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 He glanced from one to another of them, a broad grin on his round, pink, clean-shaven face.

"Sure, now," he chirped, "have ye no word of greeting for me?"

"Mr. O'Sullivan," said Lachlan, "what in Heaven's name are you doing here?"

The grin on the round, pink face widened.

"A minute ago," the little man said, "I was enjoying a little healthful exercise. Those ignorant rogues of pack drivers had expressed some scorn of the sword as a weapon, and I laid them a wager that with this rapier I could defend myself for half an hour against the cudgels of all six of them. It was none too easy because I had to be careful not to scratch them, that being part of the bargain, but I would have won the wager."

"But how came you here to Jock Pearson's camp?"

"On a mule," Mr. O'Sullivan answered, "a most abominably perverse and discontented yellow mule that I bought in Charles Town because in so short a time I could not procure a horse. Later, when I have obtained a respectable mount, I shall take delight in feeding him to the wolves."

Almayne chuckled. "You meant it, then?" he said. "When you said you would go with us, I thought you were jesting."

"I was," the little man answered, "but the more I thought about the matter, the more I liked the notion. It fell in with a scheme that has been growing in my head, a scheme to study the aboriginal natives