THE FUGITIVES.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 59, 10 March 1923, Page 21

THE FUGITIVES.

IALL SIGHTS SKSESVETJu)

BY ALICE A. KENNY.

Sf NOPSIB OF PREVIOUS CHAPTERS. The story opens at a lonely mission nation in northern New Zealand, where live Mr. Carstairs and hia convict servant Laurence. The latter has reached New j Zealand from Australia as an escapee from I the penal settlements there. A schooner | arrives, bringing Mr. and Mrs. Goodwin and their daughter Barbara, on a visit to Mr. Caretalrs from their home In England. Mr. Carstairs Is called away suddenly, and leaves his friends tinaer tho care of I-aurence, for whose fidelity he vouches. Sir. Goodwin, however, does not trust the ex-convict, though his daughter feels that her father's suspicious are not merited. | Pnrihg the night the station Is attacked by i hostile natives, and the Goodwins, with j Laurence to guide them, take to the bush, j An accidental noise discloses their presence j to the Maoris Just ns Laurence has carried j Barbara across n creek. Mr. and Mrs. I Goodwin, after being held prisoners In the i mission house, are rescued by friendly I natives led by Mr. Carstairs. Laurence and j Barbara have Ip the interval made their escape up the coast in the mission boar. The parents are 'greatly disquieted by a story brought by a native-that the Xgati Mako on their homeward Journey had lieen Joined by a white ransatirn, who came witu a whaleboar, and who hud a white wife who pined and wept. Both Goodwin and Carstairs vow vengeance on (he ci-convlct should it be found that he bad betrayed his trust. In the meantime the fugitives have put Into a little creek up the coast, anit taken shelter In a ruined whare. Here Barbara is found during Laurence's absence on a foraging expedition by a ragged man, who Induces her to go to his camp on the pretest that there are women there. She Is dismayed to Cnd that the only occupants are three repulsive and dirty men. CHAPTER Till. THE TIHICKET OF LIGHT GREEN BUSHES. Stupefied with surprise and terror Laurence sank down in the shelter of , the scrub, and looked to his gun. What had happened to the girl he could only vaguely surmise. But for the signs of j human life up at the deserted village he | would have supposed that she had merely wandered away, but now this disappearance might mean a stealthy hunting of them both. No cry had reached him, but he knew that the thick undergrowth and intervening slope could deaden all sounds of struggle. For in hour he lay still watching bush and creek for any sign of life. Birds | flew and called overhead, seed pods j snapped open in the sun, and tho heat j beat upon him in parching waves. At l length he rose, aud, summoning his { courage, which was low enough from hunger and the tension of watching, he went down to the creek and drank. With some idea of flight in his mind he put all the food supply into the boat except a few peaches, which be ate. Iv retracing his steps he came on a large bare footprint in the crumbling red earth of the slope, and then another. The ground was too dry for a trail to bo | easily followed, but here was evidence enough of tbe girl's capture. The bare feet indicated savages, so . . . she was taken or killed. .. . Searching the hut and the ground he found no trace of blood, no sign of resistance, but, living or dead, she was gone, and what could he do, alone, against a horde? He had the boat, weapons, food. . . • Crouched beside the hut a dark struggle raged within him. Love of life, cowardice, his long estrangement from all the finer things of life urged him away. Lurking death was behind these trees, out beyond waa the safety of calm seas and wooded islands, and . . . food lasted longer with only one mouth to feed. . . Barbara sat on the ground under the big tree with some cooked fish on a piece of bark in her lap, and from time to time she put a little piece into her moutb. She was terribly afraid. She knew now that there was no woman in the clearing, that there was no timber camp, that these men were not Government settlers, but desperate fugitives living miserably and lawlessly between the forests and the sea coast. The