"True."
Without mentioning his intentions, or saying a word to any of his friends, the detective passed his arm through that of the goatherd and walked away.
Little conversation passed.
The detective was full of hopeful anxiety about the capture of Hunston; and as for the goatherd, it may be presumed that the loss of his goats afforded him plenty of food for silent reflection.
They passed the place where Tomaso was captured, and then turned aside out of the road into a dense wood which covered the side of a rocky hill.
It appeared as though the old goatherd was "out of condition," as the athletes say; at all events, the scramble up the rough path brought on a loud and distressing cough.
"Be quiet," said Pike; "you will alarm them."
"No fear of that, signor; we are more than a mile from the den of the villains."
So they scrambled and climbed away, till at length they reached a place where Pike found it necessary to use hands as well as feet to make progress.
He had just put up both hands to grasp a boulder over which it was necessary to climb, when, to his intense astonishment, each wrist was grasped by a couple of strong hands, and in another moment he was forcibly dragged up.