Horrid as were these suspicions, I could not help having them; and the thought that they were true gradually becoming a conviction, kept me quiet in the tree.
CHAPTER XX.
A SPELL OF PADDLING.
I remained silent on the limb of the cypress. Even the irksomeness of my seat did not tempt me to descend.
I was now sensible of being in a position of real peril. The men were murderers—all four of them—and one more crime would be lightly added to their last. Taking my life would be a step necessary for their own safety, and I knew that if discovered I might expect but a short shrift of it. It needed nothing more to secure my silence.
I did not design remaining there forever, only until night. Then I should descend, make my way to the dug-out, which I hoped to find in its place, and, favored by this and the darkness, slip silently out of the lagoon into the open river. This was the plan traced out.
As nothing could be done before night, I summoned all my patience to await it. And all of it was called into play. Never in my life do I remember having spent what appeared a longer day. I thought it would have no end—that the sun was never to set. It was still early when I arrived at the foot of the cypress, for I had started by the first light to go toward the lagoon.
The time at first did not hang so heavily on my hands. I was furnished with a sort of melancholy entertainment in watching the movements of the three ruffians upon the flat. I still tried to catch their conversation, though it was no longer needed to elucidate the transaction in which they were engaged.
In this I was unsuccessful as ever. Though at times talking with apparent earnestness, they kept to a low key, as if themselves fearful of being overheard. No wonder they should, considering the work in which they were engaged.