When he had gone some little distance without being discovered, he fancied he was safe and rose to his feet, intending to run as fast as his legs could carry him—–­which was no snail’s pace, indeed!  Scarcely had he begun to move forward, however, when he heard a shout, followed by the sound of hurried footsteps.

Being fleet of foot and having no desire to be caught and treated as a spy, he set off running at full speed.  The ground was quite rough and he had to turn aside to avoid bushes and hollows, yet he had no difficulty in keeping ahead of his pursuers.  The very impediments in his way served to retard pursuit, and he did not despair of escaping.  He had to cross over a ridge, at the top of which he was exposed to view.  He had just reached it, when he heard some one shout: 

“Stop!  Come down,—–­or I’ll fire!”

“Fire away!” thought Hugh, knowing how unlikely it was that any one would be so desperate as to shoot at him.  “You can’t stop me with that foolish bluff!”

Ignoring the threat, he rushed down the little hill, hoping soon to find some spot where he could turn off to one side or the other, hide in shelter, and thus evade the rascals.  He was surprised to find that he had gone so far in his wanderings, that the smugglers’ island was so much larger than it had seemed.  For a moment he felt a vague fear that he had lost his bearings and was running in the wrong direction.

To ascertain how near his pursuers were, he threw a glance over his shoulder.  This proved fatal to his hopes, for his foot caught in a tangle of crab-grass and down he came headlong.  Over and over he rolled; and then for some seconds he lay still, a little dazed by his fall, unable to move.  The next minute he found himself in the grasp of two men.

“Hullo, youngster!  What made you try to git away from us?” asked one of them in an angry tone.  He was a short, thick-set, burly man, with black eyes that seemed to glitter like a serpent’s.  His huge hands fastened upon Hugh’s arm in a grip of steel.

Hugh replied truthfully but not very wisely:  “I’m on my way to camp, and I want to get there as soon as possible.”

“Camp, eh?  Who are you?”

“I don’t see what that has to do with my being in a hurry to get there.”

“Maybe not, but we want to know where you was hidin’ before you hit the trail,” said the other man, a dark-visaged fellow with a sinister cast in one eye.  “Come on now!  Spit it out!”

“I was just exploring this island for fun,” replied Hugh.  “I was hunting for—–­”

“You were hiding!” vehemently declared the black-eyed man.  “Whereabouts?”

“On the ground, of course; there are no trees to climb around here.”

“None o’ yer guff!” The swarthy captor dealt Hugh a hard thwack on the side of his head.  “What’s yer business here, anyhow?  Where’s yer camp?”

No answer.