Another gun was fired as signal, echoing through the wood, but the sound came from the opposite direction to that we were traveling; therefore we hoped that we had eluded those whose earnest desire it was to capture us for the reward.  Suddenly, however, a second gun, an answering signal, was fired from straight before us, and that revealed the truth.  We were actually between the two parties, and they were closing in upon us!  They had already driven us to the edge of the bog.  The Finlander recognized our peril as quickly as I did, and halted.

“Let us turn straight back,” he urged breathlessly.  “We may yet elude them.”

And then we again turned off at right angles, traveling as quickly as we were able back towards the lake shore.  It was an exciting chase in the darkness, for we knew not whither we were going, nor into what pitfall or ravine or treacherous marsh we might fall.  Once we saw afar through the trees the light of a lantern held by a guard, and already the sweet-faced girl beside me seemed tired and terribly fatigued.  But we hurried on and on, striving to make no noise, and yet the crackling of wood beneath our feet seemed to us to sound like the noise of thunder.

At last, breathless, we halted to listen.  We were already in sight of the gray mist where lay the silent lake that held so many secrets.  There was not a sound.  The guards had gone straight on, believing they had driven us into that deadly bog wherein, if we had entered, we must have been slowly sucked down and engulfed.  They were surrounding it, no doubt, feeling certain of their prey.

But we crept along the water’s edge, until in the gray light we could distinguish two empty boats—­that of the guards and our own.  We were again at the spot where we had disembarked.

“Let us row to the head of the lake,” suggested the Finn.  “We may then land and escape them.”  And a moment later we were all three in the guards’ boat, rowing with all our might under the deep shadow of the bank northward, in the opposite direction to the town of Nystad.

We kept a sharp look-out for any other boat, but saw none.  The signals ashore had attracted all the guards to that spot to join in the search, and now, having doubled back and again embarked, we were every moment increasing the distance between ourselves and our pursuers.  I think we must have rowed several miles, for ere we landed again, upon a low, flat and barren shore, the first gray streak of day was showing in the east.

Elma noticed it, and kept her great brown eyes fixed upon it thoughtfully.  It was the dawn for her—­the dawn of a new life.  Our eyes met; she smiled at me, and then gazed again eastward, full of silent meaning.

Having landed, we drew the boat up and concealed it in the undergrowth so that the guards, on searching, should not know the direction we had taken, and then we went straight on northward across the low-lying lands, to where the forest showed dark against the morning gray.  The mist had now somewhat cleared, but the air was keen and frosty.