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LITTLE LIZ

by B. L. Farjeon

B. L. Farjeon (1838-1903) is best known these days as the father of the well-known children’s author, Eleanor Farjeon, whose ghost story ‘Faithful Penny Dove’ has often been anthologised. Benjamin Leopold Farjeon came to Australia from London in 1854 and spent seven years on the Victorian goldfields. In 1861 he went to New Zealand and worked for a newspaper before publishing Shadows on the Snow: A Christmas Story (1866), which he dedicated to Charles Dickens. Dickens responded encouragingly to the book and Farjeon promptly returned to England to make his name as a writer.

He wrote over fifty books, many of them crime and mystery stories, some of them with Australian content. He also wrote many novels of the supernatural and occult, including Devlin the Barber (1888), A Strange Enchantment (1889), The Last Tenant (1893), Something Occurred (1893), The Mesmerists (1900), and The Clairvoyante (1905). ‘Little Liz’ is a harrowing tale from his elusive first book, Shadows on the Snow. This version is from a reprint published in 1867.

When the Victorian gold-fever was at its height, people were mad with excitement. Neither more nor less, I was as mad as the others, although I came to the colony from California, which was suffering from the same kind of fever, and which was pretty mad, too, in its way. But Victoria beat it hollow; for one reason, perhaps, because there was more of it. The strange sights I saw and the strange stories I could tell, if I knew how to do it, would fill a dozen books. In my time I have lived all sorts of lives and have worked with all sorts of mates, picked up in a rough-and-tumble kind of way, which was about the only way then that mates picked up each other. One day you did not know the man that the next day you were hob-a-nob with. I had some strange mates, as you may guess, but the strangest I ever worked with, and the one I liked more than all the others put together, was Bill Trickett. Bill was as thin as a lath and as tall as a maypole, and had come to the colony under a cloud. I don’t mean by that that he had done anything wrong at home, and was sent out at the expense of the Government, like a heap of others I mated with; but he was obliged to run away from England for a reason I didn’t know when I picked him up, but which I learnt afterwards. He had brought his wife out with him—a poor, weak, delicate creature, who died soon after he landed, leaving behind her a baby, a little girl, the only child they had. This child Bill left with some people in Melbourne, and came on to the gold-diggings to try his luck. I was working at that time in Dead-dog Gully, near Forest Creek, which was just then discovered, and Bill and me came together as mates. A better one, to do his share of the work and a little bit over, I should be unreasonable to wish for. I never had anything to complain of. On the contrary. He never shirked his work, seeming to like it more than anything else in the world. And once, when I was laid up with colonial fever—some of you have had a touch of it, I daresay, and know how it pulls a man down—he nursed me with the tenderness of a woman, and worked the claim without a murmur. Those are things one doesn’t easily forget. Soon after I got well our claim was worked out, and we had to look elsewhere for another; for every inch of Dead Dog was taken up. I remember well the night we parted. We were sitting in our tent, Bill and me, with our gold before us and our revolvers at full cock on the table. We had to look out pretty sharp in those days, mates. Many’s the man who has been robbed and disposed of, without any one being the wiser; many’s the man that has been murdered, and thrown down deserted shafts. Queer things were done on the diggings during the first fit of the fever, that human tongue will never speak of. Murder will out, they say; that isn’t quite true. I’ve seen some sights that make me shiver to think of, the secret of which will only be known on the Day of Judgment.

Well, we were sitting there, with our gold before us. Our claim had been a rich one, and we had three hundred ounces to divide, after all our sprees—and we had a few, I can tell you.

“Tom,” said Bill, as he sat looking at the gold, “if I had had as much money as that when I was in the old country, I should never have come out to the gold-fields, and my dear wife would not have died.”

“That’s more than you can say for a certainty,” I answered.

“Not a bit of it,” he said; “my wife would have been alive, and we should have been living happily together. I’ll tell you how it was. I was a contractor in a small way at home, and had lots of up-hill work, for I commenced with nothing. While I was courting Lizzie, an old hunks of a money-lender wanted to marry my girl. She had a nice time of it, poor lass! With her father on one side trying to persuade her to marry the old hunks, and me on the other, begging her to be faithful to me. But I had no need to do that. There was only one way out of the difficulty; we ran away, and got married without their knowing. We were as happy as the days were long, and should have remained so, but for the old money-lending thief. To spite me for taking the girl from him, he bought up all my debts—about three hundred pounds worth—and almost drove me mad. And one morning I caught the villain in the act of insulting my Liz. I didn’t show him any mercy; I beat him till he was sore, and then I kicked him out of the house. The next day the bailiffs were on the look-out to arrest me for debt, and I had to run for my liberty. He sold me up, root and branch, and turned my wife into the streets, and we came together to Liverpool, where Lizzie was confined. I tried hard to get work, but couldn’t; starvation or the workhouse was before us. All my chances at home were gone, and there was nothing for it but emigration. I shipped before the mast, and a friend assisted me to pay Lizzie’s passage in the steerage. A fortnight after we were out at sea, she told me that the doctor who attended her in her confinement had said that a long sea voyage would probably be the death of her. His words came true; she died within the year. So, you see, if I had had my share of that gold at home, I could have paid that damned old scoundrel, and my wife would not have died. I want to get a heap of gold, and go home and ruin him. I should die contented then.”

He rose, and walked up and down the tent, cursing the man who, he believed, had killed his wife.

“I tell you what, Tom,” he said, after a bit, “I shall tramp to Melbourne to see my little daughter, and then I shall go prospecting. There are places, I’ll stake my life, where the gold can be got in lumps, and I mean to find them out. I dreamt the other night that I came upon it in the rock, and that I had to cut it out with a chisel.”

