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A Duel in the Desert · Stingaree

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Chapter eight of Stingery by E. W. Horning. This librevox recording is
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in the public domain. Read by Beeswax Candle a jewel in the desert.
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It was eight o'clock and Monday morning when the romantic rascals were led away in
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unromantic bonds. Their arms were bound to their bodies, their feet lashed to
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the stirrubians. They sat like packs upon quiet station horses, carefully chosen for
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the knots. They were tethered to a mounted policeman apiece, each with leading
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rein buckled to his left wrist and government revolver in his right hand. Behind
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the quartet rode the officer in command, superbly mounted, watching ever all four
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with a third revolver ready cocked. It seemed a small and yet an ample
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escort for the two bound men. But Stingery was by no means in that
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state of Napoleonic despair, which is bent back and lower encountenance were in to
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convey. He had not uttered a word since the arrival of the police,
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whom he had suffered to lift him on horseback as in Arsat, without raising
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his morose eyes once. Howie, on the other hand, had offered a
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good deal of futile opposition, cursing his captors as the fit moved at once,
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struggling so insanely in his bonds as to earn a tap from the wrong
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end of a revolver and a bloody face for his pains. Stingery glowered in
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deep delight. His mate's part was as well acted as his own. But
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it was he who would conceived them both and expounded them in countless camps against
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some such extremity as this. The result was in ideal accordance with his calculations.
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The man who gave the trouble was the man to watch, and Stingaree
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chin on chest, was left in peace to evolve a way of escape.
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The chances were all adverse. He had never been less sanguine in his life.
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Not Stingery had much opinion of the police, and slipped through their hands
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too often. But it was an unfortunate circumstance that two of the present trio
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were among those whom he had eluded most recently, and who therefore would be
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least likely to give him another chance. A lightning student of his kind,
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he based his only hope upon an accurate estimate of these men, and applied
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his whole mind to the triple task. But it was a single task almost
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from the first, for the policeman in charge of him was none other than
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his credulous old friend, Sergeant Camberon from clear corner, and now his custodian,
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a young trooper run from the same mold as Constable Tyler, and many
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a hundred more in whom a thick skull canceled a stout heart. Both were
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brave men, neither was really to be feared. But the man behind upon
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the Thoroughbred, the man in front, the man now on his side,
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and now on that with his braying laugh in his vindictive voice, triumphant as
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though he had taken the bush Rangers himself, and a blatant bully in his
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triumph was none other than the formidable Superintendent, whose undying animosity the bush Rangers
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had earned by the two escapades associated with his name. If the outlaw never
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flattered him with word or look, never lifted chin from chest, never raised
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an eye or opened his mouth until Howie's knock on the head caused him to
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curse his mate for a fool who deserved all he got. The Thoroughbred was
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caracoling on his other side in an instant. You ain't a one, ay,
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you cried the taunting tongue of superintended cans. Not much fool about staying
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er. Eh. The time had come for a reply, so I thought
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until yesterday, sighed the bushranger. But now I'm not so sure, not
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so sure, eh, Ye were sure enough last time we met my beauty.
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Yes, I had some conceit of myself, then said Stingrey, with
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another of his convincing sighs, to say nothing of when you guide me.
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Damn you, added the superintendent below his breath and through his teeth well replied
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the outlaw. You've got your revenge. I must expect you to rub it
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in, my fine friend, rejoined Cairns. You may expect worse than that,
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and still you won't be disappointed. Stingarey made no reply, And it
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would have taken a very shrewd eye to have read deeper than the depths of
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sullen despair expressed in every inch of his bound body and every furrow of his
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downcast face. Even the vindictive Cairns ceased for a time to crow over so
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abject an adversary, in so bitter an hour. Meanwhile, the five horses
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streamed slowly through the high lights and heavy shadows of a winding avenue of scrub
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just like a hot house, and the dense low trees, not a wandering
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wind of a waking bird, but five faces that dripped steadily in the shade,
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and all but caught fire in the sun. The head rode how he
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dazed and bleeding, with his callous young constable. The sergeant and his chief,
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with Stingery between them, now brought up the rear by degrees. Stingery
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raised his chin a little and still looked neither right nor left. Cheer up,
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cried the chief with soothing irony. I feel the heat, said the
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bound man, uncomplainingly, and was just about here. It happened. What
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happened, We overtook the church militant here on earth, rejoined the bushranger with
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a rueful irreverence. Well he ran across a stank that time, mister sanguinary
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Stingery, I couldn't resist returning how he into the bishop, and making myself
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his mouthpiece. I dam let him open his lips. It wasn't the offer
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tree that was worth having. Was the fun of rounding up that congregation on
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the homestead Verandah, and never letting them spot a thing to which shown our
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guns hadn't been a hitch and never would have been of that old bishop had
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run all those miles barefoot of the hot sand, taken us unawares. Made
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with wry humor and philosophic candor alike Germaine to his predicament. These remarks seemed
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natural enough to one knowing little of Stingery. It seemed just the sort of
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things that Stingery would say. The effect, however, was rather to glorify
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bisch Methan at the expense of superintend cans who strove to reverse it with some
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dexterity. You certainly ran against a snag, he repeated, and now your
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mates run against another. Gave the butts of his ready pistol a significant tap.
