But this episode, instead of appeasing the executioners, has only roused them, as tigers who have tasted blood hindered from banqueting on flesh.
They quite comprehend the position in which the norther has placed them. On the way Hamersley and Wilder, most discomforted of all, have made them aware of it. The swollen stream will prevent egress from the valley till it subsides.
There is no outlet save above and below, and both these are now effectually closed, shutting them up as in a strong-walled prison. On each side the precipice is unscalable. Even if men might ascend, horses could not be taken along; and on such a chase it would be hopeless for them to set out afoot.
But men could not go up the cliff.
“A cat kedn’t climb it,” says Walt, who during his sojourn in the valley has explored every inch of it. “We’ve got to stay hyar till the flood falls. I reckon no one kin be sorrier to say so than this chile. But thar’s no help for ’t.”
“Till the flood falls? When will that be?”
No one can answer this, not even Wilder himself. And with clouded brows, sullen, dispirited, they return to the jacal.
Two days they stay there, chafing with angry impatience. In their anger they are ready for the most perilous enterprise. But, although bitterly cursing the sinister chance that hinders pursuit, deeming each hour a day, they can do nought save wait till the swollen stream subsides.
They watch it with eager solicitude, constantly going to the bank to examine it, as the captain of a ship consults his weather-glass to take steps for the safety of his vessel. All the time one or another is riding to, or returning from, the head of the valley, to bring back report of how the subsidence progresses.
And long ere the stream has returned to its regular channel, they plunge their horses into it, breasting a current that almost sweeps them off their feet. But the Texan horses are strong, as their riders are skilful; the obstacle is surmounted, and the Rangers at length escape from their prolonged and irksome imprisonment.