two other men were younger than the one who bad discovered her, but in no way more reassuring. One of them was wasted a* though with sickness, and coughed and spat frequently. They called each other by strange names, and their speech was mingled with a horrible jargon and oaths which offended her ears. The very vagueness of her fears made them worse. Only the faintest show of respect covered an ugly derision pf manner in all of them, and something worse, as when the emaciated man, putting the food into her lap, ran caressing fingers down her arm. "None o' that!" said the big man, whom they called Mat. "She ain't your girl, Blunt. You sheer off or I'll— —" The threats he uttered fell incredibly on the girl's stunned ears. "None of your missionary airs to mc," replied Blunt with an oath. ''Isn't she- —" Mat seized him by the arm and dragged him back. "You fool," he said. "I'll tell j you what She is—if you keep out of it — i she's a blanky pardon for the lot oi us. | From what she says this here white settlement can't be far off, and if we can | get her back there I tell you she's a blanky pardon for the lot of us " "Not for mc," replied Blunt. "Oh, I know you, you old ! I'm in too deep, mc and Paddy—you'll save your own skin, and let us go to h !" The other man, a rough, hairy Irishtnan, joined them, and a passionate ! debate rased just out of the wretched I girl's hearing. An oath reached her | occasionally, and a pointing hand made j her shrink, but what they urged upon [ each other with such fury she could not j hear. j .She put the food from her lap and rose unsteadily, making a step towards the creek. Mat left the other two and followed her at once. '•"Where are you going missie?" he ! said, and stood in front of her. "Back to the hut, to Laurence," she ! whispered, cringing away from the abhorrent touch of the man. . "No you don't missie, no good in that. He's cut and run, he's gone, he's blanky well left you to starve. 'Struthr I seen him off down the coast with all the tucker on his back." She did not know whether to believe him or not, but wavering away from him took a step back. He instantly stepped forward, so close upon her that his clothing brushed hers. "You go back and eat your dinner like a good little Nancy,'* he added with a coaxing leer. She saw only too well that she would not be allowed to escape, and rather than endure his touch upon her, she yielded, and walked back to her seat, under the tree.

A Story of the EaHy Days

Fear was too strong upon her now for her to eat. It had killed her hunger. She tried to think connectedly, but waves of faintness passed over her and j she trembled weakly. The nightmare I presence of thoee three men whose eyes | she could rot look into, held her like a spell. Sometimes they wrangled fiercely. Occasionally they occupied themselves with cutting wood or bringing water from the creek. One dis- • appeared for a time, returning with a string of eels from some trap in the stream. If they approached her, and j spoke to her, she neither answered nor j moved, but held herself motionless in an j extremity of sick loathing. j The sun beat warmly into the clear- ! ing she saw clouds pass across the blue, ' and in her stupefaction was sharply I aware of the small sweet sound of I winged insects, the odour of fern and sun-searched earth. Once a small pink blossom from the branches above her fell upon her lap, and she turned her linked hands over, and held it in her palm. Her set lips parted and trembled and her breast heaved with a sigh as she stared at it. "Little, sweet, friendly thing to come to mc," she thought dazedly. "Oh, when will this be over! If I could onlj' die!" And her heart cried out to Laurence to save her. The three men were sprawling in the | shade a little way off, never, as it seemed to her, taking their eyes from her. The confusion of terror began to clear a little from her brain, and sho tried to think more connectedly. Had Laurence indeed abandoned her? His face rose in her mind, and its melancholy and sullenness seemed noble in comparison with these men. On the far side of the clearing wns a thicket of light green trees, very pretty and