“Then there are strange, slow-flowing creeks in the perpetual shadows of tamarack woods, where many a man has gone in never to come out.”
“Why?” asked Tressa.
“Under the tender carpet of green cresses are shining black bogs set with tussock; and under the bog stretches quicksand,—and death.”
“Do you know these places?” asked Cleves.
“No.”
Cleves stepped forward to Tressa’s side.
“Keep flashing the ground,” he said harshly. “I don’t want you to step into some hell-hole. I’m sorry I brought you, anyway.”
“But I had to come,” she said in a low voice.
Like the two men, she wore a grey flannel shirt, knickers, and spiral puttees.
They, however, carried rifles as well as packs; and the girl’s pack was lighter.