I didn’t like the idea of losing my mate, and I did my best to persuade him not to go; but I might as well have talked to a lamp-post. So we divided the gold, shook hands, and the next morning he started on the tramp to Melbourne.

I didn’t see or hear anything of him for a good many months after this; and somehow or other, when I lost him I lost my luck. Every shaft I bottomed turned out a duffer. I could hardly earn tucker. I worked in Jackass Gully, Donkey-woman’s Gully, Pegleg, Starvation Point, Choke’m Gully, Dead-horse Gully, and at last made my way to Murdering Flat—nice, sociable names!—pretty well down on my luck. I had been in Murdering Flat three weeks, and was sitting alone in my tent one night, reckoning up things. In those three weeks I hadn’t made half-an-ounce of gold, and there wasn’t two pennyweights in my match-box—so that I didn’t feel over amiable. That day, I had been particularly unlucky, having made about three grains of gold, which I flung away in a rage. I was just thinking whether I mightn’t just as well go to the grog-shanty, and have a drink—it was past nine o’clock at night—when who should walk straight into my tent but my old mate, Bill. I scarcely knew him at first; for he had let his hair grow all over his face, and he was almost covered with it, up to his eyes and down to his breast.

“Bill!” I cried, jumping up.

“Yes, it’s me, Tom,” he said. “Are you alone?”

“Yes, Bill.”

“Stop here, then, till I come back, and don’t let anybody in but me.”

He went out, and returned in about ten minutes with a beautiful little girl in his arms.

“Hush!” he said, stepping softly. “Speak low. She’s asleep.”

She wasn’t above six years old but she was so pretty, and looked so like a little angel—such as I never expected to see under my roof—that I fell in love with her at once. Of course I was a bit surprised when he brought her in, and he couldn’t help observing it as he laid her carefully upon my stretcher.

“This is my little girl, Tom,” he said, answering my look. “If I ever go to heaven, I shall have her to thank for it. She is my good angel.”

“Where are you come from?” I asked, after we had covered the pretty fairy with a blanket. He looked cautiously round, as though he feared some one was in hiding, and then, sitting opposite me at the table, rested his chin on his hands, and said, in a whisper,

“I’ve found it, Tom!”

There was such an awful glare in his eyes that I felt quite scared as I asked him what it was he had found.

“I’ve found the place where the gold comes from,” he said, in the same sort of hoarse whisper. “I am on it, Tom! I knew I should find it at last. Look here.”

First going to the door, to see that no one could get in without warning, he pulled from his breast-pocket a nugget of pure gold that must have weighed near upon seventy ounces, and five or six others, from fifteen to twenty ounces each. Lord! how my heart beat as I handled them, and how I wished I could drop across some of the same kidney! I don’t know how it is with you, mates; but although I don’t believe I value the gold much when I’ve got it, there’s no pleasure in life so great to me as coming suddenly upon a rich patch. I think the sight of bright shining gold at the bottom of a dark shaft is one of the prettiest in the world.

“Is that good enough for you?” he asked, as he put the nuggets back into his pocket.

I laughed.

“Any more where they came from, Bill?”

“More than you could carry.”

I stared at him, believing he had gone mad. “It’s true. How are you doing?”

“I can’t make tucker, Bill. My luck’s dead out.”

“It’s dead in now,” said he; “I’ve come to put fifty ounces a day in your pocket. What do you say? Will you go mates with me again?”

That was a nice question, wasn’t it, to put to a hard-up digger, without an ounce of gold in his match-box?

“Will I, old fellow?” I cried. “Will I not! When shall we start?”

“Stop a minute, Tom,” he said gravely. “I’ve something to say to you first. I want you for a mate again, and shall be glad to have you; but we’ve got to strike a bargain. You see my little girl there?”

I nodded.

“She is the blood of my heart! I am like a plant, Tom, which would wither if deprived of God Almighty’s blessed dew. She is my dew. If anything was to happen to her I should wither, and rot, and die. I want you for my mate, because I believe you to be honest and true. And I am going to show you a place where the gold grows—a place which, of my own free will, I would not show to another man in the world. I have hunted it and tracked it, never heeding the danger I have run. But do you know, Tom, that since I have had my little pet with me”—and he laid his hand, O, so gently upon her cheek!—“all my recklessness and courage seem to have gone clean out of me. For it is her life I am living now, not my own! And I think what will become of her if I die before my time—if I should slip down a shaft, or it should tumble in upon me, or I should fall ill of a fever, or anything of that sort should happen to me that would deprive her of a protector. These thoughts haunt me day and night, and presentiments come over me sometimes that fill me with fears I can’t express. Now, Tom, listen to me. The place I am going to take you to will make you rich. If we can keep it to ourselves for a few months—(though there is another in the secret, but he won’t peach, for his own sake)—we shall get at least five thousand ounces—perhaps double as much: there’s no telling whether we sha’n’t drop across a mountain of gold. Now, lay your hand upon your heart, and swear by all you hold dearest that if anything should happen to me, you will take care of my little darling, and be a second father to her when I am gone!”

I bent over the dear little one’s face—I can feel her sweet breath again upon my cheek—and kissed her. She stirred in her sleep, and smiled. Then I said,

“That kiss is a sacrament, Bill. By all that’s holy, I will be a second father to your little girl, should she need me. So help me, God!”

He took my hand, and the big tears rolled down his beard. It was full five minutes before he was calm enough to speak.

