“We must not shoot to kill,” replied the Major. “It will be sufficient that they surrender. We have them at our mercy. Come along.”
He advanced a few paces, then paused.
“But there,” he murmured, “I do not like this snow.” He held out his hand, and a first soft feathery flake settled on his palm.
“Oh, well be all right,” cried Roderick. “Besides we’ve got to help Grant.”
They trudged along, walking zig-zag up the hill to lessen the incline, but always keeping close to the trail of the men they were pursuing. On the plateau above the snow lay deeper, and at places they were knee-deep in the drift, their feet breaking through the thin encrusting surface which frost had hardened.
“It is a pity we have not web snowshoes or skis,” remarked Buell Hampton when they had paused to draw breath. “We could make so much better time.”
“Well, the other fellows are no better equipped than ourselves,” replied Roderick, philosophically. “But, by jingo, it’s snowing some now.”
Yes, the feathery flakes were all around them, not blindingly thick as yet, but certain precursors of the coming storm. The trail was still quite clear although the fugitives were no longer in sight.
An hour passed, two hours, three hours—and hunters and hunted still plodded on. Roderick felt no misgivings, for he could tell from the lie of the hills that they were making steadily for the junction of the Ferris-Haggerty Road with the track over the range to Dillon, where Grant Jones would now be waiting. But at last the snow began to fall more thickly, and the encircling mountains came to be no longer visible. Even the guiding footprints were becoming filled up and difficult to follow.
All at once Buell Hampton stopped.