Page:Along the Trail (1912).pdf/51

 called back to her cheerily;—but at last his voice came only faintly;—and then she heard nothing but the rushing of the water far below, and the creaking of the trees as they swayed in the mountain wind, and the lonely crying of a bird, 'way up in the heights.

Presently she called, but there was no answer. Then she called again, more loudly, conscious that the sound of the water below would shut out her voice from his ears, and yet calling more and more frantically. Then, hearing no answer, she started to follow him, a wild, unreasoning fear tugging at her, and her feet slipping and sliding, and the vines tripping her, hampered as she was with her bonds, until at last her foot caught and she stumbled and fell, the force of her fall flinging her almost over the brow of a vine-covered ledge, the bottom of which she could not see.

And then a panic took her. Scrambling madly to her feet, she fled up the mountain-side, breaking her way through