"I prayed that you might escape, and that my mother might not grieve for
me too much," she answered simply. "And you?"

"I? Oh! the same--that you might escape. I did not pray for my mother as
she is dead, and I forgot about father."

"Look, look!" exclaimed Rachel, pointing to the mouth of the cave.

He stared out at the darkness, and there, through the thin flames of the
fire, saw two great yellow shapes which appeared to be walking up and down
and glaring into the cave.

"Lions," he gasped, snatching at his gun.

"Don't shoot," she cried, "you might make them angry. Perhaps they only
want to take refuge like ourselves. The fire will keep them away."

He nodded, then remembering that the charge and priming, of his flint-lock
_roer_ must be damp, hurriedly set to work by the help of Rachel to draw
it with the screw on the end of his ramrod, and this done, to reload with
some powder that he had already placed to dry on a flat stone near the
fire. This operation took five minutes or more. When at length it was
finished, and the lock reprimed with the dry powder, the two of them,
Richard holding the _roer_, crept to the mouth of the cave and looked out
again.

The great storm was passing now, and the rain grew thinner, but from time
to time the lightning, no longer forked or chain-shaped, flared in wide
sheets. By its ghastly illumination they saw a strange sight. There on the
island top the two lions marched backwards and forwards as though they