n set off at their best speed back to
their rendezvous.

After they had discovered that there were people in the cave, they had
not thought of entering. They were not fully armed, and they did not
know how many persons were inside. But they knew one thing, and that was
that these shipwrecked people--for that was what they must be--kept a
very poor watch, and if the whole band came on the following night, the
affair would probably be settled with but very little trouble, no matter
how large the party in the cave might be. It was not necessary to look
any further for the escaped negro. Of course, he had been picked up by
these people.

The three beasts reached their camp about daybreak, and everybody was
soon awakened and the tale was told.

"It is a comfort," said the leader, lighting the stump of a black pipe
which he thrust under his great mustache, and speaking in his native
tongue, which some of them understood, and others did not, "to know that
to-night's work is all cut out for us. Now we can take it easy to-day,
and rest our bones. The order of the day is to keep close. No straggling,
nor wandering. Keep those four niggers up in the pigeonhole. We will do
our own cooking to-day, for we can't afford to run after any more of
them. Lucky the fellow who got away can't speak English, for he can't
tell anything about us, any more than if he was an ape. So snooze to-day,
if you want to. I will give you work to do for to-night."

CHAPTER VII

GONE!

That morning, when the party in the cavern had had their breakfast, with
some hot tea made on a spiritlamp which Mrs. Cliff had brought, and had
looked cautiously out at the sunlit landscape, and the sea beyond,
without seeing any signs or hearing any sound of wicked men, there came
a feeling of relief. There was, indeed, no great ground for such a
feeling, but as the Rackbirds had not come the day before nor during the
night, perhaps they would not come at all. It might be they did not care
whether the black man ran away or not. But Captain Horn did not relax
his precautions. He would take no chances, and would keep up a watch day
and night.

When, on the night before, the time had come for Ralph's watch to end,
his sister had awakened him, and when the captain, in his turn, was
aroused, he had not known that it was not the boy who had kept watch
during his sleep.

In the course of the morning Mrs. Cliff and Edna, having been filled
with an intense desire t