, so that I could not cast off the
bandage from my eyes.

"`So you are not going to carry me to foreign parts,' said I, for I
thought, as they didn't mind killing my officer, they would think
nothing of sending me over the cliffs also.

"`We've changed our minds,' said they, `and can't be troubled with you;
so ask no questions.'

"I didn't like the answer at all, for I made sure they was going to do
away with me somehow; but, as I couldn't help myself, I was not going to
show them what a funk I was in; so I pretended to whistle, quite happy
like. I had been whistling away some time, when I thought I heard their
footsteps moving off; and so it proved; for when I next sung out to
them, no one answered. I called them all manner of names, and
blackguarded them like fun; but it didn't make them angry, because, you
see, there was no one there to hear me. At last, when I'd grown hoarse
with hallooing after them, I thought I might as well go to sleep a bit,
seeing as how I couldn't manage to move, or to cast off the lashings
round my arms. How long I slept I don't know; but I was woke up by
hearing some one hail me, and I soon knew that they were some of the
cutter's people. When they got up to me, and cast off the handkerchief
from my eyes, then I found I had been sitting not ten feet above the
beach, and directly opposite where the cutter is brought up. That, your
honour, is all I know about it; but who the people are who played us the
trick, or whereabouts the cave is, is more than I can say."

"Do not you think that we might manage to discover the cave, though?"
asked the Commander.

"No, sir, certainly not," answered Stretcher, positively. "It may be
close to us, or it may be five miles off. To my mind, it's some very
clever hide; and those who took us there knew very well we should never
find it again."

"We must see about that," observed my uncle. "By-the-bye, Stretcher, I
gave you some things to take charge of; where are they?"

"Here, sir; they never overhauled my pockets, which shows that they have
some manners, at all events," said Jack, producing a pistol, a
handkerchief, and a card. My uncle took the card, and on it were
written the words, "This is the way we punish informers and traitors."

"Perhaps, sir, you don't know who the man was who took the lead of the
rest in the cave," said Stretcher.

"Who was he?" asked the Commander.

"No other than Bill Myers himself," answered Jack. I knew him