We can lie on a bed of
them, wrapped up in them we can cower under them, we can even pull our
heads under and be invisible if we hear footsteps approaching. You keep
still."
He then stood up and went off. After a time he returned with a great
armful of leaves, which he threw into the niche. After many trips he had
the niche almost full of fairly dry dead leaves. By this time the warmth
of the sun was making itself felt and I stood up and stretched myself. I
did not feel weak, but my shoulder and hip, where the drain-pipe had torn
me, and the sole of my foot, where Agathemer had bitten me, were decidedly
painful. Agathemer, solicitously, steadied me on my feet and led me to the
streamside. There I seated myself on a convenient rock and he bathed my
foot, hip and shoulder. There was no sign of puffiness or heat in any of
the three wounds, but all three were raw and sore. We had nothing with
which to dress them and Agathemer merely dried them as well as he could by
patting them.
Meanwhile, even in my misery and despair, even hungry, weak and cold and
in pain as I was, I could not but feel a gleam of pleasure at the
enchanting beauty of the woodland scene about our hiding place. I gazed up
at the bits of blue sky between the sunlit boughs, at the canopy of green,
at the tenderer green of the underwood, at the carpet of grass, ferns,
sedges and flowering plants which hid the earth and I almost rejoiced at
its loveliness.
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