The sounds ceased and began again more loudly, and at last they seemed to be coming nearer, but passing him by—somewhere about a hundred yards away.
The sounds ceased—began again—ceased—then sounded more loudly; and at last, with palpitating heart, Dick began to move in the direction of the noise, for he realised that either there was open water or a canal-like passage across the bog, which someone was passing through in a boat.
Dick paused again to listen, but there could be no mistake, the sounds were too familiar, and with voice husky with excitement he put his hand to his mouth and uttered a loud hail.
Chapter Twenty Six.
A Startling Scene.
To Dick Winthorpe’s great surprise there was no answer to his cry, and raising his voice again he shouted: “Who’s that? Help!”
His voice sounded wild and strange to him out there in that waste, closed in as he was by the darkness, and as he listened he could not repress a shudder, for everything now had become so silent that it was terrible. Away to his left there was the faint glow of light—very faint now—but everywhere else darkness, and all around him now a dead silence. His cry had seemed to alarm every moving creature in the fen, and it had crouched down, or dived, or in some way hidden itself, so that there was neither rustle of body passing through the reeds, splash of foot in the mire, nor beat of pinion in the air. He looked around him half in awe for the strange lights which he had seen gliding here and there like moths of lambent fire, but they too had disappeared, and startling as had been the noise he had heard, the silence seemed now so terrible that he turned cold.
“What a coward I am!” he said to himself at last. “What is there to be afraid about?”