He parted the cane thicket, and immediately all about him began the rustle and subtle movement of living things in concealment. He recalled in a flash that something very like this had preceded that whirring through the air, and that thud into flesh that had announced the attempt on himself and the death of Mindjee, back at the stockade gate. But no tangible obstacle fell in his way this time. It was a voice, sounding ghostly in the whispering canes, from an invisible yet very close speaker.
"You no go, sar. Go back. Fren' for you say it."
"Now by James, that's enough!" swore the sailor, leaping straight in the direction of the voice. "Come out here and let's see who's running this Pepper's Ghost hoodle!" With the challenge he pulled his pistol.
He found nothing and nobody. But from the spot he had just vacated came the same voice again.
"You no shoot, sar. You shoot fren's, dat's all. Go back."
"I go back when I see what this humbug means. I'll shoot man or animal that runs across my bows!"
Barry stumbled forward, and again the subtle rustling surrounded him, but no voice now. The sound seemed to vibrate and run before him, yet faster than he could travel afoot. Then, so suddenly that it startled him, he came alongside a stout tree, and other voices sounded,—voices of white people. For the moment he was at a loss; then the truth flashed upon him and he looked up into the umbrageous foliage of the tree.
Above his head almost—he was still in the shade of the cane brake—he discerned the platform of a rough tree-dwelling from which depended a vine-stem ladder, steadied by pegs driven into the ground at the base of the trunk. And, peering over the rim of the platform, like a sailor looking over the edge of a ship's spreading top, he saw Miss Sheldon, displeasure clouding her face. Another face was at the Mission girl's shoulder, and impatience was the most prominent emotion on it. Barry had time to recognize Mrs. Goring in that second apparition; then swift and silent as a cobra's attack he was taken from behind.
No word was spoken. Arms like steel bands smothered his limbs; his pistol hand was snatched back irresistibly, yet, he noticed even then, with no violence, and the weapon was taken from his powerless fingers. A piece of coarse cloth was flung over his head; vicelike hands gripped his ankles; he was borne with no apparent effort from the spot.
After a brief initial struggle, Barry resigned himself to his captors perforce. Where he was bound for was beyond conjecture; he only heard, faintly through his hood, the cheeping and rustling of the canes; bush tendrils swept along his body and told him that he was being carried through the trackless part of the jungle. His journey was short. In ten minutes he was laid on the ground, still with no word from his captors, and in two long breaths no sound remained near him except the voices of the foliage. He lay still a moment, wondering what his fate was to be; then, involuntarily, he moved in his bonds, and found they were loose; he was unfettered.