Dorothy's Double Volume Iii Part 5

'So that is it. Then he has let the cat out of the bag at last, Hawtrey; that is a comfort anyhow. And how did she take it?'

'She was very much upset--very much; and she says she ought to have known it before.'

'Of course she ought--that is what I said all along; and she would have known if we hadn't been two old fools. Well, give me the contents of the letter as well as you can remember them.'

Mr. Hawtrey repeated the substance of the letter.

'Well, well, we must hope for the best, Hawtrey. He is clear-headed enough, and he will be sharply on his guard when he overtakes them; and he will look so different a figure in a rough dress after that long journey I can hardly think the fellow is likely to recognise him again.'

'Will you come in, Singleton?'

'Not on any account. We had best let Miss Dorothy think the matter out by herself. I fancy things will work out as I wish them yet.'

Dorothy sat for a long time without moving; then she drew a small writing-table up in front of her, and, taking a sheet of note-paper, began to write after a moment's hesitation.

'My dear Captain Armstrong,--When I saw you last I told you that I would let you know should the strange mystery of which I was the victim ever be cleared up. It is not yet entirely cleared up, but it is so to a considerable extent, as the woman who personated me has been traced to America, where she went a week after the robbery, and my portrait has been recognised as her likeness by a number of persons at the hotel where she stopped. This encourages us to hope that some day the whole matter will be completely cleared up. I received this news on the day after you left Chamounix, but I did not write to you before because I wanted to think over what you said to me in quiet.

'I have done so, and I am sorry, very sorry, Captain Armstrong, to say that I am certain my feelings towards you are not, and never will be, such as you desire. I like you, as I told you when you first asked me the question, very, very much, but I do not love you as you should be loved by a wife. I hope we shall always be good friends, and I wish you, with all my heart, the happiness you deserve, though I cannot be to you what you wish. I do not hesitate to sign myself your affectionate friend, Dorothy Hawtrey.'

The note was written without pause or hesitation. It had been thought out before it was begun. It was strange, even to herself, how easily it had come to her, after having had it so much on her mind for the last month. She wondered now how she could have hesitated so long; how she could ever have doubted as to what she would say to him.

'I thank G.o.d I did not write before,' she murmured, as she directed the letter. 'I might have ruined my life and his, for, once done, I never could have drawn back again.'

CHAPTER XX

A caravan--consisting of ten waggons, drawn by teams of six, eight, and ten bullocks, five or six lighter vehicles of various descriptions, half-a-dozen hors.e.m.e.n, and a score of men on foot--was making its way across an undulating plain.

Few words were spoken, for what was there to talk of when one day was but a picture of another? The women, sitting for the most part in the waggons, knitted or worked with but an occasional remark to each other.

The men, walking with the oxen, kept on their way as doggedly as the animals they drove, and save for the occasional crack of a whip or a shout from one of the men to his beasts, and the occasional creaking of a wheel, the procession might have seemed to an onlooker a mere phantasmagoria of silent shapes. But the sun was getting low and the oxen beginning almost insensibly to quicken their pace, and all knew that the long day's journey was nearly over, and the water-holes could not be far ahead.

Half an hour later these are reached, and at once a babel of sounds succeeds the previous silence. The children of all ages leap joyfully from the waggons, the men loose the oxen from their harness, and then some of them take them to the lowest water-hole, while the rest, and even the women, lend a hand at the work, and arrange the great waggons into the form of a square. As soon as this is done fires are made with the bundles of bush that the boys and girls have cut during the earlier part of the day's journey and piled on the tailboards of the waggons--long experience having taught them that everything that could burn had been long since cut down or grubbed up within a wide radius of the halting-place.

The horses are hobbled and turned out, to pick up what substance they can find in addition to a slice or two of bread that most of their owners have set apart from the over-night baking. Kettles are soon hanging over the fires, and it is not long before most of the women have their dough ready and placed in iron baking-pots over the red-hot embers, a pile of which is raked over the cover so as to bake it evenly right through. Two or three deer had been shot in the morning by the hunters, and the joints hung over the fires give an appetising odour very welcome to those whose chief article of diet for many weeks has been salt meat.

In one corner of the square a group of three or four men are seated round a fire of their own. It is they whose rifles have provided the meat for the camp, and who in return receive a portion of bread from each of the families composing the caravan.

'We shall not get much more hunting,' one of them said; 'we are getting to the most dangerous part of our journey. We have been lucky so far, for though we know that we have been watched, and have seen several parties of Redskins, none of them have been strong enough to venture to attack us. But now that every express rider we have met has warned us that there is trouble here, that strong caravans have been overpowered and the emigrants ma.s.sacred, there will be no more wandering away far from the camp. You will have to travel the same pace as the rest of us, Ned,' he added, to the bearded figure next to him. 'It beats me how you have got through as you have, without having your hair raised.'

'I have only made extra journeys where, by all accounts, no Indians have been seen about for some time. Besides, it is only about three or four times we have made two journeys in one. We have simply, when the party we were with have made up their minds to stop a day or two at a water-hole to rest their beasts and to wash their clothes, gone on the next morning with another party who had finished their rest. There seem to be regular places where every caravan that arrives makes a halt for a day or so. We have done this seven times, so I reckon that we have gained fourteen days that way and on five days we have made double journeys, so that altogether we have picked up something like nineteen days on the caravan we started with.'