slender against the dark forest which rose , beyond them. They bore bunches of | small dark berries and a few little*birds were hopping about them. She was looking with mournful blank eyes at the delicate quivering leaves when the birds rose and flitted across the clearing. The three men looked up, and followed their flight. "Wish they was blanky pigeons," gro\\le_ the Irishman, "or even quail." "Bettor wish they were fat turkeys iat once, 1 ' said Blunt, and rose, and | stretched. j He walked towards the fire which j they always kept just alight, and ■ dropped a few pieces of wood .on it. He looked as though lie were in a bitter temper, and his eyes ran glitteringly over the girl. Mat approached her, holding in his hand a rough cup made of flax and full of water. "Here you are missie," he said, and I the girl took it with a murmured '-Thank I yon." and drank eagerly. ' "Xow, look here," he said, standing j over her, and speaking, in what was | meant to be a reassuring tone, "Never mind them blanks. What's the good of being so skeered. I'm going to lools artcr you if I have to cut the livers out of them two, and I'm going to take you back to your people safe and sound." "yc3," said Blunt behind him, "and you'll get your heart cut out before you get a chance to turn Queen's evidence on US." Without answering him, Mat continued speaking. "You've got no need to sit as if you was froze stiff, and not eat, nor sleep. You get into the cabin there, and lie down and sleep." She shook her head. "It's for your own good. Go on, or 111 pick you up, and put you inside." "Don't you dare touch mc." she shuddered, finding words at that. "Laws-a mighty!" said the man with a jeer, and she found herself plucked up, and set on her feet, his hands upon her waist, his face very near her» She gave a cry and sprang away from him, only to be grasped*by Blunt. The light green bushes shook and parted. Laurence stood there, very pale, with tbe musket at his shoulder. '•Laurence!" she cried. "Get away from the girl, all you men," he said. CHAPTER IX. NIGHT ON THE .ISLAND. They fell back like men thunderstruck and she was left for one moment alone in the midst of the clearing. Then Laurence's low-voiced "Come to mo!" reached her, and she ran with trembling limbs to his side. Blunt was the first to recover. "Where in h did he come from?" he exclaimed in a gasping voice. "Why, curse mc! if it isn't young Jim—come alive again—young Jimmy the Gentcome back to his old pals." "Stay where you. are—all of you!" cried Laurence, as the men Paddy made a movement to run for cover. Mat, muttering curses, had his eyes I fixed on Laurence, stealthily and ] eagerly, as though bent on finding out lif lie were alone and unsupported. "Oh, Laurence, take mc away!"' moaned the girl. , ! | "Put that gun down, can't ye," said Mat sullenly, "and talk a bit. What's your garnet Wherc'd you come from? Are you by yourself!" "Keep back!" said Laurence, as Blunt moved a step towards him. "I have a loaded pistol here, too, and I'll blow your face in if you coinc on!" ! Blunt stopped nnd gnawed his lip with j a dangerous look. | "Devilish friendly, ain't he?" he said j with savage derision. I "Go back to the boat," said Laurence: 1 very low, to the girl. "I'm following; | you. Go, go quickly!" i She obeyed him, and the two walked across the clearing, Laurence still hold-1 ing back the three miscreants. In aj moment the girl was out of sight, but! her protector turned at the edge of the; : clearing. "Wait a moment!" cried Mat furiously. "You. Jimmy, listen here! I don't know what your game is, but I can tell you mine straight out. Will you etop and listen, d you!" he roared, as the young man stepped back into the scrub. "If you don't it'll be the worse for you and the girl, too, d'you hear mc!" "I've got you covered still," said Laurence, unseen "Don't you move a step. You. Blunt —keep still! By ! I've a good mind to shoot all three of you." "Wait a bit with your blanky orders." said Blunt with fury. "You'll sing small enough when we take the wench under your nose and put a knife in your blanky neck." j "I tell you I mean no harm by the girl, or you," Mat was shouting.

