Page:Ritchie - Trails to Two Moons.djvu/289

 Spout—and Zang could not withhold secret admiration for his enemy's boldness—was this but a part with some plan of Blunt's which somehow involved the girl?

Zang Whistler rode through the night to an unknowable destiny with his whole spiritual being coiled back on itself like a cobra ready to strike.

Where the faint loom of the mountains ahead parted to mark the gate out of the Spout Original ordered a turn off the road and into the fringe of heavy pine woods that came down from the eastern slope of the valley. There in secure concealment he planned to await the coming of his reënforcements with the dawn. The prisoners were set with backs to tree trunks, the horses were tethered by their bridles, ready for instant mounting. Original and his companions settled themselves to endure the sharp mountain cold and the monotony of the dragging hours.

Stars paled over the tops of the pines above their heads, and the rosy banners of the dawn began to unfold against somber green. Original, growing restless, began looking at his watch at ten-minute intervals. The road was not fifty yards away from the covert where he