He was surrounded by great mountains; ridges and cliffs and misty snow caps; unscalable barriers, towering above and beyond him as far as the eyes could see. The land between was broken by cañons and deep ravines, running this way and that; overgrown by dark forests and tangles of underbrush, forming hidden labyrinths in which an army might have lost itself.
His natural course was to follow the brook to its source, hoping that the stream might lead him through a breach in the barricading mountains, but after nearly a day lost, he discovered that the flow of water originated in a nest of springs, bubbling out from the base of an unsurmountable precipice. Next day he tried another direction, crawling around the escarpment of a steep pitched ridge, over what appeared to be a faint goat path; but again he brought up in a blind pocket from which his only escape meant to retrace his steps.
When he finally gave it up and started back over the tortuous trail, he happened to catch Alison and Archie exchanging glances of furtive significance; and it struck him in a flash that they knew the route to the pass. He watched them surreptitiously thereafter, and on two or three occasions, when they thought he was not looking, he detected them in the act of whispering together and sizing up distantly looming landmarks. There was something in their manner to tell him that they were secretly elated at his failure to find the way, and he was thoroughly convinced that they might set him on the right path if they chose.
He had no comment to make, however, and he dropped to sleep that night like a man whose mind is free from trouble. But when he awakened next morning he found himself alone under the blanket he had shared with Archie Preston. The boy had slipped away some time in the night.
Dexter flung off his blanket and strode forward to touch the small, still figure on the other side of the dead fire. "Where's your brother?" he demanded.
Alison stirred under her cover, and her eyes opened to regard him sleepily in the gray dawn. "What?" she asked.
"Archie's gone," the corporal informed her. "Cleared out while I was asleep. Where is he?"
She sat up and gazed drowsily about her. "You were the one who was watching him," she remarked after a pause. "Don't you know what's become of him?"
"You two planned it out last night," Dexter declared. "You knew he meant to escape. It isn't worth while pretending otherwise."
Alison turned squarely to meet his gaze. "Yes," she admitted without further evasion. "I knew he was going. I told him to go if he could get away. I didn't want him to leave home in the first place, but as long as he did leave, matters will be a hundred times worse if he's taken back now. He's got to get away. That's the only thing left for him to do now—to get out of the country and start his life over again some place else." She threw up her head defiantly. "I not only urged him to escape, but I guess you know I'll do everything I can to keep you from finding him again."