They were apart again, circling one another, when the grizzled warrior made his mistake—like lightning he threw his nulla at his opponent’s knee. Red Kangaroo had leapt high and the nulla struck the ground under him and skidded away behind him. Then he hurled his nulla at the belly of his enemy, who with marvellous quickness knocked it aside with his shield. Red Kangaroo snatched for his tomahawk and knew an instant of cold terror. His last weapon was missing! Then his enemy was upon him; their shields smashed together; they clutched at each other’s face with gouging fingers. Suddenly Red Kangaroo’s shield jerked down in a slashing sweep, and he grunted as the heavy body of his opponent fell away and he stumbled over it, glaring down at those protruding eyeballs.

The fallen warrior writhed there, gulping out his life, his throat severed from ear to ear right to the neckbone. Red Kangaroo had instinctively used the shield blow as the lightning chance occurred. How thankful he was now that he had persevered to make his shield end into that secret weapon he had dreamt of so long!

But for the panting of the victor, the gurgling from the bloody throat of the dying, there was a hushed silence throughout all the bush.

XXI

RED KANGAROO RETURNS HOME

Red Kangaroo stood there shivering at the memory of that second’s panic when he had snatched for his tomahawk and felt it missing. Mechanically his hand now groped back to his belt and felt the empty thong. In a flash he realised that the tomahawk must have slipped out when he had knelt down to drink at the creek. But why had his enemy not seized the advantage and used his own tomahawk? He turned the dying man over. Yes, his tomahawk carrier was empty, too! He, too, had known that icy chill of fear. What a strange fate, that each man in dire extremity should find his last weapon missing! But for Red Kangaroo, not quite the last. He gazed with grim triumph at the sharp, gory end of his shield.

He ran down to the creek. Yes, there lay his tomahawk, just where it had fallen from his belt as he knelt to drink. He thrust it deep back into its hide carrier; this would be a lesson to him. Always he would make certain that his weapons and those of his warriors were secure. He splashed across the creek and ran to the young warrior, lying dead under a wattle-tree. A golden blossom had softly fallen and now was slowly turning crimson on his chest. Red Kangaroo pressed his big foot on the chest and pulled and tugged and twisted his spear from the body—a tough job, done with urgent swiftness, but skilfully. Earnestly he glanced at the awful thing, saw that the barbs were unbroken, and breathed a deep sigh of relief. He snatched up the young warrior’s boomerang and tomahawk and possum rug, then the older man’s rug. He opened it, and there was the missing tomahawk! He recovered the boomerangs, handling the weapons in feverish delight. He was armed again.