The faces of the ten tramps could not turn white, but they did show an ashen fear under their eyes—a deadly fear of the two men for whom any one of them would have been more than a match, but who represented the world from which they were outcasts, the world of Home, of whose most precious sweetness they had stolen an hour's enjoyment—the world so strong and terrible to avenge a wrong to its best beloved.
Then the silence was broken by the voice of the child, wailing piteously:
"I don't want to be tooken away from the raggedty gentlemen!"
Dirck still looked suspicious as he took the weeping child, but Halford smiled grimly, thoughtfully and sadly, as he put his hand in his pocket and said: "I guess it's all right, boys, but I think you'd better get away for the present. Take this and get over the river and out of the county. The people have been searching for this baby all day, and I don't know whether they'll listen to my friend and me."
The level red light had left the valleys and low places, and lit alone the hilltop where the mother was watching, when a great shout came out of the darkness, spreading from voice to voice through the great expanse below, and echoed wildly from above, thrilling men's blood and making hearts stand still; and as it rose and swelled and grew toward her out of the darkness, the mother knew that her lost child was found.