The second that ensued had an unmistakable quality of drama. Nopp turned to me, exhaling heavily. “Killdare, we’ve beat the devil around the stump all along—and it’s time to stop,” he said. “I don’t like to talk like a crazy man, but we’ve got to look this infernal matter in the face. When you come out to-night come armed with the biggest gun you can find—a high-powered rifle.”
No man argued with another, at a time like this. “I don’t know where I can get a rifle,” I told him.
“Every man in the house has got some kind or another. I’m going to be frank and tell you what I’m carrying—a big .405, the biggest quick-shooting arm I could get hold of. Whatever comes to-night—we’ve got to stop.”
We gathered again at the big mahogany table, dined quietly, and the four of us excused ourselves just before dessert. The twilight was already falling—like gray shadows of wings over land and sea—and we wanted to be at our post. We didn’t desire that the peril of the lagoon should strike in our absence. And we left a more hopeful spirit among the other occupants of the manor house.
They were all glad that armed men would guard the lagoon shore that night. I suppose it gave them some sense of security otherwise not known. The four of us procured our rifles, and walked, a grim company, down to the shore of the lagoon.
“We want to guard as much of the shore line as we can, and still keep each other in sight,” Slatterly said. “And there’s no getting away from it that we want to be in easy rifle range of each other.”
He posted us at fifty-yard intervals along the craggy margin. I was placed near the approach of the rock wall, overlooking a wide stretch of the shore, Weldon’s post was fifty yards above mine, the sheriff’s next, and Nopp’s most distant of all. Then we were left to watch the tides and the night and the stars probing through the darkening mantle of the sky.
We had no definite orders. We were simply to watch, to fire at will in case of an emergency, to guard the occupants of the manor house against any danger that might emerge from the depths of the lagoon. The tide, at the lowest ebb at the hour of our arrival, began soon to flow again. The glassy surface was fretted by the beat and crash of oncoming waves against the rocky barrier. We saw the little rivulets splash through; the water’s edge crept slowly up the craggy shore. The dusk deepened, and soon it was deep night.
We were none too close together. I could barely make out the tall figure of Weldon, standing statuesque on a great, gray crag beside the lagoon. His figure was so dim that it was hard to believe in its reality, the gun at his shoulder was but a fine penciled line, and with the growing darkness, it was hard to make him out at all. Soon it took a certain measure of imagination to conceive of that darker spot in the mist of darkness as the form of a fellow man.
The sense of isolation increased. We heard no sound from each other, but the night itself was full of little, hushed noises. From my camp fire beside Manatee Marsh I had often heard the same sounds, but they were more compelling now, they held the attention with unswerving constancy, and they seemed to penetrate further into the spirit. Also I found it harder to identify them—at least to believe steadfastly the identifications that I made.