“Somewhere up the valley that runs beside here, sir; and that’s where Miss Katie must have been taken, if they’ve not killed her, for there’s been shooting ever since.”
“Did you not see who snatched her away?”
“No, sir, no; it was all in the night-time, when she was clinging tightly to me, and I was struck down at the same moment.”
“Let us descend from here, my child,” he said; “for there are friends below in the valley, seeking for us.”
He turned to lead his new companion away, but she suddenly exclaimed, “They’re coming again! O, sir, save me—save me!”—and she clung to Mr Meadows, who heard far down below him the rustling and snapping of the trees, as if several people were forcing their way through them. “That’s the way they went,” sobbed the woman; “and they’re coming again.”
Mr Meadows had no doubt as to the truth of what she said; and glancing round, he tried to make out the part of the rocky wall around by which he had descended, but for a while his efforts were fruitless; and he could not leave the woman to search for his path, since at the least effort to unclasp her hands, she clung to him the tighter, imploring him in whispers not to leave her—not to go away.
“No, no; we will go together. Quick! the wretches are upon us, and we shall be taken. Heaven give me strength! What shall I do?”
His tones were anguished, for the crashing through the leaves seemed now to be close at hand; while, as he spoke, the woman fell from him, quite inanimate.
“Must I leave her?” he murmured to himself; and then he stooped and tried to lift her, but it was beyond his strength, and in his despair it seemed to him that he must be already seen. An hour sooner, he would not have cared so much; but, with the information he had gained and the care of this poor creature upon his hands, he felt that he would give anything to escape; for might not this snatching away of Katie mean an act of daring performed by Murray or the savage, and the shots fired, a conflict still going on between them?
The leaves and boughs crashed together, and whoever they were, either friends or foes, were coming ever nearer and nearer.