Wondering, Mollie obeyed and then suddenly she too was sitting upright, her body rigid. For once again came that shuffling sound like a heavy body stealthily encircling the tent.
CHAPTER XV
A SHADOWY BULK
Regardless of Grace’s detaining hand, Mollie sprang to her feet. She crept to the flap opening, then, flinging it wide, sprang into the open. Grace, more afraid of being left alone in the tent than anything else, followed.
The night was intensely black. The rain had chased away the moon and stars and the sky was covered with lowering clouds. The chill of the descending rain made Mollie shiver convulsively.
There it came, that stealthy dragging sound. It was at the corner of the tent and Mollie crouched back against the canvas, hoping that the intruder, whatever it was, might take her for part of the shadows.
But as she stepped back a twig cracked betrayingly beneath her foot and at the corner of the tent a black shape detached itself from the blacker shadows, stood upright for a moment, staring in her direction. Mollie was quite sure her heart stood still. She gasped and felt as though she were strangling while her eyes remained irresistibly fixed on the thing at the corner of the tent.
She heard a gasp behind her and knew that Grace also had seen.
Suddenly the shape turned and moved off into the deeper shadows of the woods. It made no pretense of hiding its movements, but crashed noisily through the underbrush.
As though rooted to the spot Mollie and Grace remained motionless until the last sound of their enemy’s retreat died in the distance.