at some one had been watching him all the time.

To struggle with them would only have been to throw away his life; so,
with his heart full of despair, Ali allowed himself to be pressed back
to his old position, where he lay down, his captor telling him savagely
that the orders were to kill him if he attempted to escape.

"And we shall," said the Malay, "sooner than lose you."

His words were uttered in a tone of voice, that told his hearer of the
sincerity of that which was spoken. Ali knew the character of the
Malays too well to entertain any doubt. There would not be the
slightest compunction in the matter; and knowing this, he lay there
watching the men, as they slowly settled down once more around the
blazing dammar-torch they had replenished.

One coolly replaced his kris, and proceeded to get ready his betel for a
fresh chew, calmly taking a sirih leaf, spreading upon it a little
creamy lime from a tiny box, and rolling in it a scrap of nut, his
red-stained teeth looking ogre-like in the torch-light.

Another set-to and prepared to smoke, making himself a pipe in a very
few minutes out of a piece of green bamboo, cutting it off close to the
joint, and then a little above it for a bowl, in one side of which he
made a hole, and thrust in a little reed for a stem. In this sylvan
pipe he placed some broken leaf of the coarse Malay tobacco, and began
to smoke contentedly; while the third watcher helped himself to a piece
of sugar-cane, and began peeling off the harsh, siliceous envelope, and
then eating the sweet soft interior.

The leader had at once lain down, and seemed to have gone off to sleep;
but of that Ali could not be sure.

He had failed; but Ali was not yet disheartened, and he lay there,
thinking that he would risk life over and over again to warn his
friends; but still he had to consider that if he lost his life he would
not be serving them in the slightest degree, even if they should see his
disfigured body float down.

What could he do?

If he had only possessed a little _toobah_, that creeping plant whose
roots the Malays used for drugging the fish, some of that, he thought,
infused in the food of his guards, would send them into a state of
stupefaction, and give him time to escape.

He smiled directly after as he thought of this, and lay back wearily,
thinking of what folly it was to form such bubble-like ideas; for of
course it would have been impossible, even had he possessed the drug