“We have plenty of food,” he said, “and the water is still holding out; but what is the use of it all? To be trapped like this would break anybody’s nerve; knowing night and day that the guns were covering you. If we stay here they’re certain to get us in the end. Time is passing. If we give them no opportunity to pick us off, they’ll drive us out of our shelter. They have only to build a fire against the back wall of this house . . .”
“Oh, Heaven!” murmured Loseis.
“I don’t want to frighten you unnecessarily,” he said, stroking back her hair; “but we’ve got to face the worst. I’ve been looking for it to happen every night. That’s why I couldn’t sleep. How simple for Gault to shoot us down as we ran out, and throw our bodies back on the fire . . . I say we must make a break for it, while we are able to choose our own time.”
“But where could we go?” faltered Loseis.
“I’ve been thinking about that. God knows, I have had plenty of time! The three obvious ways out are closed to us, but there is a fourth way . . .”
“Where?”
“Across the river and over the prairie to the north or northwest.”
“But that is the unknown country!” said Loseis with widening eyes. “No white man has ever been across there!”
“True,” said Conacher; “but after all it’s just a country like any other. And I’m accustomed to making my own way.”
“Nobody knows what is on the other side!”