faith that only by the direct help of Heaven could the boy, in his
flight down through the dark, have reached the river and the other
side alive. The path dropped from ledge to ledge, and ran the
brink of precipices and chasms. In a dozen places the boy crashed
through the undergrowth from one slippery fold to the next below,
catching at roots and stones, slipping past death a score of times,
and dropping on till a flood of yellow light lashed the gloom
before him. Just there the river was most narrow; the nose of a
cliff swerved the current sharply across, and on the other side an
eddy ran from it up stream. These earthly helps he had, and he
needed them.

There had been a rain-storm, and the waves swept him away like
thistle-down, and beat back at him as he fought through them and
stood choked and panting on the other shore. He did not dare stop
to rest. The Marcums, too, had crossed the river up at the ford by
this time, and were galloping towards him; and Isom started on
and up. When he reached the first bench of the spur the moon was
swinging over Thunderstruck Knob. The clouds broke as he
clinibed; strips of radiant sky showed between the rolling masses,
and the mountain above was light and dark in quick succession.
He had no breath when he reached the ledge that ran below old
Steve's cabin, and flinging one arm above it, he fell through sheer
exhaustion. The cabin was dark as the clump of firs behind it; the
inmates were unsuspecting; and Steve Marcum and his men were
not far below. A rumbling started under him, while he lay there
and grew faint-the rumble of a stone knocked from the path by a
horse's hoof. Isom tried to halbo, but his voice stopped in a
whisper, and he painfully drew himself upon the rock, upright
under the bright moon. A quick oath of warning came then-it was