To continue the description of the coast at which we had arrived: immediately below us the ground fell away to a low-lying stretch of foreshore, which extended for nearly a mile between the end of our plateau and the sea. Half a mile west of us lay a deep ravine, which looked as if it would run into the creek entered by the motor-boat.
Along the sea and lined by the telegraph poles the main coast road wound its way. In the early evening Nobby, Looney, and Johnny went off to reconnoitre, but it was impossible to approach the coast by daylight because of the men moving about, and they had to return to the tower with little additional information. There were five tents for men and a larger one for horses, and though no guns were visible it was very probable that here was a section of a battery for dealing with any boat that might attempt to spy out the nakedness of the land. Two years before that time, Lord Rosebery's yacht, the Zaida, had been mined a few miles along the coast at a place called Ayasch Bay, which she had entered for the purpose of landing spies. Four of her officers had come to the prisoners' camp at Kastamoni, and we heard from the three of them who survived that there had been some field-guns on the shore where they were captured.
Our resting-place near the tower was an unsatisfactory one. We were close to water, it is true, but we were also close to a track leading down to the coast, and though we were soon to change our minds, we thought at the time that no flies in the world could be as persistent and insatiable as those which all day attacked us. For these reasons, and the additional one of wishing to be nearer the creek which we thought the motor-boat had entered, we decided to move to the ravine half a mile west of our tower. We would visit the well early in the morning and late at night for replenishing our water supply.
Accordingly at dusk we again packed up. Our way led us through thick undergrowth along neglected terraces, and at about 6.30 P.M. we were on the edge of the steep-sided valley. By a stroke of luck we almost immediately found a way down to the bottom. Although we were to become all too well acquainted with that ravine, we only found one other possible line of ascent and descent on the tower side, and one path up the western edge. The river-bed, of course, was dry, and filled with huge boulders and thickly overgrown with bushes. Pushing our way through these, we had only gone a quarter of a mile down the ravine when we decided to halt for the night.
CHAPTER XIII.
ON THE COAST.
There was still, however, no time to be lost in discovering and obtaining the motor-tug or other boat, seeing that we had arrived on the coast with barely three days' supply of food. That same night, then, Cochrane and Nobby carried out a reconnaissance, continuing to follow our ravine down towards the sea, in the hope that they would come out opposite the bay into which the tug and her tow had disappeared that afternoon. The remainder settled down to sleep as best they could, without a dinner and on hard and stony beds, taking it in turns at half-hour intervals to keep watch. This was necessary to prevent the two scouts passing them unawares should they return in the dark.
The whole party had reached the coast on their last legs. In the case of Grunt especially, nothing short of the certainty of being able to walk on board a boat could have moved him that night. He had still not recovered from the effects of the blow on the head. As for Cochrane and Nobby, it must have been pure strength of will which enabled them to carry on, after the trying day in the damp heat. Cochrane, indeed, had undertaken what proved beyond his powers; upon him more than any had fallen the brunt of the work of guiding the little column night after night and day after day. It was not to be wondered at that on this occasion he had not proceeded a mile before his legs simply gave way beneath him, and he had to allow Nobby to proceed alone.
Soon afterwards the ravine took an almost northerly direction. When it eventually petered out it was at some distance to the north of the probable position of the motor-boat. Nobby now found himself crossing the coast road; this we had assumed would be guarded. On the way out he saw no one; but on his return journey next morning he proved our assumption correct by almost stepping on the face of a man who lay sleeping on the road. He was presumably on duty. The propensity of the Turkish sentry for going to sleep at his post once more stood us in good stead. During the night it had been too dark to see much, and Nobby had had to return without having discovered a boat. After hunting round, he had settled down on the edge of a small creek running into the sea, where he remained till the first streak of dawn enabled him to pick his way back to the mouth of the ravine. His main difficulty that night had been to keep himself awake. All the time he was in deadly terror of falling asleep and awaking to find himself stranded on the coast in broad daylight.