IN EVIL PLIGHT 193

making his preparations, and he could only just totter about.
J would wager you anything he cannot have gone two hun-
dred yards from the house; that is where we must search
for him, I warrant we shall find him hidden in a thicket
thereabouts.”

“We shall have to take a lantern then, for it will be
dark before we get back.”

“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 Solo-
man 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.”

“Tf we can’t find this Swede, I would not wait here for
any money. I would fly at once.”

“Vou 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 to-morrow 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.”