CHAPTER II.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1964, 7 February 1885, Page 1 (Supplement)

CHAPTER 11.

THE DIBERTED CLAIMS. A few hours later found Leonard Prosser and his companion, the little Irishman, seated in Mr. Pollard's office at Marranga, and Tady jubilant over the faot of that gentleman being still a residant of that neighborhood. He had introduced his young master, and given the J.P. a sketch of his doings during his absence from Australia, and now he was greedily inquiring as to the events of the last twelve years in quiet Marranga. " And bo you tell me that a pick has never been struck in them claims since, Mr. Pollard ? " " Not since oar poor friend's ezhamation, Tady. None of the claims had paid well, yoa know, and they were abandoned after that awful murder. Even you went, Tady." " I wint, yes," the Irishman said aggressively ; " but 'twasn't on account of the bad prospeot, for we had the best in No. 2, but on account of the place gettin' a bad name — you know that yourself, sir." " Yes, a story of the claim being haunted got abroad, and every shaft was deserted ; but as I said before, there was not much temptation — no lead was ever found." " I don't know that," obstinately asserted Tady, " I had a fool of a mate, or I believe we were on the right track. An' thin' I got the master's letter callin' me home to look afther Mr. Leonard here." "He means my father," explained the young gentleman. "You must know that Tady and I are foster brothers, and his jaunt out to the diggings was an escapade of which his friends did not approve." " Well, I'm back again in spite of 'em," said Tady ; and now, Mr. Pollard, tell Mr. Leonard the story — no one knows it better nor yourBfclf." " It waa> sad story," the pleasant-looking, middle-aged gentleman went on, as he pushed the wino toward his new friend, young Leonard ; " and a great shock to me personally was the death of my friend, Colonel St. Hcrrick. It is about fifteen years ago now, I think, since he first settled here with a wife, as beautiful as an angel, and a son who died shortly after their arrival at Marranga. " The colonel had some independent means, and built the house known yet as St. Herricks on the ground ho purchased ; but when, some years after, the gold fever found its way to Murranga, ho was one of tho first who Bunk a shaft and found, as he considered, sufficient indicationn of the precioua metal to induce further efforts. "For some time, however, he could not' eucceed.in inducing anyone to join him, the few

residentd beinij occupied in fanning, or busi nc^-4 of one kind or olnur, and thp plane having not yet become known Biiftioiently to encourage regular diggers. At last, however, the Colonel came io me one day in great epirits with the news that ho had employed a man who had accidentally called in travelling toward the Murray. "It was some time, howover, before St. Ilerrlok told me that ho had been previously and unfavorably acquainted with Dan Lyons, and when the facts camo out and wrre made public there were many who wondered that my friend would have ventured on such a step as permitting the man to work as his partner, as well as beoome an inmate of his home. The facts appeared to be that in Ireland, through the evidence of St. H^rrick, Dan Lyons had been sentenced to ten years penal servitude for shooting with intent at a land bailiff, whom he was obnoxious to, and that the evidence was never forgiven, the murder of poor Rt. Herrick was a proof." "It waa Dan Lyons, then, who committed the foul dead ? " Leonard questioned. " Undoubtedly, though the wretch has escaped and baffled justice. It was Lyons himself that gave the alarm that No. 1 claim had fallen in. You remember that, Tady ? " "Ay cooree, I mind it well. There was a regular hullabulloo when he kern to No. 2 sereechin' that the claim was fell in an' that the Colonel was below. There was only four shafts an' half of 'em deserted, and round about No. 1 was so druv wid drives that we knew 'twas unsafe to stand anear where the great gap of ground fell in. The way 'twas | done at last was by putting a drive in from No. 4, an' it took us three days to do it." " Aye," responded Mr. Pollard, " three terrible days for the poor widow who would hope to the last, though we all knew that the Colonel must have perished for want of air shortly after the ground fell in. Lyons pretended to be one of the most aotive workers, but he was in reality retarding the search, and he disappeared from the moment that St. Herricks corpse was seen with a note-book in one stiffened hand and a penoil in the other." " The poor fellow .had left evidenoe against his murderer ? " "Yes. In the few scrawled words written in darkness and in the oppression of death, he told how Lyons had cut away the props and told him of the revenge he had planned — told him of it ere he escaped himself, and while the soil was slowly settling down between him and his victim. There was no more but a