They lingered for two days by Fortunate Spring in order to give the camels a much-needed rest, then they proceeded on their march, now steering due east, and it was strange indeed how this altered course affected the spirits of the party. They seemed to feel that they were at last on the straight track towards the mystic land of their desire. Mackay even more than the others showed the change in his feelings; he whistled joyously in the exuberance of his heart, and cheered on the labouring team with hearty words of praise. And Bob, relieved considerably of his own vague doubts in himself, had changed apparently into a new being. The vagaries of the Shadow called forth his amusement, and the dry wordy dialogues of the two bushmen never failed to make him laugh with keenest appreciation, a fact which endeared him much to that valiant couple. The freedom of the mighty desert held him in thrall, its dangers were forgotten, the call of the wild was in his ears, the secret of the Never Never beckoned him.

"I told you the sunny skies would alter your temperament," said Jack, whose boisterous good nature had never once deserted him. "I don't think a man gets a fair show in the constantly cloudy weather at home."

[Pg 245]

"And yet we always get back to the old country somehow," answered Bob, thoughtfully. "I suppose its grand history attracts us when the greater world has palled. I believe I could almost live in history, Jack, wandering about among the castles and cathedrals that have seen the centuries pass. What wonderful records the grim old walls hold. Why, each stone would seem alive to me."

"It would be pleasant to have a big holiday at home," admitted Jack, wistfully; "but our time—and means, for travelling about was pretty limited when we were there——"

"But that will never be again," cried Bob, gaily; "just consider what we have already got in this country, and who knows what may await us out where we are going?"

Who knew indeed? Who ever knows what lies in the dim distance of untrodden tracts? The days passed quickly, though the country continued to be barren and cheerless in aspect, the difficulties of travel were not nearly what they had been on the first long weary stretch. More than once a soak was discovered to replenish the water-bags before they had yet gone dry, and within a week two new wells had been charted. They were little more than the muddy residues of a long previous rainfall, still, the dignity of a Central Australian well as a rule lies wholly in its title, a fact which is well enough known to all explorers.

So successful were they in their journeying that after ten days had elapsed, and they were a hundred and forty miles east of Fortunate Spring, Mackay considered that a brief deviation to the north might be ventured upon on the off chance of evading a long dry stretch which at this[Pg 246] stage intervened on Bentley's route, the next and final spring charted by that explorer being over seventy miles distant.

"We had a terribly hard time on that journey," said he, as he gazed across the wavy expanse of shifting sands which spread before them, "an' it's just possible the country to the north'ard a bit may be better. It canna be much worse."

For a long time, however, the varied route showed little prospect of improvement; sand, sand, everlasting sand spread everywhere before them, and progress became dangerously slow. The camels struggled in vain to make headway; they sank and floundered and stumbled in the wreathing masses. In five days the distance covered totalled only forty miles. No wonder Mackay looked grave as he noticed the water-bags' woefully flat appearance.

"I tell you what, boys," burst out Emu Bill, during their noonday halt, "it's mighty sartain we has struck a snag this time. This is the miserablest patch——" He broke off abruptly and fell to abusing the flies besieging his face with remarkable eloquence. No one seemed disposed to question Bill's statement in any way, and shortly afterwards the march was renewed, Bill, Never Never, and the Shadow alternately lauding the striving camels for their patient endurance, and bestowing maledictions upon them for their ponderously slow onward movement.

Hour after hour the melancholy procession laboured along. So soon had the grimmer influence of the country exerted its baleful spell that for a long time each man feared to speak lest he might betray the growing depression at his heart. Then, just as the evening shadows were[Pg 247] beginning to close in, a welcome break in the monotonous landscape appeared to gladden their straining eyes. In the faint distance a feathery line of scrub stretched across their path, indicating a decided change in the sand surface, and the sight added vigour to their failing steps. Eagerly they strove to reach the inviting mallee coppice before the thick blackness of night came down to envelop them. But it was not to be; the stumbling gait of the camels could not be hastened, though Emu Bill and his compatriots implored and beseeched the hardy animals with an eloquence that was touching to hear.

"One more try, boys," cried Mackay. "There's bound to be water somewhere among the timber, and we may save ourselves another night of misery by finding it now." He went to Jack's assistance, and together they tugged at the leading camel's nose-rope until the poor brute was literally being dragged through the yielding sands. This method of progression not proving very satisfactory, he next made laudable endeavour to enliven the march by singing raucously a few bars from that old song, "The Campbells are Coming."

"I just reckon they are comin'," Never Never Dave groaned, somewhat confusing the reference; "but they need a jolly lot of persuasion, they do. Get up, Repentance, you cross-eyed streak o' misery. Didn't I give ye a drink last week?"

At length Mackay saw that they must be content to halt in the open for one night more.

"We can't do it, boys," he said, "so let us look for a decent camping-space in the sand; we'll find water if there's any about in the morning."

