In the Roaring Fifties Part 28

'What is this fortune? Where is it? How was it come by?'

'The fortune is mainly in virgin gold; it is in an untried alluvial field.'

'If the field is untried, how do you know the gold is in it?'

'I put it there.'

Jim looked at Ryder sharply. 'You have not answered one of my questions,'

he said. 'How was the gold come by?'

'There's no objection on that score,' Ryder answered lightly. 'It was come by dishonestly, every grain of it.'

'To me that is a serious objection. I am an honest man, my instincts are all for fair dealing, and I believe, as a simple everyday working principle, honesty is the best policy.'

'Honesty is not a policy, my boy: it is a misfortune.'

'Why do you wish to share your loot with me?'

'Seventy or eighty thousand ounces of gold is not easily accounted for nor easily disposed of by a guest of the Queen who is on leave without a ticket that will bear the closest investigation. You could dispose of it safely enough.'

'And if I were asked to account for it?'

'That is provided for. I have discovered a field within a day's journey that n.o.body else knows of--that n.o.body else is likely to know of. You and I go there, we work it for a few months, and the gold I have mentioned is to be represented as the result of our labours if it becomes necessary to make explanations. A few thousand ounces in nuggets which might 'by some unhappy chance be recognised by previous owners we shall batter into slugs and reserve for sale in other lands.'

And then?'

'Then all that life in London and Paris means to men with great fortunes.' Ryder was smiling as he spoke. 'Then to seize and enjoy all that smug respectability is willing to give to the wealthy, and much that it is unwilling to give, but which it shall be our pleasure to take. Then to exact our revenge for all we have endured at the hands of society by making it in some measure the slave to minister to our needs and our desires. I positively tremble, my brother, when I think of the little mischief one man can work; but with money and ingenuity, combined with devotion to purpose, we may succeed in accomplis.h.i.+ng quite a decent vengeance.'

'I have no desire for revenge upon society.'

'To be sure, you have not sat through the long black night in, a cold cell with the rats, a wet rag thrown over your lacerated back, the chains eating into your flesh like the nibbling of tiny teeth, thinking of the good people who rule England, sitting at their blazing fires or smiling round the laden tables.'

'No, thank G.o.d!'

'If you had you might appreciate the subtle delight of sinning against your enemies. I am going back to England to devote what arts I know, what cunning I have, and what attractions I can a.s.sume, to the gratification of the only pa.s.sion left me. When I think of the fair daughters and the fair sons of the comfortable middle cla.s.s, Jim, I have exquisite hopes.'

Ryder rolled the cigar between his fingers, and smiled at his brother in a gentle, kindly way. 'If I can bring an honoured son of reputable parents to taste the joys of the hulks and feel the caresses of the leaded cat, I shall, I feel, be almost reconciled to my past. They talk of stopping transportation and abolis.h.i.+ng the system. I never cease to pray that the system may be spared to us. If it is done away with before I have gratified the magnificent malice I have stored up in this breast, morsel by morsel, h.o.a.rding it with the greed of a miser, I am afraid I shall lose my faith in a just Providence.'

'This is simply hideous exclaimed Jim. 'But you are joking. You speak without bitterness.

'I speak without bitterness because I would not waste any jot of it. When my moments come (and I have had a few) I desire to experience the perfect emotion. Revenge is only sweet when it opens the flood-gates of a pent-up hatred.'

'Richard!' cried the young man, 'for G.o.d's sake put this black evil out of your heart! Here is a clean world--come into it, take part in it with the good men. Your soul is poisoned--purge it. Open your eyes to the sun. I'll help you!'

Ryder placed his cigar on the log beside him, and turning back the left wrist of the silk unders.h.i.+rt he wore, struck a match, and showed Jim a broad red wheal encircling the arm like the scar of a deep burn.

'Would you like to see my ankle?' he said. 'Or my back? It's a pretty sight. I am a hunted man. But if I were not, I would not consent to sacrifice my exquisite desires merely because the sun s.h.i.+nes and girls are merry.'

'But I have been happy. I'll have none of this ugly gospel of hatred and revenge.'

