“We rowed with muffled oars to the beach near the haunted forest, and drew up our boat under some banana-trees; then, silent as the red men of the North American forests, we made our way towards the bridge.
“The moon was about five days old, and served to give us all the light we desired. We took advantage of every bush and thicket, and finally, when within seventy yards of the river—the hustling and roaring of which we could distinctly hear—we dispatched little Fitz to reconnoitre.
“He returned in a few minutes and reported all safe, and no one on watch upon the bridge.
“We marched now in Indian file, taking care not even to snap a twig, lest we should arouse the slumbering foe. I do not know how long we took to reach the cave. To me, in my terror and anxiety, it seemed a year. They were there, and safe.
“We waited not a moment to speak. I lifted the young lady in my arms. How light she was! James escorted the elder, sometimes carrying her, sometimes permitting her to walk.
“Then the journey back was commenced.
“But in the open a glimmer of moonlight fell on the face of the beautiful burden I bore. She had fainted. That I could see at a glance.
“But something more I saw, and, seeing, tottered and nearly fell; for hers was the same lovely and childlike face I had seen that evening, which now appeared so long ago, in the Liverpool theatre.
“I felt now as if walking in the air. But I cannot describe or express my feelings, being only a sailor, and so must not attempt to.
“We might have still been a hundred yards from the bridge and river, when suddenly there rang out behind and on each side of us the most awful yells I had ever listened to, while the beating of tom-toms, or war-drums, sounded all over the eastern part of the island.