Twice Bought

“Have you seen their ambush, and how many there are!” asked Gashford.

“Niver a wan have I seen, and I’ve only a gineral notion o’ their whereabouts.”

“How then can you lead us?”

“Obey orders, an’ you’ll see, sor. I’m in command to-night. If ye don’t choose to foller, ye’ll have to do the best ye can widout me.”

“Lead on, then,” cried Gashford, half amused and half angered by the man’s behaviour.

Flinders led the way straight to Gashford’s hut where, as he anticipated, the man named Bill had silently collected most of the able-bodied men of the camp, all armed to the teeth. He at once desired Gashford to put them in fighting order and lead them. When they were ready he went off at a rapid pace towards the stable before mentioned.

“They should be hereabouts, Muster Gashford,” he said, in a low voice, “so git yer troops ready for action.”

“What do ye mean?” growled Gashford.

To this Flinders made no reply, but turning to Westly and Brixton, who stood close at his side, whispered them to meet him at the stable before the fight was quite over.

He then put his hand to his mouth and uttered three hoots like an owl.

“I believe you are humbugging us,” said Gashford.

“Whisht, sor—listen!”

The breaking of twigs was heard faintly in the distance, and, a few moments later, the tramp, apparently, of a body of men. Presently dark forms were dimly seen to be advancing.

“Now’s your time, gineral! Give it ’em hot,” whispered Flinders.

“Ready! Present! Fire!” said Gashford, in a deep, solemn tone, which the profound silence rendered distinctly audible.

The marauders halted, as if petrified. Next moment a sheet of flame burst from the ranks of the miners, and horrible yells rent the air, high above which, like the roar of a lion, rose Gashford’s voice in the single word:—

“Charge!”

But the panic-stricken robbers did not await the onset. They turned and fled, hotly pursued by the men of Pine Tree Diggings.

“That’ll do!” cried Flinders to Brixton; “they’ll not need us any more this night. Come wid me now.”

Fred Westly, who had rushed to the attack with the rest, soon pulled up. Remembering the appointment, he returned to the stable, where he found Tom gazing in silence at Flinders, who was busily employed saddling their three horses. He at once understood the situation.

“Of course you’ve made up your mind to go, Tom?” he said.

“N–no,” answered Tom. “I have not.”

“Faix, thin, you’ll have to make it up pritty quick now, for whin the boys come back the prisoners an wounded men’ll be sure to tell that their chief came for the express purpose of rescuin’ that ‘thief Brixton’—an’ it’s hangin’ that’ll be too good for you then. Roastin’ alive is more likely. It’s my opinion that if they catch us just now, Muster Fred an’ I will swing for it too! Come, sor, git up!”

Tom hesitated no longer. He vaulted into the saddle. His comrades also mounted, and in a few minutes more the three were riding away from Pine Tree Diggings as fast as the nature of the ground and the darkness of the hour would permit.

It was not quite midnight when they left the place where they had toiled so long, and had met with so many disasters, and the morning was not far advanced when they reached the spring of the Red Man’s Teacup. As this was a natural and convenient halting-place to parties leaving those diggings, they resolved to rest and refresh themselves and their steeds for a brief space, although they knew that the robber-chief had appointed that spot as a rendezvous after the attack on the camp.

“You see, it’s not likely they’ll be here for an hour or two,” said Tom Brixton, as he dismounted and hobbled his horse, “for it will take some time to collect their scattered forces, and they won’t have their old leader to spur them on, as Paddy’s rap on the head will keep him quiet till the men of the camp find him.”

“Troth, I’m not so sure o’ that, sor. The rap was a stiff wan, no doubt, but men like that are not aisy to kill. Besides, won’t the boys o’ the camp purshoo them, which’ll be spur enough, an’ if they finds us here, it’ll matter little whether we fall into the hands o’ diggers or robbers. So ye’ll make haste av ye take my advice.”

They made haste accordingly, and soon after left; and well was it that they did so, for, little more than an hour later, Stalker—his face covered with blood and his head bandaged—galloped up at the head of the mounted men of his party.

“We’ll camp here for an hour or two,” he said sharply, leaping from his horse, which he proceeded to unsaddle. “Hallo! somebody’s bin here before us. Their fire ain’t cold yet. Well, it don’t matter. Get the grub ready, boys, an’ boil the kettle. My head is all but split. If ever I have the luck to come across that Irish blackguard Brixton I’ll—”

He finished the sentence with a deep growl and a grind of his teeth.

