“Mistake?” she whispered.
“Yes,” he exclaimed. “But I will tell you all about it, everything, when I have got you to a place of safety, when we have reached Three Star. Tell me what has happened to you. I only reached the camp just before you were carried away, just in time to join in the search for you.”
Esmeralda pushed the hair from her brow with a weary, almost bewildered gesture.
“It all seems like a dream, a horrible dream,” she said; and slowly and with many breaks she gave him an account of her capture, detention in the hut, and escape.
Norman regarded her with wondering admiration.
“Is there any woman in the world so brave as you are, Esmeralda?” he exclaimed. “And you, a slip of a girl—I beg your pardon, dear—managed to get away from a ruffian like that, with a woman to help him! But that was hours ago. Why did you not ride straight to the camp?”
Esmeralda shook her head.
“It would not have been safe,” she said. “They would guess that I should do that, and would have followed and overtaken me. As it was, Simon came back and followed on my track, and I had to break it short by taking the horse up the stream and going into the wood. I lay hid there for hours; twice he passed me almost close, and it was not until I saw him ride back across the hill that I dared venture to make for the camp. Then I lost my way, and have been wandering about for—oh, I do not know how long. Perhaps I must have got in the direction of the hut again, and no doubt that was Simon we heard cry out just now.”
“Then why did he not follow, or fire on us?” said Norman.
“I don’t know,” she said, wearily. “He may have been afraid, seeing you.”