"Back!" said Laurence's voice again, and suddenly tbe elder man's tone of conciliation changed. "Blast you! you'll be sorry for this, you fool! We've got food and you haven't. We're three to one, and we'll round you up, follow your tracks, and hunt you every way you turn. And when you're dropping with Bleep, and afraid to close your eyes, and footsore and starving, we'll get you and make Laurence had a heart-throb of thankfulness at that. They knew nothing about the boat. Brave and wise little girl to keep that knowledge from them. A last look into the clearing showed him Blunt coming on with stealthily, encroaching steps, his eyes burning, his hand at his belt. "Drop that knife and get back!" lie shouted, and as Blunt stopped short with a start Laurence lowered the musket and ran swiftly into the undergrowth Nearly at the end of her strength. Barbara reached the boat and scrambled in. She heard Laurence's feet thudding behind her and he came bounding down the slope, holding the musket clear of the short scrub. Shouts followed him, and the hushes crashed as the three convicts spread out in pursuit of him. He was beside her in a moment, flinging the fern and branches from the boat. Laying tho musket on a thwart he snatched thje knife from hia belt, and cutting the boat free from the bank, pushed out into the stream. As the oars rattled into the rowlocks the man Paddy appeared on the slope. "A boat!" he shouted, with an oath. "They've got a boat." A stone flung with good aim thudded heavily on the boat near the girl, and they saw Blunt and Mat emerge from the scrub. The boat was slowly gathering way. "Rush him, boys!—rush him!" roared Mat. < Letting go the oars, which Barbara ' immediately seized, Laurence raised the mu«ket. "Stay where you are!" he. cried steadily, feeling the girl guide the boat out into the current. "It is all right," she whispered. "I can row a boat," and she dragged at tbe heavy oars. A volley of curses and threats came after them, and a stone or two. which fell short, a? the boat slid into the swift current of mid-stream. The brown banks glided by, and the oars splashed in the water. The light gleamed on tlie barrel of the gun as Laurence lowered it. The pursuit was over, and as he turned to take the oars from her hands his eyes met those of the girl in a long, strange gaze. A few swift moments, and the stream opened out to the sea, and fair, and still, the wooded islands of the coast rose before them. Laurence stepped the mast and set the little sail, and they run out and away over a lightly rippled sea, as though this desperate flight of theirs were but a summer day's pleasure trip. The girl crouched in the stern with her skirt turned over her head as a protection against the sun, and watched her companion's skilful handling of the little boat. "Are we going to that island there. Laurence V" "Yes, miss; I've been on it once before, and I know where to land, and where there's water to be found." "You knew those men before?" she asked timidly, after a pause. "Yes!" ha said abruptly, in a tone thnt startled her. "I'm sorry," she faltered, "if I've vexed you. saying that." "No Miss, no Miaa! Tisn't you have vexed mc. It's the thought of them " 'They called you Jim." "Yea, but it's not my name. Oh, thank God! we've got away from them." "Are they co bad?" "Bad? They're wild beasts, they're devils. They thoueht I was dead because they left mc to die ." His face contracted with remembered sufferings. "And I've got tlie scar of Blunts knife here." He struck his breast with his hand, and Barbarr. 6hrank from the emotion in hi 3 face. "I ought to have shot them down, one after the other." 'he muttered, "shot them down like the wolves they a/e. . ." The 'boat grounded gently in shallow ■water at the narrow 'beach of th"c island, and Laurence lowered himself over the side and waded ashore. It was nearly dark now, and both of them were worn out with fatigue and hunger. "I'll make you a shelter with the sail presently," he said, as he helped the girl up ithe beach, "but first I must get water and build a fire to cook these potatoes wo have." He moved away out of sight, and she sank down, feeling so small and lost a thing in the vast, sounding hollow of sea and sky that she could not even pray. The star shower of the Milky Way was falling down the sky towards the sea edge, and behind her the ridge of the island rose formless and black against the luminous heavens. She felt as if some power had plucked her out of the places and things to which she belonged and thrown her away, as one might throw a flower, or a chip into the ocean, to sink, or swim, or come