About daybreak the marauders set out again, and it chanced that the direction they took was the same as that taken by Fred Westly and his comrades. These latter had made up their minds to try their fortune at a recently discovered goldfield, which was well reported of, though the yield had not been sufficient to cause a “rush” to the place. It was about three days’ journey on horseback from the Red Man’s Teacup, and was named Simpson’s Gully, after the man who discovered it.

The robbers’ route lay, as we have said, in the same direction, but only for part of the way, for Simpson’s Gully was not their ultimate destination. They happened to be better mounted than the fugitives, and travelled faster. Thus it came to pass that on the second evening, they arrived somewhat late at the camping-place where Fred and his friends were spending the night.

These latter had encamped earlier that evening. Supper was over, pipes were out and they were sound asleep when the robber band rode up.

Flinders was first to observe their approach. He awoke his comrades roughly.

“Och! the blackguards have got howld of us. Be aisy, Muster Brixton. No use fightin’. Howld yer tongues, now, an’ let me spake. Yer not half liars enough for the occasion, aither of ye.”

This compliment had barely been paid when they were surrounded and ordered to rise and give an account of themselves.

“What right have you to demand an account of us?” asked Tom Brixton, recklessly, in a supercilious tone that was meant to irritate.

“The right of might,” replied Stalker, stepping up to Tom, and grasping him by the throat.

Tom resisted, of course, but being seized at the same moment by two men from behind, was rendered helpless. His comrades were captured at the same moment, and the arms of all bound behind them.

“Now, gentlemen,” said the robber chief, “perhaps you will answer with more civility.”

“You are wrong, for I won’t answer at all,” said Tom Brixton, “which I take to be less civility.”

“Neither will I,” said Fred, who had come to the conclusion that total silence would be the easiest way of getting over the difficulties that filled his mind in regard to deception.

Patrick Flinders, however, had no such difficulties. To the amazement of his companions, he addressed a speech to Stalker in language so broken with stuttering and stammering that the marauders around could scarcely avoid laughing, though their chief seemed to be in no mood to tolerate mirth. Tom and Fred did not at first understand, though it soon dawned upon them that by this means he escaped being recognised by the man with whom he had so recently conversed through the keyhole of Tom Brixton’s prison door.

“S–s–s–sor,” said he, in a somewhat higher key than he was wont to speak, “my c–c–comrades are c–c–cross-g–grained critters b–both of ’em, th–th–though they’re g–good enough in their way, for all that. A–a–ax me what ye w–w–want to know.”

“Can’t you speak without so many k–k–kays an’ j–j–gees?” demanded Stalker, impatiently.

“N–n–no, s–sor, I c–can’t, an’ the m–more you t–try to make me the w–w–wus I g–gits.”

“Well, then, come to the point, an’ don’t say more than’s needful.”

“Y–y–yis, sor.”

“What’s this man’s name!” asked the chief, settling the bandages uneasily on his head with one hand, and pointing to Brixton with the other.

“M–Muster T–T–Tom, sor.”

“That’s his Christian name, I suppose?”

“W–w–well, I’m not sure about his bein’ a c–c–c–Christian.”

“Do you spell it T-o-m or T-h-o-m?”

“Th–that depinds on t–t–taste, sor.”

“Bah! you’re a fool!”

“Thank yer honour, and I’m also an I-I-Irish m–man as sure me name’s Flinders.”

“There’s one of your countrymen named Brixton,” said the chief, with a scowl, “who’s a scoundrel of the first water, and I have a crow to pluck with him some day when we meet. Meanwhile I feel half-disposed to give his countryman a sound thrashing as part payment of the debt in advance.”

“Ah! sure, sor, me counthryman’ll let ye off the dibt, no doubt,” returned Flinders.

“Hallo! you seem to have found your tongue all of a sudden!”

“F–faix, then, it’s b–bekaise of yer not houndin’ me on. I c–c–can’t stand bein’ hurried, ye s–see. B–besides, I was havin’ me little j–j–joke, an’ I scarcely sp–splutter at all whin I’m j–j–jokin’.”

“Where did you come from?” demanded the chief, sharply.

“From P–Pine Tree D–Diggin’s.”

“Oh, indeed? When did you leave the camp?”

“On M–Monday mornin’, sor.”

“Then of course you don’t know anything about the fight that took place there on Monday night!”

“D–don’t I, sor?”

“Why don’t you answer whether you do or not?” said Stalker, beginning to lose temper.

