“Now, to save Will—and myself,” he muttered. “What a capital idea,” he chuckled, as a happy thought struck him. “They think I’m dead, very likely, and so the demon won’t be on the watch for me! Of course; and if I can’t get help, I’ll swoop down on him and do the rescuing myself.”
As fast as he could he went back to the path, thinking to climb the hill and hurry to the road. A lingering fear that the demon might return and look for him lent speed to his feet, and he walked with long swift steps. In his generous heart he resolved to liberate Will at all hazards; and if he could devise no other means of doing so, he would return and “beard the lion in his den.”
When he reached the foot of the hill he chanced to look back, and saw a man standing by the tree. It was the demon, looking for him. To his intense relief, the man turned and went slowly back towards the cave.
“I am safe now,” he thought. “He won’t come to look for me again. But does he think I am dead, or carried off? Well, at any rate he will see me before long!”
Eagerly he turned to climb the hill, thinking meanwhile:—“Poor Will! No telling what that cruel demon may do with him! Oh, dear! we are both in a very bad scrape! O my pistols!—I must hurry!”
What with scrambling up hills and rushing down them, Henry’s limbs were already becoming stiff, and he found it hard work to climb. He succeeded, after making great and desperate struggles, in getting nearly to the top of the hill; when he took a false step, slipped, was thrown off his feet, and—in spite of all his efforts to save himself—slid headlong down to the very bottom. An avalanche of stones and dirt thundered down in his train.
A little mound of earth brought him to a standstill, and a cry of pain escaped his lips.
In spite of the pain he suffered, his first words were characteristic of him. “Well,” he said, grimly, “I’ve blotted out the demons path up that hill! His nice little path is now in ruins in this valley!”
But, with a groan of agony, he ejaculated: “Oh! my foot is broken all to pieces! Oh! O—o—h!”