"'Spose yo gib Sam de painter, den swim or wade ashore. Easy pull de launch right up to de tree, den see wheder we can get past um. If too much in de way, den put Tom oberboard. Him lift de tree away. If crocodile dere, no matter; Tom very good to eat."
The little man grinned at the big negro, while the latter shook an enormous fist at him, and bared his teeth in just that same manner as had had such effect upon Jaime de Oteros. But Sam recked little of the signal.
"Yo one big, hulkin' nigger, yo," he grinned. "Yo eat wonderful nice and tasty."
Meanwhile Jim had been careful to reverse his engine, and lay with his machinery out of gear, awaiting further orders.
"Steady ahead! just a few revolutions!" commanded the Major. "Enough! That has brought us right up to the tree. Now, can one pass by it?"
The dusk was already falling outside, while here, beneath the trees which clung in luxuriant profusion to the banks on either side of the entrance to the river, it was already so dark that a white man was troubled. Neither the Major, nor Jim, nor the policemen, could detect much of their surroundings, but in the case of Sam it might have been brilliant daytime. He peered over the edge of the launch, then flopped full length on to the tiny deck she carried forward, and, pushing himself over the side, finally gripped the tree with one hand, his weight suspended between the latter and the launch. A startled cry came from him, a cry which brought Tom labouring up beside him.
"Yo hurt yoself?" he demanded abruptly. "Hi, yo, Sam, what de matter?"
"Massa Jim, we got um! We bottled dem men up fine and safe. Dey good as hanged. Dey jest as well might be dancin' on thin air at dis very instant."
Sam ignored the huge negro—in fact ignored everyone aboard save Jim—in his anxiety to make a report direct to his master. "Yo see here," he called out, turning slightly so as to be able to look aft, and still clinging half to the launch and half to the fallen tree. "Yo come along and look fo yoself. Tom, yo great big elephant, yo git along to one side. There ain't no sorter room for a person when yo's hereabouts."
There was an air of suppressed excitement about the little fellow which caused Jim to leave his engine and hasten forward.