The Shadow Of A Man Part 26

"I'll trust you," he said; "you may do as you like about me. Perhaps you yourself have had the wish that's father to the thought, or rather the thought that comes of the wish and nothing else? Well, then, that's what's been the matter with me. The moment I heard of that old rascal's escape, like every other fellow in the force, I yearned to have the taking of him. Of course it wasn't on the cards, hundreds of miles up-country as we are here, besides being across the border; yet when they got clear away, and headed for the Murray, there was no saying where they might or might not cast up. Well, it seems they never reached the Murray at all; but last week down in Balra.n.a.ld I heard a rum yarn about a stowaway aboard one of the Echuca river-steamers; they never knew he was aboard until they heard him go overboard just the other side of Balra.n.a.ld. Then they thought it was one of themselves, until they mustered and found none missing; and then they all swore it was a log, except the man at the wheel who'd seen it; so I pretended to think with the rest--but you bet I didn't! I went down the river on the off-chance, but I never let on who I hoped it might be. And what with a swaggy whose swag had been stolen, and his description of the man who he swore had stolen it, I at last got on the tracks of the man I've lost. He was said to be an oldish man; that seemed good enough; they were both of them oldish men, the two that had escaped."

"The two!" cried Moya in high excitement. "The two! I keep forgetting there were two of them; you see you never said so when you came to the station."

"I wanted to keep it all to myself," confessed the crest-fallen sergeant. "I only told two living men who I thought it was that I was after. One was my sub--who guessed--and the other was Mr. Rigden."

"Were the two men who escaped anything like each other?"

"Well, they were both old lags from the _Success_, and both superior men at one time; old particulars who'd been chained together, as you might say, for years; and I suppose that sort of thing does beat a man down into a type. However, their friendship didn't go for much when they got outside; for Gipsy Marks murdered Captain Bovill as sure as emu's eggs are emu's eggs!"

"Murdered him!" gasped Moya; and her brain reeled to think of the hours she had spent with the murderer. But all was clear to her now, from the way in which Rigden had been imposed upon in the beginning, to the impostor's obstinate and terrified refusal to own himself as such to the very end.

"Yes, murdered him on the other side of the Murray; the body's only just been found; and meanwhile the murderer's slipped through my fingers,"

said the sergeant, sourly; "for if it wasn't poor old Bovill I was after, at all events it was Gipsy Marks."

Moya sprang to her feet.

"It was," she cried; "but he hasn't slipped through your fingers at all, unless he's dead. He wasn't when I left him two or three hours ago."

"When you _left_ him?"

"Yes, I found him, and was with him all the morning."

"In Blind Man's Block--with that ruffian?"

"He took my horse and my water-bag, and left me there to die of thirst; but the dear horse turned the tables on him--poor wretch!"

"And you never told me!"

"I am trying to tell you now."

And he let her finish.

But she would not let him go.

"Dear Sergeant Harkness, I can't pretend to have an ounce of pity left for that dreadful being in Blind Man's Block. A murderer, too! At least I have more pity for some one else, and you must let me take him away before you go."

"Impossible, my dear young lady--that is, before communicating with Mr.

Cross."

"About bail?"

"Yes."

"What was the amount named this morning?"

"Fifty pounds."

"Give me a sheet of paper and a stamp, and I'll write a cheque myself."

Harkness considered.

"Certainly that could be done," he said at length.

"Then quickly--quickly!"

Yet even when it was done she detained him; even when he put a big key into her hand.

"_Must_ this go further--before the magistrates--after you have found him?"

Harkness hardened.

"The offence is the same. I'm afraid it must."

"It will make it very unpleasant for me," sighed Moya, "when I come up here. And when I've found him for you--and undone anything that was done--though I don't admit that anything was--I--well, I really think you _might_!"

"Might what?"

"Withdraw the charge!"

"But those tracks weren't his. Mr. Rigden made them. He shouldn't have done that."

"Of course he shouldn't--if he did."

"But of course he _did_, Miss Bethune. I've known Mr. Rigden for years; we used to be very good friends. I shouldn't speak as I do unless I spoke by the book. But--why on earth did he go and do a thing like that?"

Moya paused.

"If I tell you will you never tell a soul?"

"Never," said the rash sergeant.

"Then he was imposed upon. The wretch pretended he--had some claim--I cannot tell you what. I can tell you no more."

It was provokingly little to have to keep secret for lifetime; yet Harkness was glad to hear even this.

"It was the only possible sort of explanation," said he.

"But it won't explain enough for the world," sighed Moya, so meaningly that the sergeant asked her what she did mean.

"I must really get off," he added.

"Then I'll be plain with you," cried the girl. "Either you must withdraw this charge, and pretend that those tracks were genuine, or I can never come up here to live!"

And she looked her loveliest to emphasise the threat.

"I must see Mr. Rigden about that," was, however, all that Harkness would vouchsafe.

"Very well! That's only fair. Meanwhile--I--_trust you_, Sergeant Harkness. And I never yet trusted the wrong man!"