Page:Randall Parrish - The Red Mist.djvu/80

 66. The wind had arisen, and swept down the funnel in which I lay, with an icy breath against which my single blanket afforded no protection. I must get back against the rock, wherever I could find shelter. Gripping the blanket in one hand, I crept quietly up the gully, possibly a distance of fifty feet before encountering the rock wall. I felt my way blindly, and groped about until I discovered a few tufts of grass on which to lie down, but these proved so scant as to yield little comfort, and I tossed about, every bone aching, unable to lose consciousness. There was no sign of dawn in the sky, nor could I see the face of my watch to determine the hour. The man who had been lying next me, however, was gone, and so there must have been a change of guard while I slept. I could distinguish, dimly outlined against the sky, the overhanging rock-wall which enclosed our camp, and the deeper shade of a cleft a yard or two to my left, where the dead trunk of a tree stood like a gaunt, ugly sentinel. Even as I lay staring the figure of a man slipped out from behind its protection, and, dropping on hands and knees, crept forward across the open space. Another and another followed, mere ghost-like shadows, scarcely appearing real. They were within two yards of me, but their appearance, their passing was so swift and silent, as to leave me dazed and mystified. For the