Page:Such Is Life.djvu/56

42 trust, superior to anything like surprise, I saddled and mounted Bunyip, took Cleopatra by the rein, and joined the Ishmaelites, who, on their bare-backed horses, were hurrying contingents of cattle from different directions toward the gap of the fence, whilst the fascination of overhanging danger bore so heavily on their personal and professional dignity that every eye kept an anxious look-out toward the ram-paddock. In a few minutes more, we were all outside the fence; and the drivers immediately began yoking. I hooked Cleopatra’s rein on a wool-lever, and, still riding Bunyip, kept Thompson’s and Cooper’s bullocks together. Mosey’s dog was performing the same office for him and Price. Willoughby had n’t returned with the muster; and Bum was still absent.

“Did you count my (bullocks)?” demanded Dixon, limping slowly and painfully toward his big roan horse.

“O you sweet speciment!” retorted Mosey, as he picked up his second yoke. “Why the (compound expletive) don’t you rouse roun’?”

“How the (same expression)  I rouse roun’? I got the screwmatics in my (adj.) hip.”

“Somethin’ like you—Stan’ over, Rodney, or I’ll twist the tail off o’ you—You don’t ketch me havin’ nothin’ wrong o’ me when things is”

“No, begad! no you don’t!—take —ah! would you indeed!—on you go, dem you! s-s-s-s-s! get up there!” It was Willoughby’s voice among the salt-bush; and, the next moment, half-a-dozen beasts leaped the wires and darted, capering and shying, past the wagons. “Quod petis hic est!” panted their pursuer triumphantly. “The mouse may help the lion, remember, according to the old”

Then  a cataract of obscenity and invective from Price and Mosey, while Cooper remarked gravely:

“Them ain’t our bullocks, Willerby; them’s station cattle—shoved in that paddick for something partic’lar. Now they’re off to (sheol); an’ it’s three good hours’ work with a horse an’ stockwhip, to git ’em in here agen. An’ that kangaroo dog ain’t makin’ matters much better. Lord stan’ by us now! for we’ll git (adv.) near hung if we’re caught.”

And, to be sure, there was Pup looping himself along the plain in hot pursuit. It was no use attempting to call him off, for Nature has not endowed the kangaroo dog with sufficient instinct to bring him in touch with his master, except when the latter offers him food. But there is always some penalty attached to the possession of anything really valuable. So, though I wasn’t interested in the cattle, I was bound to follow them till I recovered my dog. Thompson’s unpretentious stockwhip was in my hand at the time; and, judging it unlikely that Cleopatra had been broken in to the use of that disquieting implement, I was just turning Bunyip round, when Willoughby stepped forward

“Permit me to redeem my unfortunate mistake by assisting you!” he exclaimed. “I have ridden to hounds in England. May I take this horse? Thanks. Pray remember that I shall be under your orders, Collins.”

“Take care might he buck-lep,” I remarked casually, as the whaler gathered Cleopatra’s reins, and threw himself into the deep seat of the new saddle.