Beyond it the dark trunks stretched back, a stupendous colonnade, into the shadow again.

There was nothing unusual in all this, but the man had seen something that made him check his breathing and set his lips.

He knew he might be mistaken, but the glint he had caught for a moment suggested the barrel of a rifle.
He stood, as he realized instinctively, in the shadow with a great trunk behind him, and remained so, motionless, with his blood tingling, because the bushman knows the difficulty of catching the outline of anything that is still.

Then there was a soft snapping, and the glint became visible, in another place, again, while Alton saw that he was not mistaken.

He was also aware that the free prospector does not usually wait the approach of a stranger in silence with the rifle, and it flashed upon him that as the other man had moved there would in place of a shadowy trunk now be a patch of snow behind him.