"It's only a joke, me leddy; I wouldn't hit the spalpeen, to save his neck."
In the course of an hour or so, it began to grow dark, and the fugitives impatiently awaited the time when they could move from their hiding-place. With the exception of the Indian mentioned, they saw nothing of their enemies, although they occasionally heard a whoop or halloo in the woods from them.
The sky, which, up to noon had been clear and propitious, had become, since then, darkened and overcast, and gave every sign of a coming storm. Black, threatening clouds were sweeping tumultuously across the heavens, and piling up in huge masses in the far-off horizon, where they towered like the walls of some old unbattled castle, around whose ramparts the serpentine lightning quivered like streams of blood. Faint murmurings of thunder were constantly borne upon the air, and the roaring of the wind in the forest sounded like the distant ocean.
The darkness came on earlier than usual, thus hastened by the marshaling of the storm-king's forces, and the three fugitives stole from the bushes, and commenced their journey toward the settlement.
The progress of the whites was necessarily slow, from the caution exercised. For a considerable distance Waring led the way, when he yielded to the earnest solicitation of Pat Mulroony, and allowed him to take the advance, while he fell behind, and joined Virginia.
"Keep up courage," he whispered to her. "We will soon be where we shall have fewer obstacles to oppose us."
"I am not tired," she replied. "Do not feel any anxiety upon my account."
The darkness had increased rapidly, and the whites began to take less care as they moved along. Quite a strong wind came up the river, and now and then, the flashes of lightning were vivid enough to reveal the shore and stream to them, so that they were guided in a great measure by this means.
Waring was moving along, holding the hand of Virginia in his own, when he suddenly encountered the Irishman, who had stopped walking. He was about to demand the meaning of his acting thus, when he turned his head, and whispered—
"Whist! I saan something then."