His surprise awakened him fully.  He listened, but he could not hear the sound of breathing.  He rolled out of his bunk and investigated.  The light in the camp was merely the reflection of the paler hue of the night outside, filtering through the open door and the single window.  But he perceived that he was alone in the place—­the bunks were empty.

His primitive life in the camp had inured him to new habits; he had been removing only his shoes and his coat when he went to bed.  He pulled on his shoes—­he did not bother with coat or hat.  He rushed out of doors and called aloud, hoping that his panic was exaggerating his apprehensions.  There was no answer.

Then his fears took definite shape and sought for confirmation.  He ran to the horse hovel.  The animal was gone.

Standing there, bitterly conscious of what had happened and acutely aware of what was likely to happen with those three miscreants on the trail of the treasure that they coveted, Vaniman accepted his full measure of responsibility.  He did not excuse the passion which had prompted him to open his heart in regard to Tasper Britt.  It was plain that they intended to unlock the secret of the money by the use of Britt, going to any lengths of brutality the occasion might demand.  To get at Britt they would be obliged to invade the Harnden home.  The thought of what might develop from that sortie wrought havoc in Vaniman’s soul!  His fears for Vona and her mother spurred him to action even more effectively than his conviction that his own cause was lost if the men were able to force the money from Britt.  If they were captured it would be like them to incriminate Vaniman as an accomplice; if they got safely away with the treasure there could be no revelations regarding Britt’s complicity in its concealment.  Britt certainly would not tell the truth about what had happened to him; the fugitives would hide their secret and their plunder.

If ever a victim of devilish circumstances had a compelling reason to play the game, single-handed and to the full limit of desperation, so Vaniman told himself, he was the man.

He ran from the hovel to the peak of the crag that overlooked the village of Egypt.  He beheld below him a vast expanse of grayish white, the fleecy sea of the enshrouding vapor.  He heard no sounds, he saw no lights.  He had no notion of the hour.  Wagg had accommodated him with the time of day, when he asked for it, just as Wagg loaned him a razor and doled his rations, persistently and with cunning malice working to subdue the young man’s sense of independence.

But in this crisis all of Vaniman’s courage broke from the thralls in which prison intimidation and a fugitive’s caution and despair had bound it during the months of his disgrace.

No matter how long the others had been on their way!  They would be obliged to go the long route around the hill, and were hampered by the van; their grim forethought in taking the vehicle to transport their booty, as if they were sure of succeeding, was another element that wrought upon Vaniman’s temper.