Penrose looked around. ‘No sign of anyone.’ He climbed up to the adit and peered inside. ‘They haven’t got far but I don’t think they’re digging in the right place.’ He scrambled further up the slope and, using the geologist’s hammer he carried in his belt, he cleared some of the ground cover. He ran his hand over the rock, then knocked off a few samples and slid down to where Caleb sat on a stump beside the campfire, nursing his aching leg.

Penrose crouched beside him and hammered the rocks into smaller pieces, inpecting each one. He rose to his feet and flung them into the bush. ‘Nothing.’

‘Did you really expect to find gold just like that?’ Caleb asked.

Penrose shrugged and waved a hand at a pale line of quartz breaking through the slopes, beside which the adit had been cut. ‘I’d stake my reputation that’s the Pretty Sally reef, although technically it’s called a dyke. My betting is that it runs in an incline down the valley. There’s been talk about it for a few years now. But just because it’s quartz doesn’t mean its gold bearing. I hate to say it, Hunt, but this doesn’t look promising.’

Caleb glanced at the creek, which had a good flow despite it being the height of summer. ‘But if they found alluvial gold here, there must be something—’

A crack shattered the air between them, sending a crowd of parrots screaming into the air. Instinctively Caleb hit the ground, dragging Penrose with him. Another shot rang out, hitting the tree next to them, showering them with shards of bark. Caleb fumbled for the Colt. He cocked it with the expertise born of warfare and, with his left hand on Penrose’s shoulders and a whispered warning for the engineer to stay still, he waited.

Fortunately, they had fallen in a slight dip behind a pile of rocks from the workings, which made it difficult for the shooter to get a clear shot of them.

‘Show yourself,’ Caleb demanded.

There was a rustle of undergrowth and three men emerged into the clearing, one holding a rifle to his shoulder.

‘Drop your weapon,’ Caleb said.

His request was met with a caustic laugh and another bullet, which hit the tree above their heads, causing a branch to break off. Caleb responded in kind, aiming for a point just above the head of the man carrying the rifle. The shot took off his hat. The man jumped back and swore volubly, lowering the muzzle of his rifle.

‘Stay down,’ Caleb ordered Penrose, and rose slowly to his feet, the Colt in his right hand. ‘I’m going to ask you once again to kindly put down your weapon. I have five remaining shots. You have none.’

The man glanced at his companions and his mouth twisted in a snarl. ‘Yer on our claim,’ he said without moving.