The Bon Homme County independent. [volume] (Tabor, S.D.) 1904-1913, 1911-01-19
CHAPTER XI.

Okyada, my servant, entered my bed
room at 10 o'clock that very night, and
when I crossed the landing to wake
Joan she did not answer me, nor could
my diligent search discover her to be
in the house at all.
And the minutes of my opportunity
were precious beyond all reckoning
Good God!" I cried, that I must
leave her to such men and to such a
Judgment"
For knew that it must be so, and
that by flight alone, and the perils OF
flight, would our salvation be won.
Okyada has never been a man of
many words. I think he uttered but
two that night as We crossed the val
ley garden and made for the river
bank. Shoot, MASTER" he said. mean
ing that II any barred the way the
time for passive flight had passed. 1
nodded my head in answer, and pressed
icloser upon his heels as he entered the
maze Of shrubs which defended the
gully. The silence about us had be-
come burden to the nerves. Was 1t
possible that none Of Imroth's men
watched the garden? Indeed, for a mo-
ment that appeared to be the truth.
We gained the bank Of the whirl-
pool of yesterday. and for few min
utes lay fat In the shadow of the
great boarder Of the rock which rises
up above the gully. Behind us we could
espy the lighted windows Of the bed
room had just left and the clear
shape Of the silent chalet. The gardens
and the woods were so many patches
OF black against an azure sky of night.
The water below us flowed In color q
deep indigo, between walls of lightless
rock, in q bed Of polished stone. Not
breath of wind stirred the pines upon
the hillside. We could not longer see
the ocean without or the friendly lights
It showed to us. We might have been
fugitives upon desert island; and this
deception would have continued posi-
BILE, until the sound of a distant rife
shot awoke a thousand echoes in the
hills and shattered in single instant
the dream of security we had found so
pleasing.
Okyada sprang up at the sound and
began to speak with an earnestness Of
which he was rarely guilty.
They have found the honorable cap
taln-quick, master, we must go to
him!" he said.
sloping lawn of the garden we had left.
There, in single file, the figures of sew
en- men. crossing the grass boldly to-
ward the chalet, were clearly to be
discerned. / had scarcely observed
them when a movement in the shrub
berry Immediately behind US betrayed
the presence OF others-three in all,
who came out to the waters edge at
place not 10 yards from where we
stood, and, hating there little while
to inspect the gully, afterwards made
off through the woods, as though to
join the others above.
"Old Val gets such notions into his
Iwoolly Uranium" said one Of them as
he went; IF there's any Englishman
going across there tonight, I'm derned
If he amt a-mermaid."
We listened to them, crouching low
to the rock, and with our revolvers
ready to our hands. Had the most
trifling accident occurred, falling peb-
BILE or a clumsy movement betrayed
us, that, l am convinced, would have
been the whole story of the night. But
we lay as men long practiced in the
arts OF silence, and not until the trees
hid the men from our sight did Okyada
stand up again and prepare to cross
the gully.
Go first master" he said: here Is
the rope. Our friends, with the hon
orable captain. wait yonder above. We
Will bring them the good news"
Now l saw that, as he spoke, he had
caught up rope which had been dex-
terously fixed to a bowlder upon the op-
posite bank OF the stream and allowed
TO trail In the water while he went to
fetch me from the house. Fixing this
as cleverly to the rock upon our side,
he made bridge by which any strong
lad could have crossed with the pool
as low as 1t then was; and no sooner
had he given the signal than I swung
myself out and almost Immediately
found footing upon the farther shore.
his own passage, when first he crossed,
must have been very perilous. I thought
and could but imagine that he had
Thrown the rope over first and trusted
to the graphing iron affixed to the end
upon the garden side. This, however,
was but a speculation. He crossed now
az l had done. and together we cast
the knot from the bowlder and threw
the rope In. II all our acts were cool
and collected. / set the fact down to
the knowledge that we were prisoners