blessing on his wife and his unborn babe." "We saw the little girl to-day," Leonard said, and he related what had passed between Resignation and them. " She is a lovely girl," he added, " but looks very delicate." " She has grown up with the very shadow of the grave on her," Mr. Pollard returned. " The very name given her was the last that should have been chosen, for her mother has never been and never will be resigned. She nourishes a morbid idea that somehow and some day she will see her husband's murderer brought to justice here on the spot where he died, and the dead father is almost the sole subject of conversation between her and her little girl." " Where do they live now ? " Tady asked. "In a little house I had built for them aftor the Colonel's death. On his affairs being settled it was found that there was but a few hundieds left after the house and land was paid off. St Herricks being put in the market, I bought it myself, and offered to take Mrs. St Herrick as a tenant, but she declared it would be impossible to remain where she had been so happy, and where every thing would remind her of her dead husband, no I built the cottage where they now live ; it is on the slope above the old place, Tady ; you will remember it ? " " Yes, sir, well." "The property has been a loss to me," the good man continued, " for a story of its being haunted stood in the way of its being occupied. Now, howover, I have just secured a tenant whose profession ought to prevent any superstitious terrors from affecting him." "What is he?" "By his drens, I should cay a member of some religious order, and his mother call« him •' Father James." " He has a family, then ?" " A mother and sister, and on,' serving man, as far as I could see. And rmw about yourselves " You really mean r ( > mtaok the old ground again, Tady ? ' " Wi 1 the help o' God. I'm as mire as I sit here that there's lumps of m that gully, Mr. Pollard." " Well I hope there may be, for your sake, and Mr. Leonard's too. Where ate you going to put up?" "At the hotel, for the present, Mr. Pollard," replied Leonard. " I must have a look at these wonderful claims before I decide on entering on the life of a digger, for I must confess that I don't at all share Tady's certainty of a golden claim." " More shame for you to say it," cried Tady, angrily, as he got up from his seat ; " but if you're comin', we have no time to lose, Mr. Leonard." " We had proposed a visit to the claims," young Prosser explained. "It is not a long walk, I believe." *' About half a mile only. Stay, Mr. Prosser; if you have no objection, I will walk with yon. It is years since I saw the place, which has, aa you may suppose, sad recollections for me." It was a lotely spring afternoon ; and as the trio crossed lioban Creek and mounted the slope beyond, it was an almost simultaneous impulse that slackened their steps to admire the soene around them. The gliding waters of the creek, glistening among its fringes of sweet-scented flowering wattle ; the stately Mount Boban, heaving up his huge sides, laden with their wealth of forest, flushed in the warm, bright sunbeams ; the sweep of fair pasture, dotted for miles with content sheep and cattle, until lost in the low line of blue hills in the distance— all formed as sweet a landscape as Leonard Prosser had ever gazed upon. "It is lovely," he said, " and s« different from what I fancied. My idea of Tady's diggings was of something wild and rough, and not of a loveliness such as this." "In ten minutes you will see something more like what you expected, Mr. Prosser," observed the J.P. " The gully is even wilder now than when you left it, Tady. The curse of shed blood seems to be on its very grasa." Turning to the right they passed the overgrown garden that surrounded the dwelling known as " St. Herricks," and then entered a gully wild enough to fulfil all Leonard's dreams. It seemed to be a cleft in the hills down which the dry track of a winter torrent, and up the sloping sides of whioh straggling trees grew, and wild foliage flourished rankly. Here and there were broad level spots that had been swept in winters gone by from the green hill sides, and toward onb of these level places the steps of Mr. Pollard turned. A spot that looked weird enough to justify all that Mr. Pollard had said of it, where the grass vainly struggled to hide the sunken level and the thrown up heaps that denoted the place where they had dug to recover the body of a foully-murdered man. Hugo trees without one sign of leafy verdure on them stretched their bare, bleak, crooked limbs over it an if in warning and guard, and among the scarred, hard soil, where no grass would grow, a few treaoherous holes with lichens waving long tendrils down their cavernous depths, denoted

