Page 477 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

Tommys and Billys.
* * * * * *
Sylvia passed through the rest of her journey in a dream
of terror. The incident of the children had shaken her nerves,
and she longed to be away from the place and its associations.
Even Eaglehawk Neck with its curious dog stages and its
‘natural pavement’, did not interest her. McNab’s blandish-
ments were wearisome. She shuddered as she gazed into the
boiling abyss of the Blow-hole, and shook with fear as the
Commandant’s ‘train’ rattled over the dangerous tramway
that wound across the precipice to Long Bay. The ‘train’ was
composed of a number of low wagons pushed and dragged
up the steep inclines by convicts, who drew themselves up
in the wagons when the trucks dashed down the slope, and
acted as drags. Sylvia felt degraded at being thus drawn by
human beings, and trembled when the lash cracked, and
the convicts answered to the sting— like cattle. Moreover,
there was among the foremost of these beasts of burden a
face that had dimly haunted her girlhood, and only lately
vanished from her dreams. This face looked on her—she
thought—with bitterest loathing and scorn, and she felt re-
lieved when at the midday halt its owner was ordered to fall
out from the rest, and was with four others re-chained for
the homeward journey. Frere, struck with the appearance
of the five, said, ‘By Jove, Poppet, there are our old friends
Rex and Dawes, and the others. They won’t let ‘em come all
the way, because they are such a desperate lot, they might
make a rush for it.’ Sylvia comprehended now the face was
the face of Dawes; and as she looked after him, she saw him

For the Term of His Natural Life