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"Well, I've broken my duck, anyhow, and that's more than any of you others can say!" Wally laughed. "Time enough for you to grin when you've caught something yourselves even if it's only an old boot! It's a real old stager and no mistake. I wonder how it came in here." "Some poor old beggar of a swaggie, I expect," Jim said. "He didn't chuck it away until it was pretty well done, did he?
Jim bobbed his float up and down despairingly. "This is the most fishless creek!" he said. "Well, the only thing left to tell you is where the swagman came in." "Oh, by Jove," Harry said, "I forgot the swaggie." "Was it his fault the fire started?" inquired Wally. "Rather!
He landed the swaggie first with one fist and then with the other, and the swaggie reckoned he'd been struck by a thunderbolt when they fished him out of the creek, where he had rolled! You see, Sam's very fond of Len, and it annoyed him to see his eye. "The swaggie did not do any more resisting. He was like a half-dead, drowned rat.
Norah and I were a bit scared about the swaggie, and wondered what he'd try to do; but Dad only laughed at us. It never entered his head that the brute would really try to have his revenge. Of course it would have been easy enough to have had him watched off the place, but Dad didn't even think of it. He knows better now. "I waked up early next morning hearing someone yelling outside.
"He's certainly not the ordinary swaggie," Norah said slowly. "Not by a good bit," Wally agreed. "Why, he can talk like our English master at school! Perhaps he's hiding." "Might be," Harry said. "You never can tell he's certainly keen enough on getting away from people." "He's chosen a good place, then." "Couldn't be better.
"He turned on Dad and jumped at him, but he got another one with the whip that made him pause, and then Dad caught him and shook him like a rat. Mr. Swaggie was limp enough when it was over. "'I've a very good mind to give you in charge! Dad said he was simply furious. It made a fellow feel pretty bad to see poor old Brownie's white face in the doorway, and to think what a fright she had had.
I've ridden from Mulgoa to-day, and I came to ask if your people had seen anything of such a chap passing as a swaggie or anything?" "Not that I know of," said Mr. Linton. "What is he like?" "Big fellow old plenty of white hair and beard, though, of course, they're probably cut off by this time. Very decent-looking old chap," said the trooper reflectively "an' a good way of speakin'."
They lost no time, and neither did the swaggie. He left the place at about the rate of a mile a minute!" Jim paused. "Thought I had a bite," he said, pulling up his line. "Bother it! The bait's gone! Chuck me a worm, young Wally." He impaled the worm and flung his line out again. "Where was I? Oh, yes.
Dolf took up the theme, and enlarged upon the virtues of resin, particularly that resin of his, which was the very best kind of resin for the purpose and had been specially commended by an old swaggie with one eye, who gave it to him for a four-bladed knife and a clay pipe.
"The swaggie turned a very ugly look on Dad. "'You give me in charge, and I'll precious quick have you up for assault! he said. "Dad laughed. "'As for that, you can do exactly as you choose, he said. 'I'll be quite ready to answer for thrashing a cur like you. However, you're not worth carting seventeen miles to Cunjee, so you can go the quicker the better." "And he cleared, I suppose?"
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