“Now I’ll tell you all about it. You remember my leaving you to go to Melbourne, after we had worked out our claim in Dead-dog Gully. Well, when I got there, I found that my little girl was not being well treated. The people she was living with had taken to drink, and had neglected her. And my heart so grew to her—I can see my Lizzie’s face in hers—that I made up my mind never to leave her again. So, when I was ready to start, I brought her away with me, and we’ve travelled together, since that time, I don’t know how many hundreds of miles.”

“How in the world did you manage it?” I asked, in wonder. “The little thing couldn’t walk!”

“And if she could,” he answered, “do you think I would have let her blister her pretty feet? My darling! Manage it, Tom! Sometimes I carried her, and I got her odd lifts, now and then, upon the drays and wagons going our way. There was never a drayman or a wagoner that refused to give my little girl a ride, and that wasn’t sorry to part with her—good luck to them! Why, some of them came miles out of their way for her sake, and would never take anything for it but a kiss from her pretty lips! And do you know, Tom,” he said, “she saved me from the bushrangers once. We were in the Black Forest, and they were on me before I knew where I was. We had just finished tea, and I was stooping over the log-fire to get a light for my pipe, so that the little girl was hidden from them at first. I turned, with my heart in my mouth—not for myself, Tom; for her—and looked at them. There were four of them, splendidly mounted, dressed in red serge shirts and bright silk sashes.

“Stand!” they cried, levelling their revolvers at me; “stand, for your life!”

Well, my girl jumps up, and runs to my side, and takes hold of my hand. They were dumbfounded.

“Well, I’m damned!” said one, under his breath; and then in a louder tone, “is that yours, mate?”

“Yes,” I answered, looking into their faces for pity. Upon that, they put up their pistols, and one of the men got off his horse, and came close to us.

“Don’t be frightened, little one,” he said.

“I’m not frightened,” lisped my pet, playing with the fringe of his red silk sash.

“I’m not going to harm her, mate,” he said to me; and he knelt before my darling, and put her pretty hands on his eyes, and kissed them again and again. “If every man had an angel like this by his side,” he said softly, “it would be the better for him.” Then he took off his sash, and tied it round my girl’s waist; and I had to lift her up to the other men to kiss them. That being done, they wished me good-night, and rode off. That was a lucky escape, wasn’t it? However, after a time I found I couldn’t get along as quickly as I wanted, and besides, when I was on the track of the gold I’ve discovered, I had to travel through country where I didn’t meet with drays or wagons. So I bought a wheelbarrow.”

“A wheelbarrow?” I cried, more and more surprised.

“Yes, Tom,” he said, with a comical look; “a wheelbarrow; and I put my little darling in it, and wheel her wherever I want to go. Well, to get along with my story, I came one day to the place where I’m working now, and where I want you to join me. Directly I saw it, I knew the gold was there, and I put up my tent. Before the week was out, I had a hundred ounces. I went to a cattle-station about twelve miles off, and bought a stock of provisions. Then I set to work in earnest. The whole place is a great gold-bed; wherever you dig, it peeps up at you with its bright eyes. There’s plenty of quartz on the hills, and you can’t search five minutes without finding it. At the top there’s more quartz than gold; deep down, I’ll lay my life there’s more gold than quartz. I worked by myself in this gully for four weeks, making about a hundred ounces a week, when one day, as I was panning out the gold in the creek hard by, I saw a man looking at me. He had wandered by accident to the place, and had discovered me working. My mind was made up in a minute. I took him for my mate, so that the secret might be kept, and we worked together till the day before yesterday.”

“What has become of him, then?” I asked.

“O, he’s there still, getting gold, but not so much as he might if he was one of the right sort. For I know of a gully that’s worth a dozen of the one we’ve been working in, and I don’t intend that he shall put a pick in it. No, Tom, that’s for you and me. I haven’t parted from him without good reason. My little darling never liked him from the first, and would never let him kiss her. Then there’s Rhadamanthus—”

“Rhadamanthus!”

“Don’t be scared, Tom. It’s only a dog, that was given to me by a drunken scholar—or rather, given to Lizzie in the bush—on the condition that we were always to call him Rhadamanthus—which we do, though at first it was a jaw-breaker. Then, as I say, there’s Rhadamanthus. He won’t let this mate of mine that was, come near him; snaps at him; snarls like the very devil if he tries to pat him on the head. That’s a kind of instinct I believe in. And Lizzie’s is a kind of instinct that I’d stake salvation on. But I put up with the fellow till a week ago. He wanted Lizzie to kiss him, and she wouldn’t. He tried to force her, and I came upon them when she was struggling in his arms, screaming out to me for help. I helped her—and helped him, to the soundest thrashing he ever made acquaintance with. I broke with him then and there, and came away in search of you, pretty certain I should be able to find you. You’re pretty well known, Tom.”

“And Rhada—”

“Manthus. Out with it, Tom! It’ll come as easy as butter soon.”

“Where is he?”

“Outside in the bush, a couple of hundred yards away, keeping watch over the wheelbarrow. I want to start right away; we’ll have to be careful that we’re not followed.”

“I’m ready this minute, Bill,” I said. “I’ll just take my blankets and tools. I’ll leave the tent up; it’ll keep off suspicion.”

I wasn’t long getting ready, and Bill, lifting his little girl from the bed, held her, still asleep, tenderly to his breast, and led the way into the bush, where Rhadamanthus and the wheelbarrow were waiting for us.

