An Outback Marriage by Banjo Paterson (the mitten read aloud TXT) 📕

“I will go. And you hurry on now, and get the Doctor. Tell the Doctor I’ve gone out there.” Like an arrow from the bow the young fellow sent his big thoroughbred horse across the paddocks, making a bee line over fences and everything for Tarrong, while Ellen Harriott hurried in to pack up a few things.

“Can I help you at all?” said Carew, following her into the house. “I’d like to be some use, don’t you know; but in this country I seem to be so dashed useless.”

“You will be a lot of use if you will come out with me. I shall want someone to drive the trap out, and I may want help with the patient. You are big and strong.

“Yes, and it’s about the first time my strength has even been of any use to anybody. I will go and get the trap ready while you dress.”

Hurriedly they packed food and blankets into the light buggy, and set off. Miss Harriott knew the tracks well, and the buggy fairly flew along till they came up the flat to Red Mick’s. As they drew near the hut a noise of talking and crying came through the open door.

“What’s up now?” said Carew. “Crowd of people there.”

“No”⁠—Ellen Harriott listened for a second. “No,” she said, “he is delirious. That is the old woman crying. Hurry up, Mr. Carew⁠—take the horse out of the buggy and put him in the stable, and then come in as quickly as you can. I may want help.”

Leaving Carew to unharness the horse, she went inside. In the inner roomy on a bunk, lay Red Mick. Eye, nose, forehead, and mouth were all one unrecognisable lump, while fragments of bark and splinters still stuck to the skin. In the corner sat the old mother, crying feebly. Disregarding the old woman, Ellen made a swift examination of Mick’s injuries, but as soon as he felt her touch on his face he sprang to his feet and struck at her.

Just as he did so, Carew rushed in and threw his arms round the madman. In that grip even Red Mick had no power to move.

“Just hold him quiet,” said Ellen, “till I have a look”⁠—and she rapidly ran her fingers over the wound. “Very bad. I think there must be a bit of the skull pressing on the brain. We can’t do much till the Doctor comes. I think he will be quiet now. Will you make a fire and boil some water, so that I can clean and dress the wound That will ease him a little. And get the blankets in; we can make up some sort of place on the floor to sleep. One of us will have to watch all night. Cranny, you must go to bed, do you hear? Come and sit by Mick till I put Granny to bed.”

By degrees they got things shipshape⁠—put the old woman to bed, and cleaned and dressed Mick’s wounds. Then they settled down for the long night in the sickroom. A strange sickroom it was; but many a hospital is less healthy. Through wide cracks between the slabs there came in the cool, fresh air that in itself is worth more than all the medicines in the pharmacopoeia. The patient had sunk into an uneasy slumber when Ellen made her dispositions for the night.

“You go and lie down now,” she said, “in the other room, on the sofa. I will call you if I want you. Get all the sleep you can, and in a couple of hours you can take my place. He may talk, but don’t let that disturb you. I will call out loud enough if I want you.”

“Mind you do,” said the Englishman. “I sleep like a blessed top, you know. Sleep anywhere. Well, good night for the present. He looks a little better since you washed him, doesn’t he?”

He threw himself on the couch in the inner room, and before long a titanic snore showed that he had not overrated his sleeping powers.

Ellen Harriott sat by Red Mick’s bedside and thought over the events of the last few weeks. As she thought she half-dozed, but woke with a start to find her patient broad awake again and trying to get at something that was under his bunk. Quietly she drew him back, for his struggles with Carew had left him weak as a child.

He looked at her with crazed eyes.

“The paper,” he said, “for the love of God, the paper. I have to take it to Gavan. ’Twill win the case. The paper.”

She tried to pacify him, but nothing would do but that she should get the mysterious paper. At last, to humour him, she dived under the bunk and found an iron camp-oven, and in it a single envelope. Just to see what was exciting him she opened the envelope, and found a crumpled piece of paper which she read over to herself. It was the original certificate of the marriage between Patrick Henry Keogh and Margaret Donohoe; if Ellen had only known it, she held in her hand the evidence to sweep away all her friend’s troubles. It so happened, however, that it conveyed nothing to her mind. She had heard much about Considine, but not a word about Keogh, and the name “Margaret Donohoe” did not strike her half-asleep mind as referring to Peggy. She put the paper away again in the camp-oven; then, feeling weary, she awoke Carew and lay down on the couch while he watched the patient.

Next morning the Doctor arrived with a trail of Red Mick’s relations after him; among them they arranged to take him into Tarrong to be operated on, and Ellen Harriott and Carew drove back to Kuryong feeling as if they had known each other all their lives.

As they drove along she wondered idly which of Red Mick’s innumerable relatives the paper referred to, and why Mick was so anxious about it; but by the time they arrived