"And those dead leaves and sticks in the hole there by the stump of that old tree?"
"I say, Bevis," as Bevis settled himself down again. "Bevis, don't go to sleep."
In a minute Bevis was fast asleep. He always slept quickly, and the heat and the exertion made him forget himself still quicker.
Mark was alone. He felt without going nearer that Bevis was asleep, and dared not wake him lest he should be called a coward. He moved a little way so as to have the oak more at his back, and to get a clearer view on all sides. Then he looked up at the sky, and whistled very low. Pan, who was half asleep too, got up slowly, and came to him; but finding that there was nothing to eat, and disliking to be stroked and patted on such a hot day, he went back to his old place, the barest spot he could find, mere dry ground.
Mark sat, bow and arrow ready in his hand, the arrow on the string, with the spear beside him, and his pocket-knife with the big blade open, and looked into the jungle. It was still and silent. The chafer had got loose, and there was nothing but the hum overhead. He kept the strictest watch, scarce allowing himself to blink his eyes. Now he looked steadily into the brushwood he could see some distance, his glance found a way through between the boughs, till presently, after he had searched out those crevices, he could command a circle of view.
Like so many slender webs his lines of sight thus drawn through mere chinks of foliage radiated from a central spot, and at the end of each he seemed as if he could feel if anything moved as much as he could see it. Each of these webs strained at his weary mind, and even in the shade the strong glare of the summer noon pressed heavily on his eyelids. Had anything moved, a bird or moth, or had the leaves rustled, it would have relieved him. This expectation was a continual effort. His eyes closed, he opened them, frowned and blinked; then he reclined on one arm as an easier position. His eyes closed, the shrill midsummer hum sounded low and distant, then loud, suddenly it ceased--he was asleep.
The sunburnt woodbine, the oaks dotted with coppery leaves where the second shoot appeared, the ash-poles rising from the hollow stoles, and whose pale sprays touching above formed a green surface, hazel with white nuts, stiff, ragged thistles on the stream bank, burrs with brown-tipped hooks, the hard dry ground, all silent, fixed, held in the light.