Instantly his body straightened as he threw his feet forward with all the force that he could command. The white men, still laughing and confident of success, were taken completely by surprise.
Trim’s left foot caught one of the men upon the neck and the other squarely upon the forehead.
Both staggered back, and the one who was struck in the neck lost his balance and tumbled with a loud howl of terror into the chasm. The other dropped his knife and clutched blindly at Trim’s leg to prevent himself from falling.
This clutch caused Trim to slide still further along the rope so that in a half second he was directly over the shelf. He did not let go of the pulley block yet.
Before he ventured to do that he gave the white man another vigorous kick. The fellow, already half stunned, let go his leg and rolled over the edge to join his companion three hundred feet below.
Then Trim dropped to the shelf with a sigh of relief.
“I reckon there’ll be no more trouble from them,” he said to himself, “and that accounts for four of these six men that I came to find. Now for the others.”
He listened a moment, and was certain that he heard approaching footsteps.
“I must have the rest of these fellows alive,” he thought, “or nobody will believe that I have met them.”
With this he hastily drew his knife and cut the small cord that was used for pulling the pulley block from one side of the chasm to the other.