When Harding returned to the bank the next morning, he presented such a careworn appearance that Wallace was genuinely concerned.

"Hullo," he exclaimed, "you look as if you had had enough of acting night-nurse to wounded men. It has been too much for you, my lad."

"It has been an anxious night," Harding replied. "At first both were fairly well, but towards morning old Mr. Dudgeon became very bad. You have heard all about the affair, I suppose?"

"I have had a visit from Mr. Gale. There was only one thing he could talk about. You will guess what that was. The heroism of Mrs. Eustace."

A cloud came over Harding's face at the mention of her name.

"I have a message for her from the doctor. She offered to return to-day if he wanted her help. He asked me to let her know how bad the old man had been, and is, and say he would be glad if she could go out at once. I've had no sleep all night and am fairly tired out. If you don't mind, I'll go and have a few hours' rest."

"Why, of course, my lad, I'll manage the office by myself all right. Go and get all the sleep you can. You have earned it."

"Will you let her know what the doctor said?"

"I'll send word to Mr. Gale—I've no doubt he'll let her know," Wallace said with a short laugh.

"But isn't she here?"

"No. Gale said the place was in darkness when they passed and rather than disturb me she went on to the hotel, where they put her up. Very considerate of her, I must admit. She seems to have made the most of her time on the drive back with Gale, for he knew all about her having to leave the bank premises, and told me he had secured a vacant cottage there is in the township for her. But don't waste time talking, my lad. You look worn out. Go and get to bed for a few hours. I'll see she has the doctor's message."

Harding went to his room with heavy steps. He locked the door and sat down, took the crumpled letter out of his pocket and read it through again.

Then, sitting on the side of the bed with the letter in his hand, he stared at it as he asked himself once more the question which had been haunting him since the first rush of indignation passed.

What should he do with it?

Had the letter come into his possession the night of the scene in the boudoir, he would have had no hesitation. But much had happened since then. He had learned what he believed was the truth about the Eustace marriage; he had learned that the love he had treasured so dearly was still his. It was the latter which made it so hard for him to know what course to follow.

A doubt had come into his mind, a doubt which operated in her favour. To hand the note over to the police was to admit he had no faith left in her, and he had faith. He could not bring himself to regard her as being so absolutely conscienceless as the circumstances suggested. Rather did he lean towards the idea that, after all, despite the evidence of the facts as they stood, she was innocent. And on that point he wanted to be sure rather than sorry.

The opinion of another would be a help to him in coming to the right conclusion, but to whom could he turn?

He dare not consult Wallace, who was already prejudiced against her; Brennan was out of the question. There was only one other—Durham—and he was out of reach, and would be so for some time to come.

So the matter came back to where it started, and Harding, urged one way by his love and another by his reason, ultimately adopted a middle course.

He determined to confront her with the letter, and tear the mask of hypocrisy from her face—if one were there—at the first opportunity. For the present the letter should be placed where no one but himself could find it.

Taking off his coat, he cut through the seam of the lining, placed the letter inside, stitched it to the lining and resewed the seam.

"I will not condemn her unheard," he said. "She shall have the chance of defending herself to me before I denounce her. But, if this is true, then God help her—and me too."

He flung himself on the bed. He was too tired to worry further. The irksome question was shelved—for the moment there was peace, and before that moment passed Harding was sound asleep.

Before he awakened, Mrs. Eustace visited the bank, received the doctor's message and went on her way to Taloona.

She came with Gale.

"Has Mr. Harding returned yet?" she asked, before Wallace could speak. "He was to bring me word whether the doctor wanted me to help to-day."

"He came in about half an hour ago, utterly worn out. I have sent him to bed for a few hours," Wallace replied. "He left a message for you—old Mr. Dudgeon is very bad, and the doctor sent word that if you could go out at once it would be a great help to him."

"Of course I'll go," she exclaimed. "Mr. Gale, you offered to drive me if I were wanted. Will you go for the buggy while I get some things together to take with me?"

She turned to Wallace when Gale had left the office.

"I suppose you have no objection to my going upstairs?"

"None whatever," he answered.

"I will get what things I want. The others can be taken away later to the cottage I am renting. I will give Mr. Gale a list, as he very kindly offered to see to the removal if I had to go out to Taloona again."

He held the door open while she passed into the residence portion of the building, and closed it after her. He was not a lady's man, even under the best of circumstances; with the conviction that Eustace was the culprit, not only in the bank robbery, but also in the outrage at Taloona, he wished to have as little to say to her as possible. The sooner she was out of the place the better he would be pleased.

