Hugh goes in Search

Peggy brought in the copy of her marriage certificate, an old and
faded piece of paper which ran--"This is to certify that I, Thomas
Nettleship, duly ordained clergyman of the Church of England, have
this day solemnized a marriage between William Grant, Bachelor,
and Margaret Donohoe, Spinster."

The name of Pike's Hotel and the date were nearly illegible, but there
the document was; and though it was not the original certificate,
it was pretty clear that Peggy could never have invented it. Its
production made a great impression. It certainly went far to convince
Blake.

He had cross-examined all the witnesses, had checked their accounts
by each other, had followed William Grant's career at that time,
had got on to the history of the bush missionary; and everything
fitted in. Martin Doyle--Black Martin's son Martin--was
letter-perfect in his part. Peggy could give the details of the
ceremony with unfaltering accuracy fifty times a day if need be,
and never contradict herself. So at last he gave up trying to find
holes in the case, and determined to go in and win.

On the other side there was trouble in the camp--no witnesses could
be found, except Martin Doyle, and he was ready to swear to the
wedding. At last it became evident that the only chance of overthrowing
Peggy's case was to find Considine; but the earth seemed to have
swallowed him up.

The influence of the Chief of Police was brought to bear, and many
a weary mile did the troopers of the Outer Back ride in search of
the missing man. One of them followed a Considine about two hundred
miles across country, and embodied the story of his wanderings in
a villainously written report; brief and uncouth as the narrative
was, it was in itself an outline picture of bush life. From
shearers' hut to artesian borers' camp, from artesian well to the
opal-fields, from the opal-fields to a gold-rush, from the gold-rush
to a mail-coach stable, he pursued this Considine, only to find
that, in the words of the report, "the individual was not the same."