It was far more nerve racking than it had been when he crawled in. Then he did not have much fear of any one being there. Now he knew that some one had been there and was not at all certain that he had left. His progress was painfully slow. He listened after every step. He remembered where he had been hiding a minute before and glanced nervously at the wall of rhododendron on either side. He was almost tempted to run the rest of the way and have it over with.
It was well that he did not act on that impulse. A few feet more brought him in sight of the outer end of the tunnel, and there was Foster sitting in the entrance with his long rifle across his lap and his eyes glued on the mountain trail.
Noiselessly Scott backed out of sight and beat a cautious but rapid retreat. He made his way back to Hopwood in the rhododendron and told him what he had seen. “Looks as though he was posted there for the night,” Scott growled.
“He probably is,” Hopwood replied quietly. “I reckon it’s up to us to get out through the rhododendron.”
That possibility had entirely slipped Scott’s mind. It had never occurred to him that you could go through that rhododendron. He had been too fascinated by the tunnel and that mumbling man at the end of it with a long rifle.
“Then let’s go,” he said.
Hopwood glanced about him to get his bearings and glided through the dense brush like a snake, and as silently. Scott was put to it to keep up with him, and try as he would he could not move as silently. It was slow going at the best, for the course Hopwood had chosen led them down into a draw and up on to the next ridge.
They had almost reached the edge of the rhododendron when they stumbled on to a covey of ruffed grouse. The frightened birds went up with a tremendous rush and crashed through the brush out into the open.
“It is a good thing we did not strike them down by the clearing,” Hopwood whispered. “We would have had Foster on us in an instant. Here we are safe because he can’t very well follow us fast enough through there to do him any good.”
They came out of the brush on to the open ridge and it seemed almost like coming out of a cave. Scott climbed up on a point of rock to get his bearings.