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‘How the hell did she drop to it?’ exclaimed Pinter.

‘Dunno,’ said Jim. ‘Anyway she’s coming for us. Listen to her!’

They didn’t have to listen hard. The language which came down the shaft— they weren’t sure which one—and along the drives was enough to scare up the dead and make them take to the Bush.

‘Why didn’t you fools make off into the Bush and give us a chance, instead of giving her a lead here?’ asked Dave.

Jim and Kullers began to wish they had done so.

Mrs Middleton began to throw stones down the shaft—it was Pinter’s— and they, even the oldest and most anxious, began to grin in spite of themselves, for they knew she couldn’t hurt them from the surface, and that, though she had been a working digger herself, she couldn’t fill both shafts before the fumes of liquor overtook her.

‘I wonder which shaf’ she’ll come down,’ asked Kullers in a tone befitting the place and occasion.

‘You’d better go and watch your shaft, Pinter,’ said Dave, ‘and Jim and I’ll watch mine. ’

‘I—I won’t,’ said Pinter hurriedly. ‘I’m—I’m a modest man. ’

Then they heard a clang in the direction of Pinter’s shaft.

‘She’s thrown her bottle down,’ said Dave.

Jim crawled along the drive a piece, urged by curiosity, and returned hurriedly.

‘She’s broke the pitchfork off short, to use in the drive, and I believe she’s coming down. ’

‘Her crinoline’ll handicap her,’ said Pinter vacantly, ‘that’s a comfort. ’

‘She’s took it off!’ said Dave excitedly; and peering along Pinter’s drive, they saw first an elastic-sided boot, then a red-striped stocking, then a section of scarlet petticoat.

‘Lemme out!’ roared Pinter, lurching forward and making a swimming motion with his hands in the direction of Dave’s drive. Kullers was already gone, and Jim well on the way. Dave, lanky and awkward, scrambled up the shaft last. Mrs Middleton made good time, considering she had the darkness to face and didn’t know the workings, and when Dave reached the top he had a tear in the leg of his moleskins, and the blood ran from a nasty scratch. But he didn’t wait to argue over the price of a new pair of trousers. He made off through the Bush in the direction of an encouraging whistle thrown back by Jim.

‘She’s too drunk to get her story listened to to-night,’ said Dave. ‘But to-morrow she’ll bring the neighbourhood down on us. ’

‘And she’s enough, without the neighbourhood,’ reflected Pinter.

Some time after dark they returned cautiously, reconnoitred their camp, and after hiding in a hollow log such things as they couldn’t carry, they rolled up their tents like the Arabs, and silently stole away.