The Rider of Waroona Part 38

"I am glad of that," she said. "I have always feared he would. Then there could have been no doubt. Was he found?"

"Yes. Durham was driving in from Waroona Downs with Brennan. They found him in the water where the creek crosses the road in the range."

"Drowned?" she asked wonderingly.

"No, not drowned; he had been shot."

She shuddered and gripped his hand.

"They did not----" she began brokenly. "They--it was not because he was--escaping?"

"They found him," he said gently. "He was lying in the water--the shot had been fired from behind him."

For a time she sat silent, still holding his hand firmly.

"Where is he now?" she asked presently.

"They brought him in and Durham came across to tell you. Will you----"

"No, no. Oh, no," she interrupted as she shuddered and hid her face in her hands.

Presently she raised her eyes to his.

"It is better so," she said. "They may find out now that he was innocent; they would have condemned him had he been taken alive."

He laid a hand on hers without speaking.

With a quick gesture she raised it to her lips.

"Oh, Fred, what a friend you have been to me!" she murmured.

CHAPTER XV

THE RIDER'S SCORN

Late into the night the townsfolk of Waroona stood in knots and groups in the roadway discussing the mystery surrounding the death of Eustace.

Until the closing hour compelled the hotelkeepers to turn their customers out, the bars were crowded and a roaring trade was done, all the loose cash in the place pa.s.sing into the tills which were full to overflowing.

Everyone had a theory, which differed from that of everyone else, but as one after the other told his particular views on the question and heard them criticised and discussed, and heard also the views of others, there was a rapid falling off in individual opinions and a tendency to concentrate on one or two which withstood the test of criticism the best.

On one point there was unanimity of opinion. Eustace and the man with the yellow beard had been in league. They had robbed the bank together, Eustace having drugged the other inmates so that there should be no chance of the work being disturbed.

Eustace had also partic.i.p.ated in the robbery and outrage at Taloona. He it was, the townsmen decided, who had his face hidden by the handkerchief mask. The indifference of his companion whether his face was seen or not suggested to them a stranger, one who was not known in the district, but who had come there for the purpose of carrying out the robbery of the bank.

When the first sum of twenty-five thousand was so successfully secured, Eustace would know that the Bank, for its own protection, would have to hurry forward another similar sum to meet the obligation of its client.

He would know that old Dudgeon would refuse to leave it in charge of the Bank, and would decline any police protection even if it were offered.

Therefore, the crowd argued, he and his companion had waited until they could make a dash for that second sum.

So far the events as they knew them corroborated their views. There had been the attack on Taloona; the second sum of money had been stolen and the rough treatment meted out both to old Dudgeon and the sub-inspector showed that the two outlaws were men who were prepared to play a desperate game to preserve their liberty and booty.

It was this desperation which gave the most popular clue to the solution of the mystery surrounding the death of Eustace.

The money, fifty thousand pounds in all, had been safely carried off to the hiding-place the robbers had chosen. In addition to the money there were other articles, and over the division of this spoil there had been a quarrel. Eustace had gone down, probably taken unawares, seeing that he had been shot in the back. Little as anyone sympathised with him in the course he had followed, there was a feeling of resentment against his companion for having obviously taken a mean advantage over the man who had thrown in his lot with him. A quarrel was possible at any time, even so deadly a quarrel as would result fatally for one or other of the combatants; but at least it should have been fairly conducted.

Thereafter the completion of the story was easy.

The victor had emptied his victim's pockets of everything except the incriminating handkerchief--leaving that, perchance, to fasten upon him a part responsibility of the Taloona outrage; had taken the body on his horse and ridden with it to the ford, dropping it in the middle of the stream where it was bound to be discovered by the first person pa.s.sing that way.

There was a callousness, a cynical indifference to all human instincts in this method of disposing of his victim, which deepened the feeling of resentment against the a.s.sa.s.sin who everyone held to be the unknown man with the yellow beard. To have left the body where it fell would have been less brutal than to flaunt it in the face of police and public as a taunt and a mockery. Following the outburst of amazement which the discovery had aroused, there came a sense of bitter hostility against the man who had done this, to their minds, needless act of savagery.

As Brennan pa.s.sed to and fro he was a.s.sailed with questions as to what the sub-inspector was going to do. Volunteers on all sides offered their services to scour the range, where all believed the murderer was hiding, and ride him down. But Brennan would say nothing. The sub-inspector had barely spoken since he returned to the station; but if he wanted help he would not hesitate to appeal for it, Brennan told them, adding that they need not worry--the criminal who could outwit the sleuth-hound of the force was not yet born.

"But the Rider of Waroona is no fool," one of the men remarked.

"Neither is Sub-Inspector Durham," Brennan retorted.

Gale, who was standing in the group listening to the remarks made, but advancing no theory of his own, spoke out for the first time.

"I'm not so sure," he said. "He may be smart enough in following up town robberies, but he hasn't done much here yet. Twice he has come in contact with the pair, and each time they have got ahead of him. He stops everyone else from doing anything. I offered to go out with a dozen men and scour the range, but he wouldn't hear of it--that was before he was cornered at Taloona."

"Don't you worry," Brennan replied. "The sub-inspector knows what he is doing."

He pa.s.sed away from the group and the men turned to Gale.

"That's what I don't follow," one of them said. "The chap must be hiding somewhere with that white horse of his. Why not scour the range for him?"

"Brennan told me he didn't believe there was a white horse--that it was all a yarn," another exclaimed.

"Well, I saw it," Gale retorted. "I saw it on the Taloona road. I'd have gone after it only I was in a buggy and it vanished into the bush."

"Is the range the only place you'd look, Mr. Gale?" one of the men asked.

"No," Gale replied. "I'd look there first, and then I'd go the other way."

"Taloona way?"

"Well, not far off."

"That's what I think," the man went on. "Old Crotchety takes the loss of his money too quietly to please me. He's a pretty fly old chap and does not stop at a trifle to get his own back."

"Like he did when he fired you out, Davy," someone exclaimed, and there was a general laugh, for the story of how Davy had been sent about his business at a moment's notice by Dudgeon was one of the stock anecdotes of the district.

"Oh, that's as it may be," Davy retorted, "but I know too much about the old man to trust him very far."