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But I'm the worst snag than ever I that have you struck, he
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went on in his vainglory. Make no mistake about that. In the worst
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day's work that you ever did in your life, mister sanguinary Stingery, was
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when you dared to play at being little crooked Keynes, Stingery took a first
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look at his man. After all, he was not so crooked on horseback
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as he seemed on foot at dusk. In the Victorian bush, the shump
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was even less pronounced than Stingery had made it on Rosanna. It looked more
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like a ridge of extra muscle across a pair of abnormally broad and powerful shoulders.
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There was the absence of neck, which this deformity suggests was the great
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head, lighted by flashing and indignant eyes that mounted only on its mighty chin.
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The bush ranger was conceded enough to find in the flesh a coarser and
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more common type than that created by himself for the honor of the road,
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but this did not make the real Superintendent a less formidable foe. The most
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poetic Justice murmured Stingery and resumed in an instant his apathetic pose. If you
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jolly well write, if that's what you mean, the Superintendent snarled, you've
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yourself and your own mighty chit to thank for taking me out of my shell
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and putting me on your tracks in earnest. But it was high time than
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you the cut of my jib up here. The fools won't forget me again
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in a hurry. And you, you devil, you shan't forget me till
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your dying day. The Stingery's offside Sergeant Cameron, was also hanging an insulted
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head, but the bushranger laughed softly in his chest. Some one has got
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to do your dirty work, he said, I did at that time,
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and the bishop has done it now. But you shouldn't blame me for helping
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you fellows to bring the murderer to justice. You guide me, said Kane
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through his teeth. I heard all about it. You guide me. Blight
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your soul. Stingery felt that he was missing a strong face, finally convulsed
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with passion, as indeed he was, but he had already committed the indiscretion
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of a repartee, which was scarcely consistent with an attitude of extreme despair.
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For downcast silence seemed the safest policy. After all, it used to be
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forty miles to the corner, he murmured. After a time, can't come
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more than ten? Not so much, snapped the superintendent, going to stop
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for feed at Mazeppa station. That's my business. It's a long day for
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three of you in this heat with two of us, But I mind hang
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heavy on air hands not heavy enough I should have thought. I wonder you
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didn't bring some of the boys from Molfa along with you. Superintendent Cairns braid
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a high, harsh laugh. Yes you wonder, and SA did, they
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said he. But I know a bit too much. There'll always be sympathy
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among scum like them for thicker scum like you. You're too suspicious, said
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Stingery mildly. But I'm seeing the Bishop and the boss. They've gone their
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own way, growled Kens. And it's just as well. It wasn't our
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way, understood now interference from them that had been his attitude on the station.
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Stingery had heard of his rudeness to those to whom the whole credit of
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the capture belonged. The man revealed his character as freely as an angry child,
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and indeed a childish character. It was. Arrogance was at strength and
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weakness. The suggestion had only to be made to call down either the insolence
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of offers or the malice of denial. For denial's sake, I wish you'd
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stop a bit at Mazeppa wine, Stingery, dropping like a candle in the
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heat, the station roofs gleamed through the trees far off the track. Why
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because I'm feeling sick. Dam it. You've got your friends there on yr
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push, but you will camp somewhere in the heat of the day. I
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shall do as I think fit. I shan't can salt ye, my fine
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friend. Stingery drooped and nodded lower and lower, then recovered himself with a
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jerk, like one battling against sleep. The party pushed on for another hour.
