In
that moment he would have given a year of life to have known where
they were. Still listening, still fighting to hear some sound of
them in the shriek of the storm, he took his first step out into
the pit of darkness. He did not run, but went as cautiously as
though the night was a dead calm, the club half poised in his
hands. He had measured the distance and the direction of the gate
and when at last he touched the saplings of the stockade he knew
that he could not be far off in his reckoning. Ten paces to the
right he found the gate and his heart gave a sudden jump of
relief. Half a minute more and it was open. He propped it securely
against the beat of the storm with the club he had taken from Bram
Johnson's bed.
Then he turned back to the cabin, with the little revolver
clutched in his hand, and his face was strained and haggard when
he found the door and returned again into the glow of the candle-
light. In the center of the room, her face as white as his own,
stood Celie. A great fear must have gripped her, for she stood
there in her sleeping gown with her hands clutched at her breast,
her eyes staring at him in speechless questioning.
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