"
"Our best plan will be to leave it alone till morning. If we sit
outside the hut, and take it in turns to watch, we shall hear him
when he moves, which he is sure to do when it gets dark. It will be
a still night, and we should hear a stick break half a mile away.
We shall catch him, safe enough, before he has gone far."
"Well, I hope we shall have him back before Ben Soloman comes," the
charcoal burner said, "or it will be worse for both of us. You know
as well as I do he has got my neck in a noose, and he has got his
thumb on you."
"If we can't find this Swede, I would not wait here for any money.
I would fly at once."
"You would need to fly, in truth, to get beyond Ben Soloman's
clutches," the charcoal burner said gruffly. "He has got agents all
over the country."
"Then what would you do?"
"There is only one thing to do. It is our lives or his. When he
rides up tomorrow, we will meet him at the door as if nothing had
happened, and, with my axe, I will cleave his head asunder as he
comes in. If he sees me in time to retreat, you shall stab him in
the back. Then we will dig a big hole in the wood, and throw him
in, and we will kill his horse and bury it with him.
"Who would ever be the wiser? I was going to propose it last time,
only I was not sure of you then; but, now that you are in it as
deep as I am--deeper, indeed, for he put you here specially to look
after this youngster--your interest in the matter is as great as
mine.
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