Page:Harris Dickson--The black wolf's breed.djvu/131

Rh Broussard, haggard, pale and sunken-eyed, watching me thirty feet away, it seemed that I had seen him all the night.

No detail of his dress or manner but I observed. There was a scar across his forehead, fresh and bleeding a bit. A contusion rather. He had probably struck the door-facing as he rushed in. Yes, it bled. A few drops had trickled down his nose; there hung one, quite dry, from his brow. Precisely beneath this there were some dozen or so upon the floor. All could have been covered by my hand. Like myself Broussard had not moved throughout that awful night. God, how I pitied him. With such a weight of treason on his soul. And yet, looking back, the night was less awful than the coming day, far more merciful than the hideous night which followed it. With the sun Broussard heartened up, and first broke the silence.

"Who are you comrade, and what do you here?"

I was at a loss for reply. I had no faith in him, yet even a rotten stick might serve to get me out.

"I am trapped like yourself, and feared you all the night. God in Heaven what a long night it was."

Broussard had no words, his convulsive shudder expressed more than mine.

"Do you know how to get out of here?" I asked.

"Not I, except by the door, or the window," looking at that.

"I'll try the door," he continued, smiling the treacherous smile of the tiger. I remembered so well the first day he showed his teeth aboard ship. The man