dinner, and you can yarn then. Let"s push on to the creek, if there is one, and have a feed and yarn then."
"Young feller, my lad," Palmer Billy observed, turning towards Tony, "you"ve the head of a jayneus. In course. Who wants to yarn with a full tucker-bag outside and none under the waistbelt? Shove along."
He swung his swag on to his shoulder again and resumed the walk, the others following, Gleeson silent and morose.
The view of Palmer Billy was correct. A creek, full of clear water running over a sandy bed, flowed through the scrub; and while a fire was being lit to boil the billy, Peters went a short distance along the banks of the creek. When he came back he looked at Gleeson.
"You say you"ve been here?" he asked.
"No," Gleeson answered. "I say there"s no gold in this creek or the other. It was all bluff--only the game"s gone wrong."
"Don"t be too sure," Peters said. "We had no chance of prospecting the other creek, with the mob jumping every one"s claims, but I"m on to wager this is no bluff. There"s gold in that creek; not in tons, maybe, but enough to give us wages, and good wages, for more than a week or two."
"You don"t say!" exclaimed Palmer Billy, standing up beside the fire over which he had been stooping, as he watched for the water in the billy to come to the boil.
"You"re wrong," Gleeson retorted. "I tell you the whole thing was bluff.
The hole we dug was salted, and the creek was to be salted for a bit; and then, when the rush set in, the news was to have been published and our claim offered for sale, and bought, and offered again, just as the big find was made, the find that was planted in the hole. Only Walker"s turned wrong, and Tap, the chap we left to do the salting, has cleared with the gold; and if you hadn"t stood by me in the row, I should have cleared too, and left you to get out of the way of the mob as best you could. Only you stood by me and Walker shied, so he can face the mob and the music, and we"ll clear. But there"s no gold in this creek. There may be a bit in the other; Tap may have dropped some of the stuff we were fools enough to trust with him; but I"ll swear he never came here, so how could any gold get here?"
The three stood looking at him, Palmer Billy open-mouthed and open-eyed.
"And you calls yourself a miner?" he said, with scornful emphasis.
"No, I don"t," Gleeson retorted. "I"m a mining expert--that"s my business. There"s money in that; there"s none in mining; and I"m after money, if you want to know."
The outspoken frankness of the man momentarily checked the feeling of anger or antagonism that was rising in the minds of the other three.
Tony, with the memory of what he had heard in Birralong of the engineers of wild-cat schemes, winced at the discovery that his leader was only a specimen of the tribe after all.
"What"s the use of talking? You"re after the same lay yourselves,"
Gleeson went on. "It"s money you want, only you haven"t got the savee to see the quickest way to get it."
Palmer Billy, his hat at the back of his head and his face working, moved a couple of steps nearer Gleeson.
"See here, young feller," he began. "I"m more than fifty by a long chalk, and I"ve been mining since I was fifteen; mining, I say--earning every slab of damper and pannikin of tea I"ve swallerd, not to mention "bacca and sometimes a bender on rum, by as tough a share of graft as a man wants whose muscles ain"t flabby. Fifty times I"ve struck a duffer on one field or another; twenty times I"ve struck a good show that petered out in a week; three times I struck it rich--rich enough to set me up if I"d stuck to the find, but always I"ve been had--had by darned dirty I-talyans from the towns on the coast, who"ve come up with their glib tongues and doctored tangle-foot and bested me, me and my mates, and shunted us to yacker and graft while they fattened on our find. And for years I"ve waited for the chance of meeting one of those scabs, just to get a bit even on one of them. There"s three of you here, and there"s one of me, but----"
"Don"t make no error," Peters exclaimed quickly. "I"m a miner myself. I joined this show as a fair deal, and so did the lad there."
"Good for you," Palmer Billy replied. "The lad maybe don"t know, but you and I don"t want telling what"s the pay for mining sharks. Here, put up your dooks," he added, as he sparred up to Gleeson.
"We"re mates, don"t I tell you?" Gleeson said. "I"m on for a square deal. I"m full of the others. I"ll stand in----"
Palmer Billy, sparring round him in the approved methods of Boulder Creek, came within reach and hit. Behind the blow there was a lifetime of outraged humanity, as well as the strength of a toil-trained, toughened frame, and Gleeson fell like an ox under the pole-axe. He lay where he fell, and Palmer Billy, far from satisfied at such a brief exercise of his pugilistic talents, stirred him with his foot.
