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Updated: May 18, 2025
And then these horrid fires! You were in the middle of the fire, were you not?" It suited Kate's feelings that Medlicot should be the hero of this occasion. "We were lighting them in front to put them out behind." "And then, while you were at work, these men from Boolabong came upon you. Oh, Mr. Medlicot, we shall be so very, very wretched if you are much hurt. My sister is so unhappy about it."
When asked what they had said to him, he replied that he did not wait till any thing had been said, but had hurried away as fast as his horse could carry him. "I'll go up to Boolabong myself," said Harry. "My word! They'll just about knock your head off," suggested Jacko. Karl Bender also thought that the making of such a visit would be a source of danger.
He took the German and Jacko with him, but left them with their horses about a mile on the Boolabong side of his own fence, nigh to the extreme boundary of the Debatable Land. They knew his whistle, and were to ride to him at once should he call them.
In those parts Georgie Brownbie was regarded almost as the Evil One himself, and Jacko, knowing what mischief was, as it were, in the word, thought that he was entitled to bread and jam, if not to a nobbler itself, in bringing such tidings to Gangoil. "Is that all?" asked Heathcote. "And Bos is at Boolabong, and Bill Nokes was there all Sunday, and Jerry Brownbie's been out with Bos and Georgie."
They were not probably very particular as to which owned each bed, enjoying a fraternal communism in that respect. At the end of this chamber the old man had a room of his own. Boolabong was certainly a miserable place; and yet, such as it was, it was frequented by many guests. The vagabondism of the colonies is proverbial. Vagabonds are taken in almost every where throughout the bush.
Armed with these depositions, the two constables went on to Boolabong in search of Nokes, and of Nokes only, much to the chagrin of Harry, who declared that the police would never really bestir themselves in a squatter's cause. "As for Nokes, he'll be out of Queensland by this time to-morrow." The Brownbie party returned, after their midnight raid, in great discomfiture to Boolabong.
Whereupon Jerry, without a word, pointed to the kettle, and Boscobel was allowed to fill two pannikins. Such was the welcome which was always accorded to strangers in Boolabong. After their meal the men came back on to the veranda, and there were more smoking and sleeping, more boasting and snarling.
The work had been so far done, but it might be begun again at any moment, either near or at a distance. No doubt the attempt would be made elsewhere along the boundary between Gangoil and Boolabong was very probably being made at this moment. The two men whom he could trust and Jacko were now with him. They were wiping their brows with their arms and panting with their work.
Against this assumption Heathcote had remonstrated frequently, had driven the cattle back, and had exercised the ownership of a Crown tenant in such fashion as the nature of his occupation allowed. Beyond this strip was Boolabong; the house at Boolabong being not above three miles distant from the fence, and not above four miles from the German's hut.
But the welcome given to them varies. Sometimes they are made to work before they are fed to their infinite disgust. But no such cruelty was exercised at Boolabong. Boolabong was a very Paradise for vagabonds. There was always flour and meat to be had, generally tobacco, and sometimes even the luxury of a nobbler.
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