They had barely time to gather a few twigs from the[Pg 248] sparse brush now in evidence, and start a feeble fire, before an impenetrable darkness descended over the desert. Then they busied themselves unloading the camels and preparing their frugal meal, the latter an operation which rarely occupied much time, for obvious reasons. They were indeed in a very deplorable plight at this period; the water-bags had given up much of their store by evaporation, and they now contained but a very meagre supply of the valuable liquid, and the camels were well-nigh dying on their feet from sheer exhaustion.

The hour was quite late, and they were about to roll themselves in their blankets, when suddenly a bright light flamed up luridly among the trees in their course, and harshly through the still air rose the strains of a native chant.

"By the Great Howlin' Billy!" growled Never Never Dave, "there's a corroborree on to-night. It's mighty lucky we didn't reach the timber, after all."

"If there's any nigs about there's bound to be water," asserted the Shadow, with a chuckle of delight, and certainly his reasoning was sound.

Higher and higher blazed the warning beacon, and louder and louder sounded the warriors' dismal wailings, and through the leafless branches of the eucalypti a wildly dancing band of ape-like figures could be distinguished. The little group gazed at the ominous spectacle in silence and with mingled feelings. The presence of a native tribe in the neighbourhood was conclusive proof that an ample water supply was not far off; indeed the aborigines of the Interior almost invariably hold their corroborree ceremonials around the principal spring of the district, for according to their belief a mighty[Pg 249] spirit has its abode in every desert pool or soak, and from the slimy depths thereof watches over the welfare of his people. But when ought displeases this dread "Wangul"—the great Dweller in the Waters—he visits his wrath upon the land by drying up the springs and betaking himself elsewhere. It is a wonderfully convenient idea, for it explains away all droughts and following pestilences, and it appeals to the simple heathen instinct as no finer teachings could. To propitiate this god of theirs many ordinances are performed and numerous sacrifices offered, and should any wandering members of an alien tribe happen to be near on such occasions, they are promptly seized upon to occupy the unenviable position of "Corroborree mourners," a post which entails death, preceded by much horrible suffering.

Mackay was mentally recalling his various experiences with the natives in different parts of the country, and with little sense of comfort, when Emu Bill disturbed his musings by saying suddenly—

"I wonder what the howling celebration means to-night, anyway?"

The others had by this time gone to sleep, having been utterly worn out by their trying day's encounter with the desert, and these two sat alone by the dying fire.

"I'm just a wee bit afraid, Bill," answered Mackay, dubiously, "that it has some bearing on our arrival. I never did like to be near the murderous pests in the nighttime."

Bill stirred about uneasily, and it was clear that he shared Mackay's fears.

"I believe you are right," he said, after a moment's pause. "The skunks must have seen us a long way off."

[Pg 250]

He relapsed into a gloomy silence, and began to draw with great care sundry diagrams in the sand with the improvised camp poker.

Meanwhile the whirling figures in the wood continued their mad career, and the flames from the great fire in their midst spouted high above the motionless mallee tips. The myriad stars twinkled merrily in an unclouded sky, and the Southern Cross constellation shone out brilliantly almost directly overhead. A slender crescent moon just above the horizon lent its feeble halo to the scene, so that a vague, eerie half light seemed to float on the surface of the land. Faster and still faster the maddened Wangul worshippers rushed, and the night was filled with their harsh, unmusical ravings.

Mackay watched the progress of events with quickening interest, while Emu Bill with many a muttered malediction examined the charges in his revolver, and smoked reflectively. Mackay was very unwilling to awake the sleepers unless it were absolutely necessary; they needed all the rest they could get. But Emu Bill recalled him to a sense of duty.

"I've been watching the circus," he said quietly, "an' I can see nary mourner in the crowd. For a dead cert they'll be comin' fur us when they've worked up enough enthusiasm. They'll imagine us to be asleep by now."

Mackay got up without a word, and shook Bob and Jack back to consciousness. Never Never Dave was alert on the instant, but the Shadow slumbered deeply and refused to be awakened, whereupon Emu Bill aroused him by rolling him rudely out of his blanket, a proceeding which almost created a civil war on the spot.

"You has no right to dislocate my sweet dreams[Pg 251] in such a dingo fashion," the bellicose Shadow protested grumpily; but when he understood the seriousness of the position his wrath dissolved speedily. "At the same time I reckon you is a bit too much skeert about the antics o' them muskitties," he remarked chidingly. "I was having a daisy dream, I was; flooded rivers an' gold an' di'monds, an'——"

"Shut it off, Shad," unsympathetically interrupted the object of his disapproval. "They're on our track now. Look!"

The corroborree fire continued to blaze up vividly, and the watchers could see numerous naked savages piling on the logs and dancing amid the showering sparks like denizens of the nether world. The circling mass of grotesquely garbed warriors had broken up in apparent confusion, but quickly they again came into view and re-formed on the edge of the zone of illumination, then spreading fan-like to north and south, they came slowly yet steadily towards the supposed sleeping camp. A moment more and they were hidden from view in the intervening shadows.

"Things are beginning to look lively," said Bob, adjusting his cartridge-belt.

Jack ranged himself quietly by his comrade's side, his rifle gripped in readiness.

