"This time," Arnold whispered, "I shall shoot."
"Wait a bit, wait a bit!" O'Hara gently pressed down the muzzle of the gun.
Meanwhile, you must understand, the yelling and hooting had first grown loud and near, then had drawn slowly farther away. It was not easy to let that creature, be it animal or human, come crawling up the hill in the full light of the moon. As the cries died in the distance, the thing moved faster and with less concealment, and I fiercely whispered, "Shoot, Arnold, shoot!"
"Wait," he replied and lifted a restraining hand.
At the moment I could not understand why he did not do as I said; but as the thing came out into open ground, the same thought that had caused the two to hold their fire occurred likewise to me; and now we saw that we were right.
The thing crawling up the hill was a man, and when the man came into the open clearing directly in front of our camp, we saw that it was Matterson.
Without a word, followed closely by O'Hara, who laid his gun on the threshold, I leaped out past Arnold and ran down to Matterson and helped him to his feet and led him groaning up to the hut.
