I had a weight at my
heart when we desisted; and I saw that even Northmour was unusually pale.
He looked over his shoulder nervously, as though he feared that some one
had crept between him and the pavilion door.
"By God," he said in a whisper, "this is too much for me!"
I replied in the same key: "Suppose there should be none, after all!"
"Look there," he returned, nodding with his head, as though he had been
afraid to point.
I glanced in the direction indicated; and there, from the northern quarter
of the Sea-Wood, beheld a thin column of smoke rising steadily against the
now cloudless sky.
"Northmour," I said (we still continued to talk in whispers), "it is not
possible to endure this suspense. I prefer death fifty times over. Stay
you here to watch the pavilion; I will go forward and make sure, if I have
to walk right into their camp."
He looked once again all round him with puckered eyes, and then nodded
assentingly to my proposal.
My heart beat like a sledge hammer as I set out walking rapidly in the
direction of the smoke; and, though up to that moment I had felt chill and
shivering, I was suddenly conscious of a glow of heat all over my body.
The ground in this direction was very uneven; a hundred men might have
lain hidden in as many square yards about my path. But I who had not
practiced the business in vain, chose such routes as cut at the very root
of concealment, and, by keeping along the most convenient ridges,
commanded several hollows at a time.
Pages:
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270