"You're right, Gal. Well, give him a drink, then; half a cup of water and let him think things over.... If he opens up then, O. K. If he don't we'll find the way to open him up."
"Let me go to the spring," said Joe. By now he was on his feet. "I was jus' goin' for water when you come. The spring, she's right there. You can see I don't run away...."
"Go scoop him up a can of water, Cliff," said Taggart. "You sit tight, Joe. You don't go out to-night unless we take you out to put you in a hole!"
"_Now!_" whispered Deveril sharply. "Now we've got to crawl for it!"
But Cliff Shipton demurred, saying surlily:
"I'm tired out, and I'm sore and stiff and stove-up. Let him go without his water."
"We were crazy for waiting so long!" complained Deveril. "Hurry!"
In the dugout Gallup was saying slowly, after his ponderous fashion:
"I'll go get him his water. After that, like you say, Jim, he'll open up--wide! Or, if he don't, I'll break his jaw-bone with my boot heel.... Where's a can?"
Already Babe Deveril had wormed his way out of the willows and began creeping about the edge of the tiny thicket that was farthest from Joe's cabin. Lynette, feeling weak and sick, followed him like his own shadow. Thus they skirted the brushy fringe of the spring.
Then Gallup, carrying his can, came out. Deveril dropped flat and lay motionless, his body hidden, at least to careless eyes, by the spring willows. Lynette dropped flat just behind him. She knew that again Deveril was ready to leap and strike, mercilessly hard, if Gallup came too near. It was almost an even chance whether Gallup would come their way or not.... Lynette, cold and tired and hungry and at last afraid, shivered.
But, almost immediately, it became obvious to both of them that Gallup had been here before and knew his way about. He turned, as they had hoped that he would, to the right; they heard him reach the spring and dip his pan and fill it and turn back to the dugout, slopping water after him. They saw him step on the threshold; already Deveril was crawling cautiously again, and, after him, Lynette.
It was like life in a nightmare. So tortuously slow. So great a need for quiet, and, like jeering, mocking voices, there came so many little sounds, loud in their ears--twigs snapping, leaves rustling, tiny stones set rolling. At first, what with the dark and her sole thought to be gone, Lynette failed to understand just how Deveril was directing his course. When she did grasp, she wondered at him. Instead of hurrying straight across the clearing toward the haven of the timber-line, he was drawing nearer and nearer the west end of the dugout! Now she dared not whisper to him; she could not come up with him to catch warningly at his boot. So she followed, striving with all her caution to overtake him. And before she could do so, she glimpsed his purpose.