He entered the hut and was in the act of pulling off his boots, when a distant shot rang sharply through the air. It was magnified tenfold by the intense silence. For a few seconds that seemed to be minutes he listened, cherishing the quick thought that perhaps a turtle, wandering far beyond accustomed limits, had disturbed one of the spring-gun communications on the sands. A sputtering volley, which his trained ear recognized as the firing of muzzle-loaders, sounded the death-knell of his last hope.
The Dyaks had landed! Coming silently and mysteriously in the dead of night, they were themselves the victims of a stratagem they designed to employ. Instead of taking the occupants of Rainbow Island unawares they were startled at being greeted by a shot the moment they landed. The alarmed savages at once retaliated by firing their antiquated weapons point-blank at the trees, thus giving warning enough to wake the Seven Sleepers.
Iris, fully dressed, was out in a moment.
"They have come!" she whispered.
"Yes," was the cheery answer, for Jenks face to face with danger was a very different man to Jenks wrestling with the insidious attacks of Cupid. "Up the ladder! Be lively! They will not be here for half an hour if they kick up such a row at the first difficulty. Still, we will take no risks. Cast down those spare lines when you reach the top and haul away when I say 'Ready!' You will find everything to hand up there."
He held the bottom of the ladder to steady it for the girl's climb. Soon her voice fell, like a message from a star—
"All right! Please join me soon!"
The coiled-up ropes dropped along the face of the rock. Clothes, pick, hatchet, hammer, crowbars, and other useful odds and ends were swung away into the darkness, for the moon as yet did not illumine the crag. The sailor darted into Belle Vue Castle and kicked their leafy beds about the floor. Then he slung all the rifles, now five in number, over his shoulders, and mounted the rope-ladder, which, with the spare cords, he drew up and coiled with careful method.
"By the way," he suddenly asked, "have you your sou'wester?"
"Yes."