“This is my only chance,” said Dick, as he rose to his feet. “There will be darkness for a few minutes, and then the moon will be up. I must make a bold dash for it.”
He swung the rifle back on to his shoulders, drew his sword and revolver, and struck off across the clearing in the direction of the stockade.
Chapter Eight.
Besiegers and Besieged.
It was intensely dark in the clearing, as our hero struck into it, but by contrast with the shadows in the depths of the forest it was light, so that he could see a few feet before him. He could distinguish vaguely the outline of the rocky crest near the summit of which the stockade was posted, and beyond it and to one side the dull black band of the encircling forest. In one direction there was a faint glimmer in the sky, the herald of the rising moon, while a glare rose above the stockade, not intense, to be sure, but sufficient to tell him that a fire was burning there.
“Then they are not alarmed,” he whispered, in tones of delight. “They are cooking their evening meal, which reminds me that I am hungry and thirsty, too. I must move on. Hullo!”
He fell like a stone, and lay with his body pressed close to the ground, for his ear caught a sound, and his eye detected a figure on his right. In that semi-darkness it looked huge and weird in shape, and might have been an ox or any other animal. But the low tones of men talking showed him that it must be the enemy, and caused him to grip his sword with extra determination.
“Hoot! Hoot!” Once more he heard the call of the night owl, the same cry as had awakened him when ascending the Pra, and which had aroused his suspicion. It seemed certain that this was the signal commonly used by the Ashantis, just as it had been for many and many a year by the Red Indians of America. “Hoot! Hoot!”