Finally we came to level ground, and I knew we were close to the beach, for we could hear the rollers.  The brush was thicker in the marsh, and we got off the trail, but we could see patches of the moonlight on the water ahead, and caught the white flash of the waves tumbling on the shingle.

Petrak left the bed of the brook and pushed his way straight ahead through the dense foliage which shut us off from the beach.  I fell and made a great racket, setting up a wail about my leg and swearing that I had broken it, and begging Thirkle to help me.

He struck at me with his thong, and, although he missed, I screamed at the top of my voice, as a warning to Captain Riggs, in case he should be lurking about.  Besides, I hoped my play that I had been badly crippled would give me a better opportunity to escape or to attack them, as they would be more careless if they thought I was perfectly helpless.

“I’ll give ye something to yell about soon,” said Thirkle.  “Just wait a while and I’ll give ye something to make a real fuss about.  Maybe ye think there’s a ship near—­maybe there is; but it won’t do ye much good, so let’s not have any more of this bawling.  I thought ye was gamer than that, my fine Mr. Trenholm.”

“Here we are, Thirkle!” cried Petrak, pushing the wall and bushes aside and showing us the moonlit sea and the loom of the mainland shouldering up into the stars.  “It can’t be far to the boats, Thirkle.”

We went out into the still warm sand.  The moon, lean in its first quarter, hung over the top of the island, silvering the sand and playing with the gaunt shadows of the palm-trees, distorting them into queer shapes and making grotesque patterns under our feet.  The breeze, the snoring of the waves, the sense of freedom after the hot, reeking jungle, refreshed me, and I almost forgot the doom that threatened.  Thirkle stood a minute and scanned the channel, muttering to himself.

“Looks all clear, sir,” said Petrak.

“All clear, Reddy.  Push on, lad; the boats are right ahead.”

“Here we are, sir, all snug,” called Petrak, and I saw the indistinct pile in the shadow of the brush which marked the cache of boats.

“No matches, Reddy.  Mind ye don’t make a flash or we’ll have some craft on the prowl along here.  We can’t take any chances.”

“Cut me loose from this cussed line, Thirkle.  We can take a turn on a tree and hold the writin’ chap until we have need for him.”

Thirkle cut him free from me, and they bound me to a broken palm-stump.  I pleaded to be put on the ground, complaining about my leg, and Petrak finally wrapped the rope about my legs and threw me to the ground, more to keep me quiet than to ease my supposed suffering.  They left me laying helpless in a thicket of young bamboo shoots, with my head and shoulders in the sand.  I managed to wriggle on my side so that I had view of the boats, and, what was better, I got my teeth into the rope on my hands and began gnawing it desperately.