The rest of the way to where we had left the companions of our trial was so narrow that by pressing cautiously forward I knew that we must encounter Garcia sooner or later.
As we reached the part where the track ran along a ledge we divided, Tom continuing to walk along the ledge to where it terminated in the rocky tongue over the great gulf, while my uncle and I, trembling for those we loved, continued our search by the side of the little stream till we were where the passage widened into the vault where the mules were concealed, when I stopped short, my uncle going forward to search the vault, while I stayed to cut off the enemy’s retreat, or to spring up the ledge to the help of Tom.
I heard my uncle’s whisper, and one or two timid replies, and then came an interval of anxious silence before my uncle crept back to me.
“I have been all over the place, as near as I can tell, Harry,” he whispered. “Can he have passed us?”
“Impossible!” I said. “Uncle, we must have a light.”
Without a word my uncle glided away; then I heard a
rustle as of paper; there was the faint glow of a match dipped in a phosphorus bottle, the illumination of a large loose piece of paper, and then a torch was lit, showing us Garcia standing upon the extreme verge of the rocky point over the gulf; and at the same moment he drew the trigger of a pistol, to produce only a flash of the pan, which revealed to him his perilous position.
“Señor Garcia!” I cried loudly, as I climbed up to join Tom on the ledge which he must pass, “you are standing with a great gulf behind and on either side. A step is certain death. You are our prisoner!”
With a howl like that of a wild beast he raised his other pistol and fired—the report echoing fearfully from the great abyss. Then, darting forward, he leaped upon Tom, overturned him, and the next moment he was upon me, and we were in a deadly embrace, rolling down the side of the ledge, over and over in our fierce struggle, till we reached the little stream, whose waters were soon foaming around us.