“By the way,” he suddenly asked, “have you your sou’wester?”

“Yes.”

“And your Bible?”

“Yes.  It rests beneath my head every night.  I even brought our Tennyson.”

“Ah,” he growled fiercely, “this is where the reality differs from the romance.  Our troubles are only beginning now.”

“They will end the sooner.  For my part, I have utter faith in you.  If it be God’s will, we will escape; and no man is more worthy than you to be His agent.”

CHAPTER XI

THE FIGHT

The sailor knew so accurately the position of his reliable sentinels that he could follow each phase of the imaginary conflict on the other side of the island.  The first outbreak of desultory firing died away amidst a chorus of protest from every feathered inhabitant of the isle, so Jenks assumed that the Dyaks had gathered again on the beach after riddling the scarecrows with bullets or slashing them with their heavy razor-edged parangs, Malay swords with which experts can fell a stout sapling at a single blow.

A hasty council was probably held, and, notwithstanding their fear of the silent company in the hollow, an advance was ultimately made along the beach.  Within a few yards they encountered the invisible cord of the third spring-gun.  There was a report, and another fierce outbreak of musketry.  This was enough.  Not a man would move a step nearer that abode of the dead.  The next commotion arose on the ridge near the North Cape.

“At this rate of progress,” said Jenks to the girl, “they will not reach our house until daylight.”

“I almost wish they were here,” was the quiet reply.  “I find this waiting and listening to be trying to the nerves.”

They were lying on a number of ragged garments hastily spread on the ledge, and peering intently into the moonlit area of Prospect Park.  The great rock itself was shrouded in somber shadows.  Even if they stood up none could see them from the ground, so dense was the darkness enveloping them.

He turned slightly and took her hand.  It was cool and moist.  It no more trembled than his own.

“The Dyaks are far more scared than you,” he murmured with a laugh.  “Cruel and courageous as they are, they dare not face a spook.”

“Then what a pity it is we cannot conjure up a ghost for their benefit!  All the spirits I have ever read about were ridiculous.  Why cannot one be useful occasionally?”

The question set him thinking.  Unknown to the girl, the materials for a dramatic apparition were hidden amidst the bushes near the well.  He cudgeled his brains to remember the stage effects of juvenile days; but these needed limelight, blue flares, mirrors, phosphorus.

The absurdity of hoping to devise any such accessories whilst perched on a ledge in a remote island—­a larger reef of the thousands in the China Sea—­tickled him.