off the road, fastened the horses, and remounted his own. Mr. Slaney was groaning with pain. The coach to Leichardt's Town, which the German woman wanted to catch, was to start at eight. The Bank opens at nine. You see what a risk it was. Moonlight explained the situation, and told them he would trust to their honour. He showed the German woman a cross-cut by which she could meet the down coach outside Goondi. Mr. Slaney gave his word that he would not give information to the police, and walked on to Goondi straight to the doctor's house. Moonlight waited"
Elsie paused dramatically.
"How do you know all these details?" asked Hallett, struck by the vivid way in which the girl told her story.
"Mr. Slaney told the doctor afterwards. Braile had got the particulars at Goondi. And it is easy enough to fill in from one's imagination. I have been thinking of nothing else all day. I have been picturing Moonlight nerving himself to walk into the Bank, not knowing whether a policeman would be there to take him. It seems to me a brave thing to have staked one's liberty on the honour of a poor old German woman and Mr. Slaney."
"They were true to him?"
"Yes. At nine o'clock, when the Bank opened, a very respectably got-up and quiet-looking bushman went in and presented Mr. Duncan's cheque, which he said had been paid him for a mob of store cattle. The Bank cashed it without question. Two hours afterwards it was all over the place that the Goondi coach had been stuck up, and Mr. Duncan bled of £2,000. But Moonlight and his Shadow and the respectably dressed bushman had disappeared."
"And Mr. Slaney?" asked Frank Hallett.
"Mr. Slaney," repeated Elsie solemnly. "Ah, this is what concerns you. The member for Luya died early this morning."
