Page:9009 (1908).djvu/202

Rh When he had quenched his thirst to some degree, he stood up and listened, intent. A quiet was about him, a great golden quiet; a little bird went by his head with a squeak and a whir, and the silence came flowing back in long ripples, like a sea. It was the silence of altitudes, vibrant, supersensitive, through which a sound passed aquiver like a pain; along its crystal, a whisper, a mutter, the crackling of a twig, would come for a mile. Collins listened: there was no crackling of twig, no shout, no cry, not a breath, not a sigh.

He walked to the edge of the plateau and looked down the slopes to the valley beneath. Along the ribbon of road, small like mice, and gliding without rise and fall as upon wheels, he saw specks of horses mounted by dots of men; they were going up and down the road in sudden swift flights, as if bewildered. He had outwitted them.

He returned, dragging his rifle, a little aimlessly to the centre of the plateau. He knew what he should do—plunge on into the depths Rh