Jack and His Seven Foes — page 183: what you’re looking at

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174 JACK AND HIS SEVEN FOES, CHAPTER LXX. THE WEIRD JOURNEY—TWO FIGURES Ir was a weird country that Jack passed through, and looked doubly so in the pale moonlight. To Jack it seemed as if there was something in the atmosphere that was not always there—a haze that was not a haze—a light that was not a lght. He had not seen the like before, and was disposed to charge it to his many hours’ sojourn in the bowels of the earth. But as he covered the ground, and saw no change in the indescribable, in- definable effect, he began to marvel at the phenomena more and more. The moon was there, but it was not her hght that lay upon the rocky ground. The stars were above, but it was not | said Jack. their gieaming that sparkled on the spare herbage. What wasit? Again, too, there was a dreadful still- ness, a silence that was not of the earth, a suspension, as it were, of all things that moved, save Jack himself. The echo of his footsteps was unlike anything he had ever heard before. Sharp and clear it sounded, like a suc- cession of smart raps. His ear was pained by the sound ere he had gone far, and now and then he would pause to get relief from the silence. Then he would look up at the moon, and marvel at her strange appearance, and the phosphorescent light there was everywhere. ‘“‘ [tis more hke a dream than reality,” he said, and the adventures of the past ten hours occurring to his mind, helped to make him doubtful whether he was awake or dreaming. But he kept moving on along the winding road, with the swift light step of youth, and by-and-by came within sight of two distant objects that he saw at a glance were human beings. Two men, one standing up, the other sittine down-—the Swagegerer and the Panther. Jack could not recognise them, they | were too far off for that, but it flashed up. IN THE DISTANCE—AT LAST. upon him that these were the very men -whom he had been seeking. It was a lonely place, and they were two to one. Would it avail him if he demanded fair play? No. Of them nothing but cowardice and treachery could be expected. But he went on. He walked now so swiftly and quietly that he was upon them ere they were aware of his being near. He came upon them hke a spectre from the mists of the weird night. The Swaggerer was standing, and the Panther sitting down, when “he came ‘They stared at him, out neither spoke nor moved. Mortal terror held them in its chains. “You have fled in vain from me,’ “Tam here!” But still neither moved nor spoke. Like frozen men were they. “For a long time,” continued Jack, “T have been on your trail. It was easily followed, for 1t was a broad way of blood. ‘The air was black with your crimes; these woods and plains have > echoed with the cries of your victims.” He stood with his arm extended, and a finger pointed at them as he denounced their crimes. They heard and shuddered, but made no other movement. To them the youth had borne a charmed life. He was the avenger, backed up by a mighty power they could not cope with. They felt that their hour had come. “ Murderers of children and women, cruel brutes, that shame all that 1s cruel in beasts, have you nothing to say to me?” Hie raised his voice a little, and it echoed round as his footsteps had done, sharp and clear. On the hsteners, every word fell lke a blow. It was a weird scene. The time, the strange light in the air and on the earth, the meeting of such a trio—all things were in one inspiring harmony. “ Have you nothing to say to me?” —— COMNICLOOKS.EO)