where the d«->trted shafts of the long a^o niinerß had been. " Is this at all like what you expected, Mr. Leonard?" the gentleman asked, as he paused on the edge of the sunken level. '• It is worse," almost whispered the young man, while Tady gazed around him with horror. " I scarcely wonder that men would be unwilling to work here, even for gold. What do you aay, Tady ? " " I don't know what to say, sir ; there's an awful ohange here suro enough, and they say thati a curse will always lie where a man has been killed. What happened the trees, Mr. Pollsrd? They wore fine box trees twelve years ago." " There was a bush fire that helped the desolation, I believe, Tady. Can you point out your old claim ? " " For sure, sir. The Colonel'a No. 1 was here where the ground's low, and our's was that one beyant there, where the green thing is swinging about." They advanced to jthe edge of Tady's old shaft and looked down into the darkness. Leonard lifted a atone and threw it down, and as it splashed into hidden water the Irishman shuddered as if a oold wind had struck him. " I think your gold-digging at Marranga will never be resumed, Tady," young Prosser said. " There is water down there, and a flooded olaira is no joke to tackle. At all events, I resign on the spot all interest in No. 2, it would seem to me like digging in a grave." " The place of graves has not always been respected in the search for gold in our new land," observed Mr. Pollard, " but let us go ; I own I shall be glad to get away from this melancholy spot." " What was I sent here for at all ? " murraered the Irishman discontentedly. " Day an' night I was dreamin' of it for eleven year ; warnins of all sotts, I had to come back again to the ould place ; what wai it for if 'twas not for the goold 2 " 41 Maybe 'twas to meet the priest, Tady," Leonard said smilingly. "Is this your new tenant approaching, Mr. Pollard ? I should judge so from his dress." •' Yea, it is he," replied Mr. Pollard, as he paused to speak to the clergyman who was approaohing. Father James was a man so strange in form and movement as to draw the ejes of both Leonard and his foster-brother closely upon him ; he was tall and gaunt in make, and his long, priest-like black coat hung so loosely around him as to suggest a decrease in bulk Bince it had been made for him. Indeed, the faoe, showing palely under the broad brim of the clerical hat that was drooped orer it, was that of an invalid — the white, hollow, closeshaved cheeks, the great, sunken dark eyes, with the blue circles round them, suggesting a far from perfect state of health. On meeting him Tady, with the usual respect o his j countrymen for cheir clergy, made him a respectful reverence, that was acknowledged by a curt nod as the stranger stopped to speak to his landlord. " A strange looking man and a sickly one, I should say," observed Leonard when they had separated by some steps. "He belongs to some foreign order I think— eh, Tady ? " i " Aye, sir, the dress is different from our clergy ? but what eyes he has — they seemed to look right through me, an' I declare it seems to me as if I'd seem 'em before somewhere." j •' Maybe you did, Tady. There were two or three continental priests at Corbally collecting for some charity last summer." " I was none nf them, Mr. Leonard, for I never lost a mass while they were there, an' I seen 'em all." " I don't think you ever lost a mass if you could help it, Tady. What will you do here ? I understand there ie no chapel here." " No ! " replied Tady viciously, " it's mostly ProteHtants that are at Marranga — the hathens; I beg your pardon, Mr, Leonard, I was for^ettin' you wor one, but you munt own that if there were as many Catholics about, the place wouldn't be without a church or ohapel. Well, I'm glad, anyhow, that there is a priest. If he's in orders 'twill be a great comfort to me." They were now rejoined by Mr. Pollard, whose pleasant countenance had a broad smile on it as they moved on, Tady falling, as he always did, a little in the rear. " You have heard something pleasant from our clerical friend ? " said Leonard. " I don't know that it was exactly the agreeable nature of what Father James told me that tickled me, but it was the idea of Paddy's sensations when he hears it. What do you think the priest told me, Tady ? " "He wouldn't tell you anything bad, anyhow," the Irishman xeplied stoutly. " Of course not, but something very unexpected. What do you think he is going to do, Mr. Prosser ? " " I can't guess." " He is going to open up the old ground we have just been inspecting. He is going over to see it now. He says that he has a man with him who knows the ground, and who has a great opinion of the prospects in No. 1 before it was abandoned, and he's going to take possession of that claim. What do you think of that, Teddy ? " " I'll tell you what I think 1 " cried Connor, triumphantly. "I think that priest or no priest he won't get No. 2 olaim, for I'll go back and peg it out this minnit 1 By Jove, we can set all the ghosts in the oountry at defiance now when there's a olergyman in the ground, an' we'll take plinty ov gold back to ould Corbally yet afther all, Mr. Leonard I "