It need scarce be said that that man was Chakra, the Coromantee. Who else would be seeking the Jumbé Rock at that hour?
What was his errand up there? Let the sequel declare.
On setting foot upon the platform, he undid the knot that fastened the skin mantle over his shoulders; and then taking off the garment, he spread it out upon the rock.
The stick he had brought up with him he placed along one edge, and there made it fast with some pieces of string. When this was accomplished, he lifted both stick and cloak from the rock, and, proceeding to the palm, he laid the stick transversely across the stem, at about the height of his own hand, and then lashed it fast to the tree.
The kaross now hung down the stem, in a spread position, the transverse stick keeping it extended to its full width.
While arranging it thus, Chakra evidently had an eye to the direction—that is, the plane represented by the spread garment had one face fronting the valley of Mount Welcome and the cultivated lowlands between that and Montego Bay, while the reverse side was turned towards the “black grounds” of Trelawney—a tract of wild country in which not a single estate, plantation, or penn had been established, and where no such thing as a white settlement existed. In this solitude, however, there were black colonies of a peculiar kind; for that was the favourite haunt of the absconded slave—the lurking-place of the outlaw—the retreat of the runaway.
There, even might the assassin find an asylum, secure from the pursuit of justice. There had he found it: for among those dark, forest-clad mountains more than one murderer made his dwelling.
Robbers there were many—even existing in organised bands, and holding the authorities of the Island at defiance.
All these circumstances were known to Chakra; and some of the robbers, too, were known to him—some of the fiercest who followed that free calling.
It was to communicate with one of these bands that the preparations of the myal-man were being made. Chakra was preparing the signal.