Page:Blackwood's Magazine volume 137.djvu/816

810 breath. It was not pity which he felt even at this moment – it was a furious jealousy.

When he had stood for the space of a few seconds, he turned his face in the opposite direction and broke his way through the bushes – running as if he were being pursued, as if at any price he must get away from this spot.

Vincenz walked straight on, peering about for the signal. He had not got more than twenty paces when he saw it on the tree. This signal shone so white that not even a short-sighted man could overlook it. It hung on the branch like a huge white flower, doubly pale in the moonlight. A slanting moonbeam, piercing through the branches, had touched it and made it shine out conspicuously. But though the signal on the branch was so distinct, the ground at the lawyer's feet was dark, and he did not see where he was stepping.

He stood for a moment, looking at the signal then, exactly following Tolnay's direction, unhesitatingly, unsuspiciously, blindly, he turned, as he had been told – sharp to the left.

CHAPTER XXXV. – A RIDDLE.
"But long they looked, and feared, and wept." –

The last of the plaids was strapped up, the provision-basket had been got into travelling order there was nothing now to do but to sit and wait till those two men came back again through the bushes. Mr Howard and Kurt exchanged occasional remarks; the Bohemian smoked his pipe, standing a little apart; Gretchen sat silent, feeling tired, and conscious of listening rather impatiently for the sound of the returning footsteps.

"Three minutes there," said Mr Howard, drawing out his watch, "three minutes back, and say three minutes for shuddering – nine minutes in all. They have been gone ten minutes now."

"Suppose we go on slowly, and let them follow," said Kurt.

"No," said Gretchen; "we must wait till they come."

"Oh, all right; but you looked as if you had had enough of this waiting business. I know I have."

"Four minutes for shuddering – five minutes," proclaimed Mr Howard, holding his watch so that the moonlight fell upon it. "It is beginning to grow into an unreasonable allowance. It is wrong in them to indulge in so many shivers when they know that we are waiting."

There was a short silence, during which Mr Howard kept his eyes on his watch, and the Bohemian puffed his pipe steadily. Then the puffs stopped, and the Bohemian stood in an attitude of attention.

"They are coming now," he said.

Mr Howard returned his watch to his pocket, and the Bohemian hastily lighted the little lantern which was to guide them down, for in the dense parts of the forest there would be no moonlight on their path.

They all looked towards the bushes to the right. But those bushes never rustled – they slept on peacefully in the moonlight; it was from the opposite side that the footsteps were approaching.

"Why, they have not been to the hole, after all," said Mr Howard, in a tone of disgust; "they are coming from the other side."

"Fine result of all our