“There is no sign of your comrade,” he said. “I asked the messenger particularly. He is not among either the prisoners or the fallen. Some of the Janissaries escaped, and evidently they have borne him with them. They will make their way to Athensi. We cannot stop them. They have broken down a bridge which we recently rebuilt across a deep chasm and for a time our advance is held up. Athensi lies many miles away, however, and we shall be able to gain the interior before fresh forces can be thrown against us. The Sacrificial Games still are more than a month away, and in the meantime something can be done toward effecting a rescue.”
With this, Jepthah returned to Captain Amanassar’s side, while Mr. Hampton joined the boys.
He reported that Captain Amanassar was going forward to join the revolutionaries, a portion of whom would be sent back to clear the pass so that the horses could be taken into the mountains. Aware now that betrayal of their plans by spies of the Oligarchy in their ranks had been more general than supposed, Captain Amanassar found it necessary to re-arrange his campaign.
Originally, he had intended entirely to abandon Korakum. Its peculiar position, in an outer valley, leading only by the Great Road to the desert and by the subterranean river to Athensi, made it a poor basis of operations from which to conduct a revolution among the countrymen of the many interior valleys and plateaus against the central authority of the Oligarchy. All this he and Jepthah had explained to Mr. Hampton. By placing a guard over the pass just captured, the revolutionaries would be able to prevent any forces sent out from Athensi via the river and Korakum from attacking them in the rear.
A chance suggestion made by Mr. Hampton had taken root. If the spies, as now was apparent, had betrayed the revolutionists’ plans, then the Oligarchs would not be looking for attack from Korakum along the subterranean river. Therefore, Mr. Hampton had suggested the possibility of making such an attack at a later date in conjunction with an attack in force from the field.
“They expect,” he told the boys, “to be able to raise a considerable army of ten thousand or more countrymen, for the country groans under the misrule of the Oligarchs and is ripe for revolution. It awaits only the coming of a leader supported by determined captains, and in Captain Amanassar and his hundred men I feel certain such leaders have been found.”
Accordingly, it had been decided not to abandon Korakum entirely, but to place a guard over the subterranean river for the purpose of capturing any Janissaries who might negotiate its passage from the interior, and of retaining control of that underground water thoroughfare to Athensi.
Mr. Hampton, the boys and the Arabs were to form a portion of this guard, as Jack’s father had assured Captain Amanassar he would co-operate with the revolutionaries, at least as long as there was a possibility of effecting Bob’s rescue.
“It is pretty certain,” he explained, “that Bob was captured to participate in the Sacrificial Games. Such being the case, his life will be jealously guarded until the time of the Games arrives. That gives us a full month more. Certainly, some way of saving him will develop in that time. Perhaps, the revolutionists will be successful and then, of course, the men destined to participate in the Games will be set free.”
Jack and Frank could do nothing except acquiesce gloomingly.