Neither of the occupants of the canoe appeared to have been wounded; but as the smoke cleared away, it could be seen that the shot had not passed them without effect. Chakra’s hands were empty; the paddle had been struck by the bullet; and, carried clean out of them, was now seen on the surface of the water, fast gliding towards the gorge!
A shrill cry escaped from the lips of the Coromantee. He alone understood the danger to which this accident had exposed him. He alone knew of the whirl that threatened to overwhelm both himself and his companion.
Instantly he threw himself upon his knees, and, with an arm extended on each side of the canoe, and his body bent down to the gunwale, he commenced heating the water with his broad palms. His aim was to prevent the craft from being drawn into the centre of the current.
For some moments this strange struggle was kept up—the canoe just holding its own—making way neither upwards nor downwards.
The Maroons watched the movement with mute surprise; and no doubt would have continued to do so, but that the two men left by the bottom of the stairway—perhaps stirred by a like curiosity—had rushed forward to the edge of the water, and thus permitted their faces to be seen. At the same instant were they recognised by one who had an old account to settle with them.
“The jack Spaniards!” cried Quaco, surprised beyond measure at the sight of his ci-devant prisoners. “They have got loose from our guard. Fire upon them, comrades! Don’t let them escape a second time!”
The stentorian voice of the Maroon lieutenant, audible above all other sounds, at once awakened the caçadores to a sense of their dangerous situation; and, like a brace of baboons, they commenced sprawling up the tangled stairway.
Too late had they taken this resolution. Before they had got a third of the way to the summit, half-a-dozen triggers were pulled; and their bodies, one after the other, fell with a heavy plunge into the water below.
Meanwhile Chakra, in the canoe, had kept up his life and death struggle, now going against the current—and now the watery element appearing to prevail.
For the moment the Maroons could not have decided that strife. They were engaged in re-loading their guns; and the Coromantee was left free to continue his struggles without interruption.