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The heat was terrible. The bound men endured torments in their bonds,
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but the nature of the superintendent deformed like his body declared itself duly at ever
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return. And the more one prisoner groaned and the other blasphemed, the greater
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the zest and obduracy of the driving force behind them. Noon passed, the
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scanty shadows lengthened, and how he gave more trouble of an insensate sort.
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They reined up and lashed him tighter. He had actually loosened his cords.
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Distingery seemed passed remonstrance with friend or foe, and his bound body swayed from
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side to side as the little cavalcade went on a decanter to make up for
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lost time. It was leading now with a kindly sergeant, and his mind
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had never been more alert. Behind them thundered the recalcitrant. How he with
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Constable and Superintendent on either side. Then a midway between the Zeppa and clear
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corner, or some fifteen miles from either haunt of men Singer, he pulled
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himself upright in the saddle, as by a superhuman effort, and shook off
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the helping hand that held him by one elbow. He was about to do
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a thing at which even his courage quailed, and he longed for the use
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of his right arm, twas not absolutely bound. The hand and wrist had
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been badly hurt in the Sunday's fray, so badly that it had been easy
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to sham a fracture, would have hand and wristed and splints before the arrival
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of the police. They still hung before him in a sling, his good
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right hand and forearm stiff and sore enough, yet strong and ready at a
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moment's notice. When the moment came, it had not come, and it
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was not coming for a long time. With stingery set, his teeth lurched
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either way, and toppled out of the saddle and the paths of the cantering
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hoofs, his lashed feet held him in the stirrups. The off stirruped,
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ever, had come over with his weight, and there at his horses hoofs
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kicked and trampled and smothered with blood and dust. He dragged like an anchor,
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without sign of life. And it was worse even than it looked.
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For the life never left him for an instant, nor ever for an instant
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did he fail to behave as though it had. Minutes later, when they
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stopped his horse and cut him down from the stirrups and carried him into the
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shade of hotborsh off the track, and with stingery dared to open his eyes.
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He was nearer closing than the force, and the scene swam before him
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with superfluous realism. Jaan's and Cameron dismounted, while the troopers sat aloof,
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with Howie in the saddle, were at high words about their prostrate prisoner.
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What a syllable was lost on stinger. You may put him across the horse
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yourself, said the sergeant. I won't have a hand in it, and
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make sure you haven't killed him, as it is traveling a sick man like
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that killed him he's got his eyes open, cried Cairns in savage triumph.
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Stingrey lay blinking at the sky. Do you still refuse to do your duty?
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Cruelty to animals is no duty of mine, declared the sergeant. Let
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alone my fellow men, bush rangers or no bush rangers, and you,
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funded Cairns at the mounted constable. I'm with the sergeant, said he He's
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had enough, right, cried the Superintendant, producing a notebook and scribbling venomously.
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You both refuse. You will hear more of this. Meanwhile, Sergeant,
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I should like to know what your superior wisdom may be pleased to suggest.
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Send a cart back for him, said Cameron. See the only way
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he's fit to travel. Stingery thought to ro himself upon the elbow of a
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splintered wrist and hand. There are no more bones broken that I know of,
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said he faintly. But I felt bad before, and now I feel
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worse. He looks at two, observed the sergeant. The Stingery, ghastly
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enough beneath his blood and dust, rolled over his back once more, and
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lay effectively with closed eyes. Even the superintendent was impressed. Then what's to
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be done with him? He exclaimed with an oath. What's to be done
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if you ask me, returned Cameron. I should make him comfortable where he
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is. After all, he's a human being and done no murder that we
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should run the risk of murdering them. Leave him to me while you two
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push on with his mate, and one of you can get back with a
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spring cart before sundown. But trust me to look after him till you do.
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Stingery held his breath where he lay. His excitement was not to be
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betrayed by the opening of an eye. Yet he knew that the superintendent was
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looking the sergeant up and down, and he guessed what was passing through that
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suspicious mind. Trust you, rasped the dictatorial voice at last. That's the
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very thing I'm not inclined to do, Sergeant Cameron. Sir, keep your
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temper, Sergeant. I don't say you'd let him go, but I've got
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to remember. This man has twisted you round his finger before to day.
