ly fallen
leaves.

At times he could even see the round white glare of a torch on the
ground -- see it shift ahead, lighting up tree trunks, spread out,
fanlike, into a wide, misty glory, then vanish as darkness rushed in
from the vast ocean of the night.

Once they halted at a brook. Their torches flashed it; he heard them
sounding its depths with their gun-butts.

Smith knew that brook. It was the east branch of Star Brook, the inlet
to Star Pond.

Far ahead above the trees the sky seemed luminous. It was star lustre
over the pond, turning the mist to a silvery splendour.

Now the people ahead of him moved with more caution, crossing the brook
without splashing, and their boots made less noise in the woods.

To keep in touch with them Smith hastened his pace until he drew near
enough to hear the low murmur of their voices.

They were travelling in single file; he had a glimpse of them against
the ghostly radiance ahead. Indeed, so near had he approached that he
could hear the heavy, laboured breathing of the last man in the file --
some laggard who dragged his feet, plodding on doggedly, panting,
muttering. Probably the man was Sard.

Already the forest in front was invaded by the misty radiance from the
clearing. Through the trees starlight glimmered on water. The perfume
of the open land grew in the night air, -- the scent of dew-wet grass,
the smell of still water and of sedgy shores.

Lying flat behind a rotting log, Smith could see them all now, --
spectral shapes against the light. There were five of them at the
forest's edge.

They seemed to know what was to be done and how to do it. Two went down
among the ferns and stunted willows toward the west shore of the pond;
two sheered off to the southwest, shoulder deep in blackberry and sumac.
The fifth man waited for a while, then ran down across the open pasture.

Scarcely had he started when Smith glided to the wood's edge, crouched,
and looked down.

Below stood Clinch's Dump, plain in the starlight, every window dark.
To the west the barn loomed, huge with its ramshackle outbuildings
straggling toward the lake.

Straight down the slope toward the barn ran the fifth man of Quintana's
gang, and disappeared among the out-buildings.

Smith crept after him through the sumacs; and, at the foot of the slope,
squatted low in a clump of rag-weed.

So close to the house was he now that he could hear the dew rattling on
the veranda roof. He s