“Well?” demanded Conacher excitedly.
“They are inside my father’s house,” said Loseis desperately.
“Impossible!” he cried in dismay.
“Yes! They are doing the same as us. Shooting through chinks between the logs.”
“How could they have got in? There are no windows in the back.”
“Who knows? Dug underneath the wall, maybe.”
For the first time Conacher showed discouragement. “Oh, God!” he groaned. “By night or day they’ve got us covered!”
CHAPTER XXI
A LEAP FOR FREEDOM
On the third morning following, Loseis and Conacher were seated at a little table in the kitchen of the Women’s House, with a scarcely touched meal between them. In the inner room Mary-Lou was lying on a mattress with her face turned towards the wall, asleep—or despairing. In the kitchen all was in apple pie order; a fire burning on the well-swept hearth with a small pot of water bubbling upon it; the shutter of the little window flung back, and the sunshine streaming in; outside all green and peaceful to the eye. There was nothing to indicate the horror of the situation but the faces of the two at the table. Those gaunt and gray young faces, deeply seamed and sunken eyed, told a tale of seventy-two hours’ horror. Neither had had more than a snatch or two of broken sleep. Three endless nights and days and no hope of relief. It was the absence of hope which had aged them.
Conacher rested his cheek in his palm, and gloomily traced imaginary lines on the oilcloth cover with his fork. Loseis’ eyes, which looked truly enormous now, were fixed on the young man’s face, all tenderness.