other effort could be effective. It was already too late to attempt
the organization of a rescue party; there was no warship on the coast,
and the authorities of the Colony possessed no vessel fitted for
pursuit. Long before daylight came, or I might hope to spread an alarm
abroad, the _Namur_ would be safely at sea. No, the only choice left
was for me either to accompany the girl, or else abandon her entirely
to her captors. I must either face the possibility of discovery and
capture, which as surely meant torture and death, or otherwise play
the coward, and remain impotently behind. There was no safe course to
pursue. I believed that I could play my part among the crew, once
securely established among them; that I could succeed in escaping
recognition even on the part of Cochose. If this was true, then, to a
stout heart and ready hand, a way might open even aboard the bark to
protect her from the final closing of the devil's jaws. I had nothing
to risk but my life, and it had never been my nature to count odds. I
would act as the heart bade, and so I drove the temptation to falter
away, and strode on up the bank into the black shadow of the trees.

I found extremely hard walking as I advanced through tangled
underbrush, over unlevel ground, the night so dark in those shadows I
could but barely perceive the outlines of a hand held before the eyes.
Fortunately the distance was even shorter than I had anticipated, but,
when I finally emerged upon the opposite beach, it was at once quite
evident that the sea beating upon the sand was decidedly heavier than
higher up the Bay, the white line of breakers showing conspicuously
even in the night, while their continuous roar sounded loud through
the silence. It was not until after I had advanced cautiously into the
water, and then stooped low to thus gain clearer vision along the
surface, that I succeeded in locating the vessel sought. Even then the
_Namur_ appeared only as a mere shadow, without so much as a light