no longer hide the old haunted look in her eyes.

But Jolly Roger saw the look, and the growing pallor, and had
noted them for two weeks past. And later that afternoon, when Nada
returned to Cragg's Ridge, and he re-crossed the stream with
Peter, there was a hard and terrible look in his eyes which Peter
had caught there more and more frequently of late. And that
evening, in the twilight of their cabin, Jolly Roger said,

"It's coming soon, Peter. I'm expecting it. Something is happening
which she won't tell us about. She is afraid for me. I know it.
But I'm going to find out--soon. And then, Pied-Bot, I think we'll
probably kill Jed Hawkins, and hit for the North."

The gloom of foreboding that was in Jolly Roger's voice and words
seemed to settle over the cabin for many days after that, and more
than ever Peter sensed the thrill and warning of that mysterious
something which was impending. He was developing swiftly, in flesh
and bone and instinct, and there began to possess him now the
beginning of that subtle caution and shrewdness which were to mean
so much to him later on. An instinct greater than reason, if it
was not reason itself, told him that his master was constantly
watching for something which did not come. And that same instinct,
or reason, impinged upon him the fact that it was a thing to be
guarded against. He did not go blindly into the mystery of things
now. He circumvented them, and came up from behind. Craft and
cunning replaced mere curiosity and puppyish egoism. He was quick
to learn, and Jolly Roger's word became his law, so that only once
or twice was he told a thing, and it became a part of his
understanding. While the keen, shrewd brain of his Airedale father