ed. "He isn't getting
away with you, Jim?"

"Not he!" said her brother, grinning. "But we've got to get out of this
jolly soon--hurry your old crock, Norah!" Norah's indignant heel smote
Bobs, and they raced neck and neck for a moment.

They swung out of the trees just in time, the plain clear for home
before them. Almost simultaneously, the storm broke. There was a mad
flash of lightning across the gloom, and then a rattling peal of
thunder that rang round the sky and finished with a tremendous crack
overhead. The black horse stopped suddenly, wild with terror. Then his
head went down, and he bucked.

Norah and Wally pulled up, regardless of the rain beginning to fall in
torrents. Monarch was swaying to and fro in mad paroxysms, trying to
get his head between his knees, his back humped in an arch, all his
being centred in the effort to get rid of the weight on his back, and
the iron in his mouth, and the control that kept him near that terrible
convulsion of nature going on overhead. Jim was motionless, each hand
like iron on the rein--yet with gentleness, for he knew the great black
brute was only a baby after all, and a badly frightened baby at that.
Cecil, coming by on Betty, his face white, looked aghast at the
struggle between horse and rider, and fled on homewards. The thunder
pealed, and the lightning lit the sky in forked darts.

Possibly the rain steadied Monarch, or sense came back to him through
Jim's voice. He stopped suddenly, planting all four feet wide apart on
the ground. Jim patted his neck, and spoke to him, and the tension went
out of the big horse. He stood trembling a little.

"Slip along," nodded Jim to Norah.

Bobs and Nan went off together. Behind them, Monarch broke into a
canter, obedient once more.

Five minutes later they were at the stables, Billy out in the wet to
take the horses. The storm was raging still, but there were coolness
and refreshment in the air. Billy grinned at the three soaked riders as
they slipped to the ground, and then at Brown Betty, trotting down the
hill in the rain. There was no sign of Cecil, who had fled indoors.

"Him plenty 'fraid," said the black retainer, his grin widening. "Him
run like emu!" His eagle gaze dwelt on Monarch, who was still trembling
and excited.

"Been buck?" he asked, his eyes round.

"Plenty!" Jim laughed. "All right, Billy, I'll let him go myself."

CHAPTER IX

THE BILLABONG DANCE

The slope beyond is green and st