The Argosy, January 1907 — page 31: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

IN THE DEPTHS OF DISASTER. Here we had no chance of accomplishing anything. But we knew well that if we went into this undertaking with the assassin of our uncle we must keep ourselves on the alert every moment to guard against some treachery. He could trust our word of honor. We could not trust his. And so, at last, we decided to accept our enemy’s offer. José at once took us into his confi- dence. He showed us where he had rubbed the rope that bound his hands against the gun-carriage until two of the strands were partly cut in two. ‘Now I can break it when I wish,” he said proudly, “‘ I am so strong.” He planned to wait until it had grown dark, then release himself and afterward us. He had a knife in his pocket and with this he would cut off a rope from one of the coils at hand long enough to let us down into the water without any telltale splash. After that it remained only to swim the half mile to the shore. As to that, there would be no difh- culty, for the tide would be near the full an hour after dark. Afterward, we must follow the coast south until we could dis- cover and steal a seaworthy boat. The plan seemed simple enough, and Billy and I approved it with glad hearts. José said nothing of sharks, or of other difficulties. It had been a long time dark, and I began to fear that some hitch had oc- curred. ‘There was no guard near, and I was anxious to begin the flight. Then I heard a whisper in my ear: ‘“ Be quiet. Now is the time.” CHAPTER VIII. GETTING BACK AT JOSE. I couLD see the huge figure of the out- law dimly and felt the touch of steel as the knife-blade slipped through the rope that bound-me. In another instant the three of us were at the side of the ship, where José showed us the rope dangling down to the water. Without a sound the outlaw clambered over and then down, and so disappeared from our sight. I was the next. With the utmost care to avoid any noise, I imitated our leader’s movements, 213 and after a short hand-under-hand de- scent I found my feet in the water. An- other instant, and only my head was above the waves. Yet I held on to the rope as I found José was doing, lest I be swept away. from the ship before Billy came. In half a minute more, however, my brother was at my side and the three of us, close together, let ourselves drift on the hurrying waves. It was dark as pitch and we rested each a hand on the other’s shoulder to avoid separating. But José assured us that it was impos- sible for us to go wrong, since the tide must carry us to the beach which ran for miles along this coast. There was no outcry from the vessel and this cheered us, for it meant that our flight was not yet discovered, and every minute gained was of value. If we could but reach the shore before the ship’s searchlight sought us out we would have a fair chance of escape. And so, as fate willed it, the thing came about. A great wave swept us high on the beach. We scrambled to our feet and hurried on through the darkness at top speed until we entered a jungle. Here we were soon forced to a halt by the tangled growths, but we dared hope we had gone far enough to conceal us from any prying eyes evén with lanterns, and so we sank down to rest. We took no thought of snakes or other evil crea- tures, but stretched amid the grasses of the spot and fell sound asleep. TY was awakened by José an hour be- fore sunrise, and at once the three of us made our way back out of the jungle, to the open country along the shore. This we followed toward the south for some time without seeing anything to arouse our apprehensions. We could catch occasional glimpses of the battle-ship, which still remained at anchor. But we began to suffer severely from hunger and could find nothing that offered a chance of a meal. As Billy and I had had only a few hurried mouthfuls early the day before and had endured much since that scanty repast, we were in a bad way, and were unable to proceed at other than a slow pace, to José’s obvious disgust. Luckily we found a small stream of clear water and were able to drink our fill. ’ COPMICLOOKS (F@)