‘I’m goin’ to bolt, I tell you!’ cried the searcher.

Rogers gripped him roughly.

‘Bolt,’ he said, ‘an’ you’re doomed—­done for.  Hell! man, can’t you see you’d be grabbed in less’n a day?  With that mug an’ that figure you’d be spotted whatever hole you crept into.’

’I know, I know; but it’ll come anyhow—­it’ll come!

‘Not so sure, unless you blab in one of these blitherin’ fits.  What does that kid know?  Nothin’.  He’s found our gold, an’ he’s hid it away.  He wants to keep it, an’ you know what a stubborn devil he is.  This is just a try on, an’ they’ll get nothin’ out o’ Dick Haddon.  If they do they get the gold, an’ we’re all right if we don’t play the fool.’

Rogers’s reasoning was very good as far as it went; but the discovery of the boy’s footprints in the drives had been kept a close secret, or even he might have admitted the wisdom of bolting without delay.

Dick spent a day and two nights in the cell at the watch-house in Yarraman.  Public report at Waddy was to the effect that every influence short of torture had been used in the effort to induce him to divulge the truth, and not a word had he spoken.  His mother and Mrs. Hardy and Harry had all visited him in the cell, and had failed to persuade him to open his lips.  His callousness in the presence of his poor mother’s distress was described in feeling terms as unworthy of the black and naked savage.  All this was much nearer the truth than speculation at Waddy was wont to be; and when Dick was restored to his home in the flesh on Saturday at noon and permitted to run at large again without let or hindrance, Waddy was amazed and indignant, and Waddy’s criticism of the methods of the police authorities was scathing in the extreme.

The boy was driven home by the sergeant, the same who had been commissioned to quell the Great Goat Riot.

‘He’s looking pulled down,’ said the trooper, delivering him into his mother’s arms.  ’It’s the confinement.  Let him run about as usual, Mrs. Haddon; let him have lots of fresh air, particularly night air, and he’ll soon be all right.  At night, Mrs. Haddon, the air is fresh and healthy.  Let him run about in the evenings, you know.’

Mrs. Haddon was very grateful for the advice and promised to act upon it.  But Dick was a new boy; he remained in doors all Saturday and Sunday, wandering about the house in an aimless manner, trying to read and failing, trying to divert himself in unusual ways and failing in everything.  He presented all the symptoms of a guilty, conscience-stricken wretch; and his mother, who had been priming him with camomile surreptitiously, began to lose confidence in that wonderful herb.

Meanwhile a very interesting stranger had made his appearance at Waddy; he was believed to be a drover, and he was on the spree and ‘shouting’ with spontaneity and freedom.  His horse, a fine upstanding bay, stood saddled and bridled under McMahon’s shed at the Drovers’ Arms by day and night.  His behaviour in drink was original and erratic.  He would fraternise with the man at the bar for a time, and then go roaming at large about the township in a desultory way, sleeping casually in all sorts of absurd places; but Waddy had a large experience in ‘drunks’ and made liberal allowances.