Chapter Eighteen.
Free!
It was a slim, grey-haired, military looking man who listened to these words with the light of one of the lanterns full upon his face, which contracted into a heavy frown.
“You challenged them—warned them well?”
“Again and again, sir. It was not until they were right down here, after the sergeant had been hurt, that we fired.”
The governor, for he it was, shrugged his shoulders and gave his orders. Then four of the most active of the warders began to descend, lanterns in hand, each looking like a spark on the face of the black rock.
The task was so perilous that at the end of a few minutes the governor ordered the men to halt, while ropes were fetched, and in due time these were brought and secured to the climbers’ waists, the ropes being paid out by the warders on the shelf, the light of the lanterns being now supplemented by the blue lights held in the sterns of the fast approaching cutters.
“Ahoy, there, ashore!” was shouted by the officer in one of the boats; “men escaping?”
“Yes; three,” was shouted back. “Row to and fro, and see if you can make out a man swimming.”