“What next?” a voice asked.

“Get dry brush—­these are green logs—­we’ll burn this jail!”

“Hold on!” the judge recognized the horse-thief as the speaker.  “There’s an old party in there!  No need to singe him!”

“Friend?”

“No, I tried him.”

The judge tossed away the stool.  He understood now that these men were neither lynchers nor regulators.  With a confident, not to say jaunty step, he emerged from the jail.

“Your servant, gentlemen!” he said, lifting his hat.

“Git!” said one of the men briefly, and the judge moved nimbly away toward the woods.  He had gained its shelter when the jail began to glow redly.

Now to find Solomon and the boy, and then to put the miles between himself and Pleasantville with all diligence.  As he thought this, almost at his elbow Mahaffy and Hannibal rose from behind a fallen log.  The Yankee motioned for silence and pointed west.

“Yes,” breathed the judge.  He noted that Mahaffy had a heavy pack, and the boy his long rifle.  For a mile or two they moved forward without speech, the boy in the lead; while at his heels strode Mahaffy, with the judge bringing up the rear.

“How do you feel, Price?” asked Mahaffy at length, over his shoulder.

“Like one come into a fortune!  Those horse-thieves gave me a fine scare, but did me a good turn.”

Hannibal kept to the woods by a kind of instinct, and the two men yielded themselves to his guidance; but there was no speech between them.  Mahaffy trod in the boy’s steps, and the judge, puffing like an overworked engine, came close upon his heels.  In this way they continued to advance for an hour or more, then the boy paused.

“Go on!” commanded Mahaffy.

“Do you ’low the judge can stand it?” asked Hannibal .

“Bless you, lad!” panted the judge feelingly.

“He’s got to stand it—­either that, or what do you suppose will happen to us if they start their dogs?” said Mahaffy.

“Solomon’s right—­you are sure we are not going in a circle, Hannibal?”

“Yes, I’m sure,” said Hannibal.  “Do you see that star?  My Uncle Bob learned me how I was to watch that star when I wanted to keep going straight.”

There was another long interval of silence.  Bit by bit the sky became overcast.  Vague, fleecy rifts of clouds appeared in the heavens.  A wind sprang up, murmuring about them, there came a distant roll of thunder, while along the horizon the lightning rushed in broken, jagged lines of fire.  In the east there was a pale flush that showed the black, hurrying clouds the winds had summoned out of space.

The booming thunder, first only the sullen menace of the approaching storm, rolled nearer and nearer, and the fierce light came in blinding sheets of flame.  A ceaseless, pauseless murmur sprang up out of the distance, and the trees rocked with a mighty crashing of branches, while here and there a big drop of rain fell.  Then the murmur swelled into a roar as the low clouds disgorged themselves.  Drenched to the skin on the instant, the two men and the boy stumbled forward through the gray wake of the storm.