For this great log was going down. Slowly, very slowly; but it was going down. Or else Gilbert's eyes and the deepening shadows were playing a strange trick....
He dragged his own foot out of the treacherous ground and looked about for safer support. There was a suction as he dragged his foot up which sent his heart to his mouth. "Quicksand," he muttered, shudderingly.
Was it too late? He backed cautiously out of the jaws of this horrible monster of treachery and awful death, feeling his way with each tentative, cautious step. He stood ankle deep, breathing more easily. He was back at the edge of that oozy, clinging, all devouring trap. He breathed easier.
He looked at the log. It was going down. It stood almost upright now, and offering no resistance with its bulk, was sinking rapidly. In a minute it looked like a stump. It shortened. Gilbert stood motionless and watched it, fascinated. Instinctively he retreated a few feet, to still more solid support. He was standing in ordinary mud now.
Down, down....
A long legged bird came swooping through the dusk across the pond, lit upon the sinking trunk, and then was off again.
"Lucky it has wings," Gilbert said. There was no other way to safety.
Down, down, down—it was just a hubble. The oozy mass sucked it in, closed over it. It was gone.
There was nothing but the dusk and the pond, and the discordant croaking of frogs.
Then, close to where the log had been, Gilbert saw something else. It was a little dab of yellow. It grew smaller; disappeared. There was nothing to be seen now but a little spot of gray; probably some swamp growth ...