“I must be at the foot of the way in,” thought Archy, as he felt a rope passed round him, and the next minute it tightened, he was raised from his feet, and the rope cut into him painfully as he felt himself hauled up. Then hands seized him, and he was thrown down on the grass, while the last rope was cast off.
As he lay there being untied, though his eyes were blinded, his ears were busy, and he listened to the smothered sounds of the trap being fastened and the stones being drawn over it again.
“Trap-door—door into a trap,” he thought. “Where am I going now? Surely they would not kill me.”
A cold chill shot through him, but he mastered the feeling of terror as he felt himself dragged to his feet.
“Now, then, keep step,” the same gruff voice said; and, with apparently half a dozen men close by him, as far as he could judge by their mutterings and the dull sound of their feet over the grass, he was marched on for over an hour—hearing nothing, seeing nothing, but all the while with his ears strained, waiting for an opportunity to appeal for help, in spite of the threats he had heard, as soon as he could tell by the voices that he was near people who were not of the smugglers’ gang.
But no help seemed to be at hand, and, as far as he could judge, he was being taken along the fields and rough ground near the edge of the wild cliffs, now near the sea, now far away. At one time he could hear the dull thud and dash of waves, for a good brisk breeze was blowing, and he fancied that he had a glint of a star through the thick covering, but he was not sure. Then the sound of the waves on the shore was completely hushed, and he felt that they must either be down in a hollow, or going farther and farther away inland.
Twice this happened, and the third time, as all was still, and he could feel a hard road beneath his feet, he became sure. There was an echoing sound from their footsteps, dull to him, but still plain, and it seemed as if they were down in some narrow cutting or rift, when all at once! Just in front, after the men about him had been talking more loudly, as if clear of danger, there rang out a stern—
“Halt—stand!”
There was a hasty exclamation. Then came in the loud, gruff voice,—
“Back, lads, quick!”