"I don't know how this is going to turn out, Bob," he said slowly; "but I mean to shoot straight, to-night."

"It's a case o' self preservation, my lad," warned Mackay; and he closed the breech of his powerful weapon with a vicious snap. "You needna think o' usin' the stock o' your gun in this scrimmage. I am just afraid it's goin' to be more serious than I thought."

[Pg 252]

There could be little doubt as to the meaning of the wily natives' tactics. Assuredly they intended to surround the little camp, which they considered to be safely asleep, and spear the party at their leisure.

"We are to be their sacrificial offerings, apparently," remarked Bob, with forced calm.

Mackay was aroused to a sudden burst of fury at the words; his long-smouldering anger against the natives effervesced to an alarming pitch.

"I'll give them sacrifices," he grated, peering into the darkness with eyes that seemed like glowing coals of fire over the gleaming barrel of his rifle. "I'll make them think an earthquake has broken loose in their midst. I'll—I'll——"

Indignation choked his fiery utterance, and he said no more, but toyed lingeringly with the trigger of his gun.

A minute elapsed, it seemed an eternity, but no signs of the enemy could yet be traced. Instinctively Bob's eyes returned to the recent centre of affairs where the impish fire feeders were heaping on the logs with frantic glee, and he shuddered involuntarily. The suspense was rapidly becoming unbearable, and the little band expected every moment to be overwhelmed with flying spears from some unlooked-for corner. Each pigmy bush around to their overstrained vision took on the appearance of a crouching warrior, and it was with the exercise of great restraint that Mackay and his comrades refrained from firing at random into the night. Slowly the seconds dragged their weary course, then all at once a weird unearthly chorus reached the ears of the anxiously waiting group; it seemed to come from everywhere around, and they turned about in dismay. The attacking horde were[Pg 253] closing in on them from all points of the compass. Only when the ring had been completed had they begun their deadly advance. Neither Mackay nor any of them had expected this.

"I reckon we is bested, mates," groaned Emu Bill, helplessly; and it certainly did seem as if he spoke truly.

Another minute elapsed, then they grounded their arms in impotent rage; the swelling chant from an unknown number of throats was drawing insidiously nearer, and they could only roughly guess the various origins of sound. Mackay turned to Jack to give a last word of encouragement, and he was surprised to find the boy standing by Bob's side in an attitude of acute attention—his head was bent forward, and he shielded his ear with his hand as if he were listening intently.

"I've got them," he whispered eagerly. "Unless there's a dummy musician in their ranks, there's a fifty yards' blank in the circle straight out by the camel packs."

"How many do you make altogether, Jack?" inquired Mackay.

The boy replied promptly, "They seem to be about thirty yards or so apart. They are nearly two hundred yards off now, and coming very slowly. There must be nearly fifty of the beasts."

"Good for you, Jack," murmured Mackay, heartily, a tribute of praise which even at that moment Emu Bill and the Shadow echoed with characteristic vehemence.

There was no time to be lost, the fateful ring was closing every instant; so, gripping his rifle tightly, the leader of the expedition made a course out in the direction as indicated by Jack, his comrades following after in Indian file. And as they passed out by the camels, each[Pg 254] man breathed a prayer for their safety; then, with the hideous voices of the approaching warriors ringing in their ears, they made their way stealthily out through the saving gap into the freedom beyond.

Surely never before had a course been steered by such odd reckoning, yet the droning cries on either side of the escaping party as they neared the edge of the invisible circle guided them as well as glaring beacons would have done, and they man?uvred cautiously through the midst of the fervently singing band, luckily escaping all observation.

"It was like navigatin' through the Heads of Sydney Harbour," exclaimed Emu Bill, flinging himself down on the sand immediately they had cleared the dangerous line.

"We've got to thank our stars the beggars have the good sense to say grace before supper," said Jack, cheerfully.

"We are no' just altogether out o' the difficulty yet," warned Mackay. "They'll be back with a rush when they find out their mistake."

"But you ain't goin' to let them run the whole circus, surely?" complained Emu Bill. "Let's pepper the howlin' dervishes now."

Mackay seemed to hesitate for a moment, the odds in numbers were greatly against them.

"Train your guns on the old camp, boys," he said quietly. "You'll see their black bodies against the glow o' the ashes when they get nearer." He had scarcely spoken these words when the dismal chant of the over-sanguine natives ceased, and with blood curdling yells the savage horde swept on to their supposed work of extermination. The onlookers saw a perfect hail of spears strike[Pg 255] and quiver amid the smouldering ashes; then a fantastical array of fiend-like forms swarmed before their eyes, and prolonged shrieks of baffled rage rent the air. Now was their opportunity. "Fire, boys!" cried Mackay, himself setting the example; and the death-dealing weapons thundered out their grim challenge to the foe. When they looked again only a fiercely struggling mass of black humanity was visible, and the scattering sparks showed where the shots had taken effect. Once more a well-directed volley was poured into the surging crowd; but this time the flash of the rifles betrayed their presence, and immediately about a dozen gaunt apparitions charged down on the little party with vengeful shouts. It look............