The officer turned on his heel and opened the door, to let a flood of light pour out for a short distance over the ground. To his left he saw the men’s quarters, still illuminated, and faintly heard the sound of their voices. A dim yellow beam shone from one of the stable windows, but beyond and on all sides contours and forms were lost in the darkness of the night. The pine-clad hill to the north might as well have been a part of the sky for all that could be seen of its bold, rugged sides, which dropped abruptly to the plain. Between the rifts of cloud, now beginning to break away, a few stars beamed brightly upon the earth.
To the grizzled and seasoned veteran of the Royal Mounted Police the uninspiring sight made no impression, and the sudden and peculiar manner with which he stepped outside the door was not caused by any phenomenon of nature.
“Banes,” he called sharply, “come here!”
The lethargic movements of the scout seemed suddenly to desert him. A few long strides took him to the officer’s side.
“Banes”—the sergeant spoke with curious intensity—“listen!”
“Ah, you have hear something, sergeant?”
“Yes—most assuredly,” answered Erskine. “All the men are at quarters, yet that thick blackness out there hides either one man or several. Perhaps Jed Warren is——”
“No, me think not,” interrupted Banes. “For sure he crossed the line. No—never see him more.”
The half-breed paused, for his keen ears had suddenly detected the sound of human voices. True they were so faint and partly swallowed up in the breeze that only a man whose ears were trained by long experience would have noticed them.
“They were louder than that before, Banes,” exclaimed the sergeant.