style="font-size:15px;"> “And mind the sentries.”
“Trust me, Abel. I shall not come now by day for six days. If at the end of six nights you have not been able to escape, I shall come for six days by day, hoping that you may be more successful in the daylight; for perhaps you will find that a bold dash will help you to get away.”
“But the risk – the risk?” panted Abel – “the risk, girl, to you!”
“Abel, dear, I am here to risk everything. I have risked everything to join you.”
“Yes,” he said, hoarsely. “But afterwards. If we do escape?”
“Leave the plans to me,” she said, with a little laugh. “I have boat and sail, and the world is very wide. Only escape. Take care; the men are coming back.”
Mary’s voice ceased; and Abel took hold of Bart’s arm, rose, raised his hoe, and walked with him to where they had left off work, to begin again slowly, the two men trembling with excitement now; for, as the overseer neared them, a bird began flying to and fro over the edge of the jungle, screaming wildly, evidently from the fact that somebody was hidden there.
The excitement of the bird, whose nest was probably somewhere near, did not, however, take the attention of the overseer, who came up, followed by the Irish sentry, stared hard at Abel, gave a short nod as if satisfied that one of his beasts of burden was not going to permanently break down, and then, to the horror of the young men, took off his hat, began fanning himself, and went and sat down in the very spot where Abel had talked with his sister!
“Hot, Paddy, hot!” he said to the soldier.
“Dinny, sor, av you plaze. Thrue for you, sor, and a taste of dhrink would be very nice for ye; but I shouldn’t sit there.”
“Why not?” said the overseer.
“Because the place swarms with them ugly, four-futted, scaly divils. I’ve gone the rounds here of a night, sor, and heard them snapping their jaws and thumping the wet mud with their tails till I’ve shivered again.”
“Yes, there’s plenty of them in the creek, Dinny.”
“Plinty, sor, ’s nothing to it. There niver seems to have been a blessed Saint Pathrick here to get rid of the varmin. Why, I’ve seen frogs here as big as turtles, and sarpints that would go round the Hill of Howth.”
“Well, look here, Dinny, cock your piece, and if you see anything stir, let drive at it at once.”
“Oi will, sor,” said the soldier, obeying orders; and, taking a step or two forward, he stood watchfully gazing into the dark jungle.
“Have you got your knife, Bart?” whispered Abel, whose face was of a peculiar muddy hue.
Bart nodded as he chopped away.
“Shall we make a rush at them, and stun them with the hoes?”
Bart shook his head.
“Mary’s too clever,” he whispered back. “She’s well hidden, and will not stir.”
“If that Irish beast raises his musket I must go at him,” whispered Abel, who was trembling from head to foot.
“Hold up, man. She heer’d every word, and won’t stir.”
“Silence, there. No talking!” cried the overseer.
“Let the poor divils talk, sor,” said the soldier. “Faix, it’s bad enough to put chains on their legs; don’t put anny on their tongues.”
“If I get you down,” thought Abel, “I won’t kill you, for that.”
“Against orders,” said the overseer, good-humouredly. “Well, can you see anything stirring?”
“Not yet, sor; but I hope I shall. Bedad, I’d be glad of a bit o’ sport, for it’s dhry work always carrying a gun about widout having a shot.”
“Yes; but when you do get a shot, it’s at big game, Dinny.”
“Yis, sor, but then it’s very seldom,” said the sentry, with a roguish twinkle of the eye.
“I can’t bear this much longer, Bart,” whispered Abel. “When I say Now! rush at them both with your hoe.”
“Wait till he’s going to shoot, then,” growled Bart.
The overseer bent down, and, sheltering himself beneath the tree, placed his hands out in the sunshine, one holding a roughly rolled cigar, the other a burning-glass, with which he soon focussed the vivid white spot of heat which made the end of the cigar begin to smoke, the tiny spark being drawn into incandescence by application to the man’s lips, while the pleasant odour of the burning leaf arose.
“Sure, an’ that’s an illigant way of getting a light, sor,” said the sentry.
“Easy enough with such a hot sun,” said the overseer, complacently.
“Hot sun, sor! Sure I never carry my mushket here widout feeling as if it will go off in my hands; the barl gets nearly red-hot!”
“Yah! Don’t point it this way,” said the overseer, smoking away coolly. “Well, can you see anything?”
“Divil a thing but that noisy little omadhaun of a bird. Sure, she’d be a purty thing to have in a cage.”
Abel’s face grew more ghastly as he gazed at Bart, who remained cool and controlled him.
“Bart,” whispered Abel, with the sweat rolling off his face in beads, “what shall we do?”
“Wait,” said the rough fellow shortly; and he hoed away, with his fetters clinking, and his eyes taking in every movement of the two men; while involuntarily Abel followed his action in every respect, as they once more drew nearer to their task-master and his guard.
“There’s a something yonder, sor,” said the soldier at last.
“Alligator!” said the overseer, lazily; and Abel’s heart rose so that he seemed as if he could not breathe.
“I can’t see what it is, sor; but it’s a something, for the little burrud kapes darting down at it and floying up again. I belayve it is one of they crockidills. Shall I shute the divil?”
“How can you shoot it if you can’t see it, you fool?” said the overseer.
“Sure, sor, they say that every bullet has its billet, and if I let the little blue pill out of the mouth o’ the mushket, faix, it’s a strange thing if it don’t find its way into that ugly scaly baste.”
The overseer took his cigar from his lips and laughed; but to the intense relief of the young men, perhaps to the saving of his own life, he shook his head.
“No, Dinny,” he said, “it would alarm the station. They’d think someone was escaping. Let it be.”
Dinny sighed, the overseer smoked on, and the hot silence of the tropic clearing was only broken by the screaming and chattering of the excited bird, the hum of insects, and the clink-clink, thud-thud, of fetters and hoe as the convicts toiled on in the glowing