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Let you bite the hand like a blessed old child and passed himself off for
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me. Look at the fellow, look at me, and ask yourself candidly
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if you're the man for the job. But don't ask me unless you want
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my opinion of you a bit plainer. Still, Now you go on with
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the others. The two of you can manage, howie. If you can't,
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you put a bullet through him. This is my man and I'm his
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by the hokey, as he'll know if he tries any of his tricks while
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you're gone. Distingery did not move a muscle. He might have been dead,
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and in his disappointment it was easy to lie as though he were really
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bruised, really battered, really faint and stiff for the sword, to say
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nothing of his bonds. He felt himself physically no match for so young a
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man, with the extra breadth of shoulder and the extra length of arm,
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which were part and parcel of his deformity. With the elderly sergeant, he
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might have had a chance manned man when armed too, but with superindendic cares
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his any weapons were his wits. Lay quite still and reviewed the situation as
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it was, and as it had been in the very moment of his downfall.
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By instinctive presence of mind, he had preserved the use of his right
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hand, and that was a still unsuspected acid of incalculable worth. It had
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been the nucleus of all his plans. Without a hand, he must have
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resigned himself to the inevitable from the first. Then he had split up the
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party. He heard the sergeant and the constable ride off with Howie, exactly
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as he intended two of the three captors to do. His fall alone introduced
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the element of luck. Might have killed or maimed him, but the risk
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had been run with open eyes. Being alive and whole. He had reduced
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the odds from three against two to a man and man. The difference was
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enormous. Even though one man held all the cards against Howie, the odds
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were heavier than ever. But how He was eliminated from present calculations as Stingery
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made them with the upturned face of seeming insensibility. He had a nonchalant step,
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come and go. But you and I was on him all the time,
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and never opened his own till the striking of a match was followed by
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the smell of bush tobacco. The shadow of the hot bush was spreading like
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spilt ink, and for a moment Stingery thought he had it to himself,
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But a wreath of blue smoke hovered overhead when he got to his elbow and
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glanced behind. There sat cairns in his shirt sleeves filling the niche his body
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made in the actual green bush, swollen wet water bag at his feet,
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his revolver against his knees, there was an ominous click. Even his stingeryes
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screwed round where he lay. Give me a drink, he cried at sight
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of the humid canvas bag. Why should I, asked the superintendent, smoking
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on, because I haven't had one since we started, Because I'm pushed for
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thirst part away, cried the creature of suspicion. You can't help yourself,
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and I can't help you with this baby eaten hiss, and he fondled the
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cocked revolver in his hands. Very well, don't give me one, exclaimed
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Stingery, and dealt the moist bag a kick that sent a jet of cold
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water spurting over his foot. He expected to be kicked himself, for that
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was only cursed, and the bag snatched out of his reach, and deep
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he drained before his eyes. How was ganna give you, sam said Kair,
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smacking his lips. Now your tongue may hang out before I do.
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Stingery left the last word with the foe. It was part of his preconceived
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policy. He still regretted his solitary retort, but not for a moment the
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more petulant act which he had just committed. His boots had been removed after
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his fall. One of his socks was now wet through. He spent the
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next few minutes in taking it off with the other foot. The lengthy process
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seemed to afford his mind a certain pensive entertainment. It was a shapely and
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delicate white foot that lay stripped at last, a foot that its owner,
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with nothing better to do, could contemplate with legitimate satisfaction. But Superintendent Cairns,
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noting his prisoner's every look, putting his own confident interpretation on the wall,
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cursed him afresh for a conceited pig, and filled another pipe with the
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revolver for an instant by his side. Stonery took no interest in his proceedings.
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The revolver he especially ignored, and they stretched before his captor, one
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sock off and one sock on, one arm in splints and sling, and
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the other bound to his ribs. A model prisoner whose last thought was of
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escape. His legs indeed were free, but a man who could not sit
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on a horse was not the man to run away. And then there was
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the relentless Superintendent sitting over him, pipe and mouth, but revolver again in
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hand, and a crooked finger very near the trigger. The fiery wilderness still
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lay breathless in the great heat, but the lengthening shadow of the hot bush
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was now a thing to be thankful for, and in it the broken captive
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fell into a fine semblance of natural slumber. Cairns watched with alternate envy and
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suspicion. For him, there could not be a wink. The most likely
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the fellow was shedmming all the time. No rusover succeeded in exposing the sham.
