“I beg of you, Pencroft,” said the engineer.

“Very well!” replied the sailor, who vented his anger in another way, by bestowing on the convicts the worst names in his maritime vocabulary.

The colonists remained, therefore, near the cart, and carefully watched the neighboring parts of the forest.

Three hours passed thus.  The wind had fallen, and absolute silence reigned under the great trees.  The snapping of the smallest twig, a footstep on the dry leaves, the gliding of a body among the grass, would have been heard without difficulty.  All was quiet.  Besides, Top, lying on the grass, his head stretched out on his paws, gave no sign of uneasiness.  At eight o’clock the day appeared far enough advanced for the reconnaissance to be made under favorable conditions.  Gideon Spilett declared himself ready to set out accompanied by Pencroft.  Cyrus Harding consented.  Top and Jup were to remain with the engineer, Herbert, and Neb, for a bark or a cry at a wrong moment would give the alarm.

“Do not be imprudent,” said Harding to the reporter and Pencroft, “you have not to gain possession of the corral, but only to find out whether it is occupied or not.”

“All right,” answered Pencroft.

And the two departed.

Under the trees, thanks to the thickness of their foliage, the obscurity rendered any object invisible beyond a radius of from thirty to forty feet.  The reporter and Pencroft, halting at any suspicious sound, advanced with great caution.

They walked a little distance apart from each other so as to offer a less mark for a shot.  And, to tell the truth, they expected every moment to hear a report.  Five minutes after leaving the cart, Gideon Spilett and Pencroft arrived at the edge of the wood before the clearing beyond which rose the palisade.

They stopped.  A few straggling beams still fell on the field clear of trees.  Thirty feet distant was the gate of the corral, which appeared to be closed.  This thirty feet, which it was necessary to cross from the wood to the palisade, constituted the dangerous zone, to borrow a ballistic term:  in fact, one or more bullets fired from behind the palisade might knock over any one who ventured on to this zone.  Gideon Spilett and the sailor were not men to draw back, but they knew that any imprudence on their part, of which they would be the first victims, would fall afterwards on their companions.  If they themselves were killed, what would become of Harding, Neb, and Herbert?

But Pencroft, excited at feeling himself so near the corral where he supposed the convicts had taken refuge, was about to press forward, when the reporter held him back with a grasp of iron.

“In a few minutes it will be quite dark,” whispered Spilett in the sailor’s ear, “then will be the time to act.”

Pencroft, convulsively clasping the butt-end of his gun, restrained his energies, and waited, swearing to himself.