Draw back, indeed! When does a man ever get the chance of doing that, once he’s regularly gone in for any of the devil’s work and wages? He takes care there isn’t much drawing back afterwards. So I said—

“We may as well give you a hand with this lot; but we’ll go home then, and drop all this duffing work. It don’t pay. I’m old enough to know that, and you’ll find it out yet, I expect, father, yourself.”

“The fox lives long, and gives the hounds many a long chase before he’s run into,” he said, with a grim chuckle. “I swore I’d be revenged on ‘em all when they locked me up and sent me out here for a paltry hare; broke my old mother’s heart, so it did. I’ve had a pound for every hair in her skin, and I shall go on till I die. After all, if a man goes to work cautious and mute it’s not so easy to catch him in this country, at any rate.”

Jim at this came running out of the cave with a face of joy, a bag of ship-biscuit, and a lot of other things.

“Here’s tea and sugar,” he said; “and there’s biscuits and jam. And a big lump of cheese. Get the fire right, Dick, while I get some water. We’ll soon have some tea, and these biscuits are jolly.”

The tea was made, and we all had a good meal. Father found a bottle of rum, too; he took a good drink himself, and gave Jim and me a sip each. I felt less inclined to quarrel with father after that. So we drafted all the calves into a small penyard, and began to put our brand on them as quick as we could catch ‘em.

A hundred and sixty of ‘em altogether—all ages, from a month old to nearly a year. Fine strong calves, and in rare condition, too. We could see they were all belonging to Mr. Hunter and Mr. Falk land. How they came to leave them all so long unbranded I can’t say. Very careless they often are on these large cattlestations, so that sharp people like father and the Dalys, and a lot more, get an easy chance at them.

Whatever father was going to do with them all when he had branded ‘em, we couldn’t make out.

“There’s no place to tail or wean ‘em,” whispered Jim. “We’re not above thirty miles from Banda in a straight line. These cows are dead sure to make straight back the very minute they’re let out, and very nice work it’ll look with all these calves with our brand on sucking these cows.”

Father happened to come round for a hot brand just as Jim finished.

“Never you mind about the weaning,” he snarled. “I shan’t ask you to tail them either. It wouldn’t be a nice job here, would it?” and father actually laughed. It wasn’t a very gay kind of laugh, and he shut up his mouth with a sort of snap again. Jim and I hadn’t seen him laugh for I don’t know how long, and it almost frightened us.