ng all the same. 'Pulled up before if I knowed your horses were
getting baked. Thought they were up to anything, same as you and Jim.'

'So they are. You'll find that one of these days. If there's work ahead
you ought to have sense enough not to knock smoke out of fresh horses
before we begin.'

'All right. Plenty of work to do, my word. And Starlight said, "Tell 'em
to be here to-day if they can." I know he's afraid of some one follerin'
up our tracks, as it is.'

'That's all right, Warrigal; but you ride steady all the same, and don't
be tearing away through thick timber, like a mallee scrubber that's
got into the open and sees the devil behind him until he can get cover
again. We shall be there to-night if it's not a hundred miles, and
that's time enough.'

We did drop in for a long day, and no mistake. We only pulled up for a
short halt in the middle, and Warrigal's cast-iron pony was off again,
as if he was bound right away for the other side of the continent.
However, though we were not going slow either, but kept up a reasonable
fast pace, it must have been past midnight when we rode into Starlight's
camp; very glad Jim and I were to see the fire--not a big one either.
We had been taking it pretty easy, you see, for a month or two, and
were not quite so ready for an eighty-mile ride as if we had been in
something like training. The horses had had enough of it, too, though
neither of them would give in, not if we'd ridden 'em twenty mile
farther. As for Warrigal's Bilbah he was near as fresh as when he
started, and kept tossin' his head an' amblin' and pacin' away as if he
was walkin' for a wager round a ring in a show-yard.

As we rode up we could see a gunyah made out of boughs, and a longish
wing of dogleg fence, made light but well put together. As soon as we
got near enough a dog ran out and looked as if he was going to worry us;
didn't bark either, but turned round and waited for us to get off.

'It's old Crib,' said Jim, with a big laugh; 'blest if it ain't.
Father's somewhere handy. They're going to take up a back block and do
the thing regular: Marston, Starlight, and Company--that's the fakement.
They want us out to make dams or put up a woolshed or something. I don't
see why they shouldn't, as well as Crossman and Fakesley. It's six of
one and half-a-dozen of the other, as far as being on the square goes.
Depend upon it, dad's turned over a new leaf.'

'Do you fellows want anything to eat?' said