CHAPTER XV
THE ELEVENTH HOUR
Some little time after Elizabeth had left her, Mary fancied that she caught a faint cry. She shouted to her sister, who was out of sight, but whose voice she heard calling at intervals. The feeble sound seemed to have come from a patch of woodland not a great distance from the track which Elizabeth had taken. But as the wind was blowing from that quarter, Mary realized that although she could hear Elizabeth it was probably impossible for Elizabeth to hear her. She felt very tired after her long walk, and doubted whether she could go far without her sister's sustaining arm; but the thought that Elizabeth might wander out of reach while Tommy was in danger near at hand gave her an artificial strength. She rose from the ground and tottered in the direction from which the cry had appeared to come. Every now and then she stopped, listening for a repetition of the sound; but she heard nothing except the rustle of the wind and Elizabeth's shouts, growing fainter and fainter in the distance.
In a few moments she had passed beyond the orange grove, and felt that she was in danger of losing her way. Even Elizabeth's voice soon ceased to guide her. She stumbled along, shouting every few steps, with no other result than to disturb the birds in the trees. Becoming alarmed at the possibility of being lost and her strength failing, she was on the point of trying to find her way back, and gave one last call, when she was electrified by hearing a strange hoarse sound apparently coming from some distance to the left. It was little like a human voice; yet it was not the cry of a bird, and Mary hurried with uneven steps towards it.
The ground rose steeply, leading up to the ridge far to the left. But with the new strength lent by excitement Mary was not conscious of the slope. She came to a number of straggling bushes edged by an irregular circle of small trees. Here she looked eagerly around her, peering through the bushes and between the trunks of the trees, listening for that strange cry to be repeated.
There was no sound, but as her eyes travelled over the circuit she noticed what seemed to be a small landslip in the bank. Following this downward, her glance discovered a hole in the ground several feet wide. Moved by a sudden impulse, and the instinctive feeling that here was the explanation of Tommy's disappearance, she stumbled forward, hardly conscious of her trembling limbs. Throwing herself flat on the ground at the edge of the hole, she gazed into the pit beneath. It was some moments before her eyes became used to the half-light; but then she saw something white; she distinguished it as part of an object huddled on the ground immediately beneath the opening; and she knew that Tommy was found.
But an agonizing fear seized her. Was Tommy dead? She called down in a low voice. There was no answer. She called again and still again, her tones growing louder as she became more alarmed. At length, after what seemed an age of suspense, her strained gaze noticed a slight movement in the figure below, and a faint whisper came up to her. "Thank God!" her heart cried out, and she eagerly called to Tommy, saying that she would soon be safe. But Tommy made no reply; she had relapsed into unconsciousness.
Mary was at her wits' end what to do. It was clear that Tommy was helpless. A pang shot through Mary's heart as she remembered that the girl had been without food for two days and two nights. The hole was so deep that even if Tommy had been conscious Mary could not have helped her, at the utmost stretch of her arms, to get out. Elizabeth was beyond hearing: she might return to the orange grove: what would she do if she found Mary missing? Mary dared not leave the neighbourhood of the pit now that Tommy was found: but she wanted to run after Elizabeth and bring her to the spot.
While she was still undecided she heard Elizabeth's voice in the far distance. She shouted in reply, though she still felt that against the wind her voice could not be heard. But in a few moments she was gladdened to know from the growing loudness of the shouts that Elizabeth was returning. There was a chance that as she drew nearer she would hear a shrill call, so Mary every few moments formed a trumpet with her hands, and let forth a prolonged "Cooee!" Presently she knew by the tone of Elizabeth's call that her voice had been heard; but, so confusing are sounds amid woods and thickets, it was a long time before Elizabeth discovered where she was, and came hurrying through the trees.
"Have you found her?" she asked eagerly.