"Let it drop, Dave."
"Divil a shaky," interposed the hon. member for Tipperary. "Arrah, fwy wud the chap call on the Daity? Fishper--did ye iver foine justice in a coort? Be me sowl, Oi"d take the man"s wurrd agin all the coorts in Austhrillia. An" more betoken--divil blasht the blame Oi"d blame him fur sthrekin a match, whin dhruv to that same."
"Shoosteece iss (adj.) goot, mais revahnsh iss (adj.) bat,"
remarked another foreigner--a contractor"s cook, who had come to the homestead for a supply of rations. "Vhere iss de (adj.) von?--vhere is de (adj.) autre?
All mix--eh? De cohnseerashohn iss--I not know vat you vill call him ohn Angleesh, mais ve vill call him ohn Frahnsh, (adj.) cohnplecat."
"Much the same in English, Theophile," I observed.
"You vill barn de (adj.) snack," continued Theophile, turning politely to me; "you vill call him shoosteece; mineself, I vill call him revahnsh.
Mineself, I vill not barn de (adj.) snack; I vill be too (adj.) flash.
I vill go to (sheol)."
"Not for your principles, Theophile," I replied, with a courteous inclination of my belltopper.
"Course, it"s all in a man"s lifetime," pursued Andrew resignedly.
"Same time, it seems sort a" hard lines when a man"s shoved in the logs for the best three months in the year for a thing he never done. "Sides, I was on for a good long job with two as decent a fellers as you"d meet in a day"s walk. I"d met one o" them ten mile up the river, as it might be this afternoon; an" the fire it took place as it might be to-morrow mornin"."
"But where was you when the fire broke-out?--that"s the question,"
demanded Dave, with a pleasant side-glance round the table.
"Eh?"
"You"ll be b.u.mpin" up agen a snag some o" these times, young feller,"
muttered the bullock driver.
"I was only askin" him where he was when the fire broke out," protested Somebody"s Darling; then in a louder voice he repeated his question.
"Dunno. Somewhere close handy," replied the swagman hopelessly. "Anyhow, I never done it. Well, then, I"d jist got well started to work on Monday mornin", when up comes the bobby, an" grabs me. "S"pose you"ll have to go," says the missus--for the bosses was both away at another place they got. "S"pose so," says I. "Better take my swag with me anyhow."
Course, by the time my three months was up, things was at the slackest; an" I could n"t go straight back to a decent place, an" me fresh out o" chokey.
Fact, I can"t go back to that district no more. But as luck would have it, I runs b.u.t.t agen the very man I"d ratherest meet of anybody in the country."
The swagman paused, and slowly turned toward me, in evident trouble of mind-- "He did n"t tell you two blokes I was logged for stack-burnin"?"
And the poor fellow"s flickering eyes sought my face appealingly.
"Indeed he did n"t, mate."
"Why, you let the cat out of the bag yourself!" exclaimed Dave triumphantly.
Then the conversation took a more general turn.
By this time, I had provisionally accounted for my vaguely-fancied recognition of the man. With the circ.u.mspection of a seasoned speculatist, I had bracketed two independent hypotheses, either of which would supply a satisfactory solution. One of these simply attributed the whole matter to unconscious cerebration. But here a question arose: If one half of my brain had been more alert than its duplicate when the object first presented itself--so that the observation of the vigilant half instantaneously appeared as an intangible memory to the judgment of the apathetic half--it still remained to be determined which of the halves might be said to be in a normal condition. Was one half unduly and wastefully excited?--or was the other half unhealthily dormant?
The thing would have to be seen into, at some fitting time.
But this hypothesis of unconscious cerebration seemed scarcely as satisfactory as the other-namely, that, having at a former time heard Terrible Tommy mention the name of Andrew Glover, my educated instinct of Nomenology, rising to the very acme of efficiency, had accurately, though unconsciously, snap-shotted a corresponding apparition on the retina of my mind"s eye.
Then there were lessons to be gathered from Tom Armstrongs"s prompt acceptance of such alibi evidence, touching myself, as would have merely tended to unfathomable speculations on metempsychosis in an ether-poised Hamlet-mind.
Tom, though crushing for a couple of ounces, was one of your practical, decided, c.o.c.ksure men; guided by unweighed, una.n.a.lysed phenomena, and governed by conviction alone--the latter being based simply, though solidly, upon itself. These men are deaf to the symphony of the Silences; blind to the horizonless areas of the Unknown; unresponsive to the touch of the Impalpable; oblivious to the machinery of the Moral Universe--in a word, indifferent to the mysterious Motive of Nature"s all-pervading Soul. In such mental organisms, opinion, once deflected tangentially from the central Truth, acquires an independent and stubborn orbit of its own. But the Absolute Truth is so large, and human opinion so small, that the latter cannot get away altogether, however eccentric its course may be; indeed, the more elongated the orbit of Error, the greater chance of its being swallowed up by the scorching Truth, on its return trip. In the present instance, my own ready co-operation with a marvellously conducive Providential legislation had been sufficient unto the deflection of Tom"s opinion; and I was content to let the still-impending collision take thought for itself, particularly as Mrs. Beaudesart"s conjunction was just about falling due. Then I rose to go.
"Here, mate," said I, fearlessly removing my clouded gla.s.ses, and handing them, with their case, to Andrew; "you"ll find the advantage of these."
There was no trace of recognition in Tom"s look of grat.i.tude as his eyes rested on my face. But I sighed to reflect that he was still looking out for the tracks of that miserable impostor from the braes o" Yarra.
Now I had to enact the Cynic philosopher to Moriarty and Butler, and the aristocratic man with a "past" to Mrs. Beaudesart; with the satisfaction of knowing that each of these was acting a part to me.
Such is life, my fellow-mummers--just like a poor player, that bluffs and feints his hour upon the stage, and then cheapens down to mere nonent.i.ty.
But let me not hear any small witticism to the further effect that its story is a tale told by a vulgarian, full of slang and blanky, signifying--nothing.
THE END.