stretch it a trifle.

If he could succeed in making his escape immediately, all might yet be
well; but if he was forced to remain there until his captors returned,
there was little chance he would have another opportunity.

Regardless of the pain, he writhed and twisted until bead-like drops of
perspiration stood out on his forehead, and at the instant when he was
convinced all efforts were useless, that portion of the rope which
confined his wrists suddenly loosened sufficiently to enable him to
withdraw one hand at the expense of no slight amount of skin from the
knuckles.

Once he was thus far on the road to escape, the remainder was
comparatively simple.

With the hand which was free he untied the knots, and in less than five
minutes from the time Haines disappeared among the foliage, he was at
liberty.

The only thought in his mind now was to take such a course as would
best enable him to elude his pursuers, and he knew full well that the
half-breed could track him where the white man would be wholly at a
loss to find a trace of his movements.

"Its hard to turn back, but it must be done," he said, half to himself,
as he hesitated the merest fraction of time, and then ran down the path
in the same direction from which he had come.

He had hardly started when the sound of horse's hoofbeats caused his
cheek to grow pale. He had regained his liberty only to lose it!

Involuntarily he glanced backward, and then a low cry of satisfaction
burst from his lips.

The horse coming down the path was riderless. It was the animal Haines
had ridden, and apparently much the better steed of the two.

Turning quickly, Walter ran toward the horse, seized him by the bridle
before he had time to wheel around, and in another second was in the
saddle.

A short riding-whip hung from the pommel, and with this the fugitive
struck the animal sharply as he forced him directly into the underbrush
toward the south.

Fortunately, Walter was well acquainted with this section of the
country, having been over it many times with his father, and knew
exactly which direction to take in order to gain that portion of the
forest where it would be possible to ride at a reasonably rapid gait
before venturing on the path again.

His escape, however, was not to be as simple as at first seemed. Before
he was twenty yards from the starting point a loud cry in the rear told
that his departure had been discovered, and this was followed almost