“It’s Mr. Carington! Is he dead? She shot him! I heard it—oh, this is awful! What shall I do?”
“Mr. Carington!” he called. “Mr. Carington!” As he shook his shoulder, he guessed it was blood he felt on his hand.
He stood up at last, and listened. There was no sound but the deep murmur of the distant river. More at ease, he struck a match, for the birch flame was out, and, bending over, looked at the body.
“By George! he’s not dead; he’s breathing.” And still his anxiety was intense. He took both rifles, dropped a shell in each, ran to the edge of the clearing, and laid them down. Running back, and catching Carington under the arms, he tried to drag him to a shelter. It was in vain. The tall, sturdy man was beyond his powers. But, as he tugged at him, Carington groaned aloud. At the next pull, he spoke:
“Did I do it?—my rifle?” he murmured, feebly.
“What? What’s that? A woman!” The shock of the ball-wound and the subsequent faintness, kept up by loss of blood, were partly over.
“I am dreadfully weak. What an infernal business! Where am I?”
“In the woods; in the woods. Can you get over to the bush? They might come back.”
“I’ll try. Great Scott! It’s my left shoulder.” And he fell in the effort to get to his feet. “I can’t do it. Get my flask. Ah, that’s better.”
This time he crawled with one arm and Jack’s help to the margin of the clearing, and at last lay among the underbrush.
“Tie a handkerchief, tight, here, around my arm-pit. I don’t think it bleeds. It might. Now lie down, and keep an eye over yonder. In a while I shall be better. What a deuce of a business! Now keep quiet. Are you loaded?”
Jack waited, a hand on his rifle. Presently Carington said, feeling his pocket with the right hand, “George! that’s it. I was a fool. It’s gone! and my watch!”
“No matter now. Halloa, Jack, what is that light?”
“Yes,” for the upward glow of the blazing cabin now rose in the sky overhead, and soon began to send arrowy flashes of illumination through the trees.
“Can’t be the woods,” said Carington. “They are all wet, and there are few pines. Let us try to get out of it.”
This time he did better, but it was slow work, and Jack became more and more anxious as the light grew behind them, and now and then sparks fell through the foliage about their path. They were soon close to the shore.
