“My God, how I’d like to have you out in the woods—­alone—­for just one hour!” he whispered.

Eight o’clock came, and nine.  Two or three times he heard voices in the hall, probably Mercer talking with the guard.  Once he thought he heard a rumble of thunder, and his heart throbbed joyously.  Never had he welcomed a storm as he would have welcomed it tonight.  But the skies remained clear.  Not only that, but the stars as they began to appear seemed to him more brilliant than he had ever seen them before.  And it was very still.  The rattle of a scow-chain came up to him from the river as though it were only a hundred yards away.  He knew that it was one of Mooie’s dogs he heard howling over near the sawmill.  The owls, flitting past his window, seemed to click their beaks more loudly than last night.  A dozen times he fancied he could hear the rippling voice of the river that very soon was to carry him on toward freedom.

The river!  Every dream and aspiration found its voice for him in that river now.  Down it Marette Radisson had gone.  And somewhere along it, or on the river beyond, or the third river still beyond that, he would find her.  In the long, tense wait between the hours of nine and ten he brought the girl back into his room again.  He recalled every gesture she had made, every word she had spoken.  He felt the thrill of her hand on his forehead, her kiss, and in his brain her softly spoken words repeated themselves over and over again, “I think that if you lived very long I should love you.”  And as she had spoken those words she knew that he was not going to die!

Why, then, had she gone away?  Knowing that he was going to live, why had she not remained to help him if she could?  Either she had spoken the words in jest, or—­

A new thought flashed into his mind.  It almost drew a cry from his lips.  It brought him up tense, erect, his heart pounding.  Had she gone away?  Was it not possible that she, too, was playing a game in giving the impression that she was leaving down-river on the hidden scow?  Was it conceivable that she was playing that game against Kedsty?  A picture, clean-cut as the stars in the sky, began to outline itself in his mental vision.  It was clear, now, what Mooie’s mumblings about Kedsty had signified.  Kedsty had accompanied Marette to the scow.  Mooie had seen him and had given the fact away in his fever.  Afterward he had clamped his mouth shut through fear of the “big man” of the Law.  But why, still later, had he almost been done to death?  Mooie was a harmless creature.  He had no enemies.

There was no one at the Landing who would have assaulted the old trailer, whose hair was white with age.  No one, unless it was Kedsty himself—­Kedsty at bay, Kedsty in a rage.  Even that was inconceivable.  Whatever the motive of the assault might be, and no matter who had committed it, Mooie had most certainly seen the Inspector of Police accompany Marette Radisson to the scow.  And the question which Kent found it impossible to answer was, had Marette Radisson really gone down the river on that scow?