To them the patches of moonlight were weird, unreal, the shadowy woods
held a sinister menace.
By the time they had reached the river's edge they were almost ready
to turn and run, But they conquered the impulse and pressed on. Then
suddenly they saw what they had hoped, yet dreaded, to see.
On the opposite bank, staring down into the rapids with a terrible
intentness, stood a man, or something that resembled a man. In one
awful, breath-taking minute they realized that here at last was the
"Thing."
As they watched, the hunched-up crouching figure on the opposite bank
made a lumbering movement forward as though about to throw itself into
the water at the foot of the falls.
"Oh!" screamed Betty, the words wrenched from her dry throat. "Don't
do that! You mustn't do that! Go back! For goodness' sake, go back!"
With a hoarse cry that answered her own, the "Thing" flung back from
the water's edge and disappeared into the darkness!
CHAPTER XVIII
SURPRISED
The Outdoor Girls could hardly have told how they got back to the
lodge after that, Blindly they stumbled through the underbrush,
expecting they knew not what horrible thing, thankful for the
moonlight that made it possible for them to hurry.
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