Rhadamanthus, the raggedest dog that ever breathed, with the most disgraceful tail that ever wagged, fixed his eyes upon me in a kind of way that said, “Now, what sort of a chap are you?” We laid pretty little Liz in the wheelbarrow, making her snug, and covering her up warm. Her face, as she lay asleep in the wheelbarrow, had a curious effect upon me. Made me choke a bit, as I’m doing now. When she was snugly tucked in, I kissed her, and a sweet and new feeling crept into my heart as once more she smiled at my kiss.

“It’s a trick of hers,” said Bill; she always smiles in her sleep when any one kisses her that she likes. God bless you, Tom!”

“All right, mate,” said I.

“Rhadamanthus sidled up to me, and licked my hand.

We travelled the whole of that night, taking it in turns to wheel little Liz, who slept soundly all the time. Rhadamanthus trudged along by our side, watching his child-mistress with true affection in his eyes. It was a beautiful star-lit night, and everything about us was quiet and peaceful. The scenes through which we passed were full of strange beauty to me, who had hitherto looked upon them with a careless eye. Now and again in the distance we saw a camp-fire burning, with the diggers lying around it; and occasionally we heard the tinkling of bells on the necks of horses who stumbled about with hobbles on their feet, while their drivers were sleeping between the shafts of the wagons, walled round with canvas, on beds of dry leaves. We kept out of the track of men as much as we could, and met with no obstacles on the road that we did not easily overcome. We had to lift the wheelbarrow over fallen logs sometimes, and once over a creek, and we did it gently, without disturbing our little one. That walk through the solemn and lovely woods was to me very much like a prayer. When we made our way through the tall straight trees of silverbark—when I looked up at the wonderful brightness of the heavens, which filled the woods with lovely light, among which the shadows played like living things—when upon a distant hill I saw a flock of sheep asleep, with the moon shining clear upon them—and when I gazed at the peaceful and beautiful face of the child asleep in the barrow—I could scarcely believe that it was not all a dream. The remembrance of that night’s tramp has never left me, and its lessons remain. Too often, mates, do we walk through life, blind to the signs.

During the day we camped, and took it in turns to sleep, and on the third night we came to the end of our journey. We had had three or four hours’ heavy up-hill work, but I didn’t feel tired a bit. My body was as light as my heart.

“Over that range, Tom,” said Bill, “and we’re there.”

It was the steepest of all the ranges, and took us a time getting to the top, and then, looking down, I saw a great natural basin, shut in by high hills. You would have thought there was no outlet from it, unless you climbed over the hills which surrounded it; but when you got down, you discovered a number of artful little turns and windings, which led to gullies and smaller basins which you could not discern from the heights. We had to wake little Liz, as there was some danger wheeling the barrow down so steep an incline. She jumped out quite bright, and let me carry her some distance. If she had been my own child, I could not have felt more tender towards her. Presently Bill pointed out his tent, and said he should not wonder if his old mate were sleeping in it. Sure enough, when we were within six yards of the tent, he rushed out with a revolver in his hand, and fired at Rhadamanthus, who had sprung at him the moment he made his appearance.

“Lie down, Rhad!” cried Bill, pushing the dog away with his foot; “and you, Ted, drop that revolver, or I’ll wring your neck for you!”

Almost on the words, Bill leaped at the fellow, wrested the revolver from his hand, and sent him spinning a dozen yards away. It was not done a moment too soon, for I believe he was about to fire on us. He was a desperate-looking fellow was Teddy the Tyler. A white-faced, white-livered, flat-footed bully. I heard some queer stories about him afterwards.

“You murdering villain, you!” said Bill, as Teddy the Tyler rose from the ground with an evil look, and tightened his belt. “Do you know you might have shot my little girl?”

Little Liz was clinging to her father, trembling in every limb.

“A good job if I had,” muttered Teddy the Tyler.

Bill strode quickly up to him, and seizing him by the collar, forced him to the ground by dint of sheer muscular strength.

“If ever again you raise your hand,” he said, between his clenched teeth, “against me, or my little girl, or my mate, or my dog—you so much as lift your finger against them, say good-bye to the world. I’ll break your infernal back for you, as sure as the Lord’s in heaven!”

“What do you bring loafers into the gully for?” growled Teddy.

“That’s my business,” answered Bill. “I discovered this place, and I’ve a right to bring a friend. This is my mate now. Call him a loafer again, and I’ll knock your ugly teeth down your throat; keep a civil tongue in your head, and I’ll not interfere with you. I make you a present of this gully, every inch of it.” Teddy’s face brightened. “I know where there’s a richer one—ah, you may stare, but you’ll not put your foot in it! To-morrow I shall take my tent away, and you can work here by yourself till you rot, if you like. I don’t think you’re fool enough to get the place rushed, for that would put an end to your little game. Pick up the revolver, Tom, and stick it in your belt. It’s mine. And throw out of the tent everything that belongs to the thief.”

I carried his blankets and clothes out to him, and threw them at his feet.

“There’s something else in there belonging to me,” he said. “My neckerchief.”

I found it, and flung it to him. A bright-coloured neckerchief, which he slung about his neck, sailor fashion. The light of the moon shone upon it, and I noticed particularly the combination of bright colours in which it was woven.

As he gathered up his things he had a parting word to say, and he spit it out with foam about his lips, like the hound he was.

“I’ll make this the worst night’s work you have ever done! You shall cry blood for the way you’ve served me! By this, and this, I swear it!”

He wiped the foam from his mouth, and, flicking it to the ground with a snap of his fingers, walked slowly away.

We took no further notice of him, but putting the chain on Rhadamanthus, we went into the tent, and lay down till morning.

We were up with the lark, and out. As we passed along the gully, I noticed that Teddy the Tyler had put up a sort of mimi, and that he was asleep under it.

