me back.

How to do this, or how to take with him the treasure of the Incas, was a
puzzling question with which the captain racked his brains by day and by
night. At last he bethought himself of the Rackbirds' vessel. He
remembered that Maka had told him that provisions were brought to them by
a vessel, and there was every reason to suppose that when these
miscreants went on some of their marauding expeditions they travelled by
sea. Day by day he had thought that he would go and visit the Rackbirds'
storehouse and the neighborhood thereabout, but day by day he had been
afraid that in his absence Rynders might arrive, and when he came he
wanted to be there to meet him.

But now the idea of the boat made him brave this possible contingency,
and early one morning, with Cheditafa and two other of the black fellows,
he set off along the beach for the mouth of the little stream which,
rising somewhere in the mountains, ran down to the cavern where it had
once widened and deepened into a lake, and then through the ravine of the
Rackbirds on to the sea. When he reached his destination, Captain Horn
saw a great deal to interest him.

Just beyond the second ridge of rock which Maka had discovered, the
stream ran into a little bay, and the shores near its mouth showed
evident signs that they had recently been washed by a flood. On points of
rock and against the sides of the sand mounds, he saw bits of debris from
the Rackbirds' camp. Here were sticks which had formed the timbers of
their huts; there were pieces of clothing and cooking-utensils; and here
and there, partly buried by the shifting sands, were seen the bodies of
Rackbirds, already desiccated by the dry air and the hot sun of the
region. But the captain saw no vessel.

"Dat up here," said Cheditafa. "Dey hide dat well. Come 'long, captain."

Following his black guide, the captain skirted a little promontory of
rocks, and behind it found a cove in which, well concealed, lay the
Rackbirds' vessel. It was a sloop of about twenty tons, and from the
ocean, or even from the beach, it could not be seen. But as the captain
stood and gazed upon this craft his heart sank. It had no masts nor
sails, and it was a vessel that could not be propelled by oars.

Wading through the shallow water,--for it was now low tide,--the captain
climbed on board. The deck was bare, without a sign of spar or sail, and
when, with Cheditafa's help, he had forced the entrance of the little
compan