Bill looked back at him with sullen eyes. “All right for you, professor—with two guns handy,” he said resentfully. “Put you in here with just your bare hands and maybe you wouldn’t be so damn nervy, yourself.”
“I’d probably wait until I saw some danger before I became alarmed.”
Bill muttered something under his breath, and stepped out more briskly. Both were thirsty, but since they had left the western side of the valley with one canteen nearly full, the need of water had not yet become acute. It was the tramp across the valley with packs too heavy for them that had told on the tempers of the two men—with Abington’s bruised foot and Bill’s nervous dread of pursuit for good measure.
The spring proved to be well protected, in a water-worn cave that seemed to offer excellent shelter. A tangle of nondescript oak bushes grew near the entrance and drew moisture from the overflow which, though slight, was yet sufficient for the scant vegetation.
The cave itself was not large, with a fine sandy floor and a lofty arched roof of irregular blocks of the red sandstone which was the regular formation of these hills. A lime dyke broke through here and there in sharp peaks and ridges in a fairly continuous outcropping roughly pointing toward the river.
Abington slipped off his pack, drank from the spring and sat down against the wall of the cave to unlace his boot from his lame foot.
Bill began gathering dry twigs and branches and set about making coffee and frying a little bacon. “We oughta git a sheep or something,” he grumbled, breaking a long moody silence. “This time of year there’s generally sheep running in through here.”
“I’ll take a hunt, when my foot has had a rest. We can manage for a day or two,” Abington replied without looking up.
“Say, you’d be in a hell of a fix if you broke your leg,” Bill sneered. “You’d starve to death before you’d trust me with a gun, wouldn’t you?”
“There’s meat for to-night. To-morrow will take care of itself.”