“Be content that your life is still spared, boy. It was in wrenching the pistol from you that Flavia caused the accidental shooting of Donatus. I feared you would be slain for that. The girl, the Englishman, and the hated American boy are in the cave. They are guarded. Donatus is sorely wounded and may die. Pray the gods that we may escape with our lives.”
“And is this Donatus the man you befriended?” exclaimed Maro bitterly.
“Hush, you fool!” warned Tyrus; but the eyes of Donatus were closed and he seemed to be sleeping.
Brad Buckhart had looked around for Flavia and Cavendish. In the blackness of the cave he could see nothing. The men who escorted him left him, after warning him that he would be shot down the moment he tried to step forth, unless given permission to do so.
Then they departed. He saw their forms silhouetted for a moment against the glow of the fire as they passed from the mouth of the cave. Then the guard’s dark figure paced slowly across the opening.
“Well, here I am!” muttered the Texan. “I sure opine I’m in a right bad scrape, and I’ll have to depend hugely on my pard to pull me out.”
“It is indeed a bad scrape you are in,” said the voice of a person near at hand in the darkness of the place. “How in the world did you get here?”
“Hello!” cried the Texan, in surprise and satisfaction. “Is that your gentle warble I hear, Cavendish?”
“Yes, I am Charles Cavendish, a free-born Englishman, here held captive by these dirty Greek brigands! Some one will pay dearly for it, too!”
“Fighting mad, I see,” half chuckled Buckhart. “Well, old man, this comes of monkeying round the Maid of Athens.”