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Contrary to all expectations, Gashford was calm, almost subdued, when his friends at last set him free. Instead of storming and abusing every one, he said quietly but quickly, "Let us search the bush now. He can't be far off yet, and there's moonlight enough." Leading the way, he sprang up the cellar stair, out at the hut-door, and across the bridge, followed closely by his party.
"Because it seems so queer that a lad like you should join the ranks." "Why queer? You are too young yet, but you will be in the ranks some day as a full private." "Yes, some day; but then, you see, my father was a soldier. Yours warn't, was he?" "No-o," said Pen, frowning and looking straight away before him out of the hut-door. "Well, then, why don't you speak out?"
They yield a very large return TO THOSE WHO ATTEND TO THEM IN PERSON, and who confine their attention entirely to that pursuit, growing only corn enough for their own consumption. May 10th. Felt rather lonely to-day, in the midst of this endless solitude. Sat before the hut-door thinking of Zimmerman and his Reflections.
"Don't you worry about me," Cumshaw said with affected unconcern, though something in the man's nervous tone troubled him in a way he could not define. "I've found the old chap who made the marks on the trees," he ran on. "Where?" Bradby demanded. But he looked towards the hut-door apprehensively.
But all was still, all looked peaceful and beautiful; and after stepping back to peer through the hut-door again to see that Punch had not stirred, he passed round to the back, where he could gaze in the direction of the fall and of the track by which the peasant-girl had hurried away.
"I haven't a bit," he declared. "Neither have I," said Bradby. "However, we'll have to keep it in our heads. It's just ten feet from here to the hut-door." "It doesn't look it," Cumshaw said promptly. "It doesn't," his mate agreed. "But distance is deceptive here. How's the meal going?" "Just about ready," Cumshaw told him. "I came to call you." The two men walked side by side to the hut.
The other ran out to get his horse for him, and had it saddled in no time. "If you will send a parson round," he said, when Frank was mounted, "I will ensure him a hearing, and good bye, sir." "And God speed you!" says Frank. But, lo! as he turned to ride away, Black-hair the sleepy-headed comes to the hut-door, looking important, and says, "Hi!"
"Twice this afternoon," he said, "I saw a man against the sky, opposite my hut. It was the same man both times; he was not a shepherd or a farmer's man. The night before, when David came, he did not speak to me; but for the first time he put his head in at the hut-door when he brought the food and made gestures that I could not understand.
"Is that all about Diable, Eric?" continued my uncle. He ran his fingers distractedly back through his long, black hair, rose, and, coming over to me, laid a trembling hand on each shoulder. "Gillespie!" he muttered through hard-set teeth. "It isn't all. I didn't think at the time, but the morning after the row with that red devil I found a dagger stuck on the outside of my hut-door.
Pen rose carefully so as not to disturb the sleeper, and cautiously peered outside the hut-door, keeping well out of sight till he had assured himself that there was no enemy visible upon the slopes of the valley, and then, taking a few steps under the shelter of the trees, he scanned the valley again from another point of view, while he listened intently, trying to catch the sound of the tramping of feet or the voice of command such as would indicate the nearness of the enemy.
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