Struggling on painfully, the party covered nearly twenty miles that day, encamping at nightfall on the north bank of the river. The chief was eager to cross by the ford at once, but Bob was unwilling to risk the dangers of a crossing in the darkness, and without having assured himself that the Russians were not here also. Before it was light he stole down with Sing-Cheng to reconnoitre. There was no sign of the enemy; and at daybreak the whole party started with unutterable gladness to complete, as they hoped, the last stage of their journey.
Before they reached the river one of the Manchu peasants who had been captured, seizing a favourable moment, felled the man in charge of him and scrambled down an almost perpendicular declivity. A dozen shots followed him before Bob could interfere to stop the fusillade. The sound of the shots echoed and re-echoed over the hills; they must be heard by any Russians who happened to be in the neighbourhood, and if heard they would certainly bring the enemy upon the track. For several miles Bob turned at intervals anxiously to look back; there was no sign of pursuit. But, unknown to him, ten minutes after the unfortunate incident a Manchu had galloped up to the spot where the firing had taken place, and there, hidden behind a rock, had watched the disappearing tail of the procession. His fierce eyes lit up as he looked. In a few moments he was galloping back. The Manchu was Chang-Wo.
The cavalcade crossed the river. It was a question of the direction they should take. There were probably Russians between them and the Japanese lines, it would therefore be well for them to strike south-east in order to give the enemy as wide a berth as possible. Bob pointed out that this would probably cause the loss of a day; but Kobo replied that he would rather lose one day, or even two, than run the risk of his information never reaching General Kuroki. Bob noticed that the safety of himself or of the party never entered into Kobo's calculations. With him it was merely a weighing of advantages, with the sole consideration how best his news might be delivered.
On the south side of the Yalu the fugitives saw on all hands traces of the Russian occupation. Almost every village had been sacked and burned; the country was for the most part deserted; the few Koreans who were seen wandering in disconsolate helplessness about the sites of their ruined homes scuttled away in terror when Bob's cavalcade approached. They were evidently afraid lest the party should be a band of raiders come to capture and destroy the little that the Russians had left.
No precaution was neglected to save the party from coming upon the enemy unawares. Pickets and supports were thrown out in front and rear, and the pace was regulated by the careful reconnoitring of the advance guard. The march continued for six or seven hours, and then was interrupted by a short halt to rest and feed the horses. About one o'clock, shortly after they had started again, one of the men in advance galloped back with the news that he had seen a force of Cossacks crossing the line of march from east to west about a mile ahead. Word was at once given to halt again, in order to allow this body time to pass out of sight. Bob, accompanied by Sing-Cheng and Ah-Sam, went forward, and, taking his stand behind a rock so that he could not be seen, looked out, and saw the troop of horsemen, plainly Cossacks by their yellow facings, winding among the hills, apparently striking across from Chen-seng, as the chief explained, higher up the river, to Wiju. In a quarter of an hour they would have disappeared, and it would be safe for the fugitives to continue their advance.
Bob was just returning with this good news to his party, when he was met by a messenger hastening to tell him that a large force of cavalry had been seen coming up behind, and were at the present moment no more than two miles away. He put his horse to a gallop, debating within himself, as he rode, what to do in face of this new emergency. For a moment he felt oppressed by a sense of despair. The events of the past fortnight had put a great strain upon him, and the present dilemma, coming at a time when he had hoped that all was safe, was almost overmastering. But collecting his thoughts he tried to look the situation squarely in the face. If he pressed on, he ran the risk of bringing upon him the Cossacks whom he had just seen out of harm's way. If he hesitated, he must assuredly be overtaken by the cavalry behind, which in all likelihood would turn out to be Chang-Wo's band. There was danger either way. He had not made up his mind how to choose between the two alternatives when he reached the rest of his party.
"What are we to do, sir?" he asked Kobo, after telling him of the direction in which the Cossacks had disappeared.
"I advise an immediate advance," replied the Japanese, whose serenity always had a bracing effect upon Bob. "If the Cossacks see us, they may mistake us for Manchu allies of theirs. We shall at any rate be a mile and a half farther on our way before they discover us; while if we wait and allow the horsemen behind to overtake us there is bound to be firing, the shots will bring the Cossacks down upon us, and we shall be hemmed in between the two bands. In any case we must make up our minds that both parties may chase us, but the Cossacks at any rate will not carry the pursuit far, knowing as they must do that our army cannot be far away."
The soundness of Kobo's advice was self-evident. The word was at once given, the little party set off at a trot, and in a few minutes had crossed the path of the Cossacks, easily discovered by the trampled slush. Some time elapsed before they came in sight of the rear files of the departing enemy. These had their backs to them, and the horses' hoofs making little sound in the soft earth, the Cossacks rode on in ignorance of the riders behind them. It was soon clear that no immediate danger need be feared ahead. If Bob's party could elude the horsemen in their rear they might yet make good their escape. Every step increased their distance from the Cossacks, whose course they had cut at right angles. As soon as it appeared that there was no risk of being heard, Bob gave the order to gallop, in the hope that if they had not already been sighted by the riders behind, they might either escape their notice altogether or gain a sufficient lead to make pursuit vain.
But it was soon evident that the pursuit had already begun. Riding in the rear of his party, Bob looked back at a point that promised a good view of the country, and saw that the horsemen were urging their steeds at a pace much more rapid than the horses of his own party were capable of. Half an hour later he judged that they were only a mile away; in another half-hour they might overtake him. Already some of his party were beginning to drop behind; he knew what their fate must be if they were overtaken by the enemy, and he rode up beside Kobo to consult him.