Taras did not interfere, but looked for Nashko, who once more kept aloof with his own saddened thoughts.
"What is the time?" he inquired.
The Jew was the only one of all these men who possessed a watch, and only Taras and Sophron, besides himself, understood the art of telling the hour by such means.
"Eleven. Are you beginning to be anxious?"
"No! What should have happened? But hark! listen!"
"I hear nothing."
"But I do.... Hark!" and Taras turned to the merrymakers with an imperious "Silence!" They stood still like statues, and the bagpipe ceased wailing.
They could all hear it now--a peculiar, whirring sound, not unlike that of an arrow cutting the air. It came from afar, through the stillness of the night. "It is Julko signalling," the men cried, delightedly; and Taras, taking his own whistle, signalled back. A moment's silence, and again the sound reached them--longdrawn, and thrice repeated.
"You understand its meaning," said Taras to his men. "They have missed the track in the dark. Away with you, Stas and Jemilian; take torches and go to meet them, and keep signalling as you go." The two obeyed, while the rest of the men, at his word, took their places by their horses.
But the minutes passed, and nothing was heard save the signalling and counter-signalling in the wood, till at last the sounds seemed blending, and presently the sign was given that the seekers and the sought had met. Ere long their voices could be distinguished, together with the tramping of their steeds.