George Henty - Colonel Thorndyke's Secret

“So do I. In the first place the chances are that in the next two or three months at least half the fellows will be picked up. To begin with, several of them are sure to get hold of liquor and make attacks upon the settlers, in which case some of them, anyhow, are sure to get killed. In the next place, most of them were brought up as thieves in the slums of London, and will have no more idea of roughing it in a country like this than of behaving themselves if they were transported to a London drawing room. Therefore, I am pretty sure that at the end of three months we shall not be able to reckon on half of them. Well, six men are not enough to capture a ship, or, if they do capture it, to keep the crew under. One must sleep sometimes, and with only three or four men on deck we could not hope to keep a whole ship’s crew at bay.”

“Then there is another reason. You and I, when we have got a decent rig out, could pass anywhere without exciting observation; while if we had half a dozen of the others, whatever their good qualities, they would be noticed at once by their villainous faces, and if questions were to be asked we should be likely to find ourselves in limbo again in a very short time. So I am all for working on our own account, even if the whole of the others were ready to back us; but, of course, we must keep on good terms with them all, and breathe no word that we think that each man had better shift for himself. Some of those fellows, if they thought we had any idea of leaving them, would go straight into Sydney and denounce us, although they would know that they themselves would be likely to swing at the same time.”

As none of the convicts were acquainted with the bush, they had been obliged to select as their rendezvous a hut two miles out of the town, where the convict gangs that worked on the road were in the habit of leaving their tools. On the way there the two men killed a couple of sheep from a flock whose position they had noticed before it became dark. These they skinned, cut off the heads, and left them behind, carrying the sheep on their shoulders to the meeting.

“Is that you, Captain Wild?” a voice said as they approached.

“Yes; Gentleman Dick is with me.”

“That is a good job. We had begun to think that the soldiers had caught you.”

“They would not have caught us alive, you may take your oath. How many are there of us here?”

“Ten of us, Captain. I think that that is all there are.”

“That is enough for our purpose. Has anyone got anything to eat?”

There was a deep growl in the negative.

“Well, we have brought a couple of sheep with us, and as we have carried them something like a mile, you had better handle them by turns. We will strike off into the bush and put another three or four miles between us and the jail, and then light a fire and have a meal.”

Two of the men came forward and took the sheep. Then they turned off from the road, and taking their direction from a star, followed it for an hour.

“I think we have got far enough now,” the man called Captain Wild said. “You had better cut down the bushes, and we will make a fire.”

“But how are we to light it?” one of them exclaimed in a tone of consternation. “I don’t suppose we have got flint and steel or tinder box among us.”

“Oh, we can manage that!” the Captain said. “Get a heap of dried leaves here first, then some wood, and we will soon have a blaze.”

His orders were obeyed. Some of the men had carried off the warders’ swords as well as their muskets, and now used them for chopping wood. As soon as a small pile of dried leaves was gathered the Captain broke a cartridge and sprinkled half its contents among them, and then dropped the remainder into his musket. He flashed this off among the leaves, and a bright flame at once shot up, and in five minutes a fire was burning.

One of the sheep was soon cut up, the meat hacked in slices from the bones, a ramrod was thrust through the pieces, and, supported by four sticks, was laid across the fire. Three other similarly laden spits were soon placed beside it, and in a short time the meat was ready for eating. Until a hearty meal had been made there was but little talking.

“That is first rate,” one of the men said, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Now one only wants a pipe and bacca and a glass of grog, to feel comfortable.”

“Well, Captain, are you satisfied with the day’s work?”

“It would have been a grand day had it not been for the soldiers passing just at the time. As it is, Gentleman Dick and I have been agreeing that as far as we are all concerned it has not turned out so badly. There would have been a lot of difficulty in finding food if we had all got away, and some of those mealy mouthed fellows would have been sure to go back and peach on us at the first opportunity. A dozen is better than a hundred for the sort of life we are likely to lead for some time. We are strong enough to beat off any attack from the black fellows, and also to break into any of these settlers’ houses.

“We can, when we have a mind to, take a stray sheep now and then, or even a bullock would scarcely be missed, especially if our pals in the settlement will lend us a helping hand, which you may be sure they will do; in fact, they would know better than to refuse. Then a large party could be traced by those black trackers at a run, while a small one would not; especially if, as we certainly will do, we break up into twos and threes for a time. First of all, though, we must go well into the bush; at daybreak tomorrow morning we will drive off twenty sheep, and go right away a hundred miles, and wait there till matters have settled down. They will never take the troops out that distance after us. Then we can come back again, and hang about the settlement and take what we want. The wild blacks don’t come near there, and we shall be safer in pairs than we should be if we kept together; and of course we could meet once a week or so to talk over our plans. We must borrow some whisky, flour, tea, tobacco, and a few other items from the settlers, but we had better do without them for this trip. I don’t want to turn the settlers against us, for they have all got horses, and might combine with the troops to give chase, so it would be best to leave them alone, at any rate till we get back again. Another reason for treating them gently is that even if they did not join the troops they might get into a funk, and drive their sheep and horses down into Sydney, and then we should mighty soon get short of food. It will be quite time enough to draw upon them heavily when we make up our minds to get hold of a ship and sail away. Money would be of no use to us here, but we shall want it when we get to a port, wherever that port may be.”

“That sounds right enough, Captain,” one of the convicts said, “and just at present nothing would suit me better than to get so far away from this place that I can lay on my back and take it easy for a spell.”

There was a general chorus of assent, and there being neither tobacco nor spirits, the party very soon stretched themselves off to sleep round the fire.

In the morning they were up before daylight, and half an hour later arrived at one of the farms farthest from Sydney. Here they found a flock of a hundred sheep. The shepherd came to the door of his hut on hearing a noise.

“You had best lie down and go to sleep for the next hour,” the leader of the convicts said sharply. “We don’t want to do an old pal any harm, and when you wake up in the morning and find the flock some twenty short, of course you won’t have any idea what has come of them.”

The man nodded and went back into the hut and shut the door, and the convicts started for the interior, driving twenty sheep before them.