'I did,' answered George, clapping his hand to his side. But the loop in his belt was empty. The mere was gone.
Startled, George looked about the cave; but nowhere could he find the club.
'I fear it has dropped into the river as I came down the ladder,' he said. 'Wait here, if you don't mind, Terence, and I will go and see if I have left it in our hut. No; let me go, for if I meet any one, my knowledge of the language will get me past him, whereas you might be stopped.'
'Bring back the basket of food with you,' Terence called after him as he hurried away.
As he rapidly ascended the ladder, George became conscious of an extraordinary commotion in the pah. Shouts and cries, wailing of teteres, even gun-shots, disturbed the quiet night, and, wondering what had happened, he scaled the palisades and sped to his whare.
A glance all round told him that the club was not there, so, snatching up the basket of food, he was about to set off again, when from the confusion of sounds in the direction of the marae, one detached itself, clear and high:
'Rongo pai! Rongo pai!' (Good tidings! Good tidings!) 'Salutations, O Hawk of the Mountain! O Slayer of the Pakeha, hail!'
Without an instant's pause George turned and ran, scaling the stockade, and dashing down the flax-ladder at perilous speed.
'Come!' he shouted, when he had gained the entrance to the cave. 'Out of this for your lives. Te Karearea has returned!'