louder, until at last, making a slight detour, he came upon the very edge of the descent, where he could look down and see his home nestled in the cove at the foot of the fall, the blue smoke curling upward from its great chimney.

He seated himself upon a jutting rock well screened by laurel shrubs on all sides but the one toward the fall. There, his knees clasped about with his arms, and his chin resting upon them, he sat and watched.

Behind the leafage and tangle of bare stems and twigs, he was so far above and so directly over the spot on which his gaze was fixed as to be out of the usual range of sight from below, thus enabling him to see plainly what was[Pg 38] transpiring about the house and sheds, without himself being seen.

[Pg 38]

Long and patiently he waited. Once a dog barked,—his own dog Nig. Some one must be approaching. What if the little creature should seek him out and betray him! He quivered with the thought. The day before he had driven him down the mountain, beating him off whenever he returned. Should the animal persist in tracking him, he would kill him.

He peered more eagerly down, and saw little Hoyle run out of the cow shed and twist himself this way and that to see up and down the road. Both the child and the dog seemed excited. Yes, there they were, three horsemen coming along the highway. Now they were dismounting and questioning the boy. Now they disappeared in the house. He did not move. Why were they so long within? Hours, it seemed to Frale, but in reality it was only a short search they were making there. They were longer looking about the sheds and yard. Hoyle accompanied them everywhere, his hands in his pockets, standing about, shivering with excitement.

All around they went peering and searching, thrusting their arms as far as they could reach into the stacks of fodder, looking into troughs and corn sacks, setting the fowls to cackling wildly, even hauling out the long corn stalks from the wagon which had served to make Thryng's ride the night before comfortable. No spot was overlooked.

Frequently they stood and parleyed. Then Frale's heart would sink within him. What if they should set Nig to track him! Ah, he would strangle the beast and pitch him over the fall. He would spring over after him before he would let himself be taken and hanged. Oh, he could feel the strangling rope around his neck already! He could not bear it—he could not!

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