“I’m going to roll up and sleep at the top of the rise behind a rose bush,” said Conacher grinning. “If they send out a search party they may be expected to appear in about two hours.”
“You are always talking about their searching for us,” said Loseis. “If Gault thinks we are dead he will not look for us. If he thinks we are not dead, we are certain to be caught in these empty spaces. Why worry?”
“There is a third alternative,” said Conacher. “Gault thinks we are dead, but he cannot afford to take any chances. It seems to me he will send out a party to scour the prairie just as a precaution. It is up to us to keep out of their way until they are satisfied. It won’t be as bad as if they knew we were here.”
Loseis wished to be allowed to watch from the top of the rise, but Conacher carried his point.
From behind the clump of roses that he had marked on the way over, Conacher was able to survey an expanse of country that faded into gray mist on the horizon. He slept for awhile as he had promised. It was about nine o’clock by the sun, when he perceived the first horseman, no more than a black dot far to the eastward; but a significantly shaped dot. Presently he made out another, and another at wide intervals. The nearest was about four miles distant.
Racing back down the rise, he called to Loseis. When she answered, he said: “Dress as quickly as possible. We must move on.”
When she appeared from among the trees, he explained what he had seen. “Unless I miss my guess,” he said, “they will divide and ride around the high ground surrounding the slough until they meet again. That would bring us right in their line of march. We must get over another rise. You can see that they are combing the country as they come. What we ought to do is to work around behind them.”
Hand in hand like a pair of children they headed south, bent almost double as they climbed the rises, and racing free down the other side. When they had put a couple of heights between them and the slough, they began to work around towards the east. The prairie is not such a desperate place for fugitives as it might seem. It is true that from the high places you can see for many miles around: but there are always hollows into which you cannot see until you are upon them. At a glance it seems as if the bubbles of earth had been pushed up in meaningless disorder; but such is not the case. Nature sees to it that the country is drained. Every hollow opens into another. Conacher had the mapmaker’s instinct for the contour of land, and he was never in doubt as to their proper course. At the same time while they were hidden from their enemies their enemies were hidden from them. It caused the heart to rise in the throat to imagine a horseman suddenly appearing over the grass close by.
After an hour’s walking and running, they came upon a good-sized patch of rose scrub folded into the side of a rise. Conacher stopped to survey it.
“A perfect hiding-place if you lay flat on the ground,” he said; “yet no one would suppose it. Come on, let’s tackle the thorns.”