een
a child, cried,--

"Come along, lad; let's away!"--and so, staggering and stumbling over the
tangled underwood, we fled from the fatal spot.

During the remainder of that day I felt as if I were in a horrible dream.
I scarce knew what was said to me, and was more than once blamed by the
men for idling my time. At last the hour to return aboard came. We
marched down to the beach, and I felt relief for the first time when my
feet rested on the schooner's deck.

In the course of the evening I overheard part of a conversation between
the captain and the first mate, which startled me not a little. They
were down in the cabin, and conversed in an under-tone, but the sky-light
being off, I overheard every word that was said.

"I don't half like it," said the mate. "It seems to me that we'll only
have hard fightin' and no pay."

"No pay!" repeated the captain, in a voice of suppressed anger. "Do you
call a good cargo all for nothing no pay?"

"Very true," returned the mate; "but we've got the cargo aboard. Why not
cut your cable and take French leave o' them? What's the use o' tryin'
to lick the blackguards when it'll do us no manner o' good?"

"Mate," said the captain, in a low voice, "you talk like a fresh-water
sailor. I can only attribute this shyness to some strange delusion; for
surely" (his voice assumed a slightly sneering tone as he said this)
"surely I am not to suppose that _you_ have become soft-hearted! Besides,
you are wrong in regard to the cargo being aboard; there's a good quarter
of it lying in the woods, and that blackguard chief knows it and won't
let me take it off. He defied us to do our worst, yesterday."

"Defied us! did he?" cried the mate, with a bitter laugh. "Poor
contemptible thing!"

"And yet he seems not so contemptible but that you are afraid to attack
him."

"Who said I was afraid?" growled the mate, sulkily. "I'm as ready as any
man in the ship. But, captain, what is it that you intend to do?"

"I intend to muffle the sweeps and row the schooner up to the head of the
creek there, from which point we can command the pile of sandal-wood with
our gun. Then I shall land with all the men except two, who shall take
care of the schooner and be ready with the boat to take us off. We can
creep through the woods to the head of the village, where these cannibals
are always dancing round their suppers of human flesh, and if the
carbines of the men are loaded with a heavy cha