“Helm, old man, we ‘ve lost the track!”

“Don’t be a howling idiot, man. Lost! how could we be lost? Why, there’s the track right ahead, and pretty fresh too.”

But Anderson flung himself off his horse on to the dry crisp grass, and covered his face with his hands.

“I’ll tell you,” reiterated his mate, leaning forward in his saddle and shading his eyes, “I see hoof-marks quite plain. Why, they might have been made yesterday!”

“They were made yesterday,” groaned the other, hopelessly. “Don’t you see, my dear fellow, we made them ourselves.”

“What!”

Helm raised his head and swore a passionate oath, then sprang from his horse, stooped over the faint track, ran wildly along it for a few yards, turned back, and again cried out that the other was playing some ghastly joke off on him.

“It’s too bad, Anderson, too bad. Get up, man, and don’t be a fool. Come on, there ‘s very likely water on the other side of that ridge. You’ll feel better after you’ve had a good drink.”

“That’s the ridge we passed last night, I tell you. Water—oh, yes, there’s water there, but it’s as salt as the sea.”

“The salt-pan! No, by heaven, no, I won’t believe that. That’s miles behind us!”

“Nevertheless,” said the other man, drearily, “it’s the same old salt-pan. You ‘ll see it the moment we cross the ridge.”

“Come on, then, come on. Don’t sit groaning there: let’s know the worst. I can’t believe it, I won’t believe it till I see for myself.”

“The horses ought to have a spell if we’re ever to get out of this,” muttered Anderson; but he followed his companion’s lead, mounted his tired horse, and rode slowly on after him towards the still distant ridge.

Out back beyond the Mulligan is No Man’s Land. They had gone out to seek new country, crossed the Queensland border into South Australia, and now, old bushman as he was, Anderson had only the vaguest idea of their whereabouts. Ever since they started it had been the same trouble; the season had been exceptionally dry, and everywhere the waters were dried up. First one horse had died, then another, until at last they were reduced to only three; still they had pushed on, for the blacks told a tale of a magnificent waterhole where the water was permanent, and Anderson had a certain amount of faith in the unerring wisdom of the children of the soil where water was concerned. So he pushed on, hoping against hope, till the younger man, more fearful, perhaps more prudent, persuaded him to turn back. But it was too late. The weakest horse, the one they had used as a packhorse, gave in, and had to be left behind the first day of their return journey; and now, on the fourth, they had just made the terrible discovery they were going round on their own tracks. They had been so thankful—so hopeful—when they struck that track in the morning.

Anderson knew there was another party out better appointed than they were; these might be their tracks, and possibly they had water with them. They might even have come across water—and water—water—if only they had a little water. And so they had pushed on, eagerly, hopefully, till the terrible truth began to dawn on the older and more experienced bushman. The weather for the last two days had been dull and cloudy, they had not caught a glimpse of the sun, and hourly they had expected a thunderstorm, which would not only clear the air, but would supply them with the water they needed; but to-day the clouds had all cleared away, and the only effect of their presence had been that they had lost their bearings completely. Where and when they had lost them Anderson could not say even now, and he was loth at first to share his misgivings with his mate; but the sight of the ridge decided him. If they found, as he fully expected to, the salt-pan they had passed the night before on the other side, then most surely were they lost men—lost in a cruel thirsty land where no water was.

He pondered it over in his mind as he rode slowly after his companion. “There was no hope. There could possibly be no hope.” Over and over again he said it to himself as a man who hardly realizes his own words—and then they topped the low ridge, and right at his feet lay the salt-pan glittering in the sun.

“Cruel—cruel—cruel!” Helm had flung himself face downwards on the hard ground now, and given way to a paroxysm of despair all the more bitter for his former hopefulness. Anderson looked down on him pityingly for a moment, as one who had no part in his trouble, then he looked away again. Save for the sunshine, it was exactly the same scene, the very same they had looked upon last night—there lay the glittering salt-pan, white as driven snow, above it the hard blue cloudless sky, and all around the dreary plain, broken only by the ridge on which they stood. And yet in different circumstances he might have admired the landscape, for it had a weird beauty all its own; miles and miles he could see in the clear bright atmosphere, far away to the other side of the wide lake, where a dark clump of trees or scrub was apparently raised in the sky high above the horizon. He knew it was only the effect of the mirage, another token, had he needed a token, that there was no moisture, no water, not the faintest chance of a drop of rain. And yet there had been some rain not so very long ago, for the mesembryanthemum growing in dark green patches close to the edge of the salt was all in flower, pink, and red, and brightest yellow, such gorgeous colouring; and by that strange association of ideas, for which who shall account, his thoughts flew back to the last Cup Day, and he saw again the Flemington racecourse, and heard in fancy the shouts of the people as the favourite passed the winning-post, On the ground in front of him were long lines of crows, perched in the stunted boxwood trees above his head, filling the air with their monotonous cawing. He laughed at the mockery of the thing. The other man raised his head.

