and started up the ridge, followed by several smaller dogs. Soon Bob heard from the hillside the “hy-yi-hi, whomp, whomp, whomp!” of old Thunder, and the yop-yop-yopping of the smaller fry—they had tree’d a ‘possum. Bob threw himself on the grass, and pretended to be asleep. There was a sound as of a sizeable boulder rolling down the hill, and presently Thunder trotted round the fire to see if his master would come. Bob snored. The dog looked suspiciously at him, trotted round once or twice, and as a last resource gave him two great slobbery licks across the face. Bob got up with a good-natured oath.
“Well, old party,” he said to Thunder, “you’re a thundering old nuisance; but I s’pose you won’t be satisfied till I come.” He got a gun from the waggonette, loaded it, and started up the ridge; old Thunder rushing to and fro to show the way—as if the row the other dogs were making wasn’t enough to guide his master.
When Bob returned with the ‘possums he was startled to see a woman in the camp. She was sitting on a log by the fire, with her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands.
“Why—what the dev—who are you?”
The girl raised a white desperate face to him. It was Mary Wylie.
“My father and—and the woman—they’re drinking—they turned me out! they turned me out.”
“Did they now? I’m sorry for that. What can I do for you? … She’s mad sure enough,” he thought to himself; “I thought it was a ghost.”
“I don’t know,” she wailed, “I don’t know.