“Sh–shure yer towld me th–that I d–d–don’t know, an I’m too p–p–purlite to c–contradic’ yer honour.”

“Bah! you’re a fool.”

“Ye t–t–towld me that before, sor.”

The robber chief took no notice of the reply, but led his lieutenant aside and held a whispered conversation with him for a few minutes.

Now, among other blessings, Flinders possessed a pair of remarkably acute ears, so that, although he could not make out the purport of the whispered conversation, he heard, somewhat indistinctly, the words “Bevan” and “Betty.” Coupling these words with the character of the men around him, he jumped to a conclusion and decided on a course of action in one and the same instant.

Presently Stalker returned, and addressing himself to Tom and Fred, said—

“Now, sirs, I know not your circumstances nor your plans, but I’ll take the liberty of letting you know something of mine. Men give me and my boys bad names. We call ourselves Free-and-easy Boys. We work hard for our living. It is our plan to go round the country collecting taxes—revenue—or whatever you choose to call it, and punishing those who object to pay. Now, we want a few stout fellows to replace the brave men who have fallen at the post of duty. Will you join us?”

“Certainly not,” said Fred, with decision.

“Of course not,” said Tom, with contempt.

“Well, then, my fine fellows, you may follow your own inclinations, for there’s too many willing boys around to make us impress unwilling ones, but I shall take the liberty of relieving you of your possessions. I will tax you to the full amount.”

He turned and gave orders in a low voice to those near him. In a few minutes the horses, blankets, food, arms, etcetera, of the three friends were collected, and themselves unbound.

“Now,” said the robber chief, “I mean to spend the night here. You may bid us good-night. The world lies before you—go!”

“B–b–but, sor,” said Flinders, with a perplexed and pitiful air. “Ye niver axed me if I’d j–j–jine ye.”

“Because I don’t want you,” said Stalker.

“Ah! thin, it’s little ye know th–the j–j–jewel ye’re th–throwin’ away.”

“What can you do?” asked the robber, while a slight smile played on his disfigured face.

“What c–can I not do? ye should ax. W–w–why, I can c–c–c–cook, an’ f–f–fight, an’ d–dance, an’ t–t–tell stories, an’ s–s–sing an’—”

“There, that’ll do. I accept you,” said Stalker, turning away, while his men burst into a laugh, and felt that Flinders would be a decided acquisition to the party.

“Are we to go without provisions or weapons?” asked Fred Westly, before leaving.

“You may have both,” answered Stalker, “by joining us. If you go your own way—you go as you are. Please yourselves.”

“You may almost as well kill us as turn us adrift here in the wilderness, without food or the means of procuring it,” remonstrated Fred. “Is it not so, Tom?”

Tom did not condescend to reply. He had evidently screwed his spirit up—or down—to the Turkish condition of apathy and contempt.

“You’re young, both of you, and strong,” answered the robber. “The woods are full of game, berries, roots, and fish. If you know anything of woodcraft you can’t starve.”

“An’ sh–sh–sure Tomlin’s Diggin’s isn’t far—far off—straight f–f–fornint you,” said Flinders, going close up to his friends, and whispering, “Kape round by Bevan’s Gully. You’ll be—”

“Come, none of your whisperin’ together!” shouted Stalker. “You’re one of us now, Flinders, so say goodbye to your old chums an’ fall to the rear.”

“Yis, sor,” replied the biddable Flinders, grasping each of his comrades by the hand and wringing it as he said, “G–g–good-bye, f–f–foolish b–boys, (Bevan’s Gully—sharp!) f–farewell f–for i–i–iver!” and, covering his face with his hands, burst into crocodile’s tears while he fell to the rear. He separated two of his fingers, however, in passing a group of his new comrades, in order to bestow on them a wink which produced a burst of subdued laughter.

Surprised, annoyed, and puzzled, Tom Brixton thrust both hands into his trousers pockets, turned round on his heel, and, without uttering a word, sauntered slowly away.

Fred Westly, in a bewildered frame of mind, followed his example, and the two friends were soon lost to view—swallowed up, as it were, by the Oregon wilderness.

Chapter Eight

After walking through the woods a considerable distance in perfect silence—for the suddenness of the disaster seemed to have bereft the two friends of speech—Tom Brixton turned abruptly and said—

“Well, Fred, we’re in a nice fix now. What is to be our next move in this interesting little game?”

Fred Westly shook his head with an air of profound perplexity, but said nothing.

