“What does it mean, uncle?” whispered Ess. “I thought he—he was far away by this time, and safe. And he must have been here last night—outside my window—and I might have spoken with him. Oh, uncle....”
“Whist, lass, wheest,” said Scottie. “If ye had known he was there, wad a minute hae satisfied you—or him? And every minute he stood there, when he should ha’ been hastenin’ tae his hidey-hole again, wad have been paid for maybe wi’ his life or lang years in a jail. Be glad he didna wake ye.”
“Yes, you are right,” she said soberly, “and I’m glad.”
“It’s Aleck Gault he means,” said Scottie. “I mind Steve an’ him got a litter o’ dingo pups up in the hills somewhere a year ago, an’ Aleck will ken just where. I’ll gie the message tae him. He’ll be down this mornin’, an’ I’ll send him off on some job tae gie him a chance tae meet the lad. An’ now....” He took a knife and carefully scraped the last trace of the message from the bottom of the billy.
So that afternoon Aleck Gault met Steve again, and felt a chill of apprehension and pity run through him as he stared at Steve’s sunken cheeks, tight lips, and hollow eyes.
“I’ve been breaking my heart to get a word to you or with you, Steve,” he said, “but I couldn’t risk letting you come to the fire. I had my suspicions that I was being watched, and some of those cursed trackers found the dead horse, so they know you are somewhere about and afoot, and will be likely to need food. We should have arranged some place to leave messages if we couldn’t meet. But now let’s have a look at those wounds. How are they getting along?”
Aleck Gault noted the glitter in the bright eyes and the shaking of the thin hands, and he spoke soothingly as he knew how, and made Steve strip, and dressed his wounds and rebound them afresh. He was alarmed and sore afraid when he saw the state they were in, the angry inflamed flesh and the raw unhealed cuts.
“You’ll have to be mighty careful of this, Steve,” he said gravely. “You’ll have to lie up and move as little as you can. I’ll take you along to some place to-night and leave you. I’ve brought a good stock of tucker with me to-day, and I’ll bring more, or get it to you again day by day. But I’ll have to be careful, for now they know you’re in the hills here they’re like to set a keen watch on me. I’m half afraid I was followed to-day, but if I was, it was by as cunning a man as I am, and I couldn’t spot him. We’ll wait now till dark and move you, and I’ll cover the tracks behind us.”
“All right,” said Steve, dully. “I’ll be right enough if I don’t go light-headed, Aleck. That’s what’s scaring me. I sit by the hour sometimes just doing nothing but trying to keep a grip o’ my senses. It’s wearing work, Aleck. Is there any fresh word from the township?”
“Nothing,” said Aleck. “The woman is still lying dazed and not speaking a word. They say she’s not likely to get over it, and may die when her kiddie comes. They think, too, she must have seen her man killed, for Dan says the breath was hardly out of his body when she came shrieking to him.”