As he returned to his work, which, at the moment, was a lengthy report he was preparing for despatch to the head office in condemnation of Eustace, she went through to the kitchen, where she found Bessie.

"I am leaving the bank to-day, Bessie, and all my things are going away. I have taken Smart's cottage and am going to live there. Although I engaged you, if you think you will do better for yourself by staying here, don't let me prevent you."

"Stay on here, Mrs. Eustace? What, after you've gone? No, ma'am, no! If you don't want me any longer, there may be someone else in Waroona who does, but if this is the only place where I can stay, I'm off to Wyalla," Bessie exclaimed.

"I would not like them to think I took you away, Bessie."

"I'm not the Bank's servant; I'm yours. Shall I help you get the furniture ready now?"

"No, not just at once. I am going out to Taloona to help the doctor nurse Mr. Dudgeon. I only want to take enough with me for a few days. Mr. Gale will arrange for removing the rest, but I would like you to see they are all taken."

"I'll see that they're taken, and go with them, too, Mrs. Eustace. I don't want to stay in a place where everything I do is spied on and made bad of. Let me come and help you now."

By the time they had packed a small box, Gale drove up in front of the bank.

"I'll take this down," Bessie exclaimed. "It's not heavy."

Mrs. Eustace followed her out of the room.

At the door she stopped. On the other side of the landing was Harding's room. She glanced at the closed door.

Stepping over to it, she tapped. There was no response. She turned the handle; the door was locked.

She did not want to go without a word for him. She opened her bag to see if she had a scrap of paper or a card on which she could scribble a line. As she did so, Bessie came up the stairs to ask if there was anything else she could do.

"No, that is all, Bessie. You might tell Mr. Harding I have gone. He is asleep at present."

Bessie sniffed, with her nose in the air, as she followed her mistress down the stairs. Tell Mr. Harding? Tell the man who was, in Bessie's mind, the person solely responsible for the indignity placed upon her and Mrs. Eustace of being locked in their own rooms by Constable Brennan! All the message he would ever receive through her would do him good, she told herself.

In the office Wallace heard the buggy drive away and caught a glimpse of it as it passed the door. Mrs. Eustace was sitting beside Gale, looking up at him and smiling.

The sound of another vehicle driving up to the door interrupted him. He looked up from his work as Mrs. Burke came into the office.

"Good morning, Mr. Wallace," she exclaimed, "I've looked in as I was passing, to inquire what is the latest news about the scoundrels. Have they got them yet? Is there any word of my papers?"

"Have you not heard? Has no one——"

"Heard? Heard what? Heavens about us, man, you're not going to tell me my papers have been destroyed?"

"Oh, no, I'm not going to tell you that, Mrs. Burke. As the news is all over the place, I fancied you must have heard it also. I forgot you were away in the bush. Taloona was stuck up last night and burnt to the ground; old Mr. Dudgeon was shot and is lying dangerously ill, while Mr. Durham had his skull fractured and is at death's door."

Mrs. Burke reeled.

"Oh, my God!" she gasped.

Before Wallace could reach her she lurched heavily forward and fell, striking her face against the edge of the counter.

Rushing to the door leading to the house, Wallace called to Bessie.

"Come quickly," he cried, "Mrs. Burke has fainted."

He was raising her from the floor as Bessie came.

"Help me to get her into the dining-room," he exclaimed. "What a silly woman! I'm afraid she has hurt her face rather badly. She struck it against the counter."

Bessie lent a somewhat unwilling aid. She disliked Mrs. Burke as cordially as she disliked Wallace, but she helped to support the semi-conscious woman, and undertook to revive her as soon as they had placed her on the sofa.

Wallace returned to the office, leaving the two together. Presently Mrs. Burke came back, pale and agitated, and with a pronounced discolouration on her face where it had come in contact with the counter.

"I must apologise, Mr. Wallace," she began, as soon as she entered the office. "Sure it's only us poor weak women who know the cruel pain of an unexpected blow. You'll not believe me, but when I heard the terrible news, it just turned my heart to stone, it did. Poor Mr. Durham! A fine, brave, clever gentleman if ever there was one, Mr. Wallace, and to think of him with all his brains scattered. It's no wonder I fainted."

"But I did not tell you that, Mrs. Burke. I said his skull was fractured, and that he is at death's door."

"Well, isn't that what I was saying?"

"No. I did not say his brains were knocked out. As a matter of fact, they are all in his head where I hope they will always remain, so that he can complete his task of catching your friends who were so considerate as to carry off your papers."

