Nick was convinced that there were few such natural springs in that section of Texas, though similar ones are found in plenty further east and among some of the mountainous portions.
The horses having had their fill, stepped back, and Nick began his preparations for spending the night. Everything was taken from the backs and heads of the animals and placed in a pile on the ground near at hand, while they were left to crop the grass, which was green and quite luxuriant in the vicinity of the stream.
By the time everything was complete, darkness had come. The animals were not tethered, for there was little to be feared of their running away, unless interfered with by outsiders, of which no one dreamed.
Nick now began to look for the coming of Herbert. Both paths were so easily travelled that he ought to appear in the course of twenty minutes, and a full half hour had gone by.
“I wonder whether anything could have happened to him,” said Nick, gazing down the trail in the gathering gloom, and feeling a renewal of the fears that troubled him so much in the afternoon.
He once more whistled with the power of a steam engine, and paused for the response. It was impossible, as he had learned long before, that Herbert should have made his way on horseback across the space separating the trails, and he, therefore, gave his attention to the route over which he himself had just travelled.
Nothing was to be seen of his friend, and the suspicion came to Nick that possibly he was pouting because of his mistake, but the thought was dismissed the next minute as unworthy of Herbert, who, if disposed in that direction, was in no mood to do so at the present time.
“But where can he be?” repeated Nick, recalling the preceding winter, when he went astray in the pursuit of the second moose and caused himself and Pierre Ardeau no end of worriment of mind. As the darkness increased, Nick Ribsam became aware of another discomforting fact. The wind was beginning to blow, and the cold was rapidly increasing. The norther prophesied by the Texans was at hand.
This being evident, he quickly prepared for it. He had gathered a quantity of limbs and twigs, but they were unlighted, he intending to await the arrival of his friend Herbert; but he now started the fire as quickly as possible, for, aside from its needed warmth, it would do much to dispel the gloom oppressing him.
Few who have not experienced a Texan norther can understand their fierce suddenness. I was once riding in a stage in the southern part of the State, the day was mild and balmy, and a middle-aged gentleman from New York sat in the seat with me. His overcoat was in his trunk, which was strapped at the rear of the stage. We were talking, when all at once a norther came howling across the country. My friend shouted to the driver to unstrap his trunk, so as to allow him to unlock it. The driver promptly obeyed, the gentleman leaping out of the vehicle, hastily unfastening his luggage, and bringing out the extra garment. Only a few minutes were occupied, and yet his teeth were chattering and he was shivering and blue with cold while hurriedly donning his greatcoat.