"We've taken our place and we must stick to
it. We can't afford to straggle. Hullo! it's just on twelve. Thwaite
has had three hours to prepare, and he's bound to have wakened the
south. I fancy the business won't quite come off this time."
Suddenly in the chilly silence there rose something like the faint and
distant sound of rifles. It was no more than the sound of stone
dropping on a rock ledge, for, still and clear and cold though the night
was, the narrowness of the valley and the height of the cliffs dulled
all distant sounds. But each man had the ear of the old hunter, and
waited with head bent forward.
Again the drip-drip; then a scattering noise as when one lets peas fall
on the floor.
"God! That's carbines. Who the devil are they fighting with?"
Mitchinson's eye had lost its lethargy. His scraggy neck was craned
forward, and his grim mouth had relaxed into a grimmer smile.
"It's them, sure enough," said St. John, and spoke something to his
servant.
"I'm going forward," said George. "It may be somebody else making a
stand, and we're bound to help."
"You're bound not to be an ass," said St. John. "Who in the Lord's
name could it be? It may be the Badas polishing off some hereditary
foes, and it may be Marker getting rid of some wandering hillmen. Man,
we're miles beyond the pale. Who's to make a stand but ourselves?"
Again came the patter of little sounds, and then a long calm.
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