Bunyip Land | Page 3

to New Guinea to find my father."
"There, doctor, did you ever hear any one so wickedly obstinate
before?" cried nurse. "Isn't it shocking? and his ma that delicate and
worried living all alone, like, here out in these strange parts, and him as
ought to be a comfort to her doing nothing but hanker after running
away to find him as is dead and gone."
"He's not dead, nurse; he's only gone," I cried; "and I mean to find him,
as sure as I live. There, that I will."
"There, doctor, did you ever hear such a boy?" cried nurse.
"Never," said the doctor. "Why, Joe, my boy," he cried as I stood
shrinking from him, ready to defend myself from his remonstrances,
"your ideas do you credit. I didn't think you had it in you."
"Then you don't think it is wrong of me, doctor?" I said, catching his
hand.
"No, my boy, I do not," he said gravely; "but it is a task for strong and

earnest men."
"But I am strong," I said; "and if I'm not a man I'm in real earnest."
"I can see that, my lad," said the doctor, with his brown forehead filling
with thoughtful wrinkles; "but have you counted the cost?"
"Cost!" I said. "No. I should get a passage in a coaster and walk all the
rest of the way."
"I mean cost of energy: the risks, the arduous labours?"
"Oh, yes," I said; "and I sha'n't mind. Father would have done the same
if I was lost."
"Of course he would, my lad; but would you go alone?"
"Oh, no," I replied, "I should take a guide."
"Ah, yes; a good guide and companion."
"There, Master Joseph, you hear," said nurse. "Doctor Grant means that
sarcastical."
"No, I do not, nurse," said the doctor quietly; "for I think it a very brave
and noble resolve on the part of our young friend."
"Doctor!"
"It has troubled me this year past that no effort has been made to find
the professor, who, I have no doubt, is somewhere in the interior of the
island, and I have been for some time making plans to go after him
myself."
Nurse Brown's jaw dropped, and she stared in speechless amazement.
"Hurray, doctor!" I cried.
"And I say hurray too, Joe," he cried. "I'll go with you, my lad, and

we'll bring him back, with God's help, safe and sound."
The shout I gave woke Jimmy, who sprang to his feet, dragged a
boomerang from his waistband, and dashed to the door to throw it at
somebody, and then stopped.
"You'll break his mother's heart, doctor," sobbed nurse. "Oh! if she was
to hear what you've said!"
"I did hear every word," said my mother, entering from the next room,
and looking very white.
"There, there," cried nurse, "you wicked boy, see what you've done."
"Mother!" I cried, as I ran to her and caught her--poor, little, light,
delicate thing that she was--in my arms.
"My boy!" she whispered back, as she clung to me.
"I must go. I will find him. I'm sure he is not dead."
"And so am I," she cried, with her eyes lighting up and a couple of red
spots appearing in her cheeks. "I could not feel as I do if he were dead."
Here she broke down and began to sob, while I, with old nurse's eyes
glaring at me, began to feel as if I had done some horribly wicked act,
and that nothing was left for me to do but try to soothe her whose heart
I seemed to have broken.
"Oh, mother! dear mother," I whispered, with my lips close to her little
pink ear, "I don't want to give you pain, but I feel as if I must--I must
go."
To my utter astonishment she laid her hands upon my temples, thrust
me from her, and gazing passionately in my great sun-browned face she
bent forward, kissed me, and said:
"Yes, yes. You've grown a great fellow now. Go? Yes, you must go.
God will help you, and bring you both safely back."

"Aw--ugh! Aw--ugh! Aw--ugh!" came from the verandah, three
hideous yells, indicative of the fact that Jimmy--the half-wild black
who had attached himself to me ever since the day I had met him
spear-armed, and bearing that as his only garment over the shoulder,
and I shared with him the bread and mutton I had taken for my
expedition--was in a state of the utmost grief. In fact, he had thrown
himself down on the sand, and was wallowing and twisting himself
about, beating up the dust with his boomerang, and generally exciting
poor old nurse's disgust.
"Mother!" I cried; and making an effort she stood up erect and proud.
"Mr Grant," she