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The Superintendent copied by breathing, first heavily and then stertoriously, with one
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eye open and on his man Stingarey never opened one of his. There was
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no change in the regular breathing, the peaceful expression of the blood stained face,
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the sleep the man must be. The Superintendent's own experiments had gone to
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show him that no extremity need necessarily keep one awake in such heat. His
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stifled a yawn that was no part of his performance. His pipe was out,
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he struck a match noisily on his boot. The Stingery just stirred,
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as naturally as any infant. But Stingery's senses were incredibly acute. He smelt
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every whiff of the rekindled pipe yew to ten seconds when it went out once
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more, and listened in an agony for another match. None was struck.
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Was the Superintendent himself really asleep this time? He breathed as though he were,
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but so did Stingaree. Yet there was hope in the fact that his
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own greatest struggle all this time had been against the very thing he feigned.
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At last, he opened one eye a little. It was met by no
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answering furtive glance. He opened the other, and there could be no more
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doubt. The terrible Superintendent was dozing in his place. But it was the
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lightest sort of doze. The eyes were scarcely closed, and all but watching
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Stingaree as the cock revolved from the relaxed hand, all but covered him.
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The prisoner felt that for the moment he was unseen, forgotten, that the
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lightest movement of his body would open those terrible eyes once and for all.
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It remembered that he was lying under them. Lengthwise on the bound arm,
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with the arm and the sling uppermost, and easily to be freed, And
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yet the most salient part of the recumbent figure, and that on which the
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hidden eyes still seemed fixed for all their lids. To make the least movement
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there, to attempt the slowest withdrawal of hand and arm, was to court
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the last disaster of discovery in such an act. But to lie motionless down
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to the thighs, and to execute a flank movement with the leg uppermost was
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a far less perilous exploit. It was the leg with the bare foot.
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Every detail had been foreseen, and now at last the bare foot hovered over
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the revolver and the hand at held, while the upper man lay yet like
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a log under those drowsy, dreadful eyes. Stingery took a last look,
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the barrel drooping from the slackened hand. The back of the hand lay on
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the ground. The muzzle of the barrel was filled with sand, Yet the
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anger was such that it was by no means sure whether a bullet would bury
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itself in the sand or in Stingery. He took the risk. With bare
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toe touched the trigger sharply, the a horrible explosion. It brought the drowsy
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superintendent to his senses, and with such a jerk that it was as though
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the smoking pistol leaped out of his hand a thing alive, and so into
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the hand that flashed to meet it from the sling. And almost in the
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same second, while the double cloud of smoke and sand still hung between them,
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Stingery sprang from the ground an armed man. Once more, sit where
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you are, he thundered, up with those hands before I shook them to
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shreds. Your life's in less danger than mine has been all day. But
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I'll wing you limb by limb if you offer to budge. With uplifted hands
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above his ears, the deformed officer sat with heads and shoulders depressed to the
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semblance of one's sphere. Not a syllable did he utter, but his upturned
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eyes shot indomitable fires. Stingery stood wriggling and fumbling at the coil which bound
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his left arm to his side. Suddenly the revolver went off, as if
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by accident, but so much by design, that there dangled two ends of
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rope, cut and burned asunder by lead and powder, And less than a
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minute the bushranger was unbound, and before the minute was up, he leaped
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upon the Superintendent's thoroughbred, been tethered all this time to a tree, swishing
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his tails with the station hack which Stingery had ridden as a captive. He
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now rode the thoroughbred and led the hack to the very feet of the humiliated
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cans. Oh thank you for that water bag, said Stingery. I much
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oblige, and now I'll trouble you for that nice wide awake. You really
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don't need it in the shade. Thank you so much. He received both
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bag and hat on the barrel of the government revolver, hooking the one to
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its proper saddle strap and clapping on the other at an angle inimitably imitative of
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the outwitted officer. I won't carry the rehearsal any further to your face,
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continued Stingery. But I can at least promise your more flattering portrait than the
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last. And this excellent coat, which you have soken considerably less strapped to
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your saddle, should contribute greatly to the very similitude. Dare I hope that
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you begin to appreciate some of the points of my performance so far as it
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has gone the pretext on which I bared my foot for its delicate job under
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your very eyes, Eh, not so vain as it looked in either sense.
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I fancy should you have said that your hand would recoil from a revolver
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the moment it went off. You see, I staked my life on it,
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and I've won. What about that fall? It was the lottery.
