"Shut up!"
A moment's silence. Then, from a black corner on the ditcher came the
negro's voice, moaning in cutting minor notes a primitive jungle croon
of fear and terror. White laughed grimly, making no effort to quiet
him. Roger stared up the river and made out a flicker of purple light
shooting up from the eastern horizon into the misty heavens.
"Thank God!" he said in relief. "Daylight is coming."
He leaped ashore as the tug ran close to an out-jutting point of high
land below Garman's, and cut straight across the prairie toward his
camp. The sunburst of dawn was at its gaudiest when he came within
sight of the tents and he caught the glint of sun on the bare matchets
of the clearing gang as the men prepared for the day's work. Higgins
was standing before his tent, smoking and chafing the men.
"Everything all right, Hig?" asked Roger with false calm.
"All right? Sure. Why wouldn't it be?" Higgins took the pipe from
his lips and looked closer.
"Hi! What's up? What's happened to you?"
"What do you mean?"
"Well, you don't have to tell me, of course; but--but what in the name
of smoked fish makes you look as if you'd been through the Devil's
Playground again?"
Higgins breathed hard after Roger had completed the tale of Garman's
man hunt.
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