“The———you have!”
A moment's silence. Somewhere off in the wilderness a twig crackled, and they all started. Harper's scalp tingled during the long stillness that followed the sound.
“What did you do that for?” asked Smiley. “Because we're sitting at this moment within a hundred feet of where we sat at three o'clock this afternoon.”
After this the silence grew unbearable. “I don't know how you fellows feel,” said Wilson, “but I'm thirsty clear down to my toes. If there's any water around here, I'm going to find it.” He drew a blazing pine knot from the fire and started off.
“Look out you don't set the woods afire,” growled Beveridge.
For five minutes—long minutes—the three sat there and waited. Then they heard him approaching, and saw his light flickering between the trees. He came into the firelight, and paused, looking from one to another with a curious expression. It almost seemed that he was veiling a smile.
“Come this way,” he finally said. And they got up and filed after him. He led them a short fifty yards, and paused. They stood on the edge of a clearing. A few rods away they saw a story-and-a-half farm-house, with a light in the kitchen window. Farther off loomed the outline of a large barn. They stumbled on, and found midway between the two buildings a well with a bucket worked by a crank and chain.
They could not speak; they looked at one another and grinned foolishly. Then Beveridge reached for the crank, but Dick caught his arm.
“Hold on there, Bill,” he said fervently, drawing a small flask from his hip pocket, “you wouldn't spoil a thirst like this with water?”
“You don't mean to say that you've had this in your clothes all along?” said Beveridge.