barked angrily, and Neb, who was looking for
the first steps, uttered a cry.

There was no longer a ladder!

[Illustration: THERE WAS NO LONGER A LADDER!]

CHAPTER VI

Pencroft's Halloos -- A Night in the Chimneys -- Herbert's
Arrows -- The Captain's Project -- An unexpected Explanation
-- What has happened in Granite House -- How a new Servant
enters the Service of the Colonists.

Cyrus Harding stood still, without saying a word. His companions
searched in the darkness on the wall, in case the wind should have
moved the ladder, and on the ground, thinking that it might have
fallen down.... But the ladder had quite disappeared. As to
ascertaining if a squall had blown it on to the landing-place, half
way up, that was impossible in the dark.

"If it is a joke," cried Pencroft, "it is a very stupid one; to come
home and find no staircase to go up to your room by; for weary men,
there is nothing to laugh at that I can see."

Neb could do nothing but cry out, "Oh! oh! oh!"

"I begin to think that very curious things happen in Lincoln Island!"
said Pencroft.

"Curious?" replied Gideon Spilett, "not at all, Pencroft, nothing can
be more natural. Some one has come during our absence, taken
possession of our dwelling and drawn up the ladder."

"Some one," cried the sailor. "But who?"

"Who but the hunter who fired the bullet?" replied the reporter.

"Well, if there is any one up there," replied Pencroft, who began to
lose patience, "I will give them a hail, and they must answer."

And in a stentorian voice the sailor gave a prolonged "Halloo!" which
was echoed again and again from the cliff and rocks.

The settlers listened and they thought they heard a sort of chuckling
laugh, of which they could not guess the origin. But no voice replied
to Pencroft, who in vain repeated his vigorous shouts.

There was something indeed in this to astonish the most apathetic of
men, and the settlers were not men of that description. In their
situation every incident had its importance, and, certainly, during
the seven months which they had spent on the island, they had not
before met with anything of so surprising a character.

Be that as it may, forgetting their fatigue in the singularity of the
event, they remained below Granite House, not knowing what to think,
not knowing what to do, questioning each other without any hope of a
satisfactory reply, every one starting some supposition each more
u