No sound came from the direction of the bay, and it occurred to Dory that the marauders might have continued their retreat by the road. He was startled at the thought, and he jumped down from the fence.
CHAPTER VI.
A VICTIM OF STRATEGY.
Almost at the same moment, it came to the active mind of Dory Dornwood that the burglars might have gone to the bay, and embarked in a boat. They were as likely to do this as they were to take to the road. He had heard nothing since the sound of the voice startled him, and the villains might be two or three miles from him by this time. It would not be pleasant for him, at the breakfast-table the next morning, to relate that he had got on the track of the robbers, and then entirely lost the clew to them.
The thought of such a state of things annoyed him; and he decided that he should rather be shot, or at least be shot at, than subject himself to this degree of humiliation. But it was best to be prudent, even after he had decided to be shot at rather than be inactive any longer; and he walked some distance beyond the cart-path, to the northward.
He was intent upon settling the first problem,--whether or not the burglars had retreated by the road during his absence in the other direction. He lighted a match; but his examination of the roadway revealed no prints of human feet, and even those of horses had been obliterated by the heavy rain. He investigated several points of the road, and looked carefully on each side of the driveway, without finding a mark.
Returning to the junction of the roads, he made new calculations of the probable action of the marauders. He was reasonably confident, that, as they had not taken to the road, they were still in the woods. They must be strangers to the locality, and were not likely to attempt to find their way through the woods in the intense darkness which prevailed under the trees. Possibly they were waiting, like himself, for the daylight.
Dory did not believe they could get away unless they took to the lake, or departed by the road, at least until it was light enough for them to pick their way through the woods. He was covering the road, and he believed that he had got the matter down fine enough to leave them only the lake as an avenue of escape.
The wind was now blowing a violent gale; and even the most experienced boatman in those waters would not think of going out in a small boat, unless it was to save life. Kingsland Bay was fully sheltered, for it was not more than half a mile wide at its greatest breadth. They could not get out into the lake while the present tempest raged; and if they tried to get away in any other direction, they must aim for the road, for the Little Beaver River cut off their retreat between the highway and the lake.
Dory's head had been very level so far; and when he stated his theory in detail to his uncle, the principal, he fully approved his logic. He resumed his seat on the fence. He had hardly done so before he caught a faint gleam of light in the woods in the direction of the lake. A moment later he discovered a more decided appearance of a light. The villains were getting reckless, he thought; and possibly they concluded that the pursuers had abandoned the chase, as they saw no more of them.
Encouraged by these appearances, Dory continued to wait. At the end of half an hour he was astonished to see a light in the road, not twenty rods from him, and in the direction of Beech Hill. At first he concluded that it was the lantern from the school, and that some one or a party had started to find him.