Читать книгу Nameless River онлайн

50 страница из 59

It hardly seemed possible that the two outcasts could have swum it, and yet—where were their tracks if they had not?

She circled the pool and went on, trailing carefully, but the bed beyond was composed of shale, blue and sharp—hard going for a child’s bare feet, she thought compassionately—and gave no sign of a crossing. For another hour she went on, scanning the walls, the fallen stones, the stream itself and every nook or corner where anything might hide. She was far in Blue Stone Cañon by this time and wondered at the endurance which could have brought a child so far. Or had some one come and taken it away? That was possible, of course, and yet—a grown up person would have left marks in the soft sand assuredly. She would—but at this point in her train of thought, she came around a sharp jut in the wall—and face to face with her quarry, or at least with part of it.

Startled, the dog she had seen the day before was crouched in the narrow way that led around the jut, his body half turned, one foot raised, tail lowered, and the face he turned back across his shoulder was the most vicious thing Nance had ever seen. He was crouched to spring, and the fury of his snarls, audible above the sound of the stream, made that odd clutch close her throat which always accompanies sudden horror.