“Old man, what is it? Is it possible that—”

What wild imaginings for the moment had passed through his brain he could not himself have told; but whatever his hopes might have been, they were gone the moment he looked in his mate’s face.

“Man,” he said, sharply, “are you mad?”

Anderson was sobered in a second.

“No,” he said, bitterly, “but as far as I can see, it must come to that before we ‘ve done.”

“No, no, we won’t give up hope yet. Is there no hope?”

Anderson sat down beside him, and pointed silently to the horses. If ever poor beasts were done, were at their last gasp, they were, as they stood there, their noses touching the ground. The bushman’s slender equipment had been reduced to its scantiest proportions, and yet it seemed cruelty to force them to carry even those slender packs; even the canvas water-bags, dry as tinder now, hanging at their necks, were a heavy burden. Wiser than their masters they had crawled beneath the shade, scanty as it was, of the boxwood trees, and stood there patiently waiting—For what? For death and the pitiless crows patiently waiting overhead.

“Exactly,” Helm answered his companion’s unspoken thought, “but we can’t sit and wait like that. Man, we must try to get out of this at any rate. We cant sit here and wait for the crows.”

Anderson sighed heavily.

“What can we do?” he asked. “We must spell a bit. The horses are done. As it is I ‘m afraid yours will have to be left and well have to go on foot. There must be water about somewhere, for look at the crows; but we can’t find it, and we couldn’t have searched more carefully.”

“Why not shoot the old horse if he’s no good? His blood might—”

“Nonsense, man. Aren’t you bushman enough yet to know that drinking blood ‘s only the beginning of the end? Once we do that—”

“Well, after?” asked Helm.

But the other did not answer, for he, too, in his heart, was asking, “After?” And their lips were dry and parched, and their tongues swollen, and before them lay the salt-pan, with right in the centre a little gleam of dark blue water which mocked their misery. There was nothing for it but to lie down beneath the scanty shade and rest. They were too weary to push on, all their energy had departed, and Helm, lying on his back looking up at the patches of blue sky that peeped through the branches, said with a sigh,

“If we ‘re done for, I wish to heaven the end would come now. I can’t stand the thought of—of—What’s it like, old man? Is it very bad, do you think?”

“As bad as bad can be.”

“And is there no hope?”

What could he say, this man who had lived in the bush all his life? What hope could he give, when practically his experience told him there was no hope—that if they would save themselves from needless pain they would turn their pistols against themselves and die there and at once. But the love of life is strong in us all, and the hope of life is as strong. How could they die, these strong men with life in every vein? No, no, surely it was impossible. An iguana scuttled across in front of them and Helm started up eagerly.

“There,” he said, “there—and I never thought. Look at that beast. There must be water somewhere or how could he live.”

Anderson sighed.

“Yes, there’s the bitterness of it. I know there’s water about if only we could find it; but as we didn’t find any when we had everything in our favour there’s not much good in our wasting time looking now. After all I believe those beasts must live without, though they say they don’t. No, old chap, our only hope lies in pushing on to the nearest water we know of.”

“Then don’t let us lie here wasting precious minutes. Every minute is of consequence; let’s make a start. We must push on.”

Push on! They had been pushing on ever since they left Yerlo station ten days ago, and this is what it had brought them to.

“It’s no good wearing ourselves out in the heat of the day,” said Anderson, “wait till evening and we’ll do twice as much.”

“Which way?”

“South-east, I think. If we can only hold out we ought to fetch Gerring Gerring Water. As far as I know this must be Tamba salt lake, and if so—”

“Karinda’s just to the north there.”

“A hundred and twenty miles at the very least and not a drop of water the whole way. No, that’s out of the question, old man; our only hope lies in reaching Gerring Gerring.”

“And you don’t see much probability of our doing that?”

“Well, we can try.”

He felt a great pity, this older man, for the lad—he called him a lad for all his four-and-twenty years—doomed to die, nay, dying at this very moment, in the prime of his manhood. They could but try, he said over and over again, they could but try.

And then as they rested they fell to talking of other things—talked of their past lives and of their homes as neither, perhaps, had ever talked before.

“My old mother ‘ll miss me,” said Charlie Helm with a sigh, “though Lord knows when she’ll ever hear the truth of the matter.”

“Umph, I don’t know, but I guess if we do peg out, it’ll be some considerable time before they can read the store account over us. Have you got any paper about you?”

“Not a scrap. We can leave a message on the salt though.”

“It’ll be blown away before to-morrow. Who do you want to write to? Your mother? That girl?”

Helm turned his face away. The man had no right to pry into his private concerns.