"My friends, do you call them, Mr. Wallace? Sure I'd teach them a new form of friendship if I had my hands on them for a few minutes. But tell me now, what's being done with those poor wounded creatures? The girl told me the old man had had his leg blown off. Well, well! He won't refuse a chair next time he comes to see you, I'll wager. Or maybe he'll have his twenty-five thousand sovereigns made into a special wooden leg to take the place of the other live one he's lost."

"His leg was not blown off—he was shot."

"It's all the same. He won't be able to walk about any more, and sure that's bad enough for any man to have to put up with, isn't it, Mr. Wallace? How would you like to have it happen to you now? Having to go about on a wooden stump or just sit about in the same place from morning to night and never a chance of stretching a leg or crossing the road."

"But it's not that at all, Mrs. Burke," Wallace exclaimed impatiently. "What I said was——"

"Oh, I know, I know," she interrupted. "Well now, don't you think it a terrible thing for them to be lying out there without a single woman's hand to soothe them in their agony? Only a doctor to look after them and maybe a bushman or so to boil a billy and make some tea between whiles. It's more than I can bear to think of, Mr. Wallace."

"You don't feel faint again, do you?" he asked.

"Oh, no, not at all, Mr. Wallace. Bessie was very good to me. She would be better out there helping to relieve those poor wounded creatures instead of idling away her time here, I think; but still, she does her best, poor thing, such as it is. But do you know what I thought of doing? As soon as I heard the news I said to myself, there was only one thing I could do unless I were just a mere bloodless image of a woman. I'm going to drive straight away now to Taloona and soothe the pain of those poor unfortunates. It's the sound of a woman's voice that is cheering to a lonely man when he's in pain, Mr. Wallace."

"Is it?" Wallace said curtly. "I hope you are right, Mrs. Burke, for you see Mrs. Eustace is there already."

"Mrs. Eustace! Out at Taloona? Mr. Wallace, it's enough to bring down the wrath of Heaven to think of that woman—that—well, I'll not say it; but there's her husband robbing me of my papers and the bank of its money and maybe robbing and murdering that poor old gentleman as well, and she—she of all women on the face of the earth—nursing his victims back for him to slay a second time. Sure, I'd—oh, I'd—I don't know what I wouldn't do, Mr. Wallace, to a woman like that."

"It will be an interesting meeting between you," Wallace observed drily. "I am sorry I cannot come to see it."

"But it's not the old gentleman she's after, Mr. Wallace. I suppose they robbed him of his gold?"

"I don't know, Mrs. Burke."

"Oh, you may be sure they did. So there's no more to be had out of him; but what would it be worth to that villain of a husband of hers if Sub-Inspector Durham were below ground? The only chance I have of ever seeing my papers again, Mr. Wallace, is with him. I'll go and drive him out to Waroona Downs and nurse him myself. I'll not let it be said that Nora Burke forgot a friend in his hour of need."

"I am afraid the doctor will not let him be moved. I suggested bringing them in here, but Mr. Gale tells me the doctor said it would be fatal to move either at present."

"Then I'll stay and nurse him there. Sure it's that woman I'll watch. I'll go away at once."

He did not detain her. He did not even suggest she was going on a useless journey. But he sighed deeply as she left the office.

"Little wonder she is a widow," he murmured to himself. "I wonder how long the late Mr. Burke managed to survive it? I hope they keep her at Taloona for a month."

But she did not reach there that day.

On the way she met Gale returning.

"And what's the news of the poor injured creatures?" she cried as she reined in.

Gale shook his head.

"You were not thinking of going out there, were you?" he asked.

"I'm going out to do what I can to soothe the suffering of the unfortunates," she answered. "Mr. Wallace was telling me. What a frightful thing to happen to them, Mr. Gale. Sure the awful news was too much for me to bear, and I just fell like one dead at the sound of it. You'll see the mark on my face. They tell me I fell against the counter in the bank and might have killed myself entirely with the terrible smash I came against the wretched sharp edge, only that I struck it with my face instead of the back of my head, though it's little thanks to the bank, seeing the way they made the clumsy thing."

"It's no use your going out to Taloona," Gale exclaimed. "No one is allowed near the huts where they are. The doctor and Mrs. Eustace are the only persons allowed to see the patients."

"And by what right is that woman there?"

"The best right of all, Mrs. Burke. Had it not been for her splendid courage, they would both have been dead long before the doctor could reach them. She is the only one Mr. Dudgeon will bear near him."