“Now then, Tom,” said my mate, “I’ll show you something that will open your eyes. That fool there knows nothing about it. I discovered the place three weeks ago, and held my tongue, having my doubts of him.”

Coming to the end of the gully we walked over a pretty considerable rise in the land, Bill leading the way, through more than one heavy clump of timber on the other side. We might have walked half a mile through thick clusters of trees, when Bill clapped his hand upon my eyes, and told me to close them. We might have walked a hundred yards further, when he took his hand away, saying we were there. It was a strange-looking spot, completely hidden by wood-growth; a piece of land that appeared to have been scooped out of the hills, in the exact shape of a saddle.

“Look around you,” said Bill; “see the hills, every one of them, shelving down into this hollow. Look at the veins of quartz, auriferous every bit of it, all running down to one point. Here’s a piece of the stone”—picking it up—“with gold in it, here’s another with more gold in it. That’s evidence. Now take your fossicking knife, and dig up some of the earth at the trunk of that tree with the large spreading roots. Dig into the roots. I thought as much. You can see the gold in it without spectacles. The stuff there’ll yield an ounce to the tin dish. Why is the gold just at that spot? Because it has slid down the heights with the rains, and the roots of that tree have caught some of it in its descent, and held it fast in crevices. This hollow beneath us contains all the gold that has been washed for ages off these golden hills, and it is all ours—all ours, every ounce of it!” He was on the ground, showing me proof of his theory in small lumps of gold that he dug out here and there. “Tom, kneel down here by my side, and I’ll tell you why I worship it.” He held it in the palm of his hand, and gazed with glowing eyes upon it. “I see this educating her; I see this making her fit to hold her own with the best lady in the land; I see it bring smiles to her lips, roses to her cheeks; I see her doing good with it; I see her, the light of my days, removed from the hard trials that make life so sad to many; I see lifelong joy and happiness in it for my pretty Liz, my pretty, pretty Liz!”

He let the gold fall to the ground, and hid his face in his hands. I understood then how perfect love can be.

We returned to the old gully, and carried away our tent and all that belonged to us. Before night we had our fireplace built, and our tent fixed in a spot where it would be secure from floods. The next day we set to work.

Bill was a true prophet. The hollow was heavy with gold. We did not find a regular gutter of it, though Bill said if we sank deep we should be sure to come upon one; but within a few feet of the surface, and sometimes almost on the surface, we lighted upon rich pockets of gold. Talk of jewellers’ shops! This dirty hollow took the shine out of all of them. And as day after day went away, and our bags of gold got heavier and heavier, we laid plans for the future. We were to go home and buy a farm; Liz was to be educated and grow into a beautiful young woman and get married, and we were all to live together and take care of the children—how the little one laughed when we came to this part of the story! for we spoke freely before her;—it was all settled, and certain to come true. Those five weeks that we lived together were the happiest of my life. Liz was like a star in our tent, and made everything bright and beautiful. We all worshipped her—Bill, me, and Rhadamanthus—and lived in her, so to speak. The tricks she played, the stories she had to tell, the discoveries she made, gladdened the days, and drew our hearts closer and closer to her. One day she saw a rock exactly the shape of a goat’s face and beard, and we had to go with her and christen it, “Goat’s Rock”; another day she picked up a beautiful crystal, which she declared was a charm to keep everything bad away; another day she found a new kind of wild-flower, which she prattled over in the quaintest and prettiest fashion; another day she discovered that Rhadamanthus was a fairy who had changed himself into a dog to take care of her. The faithful, ragged beast! She announced the amazing discovery to him in the most impressive manner, kneeling before him, and putting his paws on her shoulders, the while he looked into her face, and blinked in confirmation. A baize partition separated the compartment in which she slept from ours, and one night, when I heard her, before going to bed, lisping her prayer that God would bless dear father and dear Tom and Rhad, my thoughts went back to the time when I, too, prayed before I went to sleep. On Sundays we would take a walk, and Bill, in the evening, would read a chapter from a Bible he had—which him, nor me, nor Rhad, would ever have thought of but for our dear little angel. Those Sundays, with Bill, and the little girl, and the ragged, faithful dog, are never out of my mind. I wish I had always spent my Sundays in the same way.

During this time we had only seen Teddy the Tyler once. About a fortnight after we started working he strolled upon us. A tin dish with nearly a pound of gold in it was lying on the ground, and he threw a woefully covetous look at it. He had his pick and shovel hanging over his shoulder, and walking past us he stuck his pick in the ground, and tucked up his shirt-sleeves.

Bill, following him, took the pick and shovel, and pitched them a dozen yards off.

“I told you you shouldn’t come into this gully,” he said.

“It’s as much mine as yours,” replied Teddy the Tyler. “I mean to fight for it, mate, at all events.”

“That’s fairly spoken,” said Bill. “Fight you shall, and if you lick me, we’ll give you this gully, and get another. Tom, come and see fair play.”

To it they went. But Teddy might as well have stood up against a rock as against my mate. Bill was the strongest man I ever knew, and he gave Teddy such an awful thrashing that he threw up his arms in less than a quarter of an hour.

“Had enough, mate?” asked Bill.

Teddy shouldered his pick, and walked away without a word, throwing a devil’s look behind him as he went.

“He’d murder the lot of us, Bill,” I said, “if we gave him a chance.”

“Daresay,” said Bill; “we won’t give it to him.”