“I’ve a good mind,” continued Tom, “to return to Pine Tree Diggings, give myself up, and get hanged right off. It would be a good riddance to the world at large, and would relieve me of a vast deal of trouble.”

“There is a touch of selfishness in that speech, Tom—don’t you think?—for it would not relieve me of trouble; to say nothing of your poor mother!”

“You’re right, Fred. D’you know, it strikes me that I’m a far more selfish and despicable brute than I used to think myself.”

He looked at his companion with a sad sort of smile; nevertheless, there was a certain indefinable ring of sincerity in his tone.

“Tom,” said the other, earnestly, “will you wait for me here for a few minutes while I turn aside to pray?”

“Certainly, old boy,” answered Tom, seating himself on a mossy bank. “You know I cannot join you.”

“I know you can’t, Tom. It would be mockery to pray to One in whom you don’t believe; but as I believe in God, the Bible, and prayer, you’ll excuse my detaining you, just for—”

“Say no more, Fred. Go; I shall wait here for you.”

A slight shiver ran through Brixton’s frame as he sat down, rested his elbows on his knees, and clasped his hands.

“God help me!” he exclaimed, under a sudden impulse, “I’ve come down very low, God help me!”

Fred soon returned.

“You prayed for guidance, I suppose?” said Tom, as his friend sat down beside him.

“I did.”

“Well, what is the result?”

“There is no result as yet—except, of course, the calmer state of my mind, now that I have committed our case into our Father’s hands.”

“Your Father’s, you mean.”

“No, I mean our, for He is your father as well as mine, whether you admit it or not. Jesus has bought you and paid for you, Tom, with His own blood. You are not your own.”

“Not my own? bought and paid for!” thought Brixton, recalling the scene in which words of somewhat similar import had been addressed to him. “Bought and paid for—twice bought! Body and soul!” Then, aloud, “And what are you going to do now, Fred?”

“Going to discuss the situation with you.”

“And after you have discussed it, and acted according to our united wisdom, you will say that you have been guided.”

“Just so! That is exactly what I will say and believe, for ‘He is faithful who has promised.’”

“And if you make mistakes and go wrong, you will still hold, I suppose, that you have been guided?”

“Undoubtedly I will—not guided, indeed, into the mistakes, but guided to what will be best in the long-run, in spite of them.”

“But Fred, how can you call guidance in the wrong direction right guidance?”

“Why, Tom, can you not conceive of a man being guided wrongly as regards some particular end he has in view, and yet that same guidance being right, because leading him to something far better which, perhaps, he has not in view?”

“So that” said Tom, with a sceptical laugh, “whether you go right or go wrong, you are sure to come right in the end!”

“Just so! ‘All things work together for good to them that love God.’”

“Does not that savour of Jesuitism, Fred, which teaches the detestable doctrine that you may do evil if good is to come of it?”

“Not so, Tom; because I did not understand you to use the word wrong in the sense of sinful, but in the sense of erroneous—mistaken. If I go in a wrong road, knowing it to be wrong, I sin; but if I go in a wrong road mistakenly, I still count on guidance, though not perhaps to the particular end at which I aimed—nevertheless, guidance to a good end. Surely you will admit that no man is perfect?”

“Admitted.”

“Well, then, imperfection implies mistaken views and ill-directed action, more or less, in every one, so that if we cannot claim to be guided by God except when free from error in thought and act, then there is no such thing as Divine guidance at all. Surely you don’t hold that!”

“Some have held it.”

“Yes; ‘the fool hath said in his heart, There is no God,’—some have even gone the length of letting it out of the heart and past the lips. With such we cannot argue; their case admits only of pity and prayer.”

“I agree with you there, Fred; but if your views are not Jesuitical, they seem to me to be strongly fatalistic. Commit one’s way to God, you say; then, shut one’s eyes, drive ahead anyhow, and—the end will be sure to be all right!”

“No, I did not say that. With the exception of the first sentence, Tom, that is your way of stating the case, not God’s way. If you ask in any given difficulty, ‘What shall I do?’ His word replies, ‘Commit thy way unto the Lord. Trust also in Him, and He will bring it to pass.’ If you ask, ‘How am I to know what is best?’ the Word again replies, ‘hear, ye deaf; look, ye blind, that you may see.’ Surely that is the reverse of shutting the eyes, isn’t it? If you say, ‘how shall I act?’ the Word answers, ‘A good man will guide his affairs with discretion.’ That’s not driving ahead anyhow, is it?”