"Here, no sleepy "possum tricks, if _you_ please," he said, with what he considered appropriate politeness demanded by the occasion. "There"s two more waitin" after me, and I ain"t through yet. _I_ don"t want to keep you waiting. Get up and have yer smile out."
But Gleeson made no response, and Peters came over and looked at him.
Palmer Billy"s bony fist had left an unmistakable mark on the bridge of his nose, and the closed eyelids were already thickened and discoloured.
"You"ve punished him for the three of us," Peters said.
"Punished him? Don"t you believe it," Palmer Billy answered. "I"ve only begun. He"s going to learn what mining means before I"ve done with him, and then you two can take him on, and after that the boys over the rise.
He"s going to enjoy himself, I tell you, now we know who he is."
"It"s no good hammering a chap like that; he wouldn"t stand up to a black-fellow," Tony, who had been watching the proceedings, observed.
"If there"s gold in the creek, why----"
"That"s just it," Palmer Billy interrupted. "If there"s gold in the creek, he"ll get it out while we take charge of it. He"s used to all pay and no work. This journey he"ll have all work and no pay. Oh, you"re waking up, are you?" he added, as Gleeson recovered his senses sufficiently to make an ineffectual effort to rise. "Let _me_ give you a hand," he went on, as he grabbed Gleeson by the back of his collar and jerked him on to his feet, where he stood, swaying to and fro and holding his head with both hands. "Now, maybe, you"ll go on with this little affair," Palmer Billy continued. "Not that I want to hurry yer.
Take your own time, only just say when you"re ready to go on."
Gleeson, still dazed, looked round at the three standing in front of him. His head was throbbing with the knock-down blow he had received, and he had not yet had time to gather the exact meaning of his sensations. The words Palmer Billy used suggested journeying, and somewhere in the muddled confusion of his mind there was a decided impulse to journey.
"I"m ready now," he said indistinctly, as he dropped his hands. "I"m only waiting for you."
Palmer Billy, watchful, suspicious, and wroth, heard the words and saw the movement. He cut both short by getting his blow in before the ruse he believed Gleeson was trying to use could develop. The second smashing blow in his face, for which he was totally unprepared, sent Gleeson again to the ground, and also brought home to him the fact that he was very much at a disadvantage, and to a man who was by no means loth to profit by it.
He was not a fighter, either by instinct or training. In the matter of words he might hold his own, and, to any one who believed him, appear a man of great strength and courage. But when, by any mischance, he stumbled across an opponent who knew enough to correctly estimate the value of his professions, and who was self-reliant and st.u.r.dy enough to face him and challenge a proof of his a.s.sertions, Gleeson retired, or, failing escape, subsided rapidly. Usually his tact, as he called it, was successful in extricating him from positions where an exercise of brute force was imminent against him; he had never before been called on to cope with such a situation as he now realized he was in.
The second blow, directed more at his mouth, had not had the stupefying effect of the first, though it brought him to the ground with what Palmer Billy regarded as expert thoroughness. As he lay there, he understood the turn matters had taken; he was in the middle of what he had always managed to avoid, a rough-and-tumble bout of fisticuffs, and with a man stronger and more expert than himself. He partly raised his head from the ground in order to ascertain the disposition of the other two members of the party. He saw them behind Palmer Billy, looking on with apparent indifference to what was transpiring, and realized that they were certainly not on his side.
Palmer Billy, as he saw Gleeson raise his head, stepped over to him.
"You"d like to get up, I take it," he said, and reached down to catch him by the collar.
"Don"t hit me. I never did you any harm," Gleeson whined, shrinking from the extending hand which he expected was about to administer another blow, and hiding his face on his arms.
Palmer Billy, standing up, glanced round at the other two with a look of scorn on his face.
"What price _that_?" he asked, with a mixture of savagery and contempt in his voice. "Here, get up," he went on before they could answer him, as he stirred Gleeson roughly with his foot. "Get up on to yer bended knees, or I"ll sink a shaft through you as you lay."