said. "Monarch's come home alone, Norah!"

CHAPTER XIX

THE LONG QUEST

The creek went down with a broken song,
'Neath the she oaks high;
The waters carried the song along,
And the oaks a sigh.
HENRY LAWSON.

The big black thoroughbred still stood by the rails as they rode away.
He had got rid of the saddle, and the broken bridle trailed from his
head. No one had time to see to him.

Billabong was humming with activity. Men were running down to the
yards, bridle in hand; others leading their horses up to be saddled;
while those who were ready had raced over to the quarters for a
snatched breakfast. Sirdar and the boys' horses had been stabled all
night, so that they were quickly saddled. Jim was riding Nan; Wally, on
Garryowen, was already a speck in the distance.

"You'll be quicker if you take him," Jim had said. Then he and Norah
had cantered away together.

"Monarch wasn't hurt, Jim?"

"He'd been down, I think," Jim said; "His knees look like it. But he's
all right--why, he must have jumped three fences?"

After that for a long time they did not speak. Grim fear was knocking
at both their hearts, for with the return of the black horse without
his rider, their worst dread was practically confirmed. It was fairly
certain that Mr. Linton was helpless, somewhere in the bush, and that
meant that he had been so for nearly two days, since it was almost that
time since he had ridden away from Killybeg.

Two days! They had been days of steady, relentless heat, untempered by
any breeze--when the cattle had sought the shade of the gum trees, and
the dogs about the homestead had crept close in under the tree
lucernes, with open mouths and tongues lolling. The men working on the
run had left their tasks often to go down to the creek or the river for
a drink; in the house, closely shuttered windows and lowered blinds on
the verandahs had only served to make the heat bearable. And he had
been out in it, somewhere, helpless, and perhaps in pain; with nothing
to ease for him the hot hours or to save him from the chill of a
Victorian night, which, even in midsummer, may be sharply cold before
the dawn. The thought gnawed at his children's hearts.

They passed through the billabong boundary and out into the rough
country beyond, sharply undulating until it rose into the ranges David
Linton had crossed on his way to and from Killybeg. They had been
fairly certain that he had come through the