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I was prepared to have my head cracked like an egg, and it's still
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pretty sore. The broken wrist wasn't your fault. It passed into the accepted
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situation before you turned up, and you would certainly have seen that I was
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shamming sleep if we hadn't both been so genuinely sleepy at the time. Give
27:48
you my word, only you threw up the whole thing for forty winks any
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other point on which you could wish enlightenment. Then let me thank you with
27:56
all my heart for one of the worst days and some of the greatest moments
28:02
in my whole career. The crooked man answered, never a word, as
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he sat in a ball with uplifted palms and glearing, upturned, unconquerable eyes.
28:12
Good Bye, mister siperintend at Ken's said Stingery. I'm afraid I've been
28:17
rather cruel to you, but you were never very nice to me. Sergeant
28:22
Cameron was driving the spring cart towards sundown after a variety of unforeseen delays.
28:27
Of a sudden, out of the pink haze came the galloping figure, slightly
28:32
humped in the inspector's coat and wide awake, with a bare foot through one
28:36
stirrup and only a sock on its fellow, where Stingery screamed the sergeant pulling
28:42
up, and the galloper drew rein at the driven horse's head dead, said
28:48
he thickly. He was worse than we thought. You'll fetch him while I
28:52
this time. The sergeant knew that voice too well, and his right hand
28:56
had flown to the back of his belt. Stingery's shot was only first by
29:00
a fraction of a second, but had put a bullet through the brain of
29:03
the horse between the shafts, so that horse and shafts came down together,
29:07
and the sergeant fired into the earth. As he fell across the splashboard.
29:11
Stingery pressed soft heels into the thoroughbred's ribs and thundered on and on. Soon
29:18
there was a gate to open. When he listened at that gate, all
29:21
was still behind him, and before a fire ahead. The rolling plane was
29:25
faintly luminous in the dusk. As was deepened to night, a cluster of
29:29
terrestrial lights sprang out with the stars. The Stingery knew the handful of gaunt,
29:33
unsheltered huts the light stood for there were an inn, a store,
29:37
and police barracks clear corner on the map. The bushranger galloped straight up to
29:44
the barracks, but skirted the knot of men and the light before the verandah.
29:47
And when jingling round into the yard, the young constable in charge ran
29:52
through the building and met him dismounted at the back. Was the matter,
29:56
sir, he's gone, stinger eye. He's worse than we thought. Your
30:02
man all right now, trouble whatever, sir, only sick and sorry in
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saying his prayers, and away you'd never credit come and hear him. I
30:10
must come and see him at once. Got a fresh horse, and though
30:11
I have so in saddled in the stall, I thought you might want one,
30:15
sir, ran up bar Maid Stingery's own mare that was sent out here
30:18
from the station when we had the news that was very thoughtful of you.
30:23
You'll get on, young man, now lead the wave of that lamp.
30:27
This time Stingery had spoken and gasped like a man who had ridden very far.
30:32
And the young constable, unlike as sergeant, did not know his voice
30:34
of old, it has struck him at the last moment as more unlike the
30:40
voice of surprotend Cairns than the hardest riding should have made it. And with
30:44
the key in the door of the cell, the young fellow wheeled round and
30:48
held the lamp on high. That instant he was fell to the floor.
30:52
For that went down and out with a separate yet simultaneous crash, and Stingery
30:56
turned the key. Howie, not a word after come the burly ruffian crept
31:03
forth with outstretched hands apart what not even handcuffed? Now turned everid you leafed
31:11
the moment we left you, and been praying like a parson for him all
31:15
to hear this chap to know the same when he comes to himself eyes pretty
31:18
still, doesn't he in with him? The door clanged, the key was
31:22
turned, Stingery popped it into his pocket. Later they'd let him out the
31:27
better. Here's the best mount you ever had and my sweetheart's waiting for me
31:33
in the stable outside in front before the barracks, Veranda, an inquisitive little
31:37
group heard first the clang of the door within, and presently the clatter of
31:41
hoofs coming around the yard. Stingery and Howie. A white flash and a
31:47
bay streak swept past them as they stood confounded, and the dwindling pair still
31:52
bobbed in sight under a full compliment of stars, when a fresh outcry from
31:56
the cell and a mighty hammering against us lock door broke the truth to one
32:01
and all. End of Chapter eight