After quite a lapse of time Rip moved slightly and Westy immediately leaned forward.
“Westy?” Rip’s voice had a strange sound.
“Yes? What is it?”
“I’ve just got to have some more of that water!”
“Rip, old kid, I’d gladly go and get it, but there isn’t a thing to carry it in and I dare say I’d never find even a pool in this darkness.”
“Never thought of that, Wes! ’S all right——”
His voice trailed away drowsily and the next moment his steady breathing was resumed.
“Just dreaming, I guess,” Westy said.
And so he sat on until he thought that night was a thing made up of terrifying silence; an abyss of blackness wherein the hours hid and disported playfully about, instead of going quickly by as all good daytime hours did. The hours of that night simply plunged Westy into the very depths of despair.
“Ah, but the tracks!” He had forgotten them for the moment. Dawn would bring them something at that, so he must not give up.