'Well, we've just about 'ad a day of it,' said his comrade. 'I'll bet we'll be off to sleep like a shot.' CHAPTER XXXII TERRORS OF THE NIGHT It was not until they lay down and waited for sleep that the boys felt the oddness and queerness of this first night in the open. Bustling round, making the fire, cooking, rigging up their camp, eating supper, fishing--all those things had kept at bay the silence and loneliness which now seemed to settle down upon them like a pall. They were quite comfortable. Each was wrapped snugly in his blanket. The bed of larch-tips was dry and springy. The haversacks, stuffed with the smallest tips, formed capital pillows. Yet sleep did not come at once. After a time Dick spoke. 'Listen to the river,' he said. 'Rum, ain't it?' replied Chippy. 'Daytime it didn't seem to mek' no noise at all. Now yer can't hear nothin' else.' The river, as a river always does, had found its voice in the dark: it purred and plashed, while over a shallow some distance below, its waters ran with a shrill babbling, and a steady roar, unheard by day, came up from a distant point where it thundered over a weir. 'Good job we made a rattlin' fire afore we turned in,' remarked the Raven; 'seems like comp'ny, don't it?' 'Rather,' said Dick; and both boys lay for a time watching the dancing gleams, as the good beech logs blazed up and threw the light of their flames into the depths of the hanger which rose above the camp. Sleep came to Dick without his knowing it, but his sleep had a rude awakening. He woke with the echo of a dreadful cry in his ears. For a moment he looked stupidly about, utterly at a loss to discover where he was. Then the cry came again--a horrible, screaming cry--and he sat up, with his heart going nineteen to the dozen. 'Chippy!' he cried, 'are you awake? What was that?' 'I dunno,' said the Raven, sitting up too. 'But worn't it awful?' The cry came again, and the two boys, their heads still heavy with sleep, were filled with horror at its wild, wailing note. 'Sounds like some'dy bein' murdered,' gasped Chippy. 'An' the fire's gone. Ain't it dark?' The fire had gone down, and was now no more than a heap of smouldering ashes. Heavy clouds had drawn across the sky, and the darkness under the hanger was thick enough to cut with a knife. The two boys crouched together side by side and quaked. This was pretty frightful, to be roused in the dead dark time of the small hours by this horrible outcry. Suddenly Dick jumped. 'Chippy!' he whispered breathlessly, '_there's someone about. I hear them._' Both boys listened with strained ears, and caught distinctly the sound of light footfalls near at hand. '_Theer's more'n one,_' gasped Chippy. The gentle, creeping footfalls came nearer and nearer in the darkness. 'G-g-gimme the chopper!' whispered the Raven, and his voice was shaking.