Chapter IV. Springing the Trap - Page 2

lose touch in the blackness. Dick heard Warner on his right, and he followed the sound of his voice. But before he went much further his foot struck a trailing vine, and he fell so hard, his head striking the trunk of a tree, that he lay unconscious.

The cold rain drove so fiercely on the fallen boy's face and body that he revived in two or three minutes, and stood up. He clapped his hand to the left side of his head, and felt there a big bump and a sharp ache. His weapons were still in his belt and he knew that his injuries were not serious, but he heard nothing save the drive and roar of the wind and rain. There was no calling of voices and no beat of footsteps.

He divined at once that his comrades, wholly unaware of his fall, when no one could either see or hear it, had gone on without missing him. They might also mount their horses and gallop away wholly ignorant that he was not among them.

Although he was a little dazed, Dick had a good idea of direction and he plunged through the mud which was now growing deep toward the little ravine in which they had hitched their horses. All were gone, including his own mount, and he had no doubt that the horse had broken or slipped the bridle in the darkness and followed the others.

He stood a while behind the trunk of a great tree, trying to shelter himself a little from the rain, and listened. But he could hear neither his friends leaving nor any foes approaching. The storm was of uncommon fury. He had never seen one fiercer, and knowing that he had little to dread from the Southerners while it raged he knew also that he must make his way on foot, and as best he could, to his own people.

Making a calculation of the direction and remembering that one might wander in a curve in the darkness, he set off down the stream. He meant to keep close to the banks of the Rappahannock, and if he persisted he would surely come in time to Pope's army. The rain did not abate. Both armies were flooded that night, but they could find some measure of protection. To the scouts and skirmishers and to Dick, wandering through the forest, nature was an unmitigated foe.

But nothing could stop the boy. He was resolved to get back to the army with the news that a heavy Southern force was across the Rappahannock. Others might get there first with the fact, but one never knew. A hundred might fall by the wayside, leaving it to him alone to bear the message.

He stumbled on. He was able to keep his cartridges dry in his pouch, but that was all. His wet, cold clothes flapped around him and he shivered to the bone. He could see only the loom of the black forest before him, and sometimes he slipped to the waist in swollen brooks. Then the wind shifted and drove the sheets of rain, sprinkled with hail, directly in his face. He was compelled to stop a while and take refuge behind a big oak. While he shivered in the shelter of the tree the only things that he