Had there been, he wondered, anything that he could have done? He remembered in horror that he had not even tried to give the hermit any water. He had asked and the hermit had said that he had no need of water. But even so, should he have tried to give him some? Should he have tried to bring some help? But where could he have gone for help? And who could have been of help? And, he told himself, he could not have brought himself to leave a dying man, to let him die alone.

The hermit, he thought, had been an old man and had not been afraid of death. He wondered if he might not have looked on death as a welcome friend. This very morning Drood had wondered what the hermit had gotten out of life and that, of course, was a question still unanswered. But, Gib told himself, he must have gotten something out of life, perhaps a great deal out of life, to have been able to face death so serenely.

Now there were things to do, he told himself, and the afternoon was waning. He pulled back the blanket and crossed the hands of the hermit decently on his chest, then pulled the blanket up to cover his face. Having done that, he went outside to search for boulders he could use to block the entrance to the cave.

7

Hal of the Hollow Tree climbed over the rail fence and entered the cornfield. He was safe, he knew. The moonshiner and his sons were husking on the other side of the field and the moonshiner's dogs were sleeping off, beneath the stilted corncrib, the effects of last night's hunt.

It had been a long hunt and apparently an unsuccessful one. Hal and Coon had sat for hours outside the hollow tree and listened to its progress. The dogs had barked «treed» once, but the coon must have gotten away, for soon after they struck out on the trail again. Several times the two listeners had seen the lights of the lantern as the moonshiner and his sons had followed the hounds.