After waiting a few moments in silence Larkin spoke.
“Look a-here, Sam,” he said gruffly, but in a low voice, “we’ve took some gold and other stuff, as ye know; but we ain’t goin’ to do murder unless we has to. If you’ve got sense enough to keep still for a solid hour, an’ make no fuss, you’ll live to get as much gold, or more, as we’ve just grabbed. But if you try to raise the camp, or foller us, I’ll kill you before you know it. Now, I’m goin’ to stand outside the door for a solid hour—you lay still an’ count sixty seconds to a minute an’ sixty minutes to an hour. If you move before that, you’re a dead one; after the hour ye can howl all ye please, and the louder the better. I ought to stick a knife into you now; but I guess I’ll wait outside the door, an’ see if you mind what I tell you.”
Then with a threatening flourish of his pistol, he slunk away, and as soon as he was outside the door I rose up and followed.
I knew he was lying, well enough, and that his threats were merely meant to terrify me into keeping silent until he escaped. He considered me a mere boy, and believed I would be too frightened to cause him any trouble.
But where could he and his fellow thieves go? How could they penetrate the wild thicket? That was the question that puzzled me. And then I remembered that Daggett was with them, who was reputed to be able to travel at will throughout the interior of the island.
When I reached the door and looked around I could at first see no signs of the man who had just left me. Then I discovered a dark form creeping along the edge of the jungle, and at once I sprang into the shade myself and crept after him. He was going slowly, and in my eagerness I closed up most of the distance between us, until I was dangerously near. But he did not look around, and while my eyes were fastened upon him he dropped to his knees, pushed aside a thick bush, and disappeared into the thicket.
That was all the information I wanted, just then; so I hastily marked the place by heaping a mound of sand before the bush, and then ran back to my hut as fast as I could go. I was terribly humiliated at being robbed so coolly of the gold that had been placed in my care, and rashly resolved that I would recover it by my own efforts, without disturbing the slumbers of my uncle or the Major. So, entering the hut, I secured three revolvers, of the Colt type, and several boxes of cartridges for them, all of which I had secretly smuggled from the ship and hidden among the groceries, for the Major had forbidden any of our crew having fire-arms. I had thought that an emergency might arise, some time, when these revolvers would be useful to us, and now I blessed my foresight in secreting them.
Having secured the weapons I ran quickly to the hut of Nux and Bryonia, and cautiously awakened them. At my first touch Bry sprang into the air and alighted on his feet.
“What’s matter, Mars Sam?” he demanded.
“I’ve been robbed, Bry!” I panted.