“I guess I was mistaken,” he whispered softly to Wabigoon.  “Shall we get out our blankets?”

“We might as well make ourselves comfortable,” replied the young Indian.  “You sit here, and listen while I undo the pack.”

He went noiselessly to Mukoki, who was leaning against the pack, and Rod could hear them fumbling at the straps on the bundle.  After a little Wabi returned and the two boys spread out their blankets beside the rock upon which they had been sitting.  But there was no thought of sleep in the mind of either, though both were dead tired from their long day’s work.  They sat closer together, shoulder touching shoulder, and unknown to his companion Roderick drew his revolver, cocked it silently and placed it where he could feel the cold touch of its steel between his fingers.  He knew that he was the only one of the three who fully realized the horror of their situation.

Mukoki’s mind, simple in its reasoning of things that did not belong to the wilderness, had accepted the assurances and explanations of Rod and Wabigoon.  Wabi, half-bred in the wild, felt alarm only in the sense of physical peril.  It was different with the white youth.  What is there in civilization that sends the chill of terror to one’s heart more quickly than the presence of a human being who has gone mad?  And this madman was at large!  At that very instant he might be listening to their breathing and their whispered words half a dozen feet away; any moment might see the blackness take form and the terrible thing hurl itself at their throats.  Rod, unlike Wabigoon, knew that the powers of this strange creature of the chasm were greater than their own, that it could travel with the swiftness and silence of an animal through the darkness, that perhaps it could smell them and feel their presence as it passed on its way to the plain.  He was anxious now to hear the cry again.  What was the meaning of this silence?  Was the madman already conscious of their presence?  Was he creeping upon them at that moment, as still as the black shadows that shut in their vision?  His mind was working in such vivid imaginings that he was startled when Wabi prodded him gently in the side.

“Look over there—­across the chasm,” he whispered.  “See that glow on the mountain wall?”

“The moon!” replied Rod.

“Yes.  I’ve been watching it, and it’s creeping down and down.  The moon is going to swing across this break in the mountains.  In fifteen minutes we shall be able to see.”

“It won’t swing across so much as it will come up in line with us,” replied Rod.  “Watch how that light is lengthening!  We shall be able to see for several hours.”

He started to rise to his feet but fell back with an astonished cry.  For a third time there came the mad hunter’s scream, this time far above and beyond them, floating down from the distance of the moon-lit plain!

“He passed us!” exclaimed Wabi.  “He passed us—­and we didn’t hear him!” He leaped to his feet and his voice rose excitedly until it rang in a hundred echoes between the chasm walls.  “He passed us, and we didn’t hear him!”