"It is higher than I've ever seen it. But it's reached its peak and has started to fall, and it won't come up again, at least, till fall. When the Yuga rises it comes up in a flood, and it falls the same way. It's gone down quite a little since this morning; by the day after to-morrow no one could hope to get through Devil's Gate—the first cataract in the gorge."
"Not even with a canoe? Of course a raft would be broken to pieces."
"Not a canoe, either, in two or three days, if the river falls like it usually does. But tell me—you aren't serious—"
"I suppose not. But it gets my imagination—just the same. I suppose a man would average better than twenty miles an hour down through that gorge, and would come out at Back There."
Their talk moved easily to other subjects; yet it seemed to Ben that some secondary consciousness held up his end of the conversation. His own deeper self was lost in curious and dark conjectures. Her description of the river lingered in his thoughts, and he seemed to be groping for a great inspiration that was hovering just beyond his reach—as plants grope for light in far-off leafy jungles. He felt that it would come to him in a moment: he would know the dark relation that these facts about the river bore to his war with Neilson. It was as if an inner mind, much more subtle and discerning than his normal consciousness, had seen great possibilities in them, but as yet had not divulged their significance.
"I must be going now," the girl was saying. "Father pretty near goes crazy when I stay away too long. You can't imagine how he loves me and worries about me—and how fearful he is of me—"
His mind seemed to leap and gather her words. It was true: she was the joy and the pride and the hope of the old man's life. All his work, his dreams were for her. And now he remembered a fact that she had told him on the outward journey: that Ray Brent, the stronger of Neilson's two subordinates, loved her too.
"To strike at them indirectly—through some one they love—" such had been his greatest wish. To put them at a disadvantage and overcome his own—to lead them into his own ambushes. And was it for the Wolf to care what guiltless creatures fell before his fangs in the gaining of his dreadful ends? Was the gratification of his hate to be turned aside through pity for an innocent girl? Mercy and remorse were two things that he had put from him. It was the way of the Wolf to pay no attention to methods, only to achieve his own fierce desires. He stood lost in dark and savage reverie.
"Good-by," the girl was saying. "I'll see you soon—"
He turned toward her, a smile at his lips. His voice held steady when he spoke.