way with women that answers just as well, under existing circumstances. Coming along down, Murray? Or are you out on business?”
“No—I’m off again to-morrow, though. Plain-clothes job.” He laughed unmirthfully. “Chap hasn’t a chance to grow fat in such an infernally big district,” he said.
The control of his voice was too careful. Ormond had noted it all along, remembering the life of the man before him. By day or night, on saddle or on foot, Murray’s work lay in the hunting of men. He ran them down in the township, in the bush “pubs,” in the gold country, where they fled to herd with odd thousands of their fellows, in the lonely ranges with none to come between the curt menace of the revolver and the defiance of the cornered one. He brought them to punishment such as a prison holds for limited months. He brought them to punishment such as the Argyle lockup afforded the Packer for two sleepy days, and to punishment such as ends in six feet of earth with no name atop. But eternally to punishment; seeking out the evil that is in man, so that it might be hidden from other men.
Knowing all this, Ormond shivered a little on the hot hill-top.
“You’re looking seedy, Murray,” he said. “Can’t you manage a holiday, eh?”
“There’s no holiday will take a man away from himself,” said Murray, speaking sudden-