"Oh."

For once the voluble Irish tongue was reduced to the use of a simple monosyllable, but into the word there was thrown as much venom as would have taken a hundred of the snakes St. Patrick banished from the island to supply.

"So it is fortunate I met you, otherwise you would have had a drive for nothing," Gale added.

"And how's the sub-inspector?"

"The doctor tells me he is doing as well as one can expect."

"I was going to see if I could not take one of them out to Waroona Downs—it's good nursing they'll want, and that they'll get if they're in a place where they are properly looked after."

"They are getting that now," Gale retorted shortly.

"I'll go and see for myself."

"If you want to tire your horse, do so, but that is all which will happen."

"And why am I to be shut out when that woman is allowed to be there, with her husband probably hanging about the place all the time to see who else there is to shoot and maim?"

"You have no right to say that," Gale cried angrily. "There is only suspicion against her husband, and even if there were more, it would not affect her. A noble-hearted woman such as she is should have sympathy, not unjust accusation."

"Sure Mr. Eustace would be pleased to know how well his deserted wife is getting on with all the admirers she has in the place traipsing after her wherever she goes," she retorted.

"You cannot go on even if you wish to," Gale exclaimed. "One of the troopers will stop you before you reach the huts."

"Oh, the troopers are there too, are they? It's well to be a miserly old skinflint to have the State providing troopers at the ratepayers' expense to watch over one. Or maybe they're also giving sympathy to the poor distressed lady. Well, I'll interrupt them."

"You will do nothing of the kind, Mrs. Burke. I tell you the doctor sent to stop me from driving up to the huts where they are. You would do no good by going there; you may do a great deal of harm."

"Oh, indeed. And pray what is there about me that is likely to do harm to any man?"

"You know Mr. Dudgeon's character. The doctor says he is in a most critical condition. For him to see you now would probably mean his death. You remember how bitterly he resented the sale of Waroona Downs to you—your presence now would only irritate him and then——" he shrugged his shoulders.

"My presence? And what of the presence of the woman whose husband——"

"You must not say that," Gale exclaimed quickly. "It is unjust—unwomanly——"

The grey eyes flashed like steel.

"Unwomanly?" she cried. "Me unwomanly?"

She snatched up the buggy whip and in her anger cut at him, but the lash fell short, striking one of the horses. The animal plunged at the sting and its companion also started.

By the time Gale had them under control, Mrs. Burke was vanishing down the road in a cloud of dust.

Where the track to the station branched off the main road one of the troopers met and stopped her. The man recognised her from the previous day.

"Very sorry, Mrs. Burke," he said, "but I've been sent to stop anyone going near the place."

"Why can't I go? I want to know how they are and whether I can't help to nurse them," she said.

"They're both pretty bad, I believe," the trooper answered. "I don't think you could do anything now, because there's the doctor and Mrs. Eustace and my mate looking after them. But I'll tell the doctor, and maybe to-morrow——"

Mrs. Burke slowly wheeled her horse.

"I shall not come to-morrow," she said. "It is evident I'm not wanted. But I shall come in a few days and take one of them away with me to my house. I'm sure Mr. Durham would be much better away from here. Tell the doctor I say so. Who is taking Mr. Durham's place?"

"Taking up his work do you mean?"

"Yes—who is looking for the man who stole my deeds from the bank? Why aren't you doing it, instead of wasting your time here?"

"Oh, that'll be all right, Mrs. Burke. We've got a clue—don't you be uneasy."

"I shall be uneasy until Mr. Durham is able to look after it again. He is the only hope I have of ever seeing my papers again."

"You're right," the trooper exclaimed. "He's the smartest man for the job there is. That's why he's lying there now—we know for certain he was on their track when he got here, and as soon as they saw who it was after them, they went for him. It wasn't the fault of the chap who tried to brain him that the sub-inspector is alive to-day."

"He is very badly hurt?" Mrs. Burke asked.

"The chap who hit him saw to that—I'd just like to have my hands on him for a few minutes, the mean hound. There was probably more than one, and while the sub-inspector was facing the others, this one must have crept up behind him and tried to brain him from the back. But we'll get him, and then he will know something."

"You think you will catch them?"

"Catch them? Of course we shall. But it's the chap who knocked the sub-inspector on the head we want mostly."

"You'll punish him when you do catch him?" she asked, with a gleam in her eyes.

"Ah!" he exclaimed.

She leaned forward.

"I hope you do," she said. "I would—if I were a man—even if they had not stolen my papers."