Читать книгу Всадник без головы / The Headless Horseman онлайн | страница 3

“What are we to do?”

The planter himself put this inquiry, in a tone that told of a vacillating spirit.

“What else but keep straight on, uncle Woodley? The river must be on the other side? If we don’t hit the crossing, to a half mile or so, we can go up, or down the bank – as the case may require.”

“Well, nephew, you know best: I shall be guided by you.”

The ex-officer of volunteers with confident air trots onward. The waggon-train is once more in motion.

A mile or more is made, apparently in a direct line from the point of starting. Then there is a halt. The self-appointed guide has ordered it. He appears to be puzzled about the direction.

“You’ve lost the way, nephew?” said the planter, riding rapidly up.

“Damned if I don’t believe I have, uncle!” responded the nephew, in a tone of not very respectful mistrust. “No, no!” he continued, reluctant to betray his embarrassment as the carriole came up. “I see now. We’re all right yet. The river must be in this direction. Come on!”

half-score

Like themselves, it could only be going towards the Leona. In that case they have only to keep in the same track.

For a mile or more the waggon-tracks are followed. The countenance of Cassius Calhoun, for a while wearing a confident look, gradually becomes clouded. It assumes the profoundest expression of despondency, on discovering that the four-and-forty wheel-tracks he is following, have been made by ten Pittsburgh waggons, and a carriole – the same that are now following him, and in whose company he has been travelling all the way from the Gulf of Matagorda!

Beyond doubt, the waggons of Woodley Poindexter were going over ground already traced by the tiring of their wheels.

“Our own tracks!” muttered Calhoun on making the discovery.

“Our own tracks! What mean you, Cassius? You don’t say we’ve been travelling—”

“On our own tracks. I do, uncle; that very thing. That’s the very hill we went down as we left our last stopping place. We’ve made a couple of miles for nothing.”

Embarrassment is no longer the only expression upon the face of the speaker. It has deepened to chagrin, with an admixture of shame. He feels it keenly as the carriole comes up, and bright eyes become witnesses of his discomfiture.