In eleven weeks we got eleven hundred ounces of gold, and then a thing happened that makes my blood turn cold to speak of. I started one night to get a stock of provisions. We used to start in the night so that we shouldn’t be discovered, and when we made our appearance at the cattle station early in the morning for meat and flour, the people there didn’t suspect we had been walking all the previous night. I was pretty well the whole day getting back, for I had to be cautious, to prevent being followed. Within half a mile of our gully I met Bill, with a ghost’s face on him, and looking as if he had gone mad in my absence.

Running towards me, he said wildly,

“Tom, for God’s sake answer me quickly! Have you seen Lizzie?”

“Not since last night,” I said, with an uncomfortable feeling at Bill’s wild manner.

“She’s lost! She’s lost!” he screamed.

“Lost!”

“I’ve been hunting for her all the day. O my pet, my darling! if I don’t find you, may the world be burned, and all that’s in it!”

I was almost as mad as he was, for you know I loved the little thing as if she were my own daughter.

“Keep cool, Bill,” I said, as quietly as I could, though I felt my words trembling with the trembling of my lips; “if we want to do any good, we mustn’t lose our wits.”

“I know, I know!” he said, beating his hands together; “but what am I to do—what am I to do?”

“When did you miss her?”

“This morning. I got up at day-light, and left her sleeping in her crib. She was asleep, and I kissed her before I went out. I shall never kiss her again! I shall never kiss her again! O my pet, my pet!”

And he broke into a passionate fit of sobbing. It was awful to see. I waited till he was a bit calmer, and then I told him to go on.

“I came back to breakfast, and she was gone; and Rhad’s off his chain, and gone too. I’ve been hunting for her all the day. O God! tell me where she is!”

“I am glad the dog was with her,” I said. “How long is it since you were at the tent?”

“Not an hour ago. But all this talking won’t bring her back. Let’s go on searching for her. Perhaps she has climbed over the ranges, and is lost in the bush beyond.”

“She could never do it, Bill; she hasn’t strength enough, the dear little thing, to walk to the top of these hills. Now, Bill, I am cooler than you are, and I intend to keep cool. Although I’d give my legs and arms rather than any hurt should come to our pretty darling,”—I had to hold myself tight in here, to keep myself from breaking down—“I’m not going to let my feelings run away with me. If I am to help you, I must know everything. Let us go back to the tent, and start from there. Here’s my hand, Bill; I’ll search for our darling till I drop.”

He grasped my hand, and we ran to our tent. The first thing I did was to examine the dog’s chain. It had been unlocked in the usual way, and the key was lying on the table.

“That’s plain proof,” I said, “that Liz herself let him loose, and took him out with her. Had she all her things on?”

Yes; her hat and mantle were gone, and also a little basket she used to take with her, to fill with wild flowers.”

“You see,” I said, “she went out flower-gathering. Now which way did she go?”

Naturally, I considered, she would take the road she knew best—the one that led to the gully Bill first worked in. There was a creek on the road, pretty deep in parts, and the dreadful idea struck me that she might have fallen in. All this time Bill was behaving in the wildest manner. He took every little thing that belonged to her, and kissed them again and again. He called her by name, as if she could hear him; cried to his dead wife, as if she were standing before him; and altogether was about as useless as a man well could be. Then, taking a chamois-leather bag filled with gold, he threw it on the ground, screaming,

“To the Devil with all the gold! Devil gold! devil gold! why did I come here and lose my pet for you? O Lord! take all the gold, and give me back my child!”

“Come along, Bill,” I said, without appearing to heed his ravings, for that, I knew, was the best way; “I am going to the creek to look for her.”

“She hasn’t fallen in!” he cried. “How do you know she has fallen in? It’s not true! My pet is not drowned! No, no!”

“I don’t say she is drowned,” I said. “God forbid that she is! Behave like a man, Bill, and keep your senses about you, or we may as well give her up altogether.”

I was bound to speak in that way to him, and after a time I got him to be a little more reasonable. Then we started for the creek, calling out “Liz! Liz!” at the top of our voices, and whistling in the old familiar way to Rhadamanthus. No sound answered us, and the solemn stillness of the place, when we were not speaking, fell upon my heart like a funeral pall. We tracked the creek from one end to the other, and then I sat on the bank to consider.

“Bill,” said I, “she can’t be drowned, thank God! Rhad can swim, and if he couldn’t have saved her, he would be somewhere about. Besides, her basket would float, and we should see some signs.”

And then a thought flashed into my mind. “Bill, have you been to Teddy the Tyler?”

“Great Lord! Do you think—”

“I don’t think anything. Let’s go and see him.”

We walked to Teddy’s tent, calling and listening to imaginary answers as we walked. It was late in the evening by this time, and Teddy was sitting outside his tent smoking his pipe. He barely looked up as we approached; but I noticed that he hitched close to him with his foot an axe that was lying on the ground.

“Good-evening, mate,” I said, by way of commencement, though I felt more inclined to spit in his face than be civil to him.

Bill shook with excitement, and there was a dangerous gleam in his eyes.

Teddy did not reply to my “Good-evening,” but sat still, smoking. He had his eye on the axe, though; I didn’t miss that.

“Are you deaf?” I asked.

“No,” he snapped. “Are you?”

“Look here, mate,” I said.

“And look you here, mate,” he interrupted; “I don’t want any of your “Good-evenings” or any of your company. What are you loafing in my gully for? I’ll split your skull open if you stop here much longer.”

“We’ve come here for a purpose,” I said. “I am going to ask you a question or two—that you’ll have to answer, my lad, if you wish ever to answer another.”

“You can ask a thousand,” said Teddy. “Fire away. You won’t get me to answer one.”

“We shall see. We are in search of little Liz. She hasn’t been home all day. Have you seen her?”

Teddy gave us both a sharp, quick look, and did not answer. Bill never took his eyes from Teddy’s face.