ashore on strange strands. The low and smothered fire which Laurence made, and she tended, cooked : their little provision of potatoes well, | and they drank water from a can which i he had found in the locker of the boat. The comfort of food, a more sufficient meal than they had had for two days, I brought courage and consolation to the girl's forlorn heart. It was the strangest and moat delicious meal she had ever eaten. The serious un-selfconscious intimacy -with which they conducted the cooking and shared each morsel had a strange and unexpected joy. She looked at Laurence as the faint glow of the sinking fire revealed his face to her. "Laurence," she said, and he started at ; the low-toned voice falling so silverlv on | his ears in that great cavern of night | and ocean. Her face, pearly white now shone towards him in a flicker of flame' ' now vanished in shadow. ' I "I want to thank you—oh, with all my | heart, lor saving mc to-day," , He seemed unable to answer, but at length stammered: "It was-for myself, "°7 T^VT ld ■** at nothi "S, -hose bloody-minded wretches!" The rough-epithet on his ton-nic rave her a l.ttle sick quiver of ?"s_. *re awakening the day's terrors anfdfcpellevfl and T™"™? » had a sounT of evil and disrespect "I don't think, Laurence" aha ..-j with a falter that was Uk. appeal when t0 t- USe W ° rda "M. wnen you are speaking to mc." 1 know I ought not, Miss" he With a rekl contrition, a _li»ofTh $ hßg y ° Ur » ™» do -?♦«? ' the , ioi « ue ' I've had more to rou ltr^ eh men than with ladi « I** feU^»r- nya .' ear " His words fell one -by one into the silence, slowly "Oh ed yJ° W ' " G _'T ki V t0 himßelf - get< >> • • • God knows.' one does for-

After a pause she asked softly. "Used you to know ladies like mc, Laurence?" "Yes, Miss." "A Song time ago, when you were a boy?" "Yes, when I was a boy; and other ladies too, not like you—their wives, over in the colony, officials cleaning their boots and grooming their horses only v a boy. . . . and sent back to the jail with a 'bad report .... sullen and insolent, and fl— punished for it—a wretched heartbroken 'boy." "I'm sorry!" stammered the girl, shrinking away. "I didn't mean ." She leaned away into the dark. The least flicker fell on his bent head and bitter lips as he turned a little towards •her. "You didn't mean to make mc remember that I am one of that gang, ashore there, when all's said and done." She put 'her hand on his arm. "Xo," she said, "ah! please 1 only know that you have suffered. I don't know what you did, or-or whether you were wrongly convicted, but even before what you did to-day I know you were not bad. Oh, indeed I am grateful. Indeed, I believe in you!" He lifted her hand from his arm and held it a moment. His voice shook a little when he spoke. "And I am grateful. . . . just for that belief. And it's true. Before God I am not bad. .. . not vile like thosa wretches. 'Xo helpless thing would ever need to fear mc. I've been the helpless thing myself. . . bruised to the very jearth. .'. . grovelling to other men. . ." He groaned and let her hand go. "Just men, as if they were gods, crawling to *hem to be spared a little worse wretchedness." "But you're free now?" she whispered. ''Free?''"He moved restlessly. "Xo, only free until they drag mc back; till some stony-hearted" ofiieer hunts mc down. Only one degree better off than those murderers with the gallows hanging over them." "Murderers?" "Yes, every one. Blunt, twice over, to make good his escape." "And you —and you walked in among them, unafraid, to help mc." "I was armed* . . .and I was afraid too." "I will never forget thi3 if——lf I live to go back." Her voice trembled with tears. Laurence rose and walked away from her down the beach to the boat, and returned with the sail, which he spread over some blushes near them." "Hero is your tent," he said, kneeling and breaking branches of ti-tlea to make her a bed. Thank you," she murmured. "I am very tired. Laurence?" "Yes, miss." "Are you Mr. Laurence, or Laurence something else?" "I am Laurence something else, but I don't use my name —my mother's and father's name," he added, dipping his voice. "Then I may call you Laurence, though it is rather.familiar. I would let you call mc Miss Barbara, or Barbara even," she added with wistful friendliness, "foJ I am not very old." "Xo, Miss, I couldn't do that, I am only a servant." "You say that," she said slowly, as she knelt down to enter her low tent. "But you are not, really. Goodnight, Laurence, and please don't be far away." 'Til be within call, Miss, if you should be frightened of anything." (To be continued Saturday next.)