Читать книгу Всадник без головы / The Headless Horseman онлайн | страница 5
“It is very good of you. We shall be most thankful, sir. My name is Woodley Poindexter, of Louisiana. I have purchased a property on the Leona river, near Fort Inge. We were in hopes of reaching it before nightfall. Can we do so?”
“There is nothing to hinder you: if you follow the instructions I shall give.”
On saying this, the stranger rode a few paces apart; and appeared to scrutinise the country – as if to determine the direction which the travellers should take.
A blood-bayrancher
a man of heroic mouldCreole
“By my faith!” he declared, facing round to the owner of the waggons, “I can discover no landmarks for you to steer by. For all that, I can find the way myself. You will have to cross the Leona five miles below the Fort; and, as I have to go by the crossing myself, you can follow the tracks of my horse. But you may not be able to distinguish them”, said the horseman after a pause, “the more so, that in these dry ashes all horse-tracks are so nearly alike.”
“What are we to do?” despairingly asked the planter.
cypress
The young horseman, once more drawing up his reins, was about to ride off; when something caused him to linger. It was a pair of dark lustrous eyes – observed by him for the first time – glancing through the curtains of the travelling carriage.
He perceived, moreover, that they were turned upon himself – fixed, as he fancied, in an expression that betokened interest – almost tenderness!
He returned it with an involuntary glance of admiration, which he made but an awkward attempt to conceal.
“You are very kind, sir,” said Poindexter; “but with the directions you have given us, I think we shall be able to manage. The sun will surely show us —”
“No: now I look at the sky, it will not. There are clouds looming up on the north. In an hour, the sun may be obscured – at all events, before you can get within sight of the cypress. It will not do. Stay!” he continued, after a reflective pause, “I have a better plan still: follow the trail of my lazo!”
While speaking, he had lifted the coiled rope and flung the loose end to the earth – the other being secured to a ring in the pommel. Then raising his hat in graceful salutation – more than half directed towards the travelling carriage – he gave the spur to his steed.