Page:Aladdin O'Brien (1902).pdf/148

 white arms stretched out like a malediction; and for a moment he had to take himself in hand. After a little he mastered the fear that had seized him.

"It's only a poor old lonely vegetable out in the cold," he said. "And it shows us exactly where we are and exactly which way we have to go."

He set himself right, and, with head lowered and hands clenched, again started on. But he was beginning to be very much bored, and sensible that his legs were not accustomed to being used so hard. Furthermore, there was a little difficulty—not by any means an insurmountable one—in steering straight, because of the constantly varying point of the compass in which the wind blew. He went on for a long time. . ..

He began to look for the high ground to decline, as it should, about now, if it was the high ground he took it for. "I ought to be getting somewhere," he said.

And, God help him! tired out, half frozen and very foot-sore, he was getting