While the Billy Boils by Henry Lawson (best value ebook reader .txt) 📕

down with a clatter he hitched up the knees of his moleskins and sat down on one heel.

“What are yer⁠—why⁠—doin’ on the slate, Isley?” said he, taking out an old clay pipe and lighting it.

“Sums,” said Isley.

Tom puffed away at his pipe a moment.

“ ’Tain’t no use!” he said, sitting down on the clay and drawing his knees up. “Edication’s a failyer.”

“Listen at ’im!” exclaimed the boy. “D’yer mean ter say it ain’t no use learnin’ readin’ and writin’ and sums?”

“Isley!”

“Right, father.”

The boy went to the windlass and let the bucket down. Tom offered to help him wind up, but Isley, proud of showing his strength to his friend, insisted on winding by himself.

“You’ll be⁠—why⁠—a strong man some day, Isley,” said Tom, landing the bucket.

“Oh, I could wind up a lot more’n father puts in. Look how I greased the handles! It works like butter now,” and the boy sent the handles spinning round with a jerk to illustrate his meaning.

“Why did they call yer Isley for?” queried Tom, as they resumed their seats. “It ain’t yer real name, is it?”

“No, my name’s Harry. A digger useter say I was a isle in the ocean to father ’n mother, ’n then I was nicknamed Isle, ’n then Isley.”

“You hed a⁠—why⁠—brother once, didn’t yer?”

“Yes, but thet was afore I was borned. He died, at least mother used ter say she didn’t know if he was dead; but father says he’s dead as fur’s he’s concerned.”

“And your father hed a brother, too. Did yer ever⁠—why⁠—hear of him?”

“Yes, I heard father talkin’ about it wonst to mother. I think father’s brother got into some row in a bar where a man was killed.”

“And was yer⁠—why⁠—father⁠—why⁠—fond of him?”

“I heard father say that he was wonst, but thet was all past.”

Tom smoked in silence for a while, and seemed to look at some dark clouds that were drifting along like a funeral out in the west. Presently he said half aloud something that sounded like “All, all⁠—why⁠—past.”

“Eh?” said Isley.

“Oh, it’s⁠—why, why⁠—nothin’,” answered Tom, rousing himself. “Is that a paper in yer father’s coat-pocket, Isley?”

“Yes,” said the boy, taking it out.

Tom took the paper and stared hard at it for a moment or so.

“There’s something about the new goldfields there,” said Tom, putting his finger on a tailor’s advertisement. “I wish you’d⁠—why⁠—read it to me, Isley; I can’t see the small print they uses nowadays.”

“No, thet’s not it,” said the boy, taking the paper, “it’s something about⁠—”

“Isley!”

“ ’Old on, Tom, father wants me.”

The boy ran to the shaft, rested his hands and forehead against the bole of the windlass, and leant over to hear what his father was saying.

Without a moment’s warning the treacherous bole slipped round; a small body bounded a couple of times against the sides of the shaft and fell at Mason’s feet, where it lay motionless!

“Mason!”

“Ay?”

“Put him in the bucket and lash him to the rope with your belt!”

A few moments, and⁠—

“Now, Tom!”

Tom’s trembling hands would scarcely grasp the handle, but he managed to wind somehow.

Presently the form of the child appeared, motionless and covered with clay and water. Mason was climbing up by the steps in the side of the shaft.

Tom tenderly unlashed the boy and laid him under the saplings on the grass; then he wiped some of the clay and blood away from the child’s forehead, and dashed over him some muddy water.

Presently Isley gave a gasp and opened his eyes.

“Are yer⁠—why⁠—hurt much, Isley?” asked Tom.

“Ba-back’s bruk, Tom!”

“Not so bad as that, old man.”

“Where’s father?”

“Coming up.”

Silence awhile, and then⁠—

“Father! father! be quick, father!”

Mason reached the surface and came and knelt by the other side of the boy.

“I’ll, I’ll⁠—why⁠—run fur some brandy,” said Tom.

“No use, Tom,” said Isley. “I’m all bruk up.”

“Don’t yer feel better, sonny?”

“No⁠—I’m⁠—goin’ to⁠—die, Tom.”

“Don’t say it, Isley,” groaned Tom.

A short silence, and then the boy’s body suddenly twisted with pain. But it was soon over. He lay still awhile, and then said quietly:

“Goodbye, Tom!”

Tom made a vain attempt to speak. “Isley!” he said, “⁠—”

The child turned and stretched out his hands to the silent, stony-faced man on the other side.

“Father⁠—father, I’m goin’!”

A shuddering groan broke from Mason’s lips, and then all was quiet.

Tom had taken off his hat to wipe his forehead, and his face, in spite of its disfigurement, was strangely like the face of the stone-like man opposite.

For a moment they looked at one another across the body of the child, and then Tom said quietly:

“He never knowed.”

“What does it matter?” said Mason gruffly; and, taking up the dead child, he walked towards the hut.

It was a very sad little group that gathered outside Mason’s but next morning. Martin’s wife had been there all the morning cleaning up and doing what she could. One of the women had torn up her husband’s only white shirt for a shroud, and they had made the little body look clean and even beautiful in the wretched little hut.

One after another the fossickers took off their hats and entered, stooping through the low door. Mason sat silently at the foot of the bunk with his head supported by his hand, and watched the men with a strange, abstracted air.

Tom had ransacked the camp in search of some boards for a coffin.

“It will be the last I’ll be able to⁠—why⁠—do for him,” he said.

At last he came to Mrs. Martin in despair. That lady took him into the dining-room, and pointed to a large pine table, of which she was very proud.

“Knock that table to pieces,” she said.

Taking off the few things that were lying on it, Tom turned it over and began to knock the top off.

When he had finished the coffin one of the fossicker’s wives said it looked too bare, and she ripped up her black riding-skirt, and made Tom tack the cloth over the coffin.

There was only one vehicle available in the place, and that was Martin’s old dray; so about two o’clock Pat Martin attached his old horse Dublin to the shafts with sundry bits of harness