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He found the remains of the parrot that Bradby had eaten for breakfast, and he wondered vaguely who the man might be who had been so close to him that morning. His wonder was such an impersonal thing that he did not connect his own condition with the fact of the other man's presence. Something had given way inside his head, that something that controlled rational and consecutive memory.
Everybody, from your father and Bradby down to Bryce and ourselves, has taken it for granted that a tree's vital to the solution." "Isn't it?" Cumshaw queried quickly. I shook my head. "Not in the least," I said.
I'm after that gold, and, in order to get it, I'm quite ready to repeat my previous offer. We each seem to have something that the other lacks. You can tell me many things I don't know. Of that I'm sure." "There's a lot of things you seem sure of," Cumshaw said with a half-defiant air. "I'm as sure that you're the man who was with Bradby as if I'd seen it all myself," Bryce stated.
"I haven't a bit," he declared. "Neither have I," said Bradby. "However, we'll have to keep it in our heads. It's just ten feet from here to the hut-door." "It doesn't look it," Cumshaw said promptly. "It doesn't," his mate agreed. "But distance is deceptive here. How's the meal going?" "Just about ready," Cumshaw told him. "I came to call you." The two men walked side by side to the hut.
The suddenness of it startled Bradby, and it wasn't until he saw Cumshaw waving to him that he realised that the sound he had heard was his companion's "Coo-ee." He loosed his hold on the reins, allowing the two horses to wander where they might, and commenced to run towards the hut.
As near as they could judge the valley was about a mile across at its widest, but it merged so gently into the further side of the ranges that it was almost impossible to say exactly. The wood grew thicker as the men advanced, until presently it was with difficulty that they could make their way forward. "Getting pretty close," Bradby said at length. Cumshaw nodded.
He came down amongst a lot of bracken and fern, and suffered no worse harm than the shock of a sudden stoppage. Mr. Bradby, he saw, was sitting almost buried in a mass of bracken, and looking much cheerier than his recent utterance would seem to suggest. "Are you hurt?" Cumshaw asked him. He held out a helping hand. Mr. Bradby struggled to his feet and smiled at his questioner. "Hurt?
"While you're talking about something to eat," Cumshaw told him, putting the bags down again, "I'd like to remind you that we're right on the last of the tucker. There's just enough flour for the day." "I wouldn't worry about that," Bradby said. "There's sure to be plenty of game about in a thickly-wooded country like this."
"Maybe not," Bradby replied. Cumshaw turned to the plank bed and lifted up the saddle-bags, one in each hand. "Don't you think we should get rid of these?" he remarked. "I'd almost forgotten about them," Bradby answered with an assumed indifference. "Yes, we'll 'tend to them as soon as we've had something to eat."
"It's a funny thing," remarked Bryce, with the adventures of Mr. Cumshaw and the late Mr. Bradby in his mind, "it's funny how history repeats itself." The leader made a step forward and stared intently at Bryce. "You're the man right enough," he said. "Where's your pal?" "Ask me something easy," sneered Bryce, "and I'd be obliged if you'd let me drop my hands awhile.
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