“Write to your mother, lad, write to your mother by all means. Mothers are made of different clay to other women; but don’t you bother about the other. Women are all alike, take my word for it. It’s out of sight out of mind with all of them. But write to your mother.”

“Some one may pass this way,” pondered the younger man, hardly heeding his words. “It’s just worth trying,” and he lay silent while Anderson talked on or rather thought aloud.

“It’s of the boy I’m thinking,” he said. “The poor helpless little one. He never throve since his mother died. She didn’t go much on me, but the boy was everything to her though he was a cripple. Well—well—if I were only certain he was dead now it wouldn’t be half so hard. He’d be better dead, I know, but I couldn’t think it before; he was all I had, and the last time I saw him he put up his little hand—such a mite of a hand—and clutched his daddy’s beard. He was all I had, how could I wish him dead? But now—now—my God!—if I were certain he was dead and it hadn’t hurt much.”

Helm sprang to his feet, and swore an oath.

“We’re not going to die,” he cried, “not as easily as all that. Come on, we have wasted enough precious time.

“Not till it’s a little cooler. It’s no good, I tell you, wearing ourselves out in the heat.”

And Helm, seeing the advice was good, lay down again. Lay down and tried not to listen to the cawing of the crows, the only sound that broke the stillness—tried not to think of cool waters; not to think of a household down south; not to think of the girl who, notwithstanding his mate’s cynical warning, filled all his thoughts. He dozed a little and dreamed, and wakened with a start and a strong feeling upon him that it had been something more than a dream, that some one had really called him, was calling him still. Was it his mother’s voice, or that girl’s, or was it Anderson’s? Anderson was sleeping heavily, and strong man as he was, sobbing in his sleep. Helm stretched out a hand to awaken him and then paused. Why should he? What had he better to offer than these broken dreams?

He broke a branch from a tree, thereby scattering the crows and stepped down to the edge of the glittering white salt. It crunched beneath his feet like sand, and he went on till the hard crust began to give way beneath him and the thick mud oozed up. Then when he thought it was moist enough to resist the fierce hot wind, which was blowing from the north like a breath from an oven, he prepared to write his last message. And then came the difficulty.

What was he to say? What could he say? Not that he had so little, but so much. And it might never be read after all, or at best it would only be read by some station hand who, once they were dead, would give but a passing thought to their message, only a passing thought to their sufferings. They had found a skeleton, he remembered, the first year he had been on Yerlo, a skeleton that must have been lying there years, a poor wind-tossed, sunbaked thing from which all semblance of humanity had long since departed, and he, in his carelessness, had thought so little of it, had never realized the awful suffering that must have been before the strong man came to that.

And now—and now—he took his stick and wrote in large printed letters on the crisp salt—

STOP. LOST.

“James Anderson and Charles Helm were lost on the 20th October. They have gone S.E. from the salt-pan. Will you kindly send word to Mrs. Helm, The Esplanade, St. Kilda, and to Miss Drysdale, Gipps Street, East Melbourne.”

Then he wrote his name, “Charles Helm.”

It seemed so feeble, so inadequate, not a hundreth part of what he felt did it express, and yet what could he say? Not even in his extremity could he write tender messages to his loved ones there. They would know, surely they would know, they would understand, that his thoughts had been full of them when he wrote that cold message. What more could he say? But would they ever know the love and longing that had filled his heart? Would his mother ever know that her boy had thought of her at the last? Would Mabel Drysdale understand how he had cared for her?—all he had meant to convey by the mere mention of her name? He stepped slowly back and wakened his companion.

“Mate,” he said, “don’t you think we’d better be travelling? It’s a little cooler now, and it ‘s getting late.”

Anderson struggled to his feet wearily and then went down to the salt-pan.

“So you ‘ve been leaving a last message,” he said; “I ‘m afraid it’s not much good. Who ‘s likely to pass this way?”

“It’s only a chance, of course,” said Helm, “but—well—I ‘d like them, if possible, to know I ‘d thought of them.”

“And a woman, too,” laughed Anderson cynically, “if we get out of this you ‘ll learn, I expect, just about how little value she sets on your care for her.”

“You ‘ve been unlucky,” said the younger man gently; “there are women who—but there, I don’t suppose we’ll come through. Anyhow, it’s time we started.

“Well—well, keep your faith and I’ll keep mine. Perhaps here and there, there may be a woman worth caring about, but they ‘re few and far between.”

“Don’t you want to say anything?” asked Helm.

“Who? I? No. Who is there to care a straw whether I leave my carcase to the crows or not? There’s only the boy, and he’s too young to understand. But, I say, you might have mentioned the name of the station,” and taking the stick from Helm’s hand, he walked out on the salt and wrote;

LOST

“Please let them know at Yerlo,” and signed his name, “James Anderson.”

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