Almost at the same instant he heard a crashing sound in
the trees - a sound that died without an echo - and all was still.
The officer rose to his feet, trembling. The familiar sensation of an
abraded shin recalled his dazed faculties. Pulling himself together, he
ran obliquely away from the cliff to a point distant from its foot;
thereabout he expected to find his man; and thereabout he naturally
failed. In the fleeting instant of his vision his imagination had been
so wrought upon by the apparent grace and ease and intention of the
marvelous performance that it did not occur to him that the line of
march of aerial cavalry is directly downward, and that he could find the
objects of his search at the very foot of the cliff. A half-hour later
he returned to camp.
This officer was a wise man; he knew better than to tell an incredible
truth. He said nothing of what he had seen. But when the commander asked
him if in his scout he had learned anything of advantage to the
expedition, he answered:
"Yes, sir; there is no road leading down into this valley from the
southward.
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