Part 80 (2/2)
”Well, they all began co'eeing again, and they heard the others in reply, apparently all about in the scrub. So off they starts, one by one, into the scrub, answering and hallooing, for it seemed to them that their mates were scattered about, and didn't know where they were.
Well, as I said, fourteen of them started into the scrub to collect the party and bring them up to the fire; only old Cranky Jim sat still in the camp. He believed, with the others, that it was the rest of their party coming up, but he soon began to wonder how it was that they were so scattered. Then he heard one scream, and then it struck him all at once that this was a dodge of the blacks to draw the men from the camp, and, when they were abroad, cut them off one by one, plunder the drays, and drive off the sheep.
”So he dropped, and crawled away in the dark. He heard the co'ees grow fewer and fewer as the men were speared one by one, and at last everything was quiet, and then he knew he was right, and he rose up and fled away.
”In two days he found the other party, and told them what had happened.
They came up, and there was some sharp fighting, but they got a good many of their sheep back.
”They found the men lying about singly in the scrub, all speared. They buried them just where they found each one, for it was hot weather.
They buried them four foot deep, but they wouldn't lie still.
”Every night, about nine o'clock, they get up again, and begin co'eeing for an hour or more. At first there's a regular coronach of them, then by degrees the shouts get fewer and fewer, and, just when you think it's all over, one will break out loud and clear close to you, and after that all's still again.”
”You don't believe that story, I suppose?”
”If you press me very hard,” said the Doctor, ”I must confess, with all humility, that I don't!”
”No more did I,” said Macdonald, ”till I heard 'em!”
”Heard them!” said the Doctor.
”Ay, AND SEEN THEM!” said the man, stopping and turning round.
”You most agreeable of men! pray, tell me how.”
”Why, you see, last year I was coming down with some wool-drays from Parson Dorken's, and this Cranky Jim was with us, and told us the same yarn, and when he had finished, he said, 'You'll know whether I speak truth or not to-night, for we're going to camp at the place where it happened.'
”Well, and so we did, and, as well as we could reckon, it was a little past nine when a curlew got up and began crying. That was the signal for the ghosts, and in a minute they were co'eeing like mad all round.
As Jim had told us, one by one ceased until all was quiet, and I thought it was over, when I looked, and saw, about a hundred yards off, a tall man in grey crossing a belt of open ground. He put his hand to his mouth, gave a wild shout, and disappeared!”
”Thank you,” said the Doctor. ”I think you mentioned that your wife's confinement was somewhat sudden?”
”Yes, rather,” replied the man.
”Pray, had you been relating any of the charming little tales to her lately--just, we will suppose, to while away the time of the evening?”
”Well, I may have done so,” said Macdonald, ”but I don't exactly mind.”
”Ah, so I thought. The next time your good lady happens to be in a similar situation, I think I would refrain from ghost stories. I should not like to commit myself to a decided opinion, but I should be inclined to say that the tales you have been telling me were rather horrible. Is that the light of your hut?”
Two n.o.ble colley dogs bounded to welcome them, and a beautiful bare-legged girl, about sixteen, ran forth to tell her father, in Gaelic, that the trouble was over, and that a boy was born.
On going in, they found the mother asleep, while her gossip held the baby on her knee; so the Doctor saw that he was not needed, and sat down, to wait until the woman should wake, having first, however, produced from his saddle two bottles of port wine, a present from Alice.
The woman soon woke, and the Doctor, having felt her pulse, and left some medicine, started to ride home again, carrying with him an incense of good wishes from the warm-hearted Highlanders.
Instead of looking carefully for the road, the good Doctor was soon nine fathoms deep into the reasons why the mountaineers and coast folk of all northern countries should be more blindly superst.i.tious than the dwellers in plains and in towns; and so it happened that, coming to a fork in the track, he disregarded the advice of his horse, and, instead of taking the right hand, as he should have done, he held straight on, and, about two o'clock in the morning, found that not only had he lost his road, but that the track had died out altogether, and that he was completely abroad in the bush.
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