f you don't let on
to the Bishop that you found me in this--this state. He never saw me
like this: he's good, I tell you. And he'd be sick and sorry if he
knew. I'm just mad with myself, too; but I swear I never meant to be
like this to-day. I just took a dose to fix me up for the journey;
but ever since I've been holding off from the whisky the least drop
gets into my walk. You didn't happen to notice a spring anywhere
hereabouts, did you? There used to be one that ran right across the
track.'

"'I passed it about a hundred yards back.'

"I dismounted and led her to the spring, where she knelt and bathed
her face in the water, cold from the melting snowfields above.
Then she pulled out a small handkerchief, edged with cheap lace, and
fell to dabbing her eyes.

"'Hullo!' she cried, breaking off sharply.

"'Yes,' I answered, 'you had forgotten that. But another wash will
take it all off, and, if you'll forgive my saying so, you won't look
any the worse. After that you shall soak my handkerchief and bandage
it round your forehead till you feel better. Here, let me help.'

"'Thank you,' she said, as I tied the knot. 'And now hurry along,
please. Sixty-seven, West Fifteenth Street. I'll be waiting here
with your handkerchief.'

"I mounted and rode on. At the end of half a mile the track began to
dip more steeply, and finally emerged by a big clearing and the two
marble pillars of which Hewson had spoken; and here I tethered the
brown horse, and had a look around before walking down into
Eucalyptus. Within the clearing a few groups of Norfolk pines had
been left to stand, and between these were burial lots marked out and
numbered, with here and there a painted wooden cross; but the
inhabitants of this acre were few enough. Behind and above the
'Necropolis' the hill rose steeply; and there, high up, were traces
of the disused cinnabar mines--patches of orange-coloured earth
thrusting out among the pines.

"The road below the cemetery ran abruptly down for a bit, then heaved
itself over a green knoll and descended upon what I may call a very
big and flat meadow beside the river. It was here that Eucalyptus
stood; and from the knoll, which was really the beginning of the
town, I had my first good view of it--one long street of low wooden
houses running eastward to the river's brink, where a few decayed
mills and wharves straggled to north and south--a T, or headless
cross, will give you roughly the sha