s tracks all around Pool of Skulls. He want run
away. He come back soon. Nintha (one), thama (two), urapitcha
(three), therankathera (four)--many, many more. Kill black-fellow.
Kill black-fellow. Kill black-fellow."

He stopped speaking and stretched out his painted arm towards the
drover. The warraguls leapt to their feet, their eyes blazing, and
their bodies ready to spring upon the white man. Stobart got up from
the ground very slowly and faced his enemies, staring steadily at them.
His hour had come. He would face death without flinching.

The blacks paused. Arrkroo feared that even now the white man would
escape by the tremendous power of his dauntless eye. So he started to
speak again, very excitedly.

"He bone Wuntoo. He burn bone, make death sure. You all see him burn
bone. He go in last night, make him worse. You see him go in last
night. Wuntoo die. You all die. You all die. You all die."

He had succeeded. A roar of fear and hatred went up from the assembly.
Every man goaded his neighbour to be the first to spring upon the
defenceless captive. Arrkroo's heart was glad. He started to dance
again, but this time it was the Dance of Death. Stobart knew that he
was a doomed man, but not a muscle of his face altered. The crowd of
frenzied warraguls, eager to pull him limb from limb, leaned forward,
but he still held them with his fearless eye. How long would it last?

Arrkroo danced nearer and nearer. When one of those whirling arms of
his touched the victim, the spell would be broken, and Boss Stobart,
the bravest drover of Central Australia, would go down before the
onslaught of a hundred yelling fiends.

Arrkroo's spinning and swaying body came nearer and nearer. There was
tense stillness. Men held their breath. Stobart faced the future as
he had always faced every difficulty--with clear open-eyed courage.
Arrkroo's hand passed his face so closely that he felt the wind of it.
The next time it would touch him.

Stobart did not move, but every muscle of his powerful body gathered
itself for the supremest effort of his life. The head of the Hater
swayed towards him, back, and then forward again. Then Stobart acted!
Like a flash his fist shot out. His body was like a spring suddenly
released. The weight of every ounce of him, the force of every nerve
and sinew, and all the gathered knowledge of years went into that
terrific blow. It caught Arrkroo on the point of the chin. Th