Then we would let down the ladder to Norris and Carlos, who would come up and help us lower the captive into the vale.
Our bare feet crept forward at a snail's pace, nearer and nearer to the cedars. A pebble rolled, and suddenly a figure rose up before us with a startled grunt. And that instant it toppled over the cliff-edge with a guttural cry; and we heard nothing more.
In a minute we had the rope ladder unrolling, down the cliff-side. We threw down the loose end of halliard, and began the descent.
"I didn't expect we'd get him down so easy," observed Robert, seeking comfort in a grim joke.
"I wish it could have been as we planned," I said. I sickened at the thought of that mangled body somewhere down below.
We soon had our feet on the sloping ledge. Norris and Carlos stood there waiting.
"Did you have to throw him down?" queried Norris. And then, when I had related the circumstance:—"He must have been asleep," he said.
Having pulled the ladder up to the cedars, I took up the loose end of the halliard, and climbing as high as I dared venture among the vines, I made fast the rope so that Duran would not easily discover it.
Norris and Carlos had made some disposition of the black's body, for which I was thankful; for I had no wish to set my eye on the thing, even in the dark.
Norris and Carlos took over the heavy ammunition, and we set off up the vale. It was a silent file that stole cautiously through the woods, till we had joined Marat and Ray, who were greatly relieved to learn that our adventure had been carried through without unhappy accident. That it had cost the life of one of the enemy was accounted a gain. There had fallen an accession to our party, too, while we were gone; and Hawkins and the black boy had stolen away from Duran's party soon after the arrival at the huts.