“What I’m very much afraid of is this,” remarked Mr. Triggs, “that when their first panic is worn off, they’ll remember about us, and send out search parties with the bloodhounds to hunt us down.”
“They won’t go within a good many cable-lengths of the wolcano, that you may bet your bottom dollar,” said Ned with a laugh. “By the piper, they was in a high old funk, and no mistake! I never see’d the like in my life before. They ran like riggers, the swabs.”
“Small blame to ’em,” cried Mr. Triggs emphatically. “I felt as green as a hadji’s turban myself, I can tell you; and as to running, I think we ourselves put our best foot foremost when once we got clear of the cave.”
“I don’t know about your feeling green, Mr. Gunner, beggin’ your parding for bein’ personal, so to speak,” said my coxswain with a grim smile, “but you sartinly looked a bit white about the gills.”
Mr. Triggs looked a little indignant at this facetiousness on Ned’s part, but the current of our thoughts was suddenly turned into another channel.
The volcano was evidently increasing in activity. The roar of the reports, the hissing of steam, and other frightful noises doubled in intensity, and the solid earth beneath us shook with violent tremors. Even showers of stones and mud began to fall about us, and the descending clouds of ashes became like a heavy rain or a fall of snow.
A really awe-inspiring darkness began to enwrap us as with a sable cloak. It was no time to be talking. We must act, and that promptly, or our fate would be sealed for ever.
We sprang to our feet, and it was at this moment that Mr. Triggs was struck upon the right shoulder by a volcanic stone.
“Why, this is as bad as being under fire!” he cried, rubbing the injured part. “Carry on, Ned. Act as guide, like a good fellow, and try to steer for the coast on the opposite side of the island from the creek.”
“Right you are, sir; I’ll do my best, and no man can’t do more than that. We’ll give the lagoon a good wide berth most sartinly.”