“Have you seen our Liz?” I repeated. “Has she been here today?”

Still no answer.

Without any warning, Bill made a spring at him; but Teddy was on his legs like lightning, brandishing the axe over his head. Bill avoided the blow, catching the handle on his arm, and, closing with Teddy, had him on the ground in no time, with his knee on his chest, and his hand at his throat.

“Hold off!” Teddy choked out. “Take this madman off, or he’ll throttle me!”

“Answer that question,” said Bill, with set teeth; “if you don’t, I’ll kill you!”

“She hasn’t been here to-day,” the fellow gasped.

“Have you seen her anywhere, you devil?”

“No,” was the sullen reply.

“You may get up,” said Bill, rising. “Let me find that you are lying, and I’ll tear your heart out. Mark me, Teddy the Tyler! If I discover that you have seen my child to-day, and have been telling us lies, you shall do what you threatened I should do, and what I am doing, God help me! You shall cry blood. Come away, Tom; the sight of him turns me sick.”

We had a weary night of it. We searched in every likely place; we lighted fires on every rise, so that they might catch the child’s eye, if she was anywhere near; but when the morning came, we were as far off finding her as ever. What puzzled me most was the absence of Rhadamanthus. We could find no trace of him. If anything had happened to the child, I thought, the dog’s instinct would surely have led him home to the tent. We trudged back, sore and disheartened. We had not eaten a morsel the whole night. Bill, I believe, hadn’t put food to his lips since he first missed little Liz. He hadn’t even smoked a pipe. I was thinking to myself, what shall we do next? when my mate, who had thrown himself on the ground, whispered to it in a voice so low that he seemed to be afraid of my hearing him,

“The old shafts—the deserted shafts—we haven’t looked there for her!”

The idea that our little girl might be lying at the bottom of one of the deserted holes, dying perhaps, made me dizzy for a moment.

We turned out of the tent in silence, and recommenced our search, Bill trembling like a man with the palsy at every hole we stopped at. I went down myself, to save him the first shock of the awful discovery, if she were lying there. But I discovered nothing.

“Let’s go to the old gully again,” said Bill.

The sun was rising over the hills, bathing them in seas of gold and purple, and the laughing jackass was waking everything up with its gurgling laughter. Teddy the Tyler was not out of bed, and I went down the shaft he was then working. The noise disturbed him, and he came from his tent, half dressed, and, with a death-like scare on his face, asked us what we were up to now.

“It’s only fair to tell him,” said Bill. “We’re looking for my child. She might have tumbled down a shaft, you see.”

We searched every hole in the gully without result, and then we went away.

And now, mates, something happened that I have thought of over and over again with wonder. I was a better man then than I am now, for I had the impression of those peaceful and happy Sundays, with the readings out of the Bible, and the quiet walks with little Liz, full upon me. And I believed at that time that God Almighty had sent some little birds to assist us to the end of our search. We had got away from Teddy’s gully, fully a mile from it, and were passing a cluster of gum-trees, upon one of which half a dozen laughing jackasses were perched. As we passed they set up a chorus of mocking laughter, which so grated upon me, that I threw my stick at them, and sent them flying away. Going to pick up my stick, which had fallen some distance off, I observed an abrupt turn in the ranges, leading to a chasm in the hills which neither of us had ever trodden before. But for these birds, we should not have discovered it. I called out to Bill, and he followed me into the declivity.

“Here’s a shaft sunk,” I said; some one has been prospecting.”

The shaft was about twenty feet deep, and, holding on to a rope that I tied to the stump of a tree, I lowered myself down. Before I reached the bottom, I saw that our search was at an end. There lay our little Liz, with her face turned upwards, as though she was sleeping. I could not distinguish her features, and indeed I was so startled that I did not pause to think or look more closely.

“Liz!” I whispered.

No answer came, and I called to her again. All was silent. The rope to which I was clinging was not long enough to tie a slip-knot by which we could raise her. Another and a longer rope was in Bill’s hands above. I climbed into the sunlight, and, taking the rope from Bill, prepared to make a sling of it.

Bill allowed me to take the rope, and looked at my fear-struck face with a terrible twitching of his features. He was trying to utter words, but for a moment or two he had lost the power. With a sound that was like a shriek and a sob he regained it.

“For the good God’s sake, Tom, don’t tell me she is down there!”

“She is there, Bill. No, no! What are you about?”

I flung my arms around him, to prevent him springing down the shaft.

“Bill, this is an awful moment, and Lizzie’s life may hang upon our keeping steady. As you love your dear little one, don’t give way yet awhile. She wants your help to raise her. Do you hear me? She wants your help.”

“Ay,” he replied vacantly.

“I am going to tie this rope round her. Will you stand steady here above, and raise her, while I support her below?”

He nodded, and made motions with his lips, as though he were speaking. But no sound came from them.

“For our precious darling’s sake, Bill,” I said, as I prepared to descend again, “be steady, lad.”

I tied the rope round her slender body—ah, me! ah, me! the pretty little hands that did not respond to the touch of mine! the soft face that rested on my shoulders!—and slowly, slowly, we brought her to the surface, where I tenderly set her down.

She was dead! The angels had taken her from us.

As she lay with her eyes turned blindly to the sun that was smiling on the hills, and bathing them in light, I could scarcely believe that she was dead. In her innocent young face the roses were still blooming, and in her pretty little hands were grasped a few of the wild flowers she had been gathering. I stooped, and kissed her pure fresh lips. Then I turned away, for blinding tears were in my eyes, and a darkness fell upon me.

