It was the mood of a moment, no more. Even as she thrilled with the anguished longing she lifted her eyes, and halted, aghast at the scene before her. There, close at hand to the southeast, Stone Mountain upreared its huge and rugged bulk. It loomed implacable, with the naked cliffs staring grotesquely. It overhung her like immutable fate, silent, pitiless. There was sinister significance in its aspect, for just before her lay the cavernous shadows of the Devil's Cauldron. The girl's gaze went to the verge of the precipice far above. It followed down the wild tumblings of the little stream, fed from lofty springs. It descended in the last long leap of the waters into the churning pool. And she had a vision of the man she loved, bound, and helpless--dead perhaps, shot from behind--and now thrust out from the verge into the abyss, to go hurtling into the mist-wreathed depths.... No, Zeke must not come back. The hardness crept again into her face, as she went forward. She held her eyes averted from that gruesome cavern high in the mountain's face.
The girl came soon to the Holloman Gate, which swung across the trail near the west end of the mountain. Tall poplars and spruce made an ample shade, but a glance toward the sun showed it at the zenith. She was prompt to the rendezvous; it was the lover who was laggard. She wondered a little at that, but with no lightening of her mood. She was sure that he would come all too speedily. She stood waiting in misery, leaning listlessly against the fence, her gaze downcast. The geranium blossoms touched the sward richly with color; the rhododendrons flaunted the loveliness of their flowering round about the spot. A delicate medley of birds' songs throbbed from out the thickets; a tiny stream purled over its pebbled bed in the ravine that entrenched the trail. Plutina gave no heed. She saw and she heard, but, in this hour, she was without response to any charm of sight or of sound. Yet, that she was alert was proven presently, for her ear caught the faint crackle of a twig snapping. It was a little way off--somewhere along the line of the brush-grown fence, on the same side of the trail. She peered steadily in the direction of the noise. When her eyes became accustomed to the shadows, she made out the figure of a man, crouched in a corner of the fence, behind the screen of a bush. He was no more than three or four rods from her. She was sure even that she recognized him--Gary Hawks, one of the most vicious of the Hodges gang, but notorious for cowardice. She was puzzled for only a moment by the presence of the fellow. Then, she realized that he doubtless was acting under his leader's orders. It was another menace against her own safety. The fingers of her hand went once again for encouragement to the holster beneath her arm.