Not a word was spoken as they trudged cautiously forward. Every care was taken not to cause the least sound. Hounds, they knew all too well, have sharp ears. So, darting from bush to bush and from tree to tree, they came at last to a spot directly over a cliff where, by parting branches, they might get a fair view of the deserted cabin and the clearing.

"Someone there," whispered Marion. "See! There's a wisp of smoke curling from the chimney."

For a time they sat silently intent.

Suddenly Marion's heart stopped beating! Had she caught the low cry of a child? Yes, there it was again.

"Hallie," she whispered, springing to her feet. "I must go to her."

"No! No!" Patience whispered tensely. "They are bad men. They would kill you."

"But Hallie." The girl's heart was wrung by the thought of the innocent child's suffering.

"Hallie's all right for now. You have heard her cry in that way often before. It's just a fretful, sleepy cry. She will soon fall asleep."

It was true. Even as they waited and listened the crying ceased and over the hills and the forest there fell the hush of night.

Into this hush Patience burst with an exceedingly strange whispered remark:

"If only we had that c.o.o.n. Marion, have you any money?"

"Five dollars."

"Oh! Good! They'd sell it for that, I am sure. But we won't ask them; just pin the money to the c.o.o.n's box."

"But it's all we have. We will need food. The kidnappers may go to the railroad. We will need money. Anyway, why the c.o.o.n?"

Patience did not answer. s.n.a.t.c.hing the money, she was away in the night, leaving Marion alone in the dark and with the strange men scarcely more than a stone's throw beneath her.

Who can tell what this city girl's thoughts were as she sat there alone with the silence of night hovering over her? Whatever the thoughts might have been, they were at last broken in upon by the low rattle of a chain.

Beside her stood Patience and in her arms, cuddled up like a kitten, was the pet c.o.o.n.

"Now what in the world did you do that for?" demanded Marion as, having picked up Patience's long squirrel rifle, she came trudging after her.

"Wait and see!" she panted.

Very weary and very skeptical, Marion waited. Having once more reached the crest of the cliff, Patience felt her way about until she had located a tall young hickory tree with branches some six feet from the ground.

Placing the c.o.o.n on the ground and handing the chain to Marion, she whispered: "Give me a lift to the first limb. Then hand me the c.o.o.n."

Having complied with her request, Marion leaned wearily upon the rifle while she listened to the sound of her companion scaling the tree, branch by branch.

Presently she heard Patience coming down. When at last Patience caught the lowest branch and swung herself down Marion saw that her hands were empty.

"C'mon!" Patience whispered hoa.r.s.ely as she dragged her companion through the brush.

In silence they skirted the mountain side until they were almost directly above the cabin.

"Hist! Listen!" Patience came to a sudden standstill.

"Wha-what is it?" the other girl breathed.

"It's the sound a c.o.o.n makes when he's lonesome. But listen!"

A new and louder sound burst upon their ears. There was no need for asking what this was. Marion knew all too well. It was the booming baying of a hound. The next second he was joined by his companion.

"Are they coming this way?" asked Marion, while a cold chill shook her from head to foot.

"No." There was a quiet a.s.surance in Patience's tone. "We've made no sound. It isn't us they hear. It's that c.o.o.n. They'll race over to that tree and bay up at it if the men'll let 'em, and I think they will."

"And then they'll get on our scent and-and it will all be over!" Marion's teeth were chattering in spite of her.

That this was a possibility she had not thought of was told by the long moment of silence before the mountain girl spoke.

"Well, they might," she whispered, measuring her words, "but a hound's a hound, and all hounds love to bay a c.o.o.n tree. We'll just have to wait and see."

Waiting out there in the dark forest with every least sound, the flutter of a bird or the movement of some small living thing in the gra.s.s at their feet giving them a start, was not the easiest thing in the world.

Indeed, Marion found it almost the hardest.

Now and again there came the call of the c.o.o.n, then the booming of the hounds.

"Why don't they let them go?" Patience murmured impatiently. "If they don't; if-"

She paused in the midst of a sentence to listen. Then in a joyous whisper she exclaimed:

"There! There they go!"

It was true. As Marion strained her ears she caught the sound of the hounds tearing away through the brush.

But even as she listened her heart suddenly went wild. What if the hounds had somehow gotten scent of them and were coming their way? How terrible that would be! They were sure to be great, gaunt, vicious beasts.

In the darkness it was impossible to tell what direction they were taking. Aided by her heightened imagination, she fancied the sound of their rush through the bushes growing louder, seemed to catch more plainly their hoa.r.s.e breathing.

Wildly she strained her eyes in the dark, searching for a tree that she might climb, but in vain. The trees were either too large, with branches twenty feet in air, or too slender to bear her weight. In her wild terror she was about to flee when again Patience whispered:

"There they go!"

"Who?" Marion whispered back.

"The men. They are all alike-hounds and mountain men. They can't stand the call of a c.o.o.n. Oh, thank G.o.d! Our chance is coming. See!"

As she looked toward the cabin Marion did see. Not alone did she see the men, but saw their faces plainly. By the glaring light of a burning pine knot held aloft by one of the men, faces of three tall, gaunt, stubby-whiskered men were silhouetted against the shadows of night.

"Know them?" Marion whispered as they disappeared behind a clump of trees.

"Narry a one."

"I guess that's all of them," Patience whispered a moment later. "Away, now, for little Hallie. We'll have to take a chance. C'mon, and remember-not a sound. Not a snap of a twig, not a breath!"