Down, down he went; past rooms where all was dark, skinning his knees upon the sharp edges of stone, bumping and swaying, but nearing ground at every yard, and with the breath of sweet night air upon his cheek.
And so at last, without misadventure, he reached the inner courtyard, and looked about for the cart of hay.
The dawn was not far distant now, and he crept about the place feeling his way, seeing but dimly, and fearful that there was no cart at all.
At last, however, some ten yards away, his hand touched a wheel. With a gasp of relief he ran his fingers through soft wisps of hay over his head. Then climbing up, he wormed his way beneath a bundle of horse-cloths, and waited for the morning.
The cart had apparently unloaded and was ready to leave the fort. Fortunately for Rob the cloths were heavy, and the horses' nose-bags and other articles made sufficient to entirely conceal his presence. But how Muckle John could hope to avert suspicion falling on such an obvious place of concealment, he could not imagine.
Very gradually the grey, flickering lights of another day glimmered above the fort, and still there was no sound of alarm—no sign of Muckle John.
Now the side of the fort where Rob's cell lay was not much frequented until broad daylight, the sentry rarely coming so far along—an item with which Muckle John was well acquainted. Opposite this part the hill sloped upwards towards broken country, commanding a clear view from the walls.
It was not until seven o'clock, for the morning was dark and cold, that a man passing through the inner courtyard to water the horses saw the rope dangling down the wall, and with a frenzied shout brought the sentry at a run towards him.
"Prisoner escaped!" yelled the fellow.
With an answering cry the sentry raced away. A moment later a bugle sounded the call to arms. Clatter of muskets, hoarse voices, commands, questions, running footsteps—all the characteristic commotion of a sudden alarm—reached Rob in his hiding-place, and set him wondering whether Muckle John had failed him, or whether he had dreamed he heard the reed.