Less than a hundred miles away, to the east of Carey Downs, Terence had turned off the main road and followed the tracker and his wagon to where the drovers had set up camp close to Blackman’s Creek. It was a desolate place, the creek all but dry, the landscape naked to the sun which beat down remorselessly.

The injured man was lying under a canvas awning which had been tied to the desiccated remains of a fallen tree and held up at the front by two pronged bits of wood. The other two men had lit a fire under the billycan and were using their hats to keep the flies off the blood-soaked shirt that covered the wound. They introduced themselves as Paddy and Mike.

‘Good to see ya, Doc,’ the injured man groaned. ‘The name’s Ross.’

‘G’day, Ross,’ said Terence with a swift glance at the bloodied shirt. ‘Don’t try to talk, mate.’ Ross was, he guessed, in his mid-twenties, with the weathered skin of a man who earned his living under the sun. His face was drawn and etched with pain, his breath shallow, and his skin had the dry heat of fever.

Terence opened his medical bag and took out a hypodermic and a phial of morphine. ‘This will help ease the pain,’ he reassured him, as he injected the muscled arm.

As Ross slipped into unconsciousness, Terence carefully cut away the shirt that was stiff with the man’s blood. The gash from the bull’s horn had almost ripped the man in two, and Terence surmised that Ross must have the constitution of an ox to have survived this long.

‘Keep the flies off him while I prepare for surgery,’ he said to the tracker. Turning to the two drovers, he started issuing orders, and before long the wagon had been pulled close to the makeshift tent so the awning could be lifted higher and provide more shade and room to manoeuvre; boiling water was poured into a kidney dish so Terence could wash his hands, and a large rubber sheet was very carefully spread on the ground beneath the injured man. In an effort to keep the dust away, the stretcher had been put into service as a windbreak, and the four kerosene lamps the tracker had brought from the homestead had been primed for when the light faded.

‘I’m going to need help,’ he said to the two drovers. ‘Which one of you has the stronger stomach?’

‘Reckon I do,’ said Paddy, glancing at his younger offsider who had turned an interesting shade of green. ‘I was a stretcher bearer in the army medical corps, so I’m used to it.’

Terence handed him the soap and nail brush. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘You know the drill. Wash right up to your elbows and then don’t touch anything unless I tell you,’ he said firmly.