“O my darling! my darling!” I heard Bill say. “You are not dead—you cannot be dead! Look at me, speak to me, my pet! Throw your arms round my neck.” And he pressed her to his breast, and kissed her many times.

“She is only sleeping. Feel her heart, Tom, it is beating. Feel, feel, I say!”

I placed my hand on her heart, to soothe him; alas, its pulse was stilled for ever!

“Bill,” I said solemnly, for it was an awful thing was the sight of the dear angel lying dead upon the grass, “do not deceive yourself; she is dead. She has gone to a better world than this.”

“Dead!” he cried, springing to his feet, and looking wildly upwards. “Then strike me dead, too!”

He threw himself beside her again; he clasped her in his arms, nursing and rocking her as he would have done if she had been sleeping; he called her by every endearing name; and suddenly became quite still.

“Tom,” he said presently, in a strangely quiet and eager tone, “look at this mark on my child’s neck. What is it? God! what is it?”

I looked. It was a discoloured mark, and I shuddered to think that it might have been caused by the grasp of a cruel hand. But I would not madden him utterly by a whisper of my suspicions.

“It is impossible to say what it is, Bill, without evidence.”

“True,” he replied, still more quietly; “without evidence. Where’s Rhad?”

The absence of the dog had been puzzling me. That he would not have voluntarily deserted little Liz was as certain as fate.

“Stay here with my child,” said Bill; “I am going to search for her dog. He loved my Liz, and was faithful to her. He would have laid down his life for her.”

He disappeared in the bush, and within ten minutes I heard him call out that he had found Rhadamanthus. He stepped from the shadows of the trees, and placed Rhad at my feet. Poor Rhad! He was dead—shot through the heart.

“You see, Tom, he’s been shot. Who did it? We want evidence. Whoever killed the dog killed my child.”

I knelt and examined the dog’s body. Three bullets had been fired into it, and there was something in the dog’s mouth. Forcing the jaws open, I took it out, and recognised it immediately. It was a piece of the coloured silk handkerchief I had thrown out of the tent to Teddy the Tyler, the first night he came to the gully. The dog had evidently torn it away in a desperate struggle, for shreds of it were sticking between his teeth so firmly that I could not drag them away.

“There has been foul play here, Bill,” I said.

“I know it, I know it. What is that between his teeth? Faithful Rhad! It is part of a handkerchief. O, I know without your telling me! But whose handkerchief?—do you hear me?—whose handkerchief? Speak the name. Out with it, man!”

“Teddy the Tyler’s,” I said.

I had no time to add another word, for Bill was off with the speed of the wind in the direction of Teddy’s gully. I hurried after him, but he was too swift for me, and I lost him. When I reached the gully, neither Teddy nor Bill was in sight, and though I searched for an hour I could see nothing of them. Not knowing which way to turn to look for them, I hastened back to where our dear dead Liz was lying, and carried her in my arms to our tent. My first impulse was to put everything in order. I tidied up the place, and arranged our darling’s bed, my scalding tears almost blinding me as I worked. Then I laid the body on it, and covered it up, all but the face, which was still bright with roses soon to fade. About her head I scattered some wild flowers growing near our tent; and on her breast I placed the Bible, our only book. This done, I went again in search of Bill, with no better success than before. I was full of fears, but was powerless to act. All I could do was to wait. My next impulse was to bring Rhad’s body home. I did so, and placed it at the foot of the bed, on the ground. The hours went by, and Bill did not appear. Noon was past, and still no sign. The sun set, and still no sign. Half a dozen times at least I went to Teddy’s gully, only to find it deserted. What was I to do? What could I do? I would have gone to the cattle-station, where we purchased our food, but that I was loth to leave our darling alone. It seemed like deserting her. No; I would wait till the morning. Night coming on, I lit a candle, and sat in the dim tent, keeping watch—for the living and the dead. It was an awful, awful time. Sounds without warned me that the weather was changing. Dark clouds were in the skies; the wind sighed and moaned. I knew the signs. A storm was coming. It came, sooner than I expected, bursting upon us with frightful fury. One of the most terrible storms in my remembrance. The rain poured down in floods—the thunder shook the hills—the lightning played about the peaceful face of little Liz, and cast a lurid glare upon the flowers and the Bible on her breast. I knelt by the side of the bed, and prayed, keeping my face buried in the bed-clothes, and holding the dead child’s cold fingers in mine. I may have knelt thus for an hour, and the storm raged on without abatement. Then I raised my head. My heart leaped into my throat. At the door stood my mate Bill, haggard and white, with blood oozing from between the fingers which he pressed upon his heart. It was but a vision, and it lasted but a moment; but so terrible an impression did it leave upon me, that I ran into the open air for relief. And in that moment a voice fell on my ears:

“Liz! My pet! My darling!” The voice of a dying man. But the darkness was so thick that I could not see my hand before me.

“Bill!” I cried. “Where are you?”

I received an awful answer. A hand stretched itself from out the darkness, and, clutching me with a strength so fierce and resistless that I had no power to resist, forced me back into the tent. The candle was still burning, and by its light I saw my dear old mate standing before me, grasping with his other hand the lifeless body of Teddy the Tyler. Bill’s hand upon my breast relaxed, and the body of the murderer slid from his grasp, and lay in a heap on the soddened ground.

“Liz!” whispered Bill. “My Liz! Life of my life! my pet!”

He saw her in her bed, and a ghastly smile of joy played about his lips. He staggered towards her, and fell down dead! Within twenty-four hours five hundred men were in the gullies. They helped me to bury Bill and little Liz in one grave, and to put a fence round it.

My story is done.