Jack whipped off his Norfolk tunic and folded it about his head, leaving himself a peep-hole to watch the guide. He did as he saw them do. He dropped to the ground, wriggled under the net, then sprang to his feet and hurried beside his father, following Me Dain, who led the way back to the patch of reeds whence he had crept. Skirting the reeds he raced at full speed along the edge of the swamp, keeping at the foot of the slope which ran down to the marsh, but heading away from the spot where Saya Chone and his attendant Kachins were posted.
The torture of that journey through the swamp was a thing which Jack never forgot. The mosquitoes worked their way into every crevice of the tunic he had folded about his head. They crept into his hair, down his neck, and swarmed over his face through the breathing hole he was compelled to leave open in front of it. The pain of their sting was such that he had to set his teeth to keep back a growl of malediction upon their evil fangs. Every venomous little wretch seemed to carry a red-hot needle which it thrust joyfully into the soft flesh wherever it happened to alight.
At last, after three hundred yards of silent scurry through this pestilential tract, they struck hard ground, and went at full speed up the hill-side for open country and purer air. Still following Me Dain, who pushed on as fast as he could go, Jack and his father plunged into a bamboo groove, and followed a narrow path. This brought them in a few minutes to a small clearing, where the Burman paused, and all were glad of an opportunity to draw breath, and knock off the mosquitoes which still clung to them.
Jack sprang forward and seized the guide by the hand.
"Me Dain," he cried, "wherever have you sprung from to lend us a hand in this fashion, just in the nick of time?"
"Ay, ay," said Mr. Haydon, "just at the moment of our hardest trial and greatest danger. Me Dain, old fellow, we are enormously indebted to you."
Father and son shook hands with the Burman and thanked him over and over again, and Me Dain grinned all over his broad, pleasant face.
"Better get on," he said, "Saya Chone not far away yet."
These words recalled the fugitives to a sense of the great danger in which they stood as long as U Saw's valley still held them, and they hastened to follow Me Dain, who was now walking briskly forward. Twenty minutes of swift and silent progress brought them to a native hut in a little clearing.
"Here you must stay for a time," said the Burman.