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appeared to be coming. How slowly it moved! The air was like steam. If there
broke one of those dark, violent storms common though rare to the country,
Duane believed he might slip away in the fury of wind and rain. Hope, that
seemed unquenchable in him, resurged again. He hailed it with a bitterness
that was sickening.
Then at a rustling step he froze into the old strained attention. He heard a
slow patter of soft feet. A tawny shape crossed a little opening in the
thicket. It was that of a dog. The moment while that beast came into full view
was an age. The dog was not a bloodhound, and if he had a trail or a scent he
seemed to be at fault on it. Duane waited for the inevitable discovery. Any
kind of a hunting-dog could have found him in that thicket. Voices from
outside could be heard urging on the dog. Rover they called him. Duane sat up
at the moment the dog entered the little shaded covert. Duane expected a
yelping, a baying, or at least a bark that would tell of his hiding-place. A
strange relief swiftly swayed over Duane. The end was near now. He had no
further choice. Let them come a quick fierce exchange of shots and then this
torture past! He waited for the dog to give the alarm.
But the dog looked at him and trotted by into the thicket without a yelp.
Duane could not believe the evidence of his senses. He thought he had suddenly
gone deaf. He saw the dog disappear, heard him running to and fro among the
willows, getting farther and farther away, till all sound from him ceased.
"Thar's Rover," called a voice from the bluff-side. "He's been through thet
black patch."
"Nary a rabbit in there," replied another.
"Bah! Thet pup's no good," scornfully growled another man. "Put a hound at
thet clump of willows."
"Fire's the game. Burn the brake before the rain comes."
The voices droned off as their owners evidently walked up the ridge.
Then upon Duane fell the crushing burden of the old waiting, watching,
listening spell. After all, it was not to end just now. His chance still
persisted looked a little brighter led him on, perhaps, to forlorn hope.
All at once twilight settled quickly down upon the willow brake, or else
Duane noted it suddenly. He imagined it to be caused by the approaching storm.
But there was little movement of air or cloud, and thunder still muttered and
rumbled at a distance. The fact was the sun had set, and at this time of
overcast sky night was at hand.
Duane realized it with the awakening of all his old force. He would yet
elude his pursuers. That was the moment when he seized the significance of all
these fortunate circumstances which had aided him. Without haste and without
sound he began to crawl in the direction of the river. It was not far, and he
reached the bank before darkness set in. There were men up on the bluff
carrying wood to build a bonfire. For a moment he half yielded to a temptation
to try to slip along the river-shore, close in under the willows. But when he
raised himself to peer out he saw that an attempt of this kind would be liable
to failure. At the same moment he saw a rough-hewn plank lying beneath him,
lodged against some willows. The end of the plank extended in almost to a
point beneath him. Quick as a flash he saw where a desperate chance invited
him. Then he tied his gun in an oilskin bag and put it in his pocket.,
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The bank was steep and crumbly. He must not break off any earth to splash
into the water. There was a willow growing back some few feet from the edge of
the bank. Cautiously he pulled it down, bent it over the water so that when he
released it there would be no springing back. Then he trusted his weight to
it, with his feet sliding carefully down the bank. He went into the water
almost up to his knees, felt the quicksand grip his feet; then, leaning
forward till he reached the plank, he pulled it toward him and lay upon it.
Without a sound one end went slowly under water and the farther end appeared
lightly braced against the overhanging willows. Very carefully then Duane
began to extricate his right foot from the sucking sand. It seemed as if his
foot was incased in solid rock. But there was a movement upward, and he pulled
with all the power he dared use. It came slowly and at length was free. The
left one he released with less difficulty. The next few moments he put all his
attention on the plank to ascertain if his weight would sink it into the sand.
The far end slipped off the willows with a little splash and gradually settled
to rest upon the bottom. But it sank no farther, and Duane's greatest concern
was relieved. However, as it was manifestly impossible for him to keep his
head up for long he carefully crawled out upon the plank until he could rest
an arm and shoulder upon the willows.
When he looked up it was to find the night strangely luminous with fires.
There was a bonfire on the extreme end of the, bluff, another a hundred paces
beyond. A great flare extended over the brake in that direction. Duane heard a
roaring on the wind, and he knew his pursuers had fired the willows. He did
not believe that would help them much. The brake was dry enough, but too green
to burn readily. And as for the bonfires he discovered that the men, probably
having run out of wood, were keeping up the light with oil and stuff from the
village. A dozen men kept watch on the bluff scarcely fifty paces from where
Duane lay concealed by the willows. They talked, cracked jokes, sang songs,
and manifestly considered this outlaw-hunting a great lark. As long as the
bright light lasted Duane dared not move. He had the patience and the
endurance to wait for the breaking of the storm, and if that did not come,
then the early hour before dawn when the gray fog and gloom were over the
river.
Escape was now in his grasp. He felt it. And with that in his mind he
waited, strong as steel in his conviction, capable of withstanding any strain
endurable by the human frame.
The wind blew in puffs, grew wilder, and roared through the willows,
carrying bright sparks upward. Thunder rolled down over the river, and
lightning began to flash. Then the rain fell in heavy sheets, but not
steadily. The flashes of lightning and the broad flares played so incessantly
that Duane could not trust himself out on the open river. Certainly the storm
rather increased the watchfulness of the men on the bluff. He knew how to
wait, and he waited, grimly standing pain and cramp and chill. The storm wore
away as desultorily as it had come, and the long night set in. There were
times when Duane thought he was paralyzed, others when he grew sick, giddy,
weak from the strained posture. The first paling of the stars quickened him
with a kind of wild joy. He watched them grow paler, dimmer, disappear one by
one. A shadow hovered down, rested upon the river, and gradually thickened.
The bonfire on the bluff showed as through a foggy veil. The watchers were
mere groping dark figures. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]