'Happy! Because you are free for a moment; because you are not treated quite as a pariah because that black-eyed houri down at the shanty smiles at you? You'll sicken of this presently. I tell you you must come back to your healthy hatred. The spirit of revolt is in your blood; the contempt is with you. I shall win you over.'

Never! Never!'

'Happy! Son of a mother tortured to death by a Christian people; brother of the girl driven to suicide by hate; brother of the man whom society set in h.e.l.l.' Ryder's voice was low and musical, and his words were more dreadful than curses. 'You have not told me all,' he continued. 'Sit down, man--tell me of your life at home there.'

Jim demurred, but Ryder led him on to the narrative, and eventually he described his past, and as he talked of the old troubles and tribulations, his former prejudices awoke, and something of the early hatred and disdain. Ryder, quick to detect the effect of the revival of his boyish grievances, kept the young man's thoughts on the more painful features of the story, and worked upon his feelings guilefully probing his soul, finding his weaknesses with an unerring touch, prompted, no doubt, by his knowledge of Richard Done, the man he had been, whose youthful character he found faithfully reflected here.

'You'll come with me?' said Ryder.

'No, I couldn't do it,' answered Jim. 'Your idea of vengeance strikes me only as the dream of a madman.'

'But you'll think it over?'

'You don't suppose a man can get this sort of thing out of his mind in a day.'

'Remember, I bind you to nothing, and there is a big fortune at stake.'

Got by crime.'

'By open, honest daylight robbery.'

Jim looked at his brother with a feeling of despair; he recognised the utter hopelessness of argument based on accepted ideas of right and wrong. In disputing he felt like a child blowing bubbles against a stone wall. Ryder's att.i.tude implied that he had tested everything in the fire of a terrible experience.

'Man, man!' cried Done, 'how can you hope to beat the world?'

'For four years I have beaten it. And I am appreciated. The Government of Victoria has just raised the price of my head to one thousand pounds.'

'Why not leave the country at once?'

'As soon as you are ready.'

'Impossible. I will not go.'

'I remain until you change your mind, unless, in the meantime, some safe and convenient means of transporting my hard-earned gold presents itself.

I have an alternative scheme, but it means greater risks, and, besides, I find I am still capable of the preposterous folly of liking. I like you.'

'Then give up this brutal scheme, join with me, make an effort to work the poison out of your blood, to revive a clean, honest interest in existence, and I'll stand by you through thick and thin, against the law and all your enemies, while I've a heart-beat left in me. It's worth the effort, d.i.c.k; the world is fair, men are decent, and women are sweet.'

Ryder sat nursing a foot, smiling a smile of kindly interest. 'My boy,'

he said, 'you have the ardent sentimentality of a good mother's pink-cheeked cub of nineteen. Has it occurred to you that I have run a very great risk in being seen for five minutes in your company? Your name is Done, and you made the name rather familiar along Forest Creek; we are alike, as you have noted, and although Richard Done, the escaped convict, is not much thought of at this date, it is certain that hearing your name awakened recollection amongst the old Vandemonians in the police here, and they have probably run the rule over you more than once. If I were to join with you, they'd clap the darbies on me within a week.'

Jim spread his hands in a gesture of despair. 'I have been mistaken for Solo once; that risk must always follow you,' he said.

'I am prepared; but the Government shall never pay their thousand pounds for a live man. I appear as little as possible in the diggings in this guise, however. You did not know me as the chief performer in that little comedy with Brigalow on Diamond Gully. You did not recognise me in the dark man who talked with you and Burton while the madcap from Kyley's was leading the troopers a merry dance along the lead. By the way, I admire your taste in women, Jim. She's a fine, unshamed barbarian, this Aurora.'

The subject was distasteful to Jim. He put it aside hastily. 'If I worked with you in this scheme for disposing of the gold you would run the same risk,' he said.

'No; I need not appear in the matter. The field I speak of, which is probably very rich in itself, is so situated that we might work it for a year without being discovered. Meanwhile, by making frequent trips to Ballarat and Bendigo, you could sell a great deal of my gold along with such as we may earn. Then I should sail for England, taking with me as much gold as I could safely handle, leaving you to sell more, and eventually join me with the remainder. In this way we can, if we choose, rid ourselves of three hundred thousand pounds' worth without attracting any particular attention.'