ONE:Gornom opened the door of the new room. Inside, Cadnan saw six elders, sitting in a circle on the floor. The circle, incomplete, was open toward the door, and all six big eyes were staring at the newcomers. The floor was nearly bare: the leaves had been brushed into mounds that lay in the corners.
FORE:"That zouave drill was a mighty good thing, after all," thought Si, as he turned from his prostrate foe to the others.Presently, on mounting a roll of the ground, they saw sloping down from them a few rods away, and running obliquely to their right, a small "deadening," made by the shiftless farmer for his scanty corn crop. A mob of fugitives flying through had trampled the stalks to the ground. Si and Shorty had seen some of them and yelled at them to come up and form on them, but the skedaddlers either would not or could not hear.
FORE:Puna himself rose. "I will tell him." And Cadnan, frightened by the very look of the elder, could do nothing but follow him as he beckoned and went to a corner near a mound of leaves. The others, scattered, were eating. Cadnan picked up a leaf, but Puna took it gently out of his hand."Naah," said Si contemptuously. "We're just crawlin' along. Wait till we git where it's a little clear, and then we'll go. Here, cut acrost ahead o' that battery that's comin' up a-trot."