'Your critters are in good condition, too,' the man remarked.

'Yes, I have been fortunate with the hunting. One can always get half a pound of flour for a pound of meat, so that I still have almost as much as I started with, and I always give each of the horses four pounds of bread a day. One cannot expect that horses can be kept in condition when they are working day after day and have to spend their nights in searching for food and then not getting half enough of it.'

'These Indian ponies can do it; no one thinks of feeding a horse on the plains. They have got to rustle for themselves.'

'That may be, but these three horses have not been accustomed to that sort of thing. No doubt they have always been fed when they have worked, and they would soon have broken down under the life that comes natural to the half-wild ponies of the plains. However, it has paid to keep them well; they have come along without halts, and, as you see, they are in as good condition as when they started. In better condition indeed, for they are as hard as nails and fit to do anything.'

'That young mate of yours is a good 'un, and takes wonderful care of the critters. He is British too, I suppose?'

'Oh, yes, we came out together.'

'Ain't no relation of yourn?'

'No. I was coming out and so was he, and we agreed to come together. It is always a good thing to have someone one knows at home with one.'

'That is so,' the man agreed. 'A good mate makes all the difference in life out here. It is easy to see the young 'un thinks a heap of you, and I guess you could reckon on him if you got into a tight corner. He is a tough-looking chap, too. Well, I reckon the meat's done. You had better give a call for your mate. Where has he gone to?'

'He is at the cart,' Ned said, as he stood up and looked round. 'Jacob, supper is ready.'

'I am coming,' was called back; but it was another five minutes before Jacob came up and seated himself by the fire.

'What have you been up to, Jacob?'

'I fetched a couple of buckets of water, and I have been a-giving the cart a wash down and a polish.'

The hunters looked at the lad in surprise.

'Do you mean that?' one asked; and on Jacob nodding they all burst into a hearty laugh.

'Well, I reckon, Jacob, as that's the first cart as ever was washed out on these plains. Why, what is the good of it, lad? What with the mud-holes in the bottoms and the dust where the wind has dried the track, it will be as bad as ever afore you have gone half an hour; besides, who is a-going to see it?'

'I don't care for that,' Jacob said st.u.r.dily; 'if it has got to get dirty it has got to; that ain't my fault; but it is my fault if it starts dirty. It ain't often one gets a chance o' doing it, but as we was in good time to-day I thought I would have a clean up. Ned had seen to the horses, so I looked to the cart.'

It had taken Captain Hampton immense trouble to accustom Jacob to call him by his Christian name. He began by pointing out to him that were he to call him 'Captain' or 'sir' it would at once excite comment, and that it was of the greatest importance that they should appear to be travelling together on terms of equality.

'Unless you accustom yourself always to say "Ned" the other words are sure to slip out sometimes. This journey is going to be a hard one, and we have got to share the hardships and the danger and to be comrades to each other, and so you must practise calling me Ned from the time we go on board the steamer.'

It had not been, however, until they had been out on the plains for some time that Jacob had got out of the way of saying 'Captain' occasionally, but he had now fallen into 'Ned,' and the word came naturally to his lips.

'I think the idea is right, Jacob. Absolutely, washing the cart may seem useless. So it is to the cart, but not to you. There is nothing like doing things as they should be done. When one once gets into careless habits they will stick to one. I always give my horse a rub down in the morning and again before I turn it out after it has done its work. I think it is all the better for it, and I like to turn out decently in the morning, not to please other people, but for my own satisfaction.'

'I reckon you are about right,' the oldest of the party said; 'a man who takes care of his beast gets paid for it. You don't have no trouble in the morning. Your three critters come in at once when they hear you whistle. I watched them this morning and saw you give them each a hunch of bread and then set to work to rub them down and brush their coats, and I says to myself, "That is what ought to be between horse and master. If we was attacked by Redskins you and that young chap would be in the saddle, and ready either to fight or to run, afore most of them here had begun to think about it."'

One of the horses in the cart always carried a saddle, and Jacob sometimes rode it postilion fashion, and also rode out with Ned Hampton when the start of the caravan was late and he went out to try to get a shot at game before they moved. In this way he had got to ride fairly, which was Ned's object in accustoming him to sit on horseback, as he told him there was never any saying when it might not be necessary to abandon the cart and to journey on horseback. The two draught horses were ridden in turns, and when the lad rode with his master the third horse was always summoned by a whistle to accompany them, and cantered alongside its companion until both halted, when Ned caught sight of game and went forward alone in its pursuit. Jacob was also taught to use a pistol, and by dint of steady practice had become a fair shot.

The meal was just finished when there was a shout from the man placed on the lookout a hundred yards from the encampment.

'What is it?' a boy posted just outside the waggons shouted back.

A dead silence fell on the camp until, a minute later, they heard the reply, 'It is only the express rider.'

Many of the men rose and moved towards the narrow opening left between two of the waggons to give admittance to the square.