"Neither could I sleep, Corrie. Let us sit and talk and smoke; here's a spare pipe and tobacco--and you shall tell me in your own way."
Corrie nodded, and filled his pipe, and lit it Basil did the same, and waited in anxious expectancy, while Corrie puffed and contemplated the ceiling meditatively.
"A roundabout way, but there's plenty of time before daybreak, and then a couple of hours sleep will make us both fit. Old bushmen like ourselves won't miss one night's rest."
There was distinct tenderness in Old Corrie's face as he watched the curling wreaths of smoke.
"I don't lay claim to being a poet," he said; "I leave that to my betters; but they almost seem to me to belong to poetry, these rings of smoke that come and go. They bring back old times, and I could fancy we were in the bush, sitting by the camp fire before turning in for the night, spinning yarns, and as happy as blackbirds in spring. There's no life like it, Master Basil, say what they will of the pleasures of the city. Pleasures! Good Lord! To think of the lives some lead here and then to speak of pleasures! I'm not going to preach, however; the ship's been battered about, but it has reached port,"--he touched Basil's hand gratefully--"and here sits the old bushman recalling old times. I shan't dwell upon them because I know it would be trying your patience. I'd like you to give me a little information about yourself before I go on."
"I left you on the goldfields, mates with Newman Chaytor, of whom, as you know, I did not have a good opinion."
"However badly you thought of him, you were justified."
"Sorry to hear it. Did you get a proper knowledge of him suddenly or gradually?"
"And all the time he was practising on you?"
"Master Basil," said Old Corrie, gravely, "you were never fit to battle with human nature; you never understood the worst half of it."
"Perhaps not, Corrie, but I understand it now. Newman Chaytor is a black-hearted villain."
"I am not surprised to hear you say so; I had my suspicions of him from the first. Unreasonable, I grant you, no grounds to go upon; but there they were, and I am sorry, for your sake, that they proved true. Where's my gentleman now?"
"In Europe, somewhere. I am hunting for him; it will be a dark day for the traitor when I come face to face with him."