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"I want to see Michael," Potch said, when they approached the huts.

"I'll be in, in a couple of minutes."

Sophie went on to their own home, and Potch, swerving from her, walked across to the back door of Michael's hut.

CHAPTER XV

Charley was sitting on the couch, leaning towards Michael, his shoulders hunched, his eyes gleaming, when Potch went into the hut.

"You can't bluff me," Potch heard him say. "You may throw dust in the eyes of the men here, but you can't bluff me.... It was you did for me.... It was you put it over on me--took those stones."

"Well, you tell the boys," Potch heard Michael say.

His voice was as unconcerned as though it were not anything of importance they were discussing. Potch found relief in the sound of it, but its unconcern drove Charley to fury.

"You know I took them from Paul," he shouted. "You know--I can see it in your eyes ... and you took them from me. When ... how ... I don't know.... You must 've sneaked into the house when I dozed off for a bit, and put a parcel of your own rotten stuff in their place.... How do I know? Well, I'll tell you...."

He settled back on the sofa. "I hung on to the best stone in the lot--clear brown potch with good flame in it--hopin' it would give me a clue some day to the man who'd done that trick on me. But I couldn't place the stone; I'd never seen it on you, and Jun had never seen it either. I was dead stony when I sold it to Maud ... and I told her why I'd been keeping it, seeing she was in the show at the start off. She sold the stone to Armitage in America, and first thing the old man said when he saw it was: 'Why, that's Michael's mascot!'"

"Remembered when you'd got it, he said," Charley continued, taking Michael's interest with gratified malice. "First stone you'd come on, on Fallen Star, and you wouldn't sell--kept her for luck.... Old Armitage wouldn't have anything to do with the stone then--didn't believe Maud's story.... But John Lincoln got it. He told me...."

"I see," Michael murmured.

"Don't mind telling you I'm here to play Armitage's game," Charley said.

Michael nodded. "Well, what about it?"

"This about it," Charley exclaimed irritably, his excitement and impatience rising under Michael's calmness. "You're done on the Ridge when this story gets around. What I've got to say is ... you took the opals. You've got 'em. You're done for here. But you could have a good life somewhere else. Clear out, and----"

"We'll go halves, eh?" Michael queried.

"That's it," Charley assented. "I'll clear out and say nothing--although I've told Rummy enough already to give him his suspicions. Still, suspicions are only suspicions--nothing more. When I came here I didn't even mean to give you this chance.... But 'Life is sweet, brother!'

There's still a few pubs down in Sydney, and a woman or two. I wouldn't go out with such a grouch against things in general if I had a flash in the pan first.... And it'd suit you all right, Michael.... With this scheme of Armitage's in the wind----"

"And suppose I haven't got the stones?" Michael inquired.

Charley half rose from the sofa, his thin hands grasping the table.

"It's a lie!" he shrieked, shivering with impotent fury. "You know it is.... What have you done with 'em then? What have you done with those stones--that's what I want to know!"

"You haven't got much breath," Michael said; "you'd better save it."

"I'll use all I've got to down you, if you don't come to light," Charley cried. "I'll do it, see if I don't."

Potch walked across to his father. He had heard Charley abusing and threatening Michael before without being able to make out what it was all about. He had thought it bluff and something in the nature of a try-on; but he had determined to put a stop to it.

"No, you won't!" he said.

"Won't I?" Charley turned on his son.

"No." Potch's tone was steady and decisive.

Charley looked towards Michael again.

"Well ... what are you going to do about it?"

"I've told you," Michael said. "Nothing."

"Did y' hear what I've been calling your saint?" Charley cried, turning to Potch. "I'm calling him what everybody on the fields'd be calling him if they knew."

Michael's gaze wavered as it went to Potch.

"A thief," Charley continued, whipping himself into a frenzy. "That's what he is--a dirty, low-down thief! I'm the ordinary, decent sort ...

get the credit for what I am ... and pay for it, by God! But he--he doesn't pay. I bag all the disgrace ... and he walks off with the goods--Rouminof's stones."

Potch did not look at Michael. What Charley had said did not seem to shock or surprise him.

"I've made a perfectly fair and reasonable proposition," Charley went on more quietly. "I've told him ... if he'll go halves----"

"Guess again," Potch sneered.

Charley swung to his feet, a volley of expletives swept from him.

"I've told Rummy to get the law on his side," he cried shrilly, "and he's going to. There's one little bit of proof I've got that'll help him, and----"

"You'll get jail yourself over it," Potch said.

"Don't mind if I do," Charley shouted, and poured his rage and disappointment into a flood of such filthy abuse that Potch took him by the shoulders.

"Shut your mouth," he said. "D'y' hear?... Shut your mouth!"

Charley continued to rave, and Potch, gripping his shoulders, ran him out of the hut.

Michael heard them talking in Potch's hut--Charley yelling, threatening, and cursing. A fit of coughing seized him. Then there was silence--a hurrying to and fro in the hut. Michael heard Sophie go to the tank, and carry water into the house, and guessed that Charley's paroxysm and coughing had brought on the hemorrhage he had had two or three times since his return to the Ridge.

A little later Potch came to him.

"He's had a bleeding, Michael," Potch said; "a pretty bad one, and he's weak as a kitten. But just before it came on I told him I'd let him have a pound a week, somehow, if he goes down to Sydney at once.... But if ever he shows his face in the Ridge again ... or says a word more about you ... I've promised he'll never get another penny out of me.... He can die where and how he likes ... I'm through with him...."

Michael had been sitting beside his fire, staring into it. He had dropped into a chair and had not moved since Potch and Charley left the hut.

"Do you believe what he said, Potch?" he asked.

Michael felt Potch's eyes on his face; he raised his eyes to meet them.

There was no lie in the clear depths of Potch's eyes.

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