The ill-treatment inflicted on Ayrton was now redoubled.  His hands and feet still bore the bloody marks of the cords which bound him day and night.  Every moment he expected to be put to death, nor did it appear possible that he could escape.

Matters remained thus until the third week of February.  The convicts, still watching for a favorable opportunity, rarely quitted their retreat, and only made a few hunting excursions, either to the interior of the island, or the south coast.

Ayrton had no further news of his friends, and relinquished all hope of ever seeing them again.  At last, the unfortunate man, weakened by ill-treatment, fell into a prostration so profound that sight and hearing failed him.  From that moment, that is to say, since the last two days, he could give no information whatever of what had occurred.

“But, Captain Harding,” he added, “since I was imprisoned in that cavern, how is it that I find myself in the corral?”

“How is it that the convicts are lying yonder dead, in the middle of the enclosure?” answered the engineer.

“Dead!” cried Ayrton, half rising from his bed, notwithstanding his weakness.

His companions supported him.  He wished to get up, and with their assistance he did so.  They then proceeded together towards the little stream.

It was now broad daylight.

There, on the bank, in the position in which they had been stricken by death in its most instantaneous form, lay the corpses of the five convicts!

Ayrton was astounded.  Harding and his companions looked at him without uttering a word.  On a sign from the engineer, Neb and Pencroft examined the bodies, already stiffened by the cold.

They bore no apparent trace of any wound.

Only, after carefully examining them, Pencroft found on the forehead of one, on the chest of another, on the back of this one, on the shoulder of that, a little red spot, a sort of scarcely visible bruise, the cause of which it was impossible to conjecture.

“It is there that they have been struck!” said Cyrus Harding.

“But with what weapon?” cried the reporter.

“A weapon, lightning-like in its effects, and of which we have not the secret!”

“And who has struck the blow?” asked Pencroft.

“The avenging power of the island,” replied Harding, “he who brought you here, Ayrton, whose influence has once more manifested itself, who does for us all that which we cannot do for ourselves, and who, his will accomplished, conceals himself from us.”

“Let us make search for him, then!” exclaimed Pencroft.

“Yes, we will search for him,” answered Harding, “but we shall not discover this powerful being who performs such wonders, until he pleases to call us to him!”

This invisible protection, which rendered their own action unavailing, both irritated and piqued the engineer.  The relative inferiority which it proved was of a nature to wound a haughty spirit.  A generosity evinced in such a manner as to elude all tokens of gratitude, implied a sort of disdain for those on whom the obligation was conferred, which in Cyrus Harding’s eyes marred, in some degree, the worth of the benefit.