“Whist! What is that beyant there? Is it a house, I dunno, or is it somebody carrying a light?”
At almost the same moment Ben had perceived the dim spark through the falling snow.
“It is moving,” said he, “and that shows that it is a light that is being carried.” They paused for a time and watched the spark.
“It is slowly growing brighter,” commented Ben, “and that proves that it is coming toward us.”
A little more observation showed that the light must be upon the road.
“Many’s the time I’ve seen the lights coming on that way on the night before market day at Ballysampson,” said Paddy Burk. “They’d move a weeny bit this way, and a small bit that way, according to the turns in the road, and all the time they’d be a-blinking like a one-eyed dragon out of a fairy book.”
Ben, with a sharp intaking of the breath, drew out his pistols. The other perceived the action in the dim light thrown up by the snow.
“Ah, ha,” said he, “and so here is where the ruction starts. Well,” with a brisk whirl of his cudgel, “the sooner the better, for a trifle of exercise would warm me, so it would.”
“The first point I must warn you on is to keep silence,” said Ben, one hand uplifted. “A wagon or carriage is expected at any time, bearing matters of moment for the American camp. I have reason to think that it is to be stopped near here.”
“And you think,” said Paddy Burk, in a whisper, “that this, with the light, may be the carriage?”