An sure it’s lost an done for we are intirely, an there you have it.”
After this dreadful intelligence, not a word was spoken for a long time. Pat had said his say, and had nothing to add to it. Bart had heard it, and had nothing to say. He was dumb. They were helpless. They could go no farther. Here they were on this log, half way up the pit, but unable to ascend any further, and with the prospect before them of swift and inevitable destruction.
They had worked long and diligently. Not one mouthful had they eaten since morning; but in their deep anxiety, they had felt no hunger. They had labored as those only can labor who are struggling for life. And this was the end. But all this time they had not been conscious of the passage of the hours; yet those hours had been flying by none the less. Time had been passing during their long labor at the logs below—how much time they had never suspected.
The first indication which they had of this lapse of time was the discovery which they now made of a gradually increasing gloom. At first they attributed this to the gathering of clouds over the sky above; but after a time the gloom increased to an extent which made itself apparent even to their despairing minds. And what was it? Could it be twilight? Could it be evening? Was it possible that the day had passed away? Long indeed had the time seemed; yet, even in spite of this, they felt an additional shock at this discovery. Yet it was true. It was evening. The day was done. They two had passed the day in this pit. This was night that was now coming swiftly on.
They remained motionless and silent. Nothing could be done; and the thoughts of each were too deep for utterance. Words were useless now. In the mind of each there was an awful expectation of a doom that was coming upon them—inevitable, swift, terrible! They could only await it in dumb despair.
Night was coming, adding by its darkness to the horror of their situation. Death in daylight is bad enough, but in the dark how much worse! And the fate that threatened them appeared wherever they might turn their eyes—above, in the shape of that broken beam which yet in the twilight appeared defined in a shadowy form against the dim sky; around, in this treacherous casing, which, being undermined, might at any moment fall, like the lower portion, and crush them; beneath, most awfully, and most surely, are those dark, stealthy, secret waters which had come in from the “drain” upon them as though to punish their rashness, and make them pay for it with their lives. In the midst of all these fears they remembered the superstitious words of the man whom they had questioned, “Flesh and blood will never lay hands on that treasure, unless there’s a sacrifice made—the sacrifice of human life!” Such was the declaration of the man on the shore, and this declaration now made itself remembered. The sacrifice of life. What life? Was it theirs? Were they, then, the destined victims? Awful thought! Yet how else could it be? Yes, that declaration was a prophecy, and that prophecy was being fulfilled in them. But O, how hard it was to die thus! so young! in such a way! to die when no friends were near! and where their fate would never, never be known to those friends.
CHAPTER XVI.
The boys at the inn slept soundly, and did not wake until after their usual time. On going down to breakfast, they looked about for Bart and Pat. At first they thought that their two friends had already taken their breakfast, and gone out; but an incidental remark of the landlady made known to them the fact that they had not been back to the inn at all. This intelligence they received with serious faces, and looks of surprise and uneasiness.
“I wonder what can be the meaning of it,” said Bruce.
“It’s queer,” said Arthur.
“They were very mysterious about going, in the first place,” said Tom. “I don’t see what sense there was in making such a secret about it. They must have gone some distance.”
“Perhaps they didn’t think we’d be back so soon,” said Phil, “and have planned their own affair, whatever it is, to last as long as ours.”
“O, they must have known,” said Bruce, “that we’d be back today. Aspotogon is only a few miles. In fact we ought to have been back yesterday, in time for tea, by rights.”
“Where in the world could they have gone to?” said Arthur.
“O, fishing, of course,” said Tom.
“But they ought to have been back last night.”
“O, they’ve found some first-rate sport.”
“After all,” said Phil, “there wasn’t any actual reason for them to come back. None of us are in any hurry.”
“Yes; but they may have got into some scrape,” said Bruce. “Such a thing is not inconceivable. It strikes me that several members of this party have already got into scrapes now and then; and so I’m rather inclined to think that the turn has come round to Bart and Pat.”
“What I’m inclined to think,” said Arthur, “is, that they’ve gone off in a boat for a sail before breakfast, and have come to grief somehow.”
“Well, if they tried a sail-boat, they were pretty sure of that,” said Tom.
“Yes,” said Phil; “neither Bart nor Pat know anything more about sailing a boat than a cow does.”
“At any rate,” said Bruce, “they can’t have fallen into any very serious danger.”
“Why not?”
“There hasn’t been any wind worth speaking of.”
“Neither there has.”
“But there was some wind yesterday morning,” said Arthur. “It carried us to Aspotogon very well.”
“Pooh! Such a wind as that wouldn’t do anything. A child might have sailed a boat.”
“O, I don’t know. That wind might have caught them off some island, and capsized them.”
“I don’t believe that wind could have capsized even a paper boat,” said Phil; “but still I’m inclined to think, after all, that they’ve met with some sort of an accident in a boat.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Tom. “They couldn’t meet with any kind of accident. My opinion is, that they went off fishing, kept at it all day, got too far away to think of coming back last night, and so very naturally put up at some farm-house, where they have by this time eaten a good, rattling breakfast, and are on their way back, walking like the very mischief.”
“The most natural thing in the world too,” said Bruce. “I quite agree with Tom. It’s just what any other two of us fellows would have done. In the first place, they backed out of the Aspotogon expedition very quietly, so as not to make a fuss, then they went off, and, as Tom says, got too far to come back; though whether they’ve had such a tremendous adventure as ours at Deep Cove with the shark is a matter that has yet to be decided.”
This first allusion to the shark was received by all the party with a solemn smile.
“Well,” said Arthur, “I believe they’ve taken to a boat. Perhaps they’ve gone cruising about.”
“But they couldn’t have been capsized.”
“No.”
“Then how do you account for their absence?”
“Easily enough,” said Phil. “I believe they’ve gone visiting some of the islands, and somehow they’ve lost their sail, or their oars, or else they’ve been careless about fastening the boat, and she’s drifted away. And so I dare say that at this very moment they are on some desert island in this bay, within a mile or so of this town, looking out for help; but if they are, they must be pretty hungry by this time, for it isn’t every island that can furnish such a bill of fare as Ile Haute gave to Tom.”
“A perfectly natural explanation,” said Arthur. “Those two fellows are both so abominably careless, that, if they did go ashore on any island, they’d be almost certain to leave the boat loose on the beach, to float away wherever it liked. I believe, as Phil says, that they’re on some island not far away.”
“I