“You may be right,” returned Tom, “I hope you are. But, come, what does your wisdom suggest in the present difficulty?”

“The first thing that occurs to me,” replied the other, “is what Flinders said, just before we were ordered off by the robbers. ‘Keep round by Bevan’s Gully,’ he said, in the midst of his serio-comic leave-taking; and again he said, ‘Bevan’s Gully—sharp!’ Of course Paddy, with his jokes and stammering, has been acting a part all through this business, and I am convinced that he has heard something about Bevan’s Gully; perhaps an attack on Bevan himself, which made him wish to tell us to go there.”

“Of course; how stupid of me not to see that before! Let’s go at once!” cried Tom, starting up in excitement. “Undoubtedly he meant that. He must have overheard the villains talk of going there, and we may not be in time to aid them unless we push on.”

“But in what direction does the gully lie?” asked Fred, with a puzzled look.

Tom returned the look with one of perplexity, for they were now a considerable distance both from Bevan’s Gully and Pine Tree Diggings, in the midst of an almost unknown wilderness. From the latter place either of the friends could have travelled to the former almost blindfold; but, having by that time lost their exact bearings, they could only guess at the direction.

“I think,” said Fred, after looking round and up at the sky for some time, “considering the time we have been travelling, and the position of the sun, that the gully lies over yonder. Indeed, I feel almost sure it does.”

He pointed, as he spoke, towards a ridge of rocky ground that cut across the western sky and hid much of the more distant landscape in that direction.

“Nonsense, man!” returned Tom, sharply, “it lies in precisely the opposite direction. Our adventures have turned your brain, I think. Come, don’t let us lose time. Think of Betty; that poor girl may be killed if there is another attack. She was slightly wounded last time. Come!”

Fred looked quickly in his friend’s face. It was deeply flushed, and his eye sparkled with unwonted fire.

“Poor fellow! his case is hopeless; she will never wed him,” thought Fred, but he only said, “I, too, would not waste time, but it seems to me we shall lose much if we go in that direction. The longer I study the nature of the ground, and calculate our rate of travelling since we left the diggings, the more am I convinced that our way lies westward.”

“I feel as certain as you do,” replied Tom with some asperity, for he began to chafe under the delay. “But if you are determined to go that way you must go by yourself, old boy, for I can’t afford to waste time on a wrong road.”

“Nay, if you are so sure, I will give in and follow. Lead on,” returned Tom’s accommodating friend, with a feeling of mingled surprise and chagrin.

In less than an hour they reached a part of the rocky ridge before mentioned, from which they had a magnificent view of the surrounding country. It was wilderness truly, but such a wilderness of tree and bush, river and lake, cascade and pool, flowering plant and festooned shrub, dense thicket and rolling prairie, backed here and there by cloud-capped hills, as seldom meets the eye or thrills the heart of traveller, except in alpine lands. Deep pervading silence marked the hour, for the air was perfectly still, and though the bear, the deer, the wolf, the fox, and a multitude of wild creatures were revelling there in the rich enjoyment of natural life, the vast region, as it were, absorbed and dissipated their voices almost as completely as their persons, so that it seemed but a grand untenanted solitude, just freshly laid out by the hand of the wonder-working Creator. Every sheet of water, from the pool to the lake, reflected an almost cloudless blue, excepting towards the west, where the sun, by that time beginning to descend, converted all into sheets of liquid gold.

The two friends paused on the top of a knoll, more to recover breath than to gaze on the exquisite scene, for they both felt that they were speeding on a mission that might involve life or death. Fred’s enthusiastic admiration, however, would no doubt have found vent in fitting words if he had not at the moment recognised a familiar landmark.

“I knew it!” he cried, eagerly. “Look, Tom, that is Ranger’s Hill on the horizon away to the left. It is very faint from distance, but I could not mistake its form.”

“Nonsense, Fred! you never saw it from this point of view before, and hills change their shape amazingly from different points of view. Come along.”

“No, I am too certain to dispute the matter any longer. If you will have it so, we must indeed part here. But oh! Tom, don’t be obstinate! Why, what has come over you, my dear fellow? Don’t you see—”

“I see that evening is drawing on, and that we shall be too late. Good-bye! One friendly helping hand will be better to her than none. I know I’m right.”

Tom hurried away, and poor Fred, after gazing in mingled surprise and grief at his comrade until he disappeared, turned with a heavy sigh and went off in the opposite direction.