The sharp crack of a rifle broke upon the still, balmy air, as they say in the “yellow-backs,” and the fugitives looked at each other with suddenly awakened dread.

“The fools!” grated the man.

“What do they mean?” cried the breathless girl, very white in the face.

“They are trying to frighten us, that’s all.  Hang it!  If I only knew the lay of the land.  I’m completely lost, Marjory.  Do you know precisely where we are?”

“Our home is off to the north about three miles.  We are almost opposite Crow’s Cliff—­the wildest part of the country.  There are no houses along this part of the river.  All of the summer houses are farther up or on the other side.  It is too hilly here.  There is a railroad off there about six miles.  There isn’t a boathouse or fisherman’s hut nearer than two miles.  Mr. Bracken keeps his boat at the point—­two miles south, at least.”

“Yes; that’s where we were to have gone—­by boat.  Hang it all!  Why did we ever leave the boat?  You can never scramble through all this brush to Bracken’s place; it’s all I can do.  Look at my arms!  They are scratched to—­”

“Oh, dear!  It’s dreadful, Jack.  You poor fellow, let me—­”

“We haven’t time, dearest.  By thunder, I wouldn’t have those Rubes head us off now for the whole county.  The jays!  How could they have found us out?”

“Some one must have told.”

“But no one knew except the Brackens, you and I.”  “I’ll wager my head Bracken is saying hard things for fair down the river there.”

“He—­he—­doesn’t swear, Jack,” she panted.

[Illustration:  “‘Safe for a minute or two at least,’ he whispered”]

“Why, you are ready to drop!  Can’t you go a step farther?  Let’s stop here and face ’em.  I’ll bluff ’em out and we’ll get to Bracken’s some way.  But I won’t give up the game!  Not for a million!”

“Then we can’t stop.  You forget I go in for gymnasium work.  I’m as strong as anything, only I’m—­I’m a bit nervous.  Oh, I knew something would go wrong!” she wailed.  They were now standing like trapped deer in a little thicket, listening for sounds of the hounds.

“Are you sorry, dear?”

“No, no!  I love you, Jack, and I’ll go through everything with you and for you.  Really,” she cried with a fine show of enthusiasm, “this is jolly good fun, isn’t it?  Being chased like regular bandits—­”

“Sh!  Drop down, dear!  There’s somebody passing above us—­hear him?”

They crawled into a maze of hazel bushes with much less dignity than haste.  Two men sped by an instant later, panting and growling.

“Safe for a minute or two at least,” he whispered as the crunching footsteps were lost to the ear.  “They won’t come back this way, dear.”

“They had guns, Jack!” she whispered, terrified.

“I don’t understand it, hanged if I do,” he said, pulling his brows into a mighty scowl.  “They are after us like a pack of hounds.  It must mean something.  Lord, but we seem to have stirred up a hornet’s nest!”