e of an enormous sausage. The two
men lowered it without much caution; it was heavy but rather limp. Then
came another exactly like the first, which they also lowered into the
boat, and a moment later Don Antonino came over the side as quickly and
noiselessly as he had gone up, and shoved off quietly into the
starlight.

Half an hour later he ran alongside of a narrow ledge of rock,
apparently quite inaccessible from the land above, but running up along
the cliff in such a way that, in case of danger from the sea, a man
could get well out of reach of the breakers. He went ashore, taking the
end of his own coil of rope with him. He made it fast in the dark
shadow, and he must have known the place very well, for there was but
one small hole running under a stone wedged in a cleft of the rock,
through which he could pass the line. He got back into the boat.

"Get ashore, boys," he said, "and wait here. If you see a revenue boat,
with coast guards in it, coming towards you as though the men wanted to
speak to you, cast off the end of the rope and let it run into the sea.
Then run up the ledge there, and climb the rock, the faster the better.
There is a way up. But keep out of sight when it is day, by lying flat
in the hollow there. If anybody else comes in a boat, and says nothing,
but just takes the rope, do not hinder him. Let him take it, and he will
take you too, and give you a couple of biscuits."

Don Antonino pushed off a little, letting the rope run out. Then he
made his end of it fast to the two ends of the black bundles, and
backing out as far as he could, he let them both down gently into the
water, and pulled away, leaving the Children of the King alone on the
ledge. He had managed to bring the rope down through the cleft, so that
it could not easily be seen from the sea. The boys waited some time
before either of them spoke, although the old fellow was deaf.

"Those things looked like dead men," said Sebastiano at last.

"But they are not," answered Ruggiero confidently. "Now I know why Don
Antonino is so rich. He smuggles tobacco."

"If we could smuggle tobacco, too, it would be a fortune," remarked the
younger boy. "He would give us bread every day, with cheese, and wine to
drink."

"We shall see."

They sat a long time, waiting for something to happen, and then fell
asleep, curling themselves up in the hollow as they had been told to do.
At dawn they awoke and began to look out for the revenue boat.