Dias, his wife, and Harry walked down towards the tent, and Bertie chatted with Jose while the latter was dressing.

"You must feel horribly cold, Jose," he said.

"I am cold, now I think of it. I did not notice it while I was watching the savages. When I took to the water again I did feel it. Maria will make me a cup of hot coffee, and then I shall be all right again. It was good fun to look at them, and know that they had no idea that I was so close. If I could have understood their language, I should have learned something worth telling. I felt inclined to scare them by giving a tremendous yell, and I know I could have got away all right.

They were sitting round a big fire and would not have been able to see in the dark. I should have done it, only I thought Dias would have blamed me for letting them know that one of us had come down the canon."

"He would have been angry, Jose, and so would my brother, for they would certainly have set a watch afterwards, which would have spoilt all our plans. Now run along, your teeth are chattering, and the sooner you get something warm and wrap yourself up in your blankets the better."

The fire had burnt low when the others returned, but an armful of sticks was thrown upon it at once. The kettle had been left in the embers at its edge by Maria when she started, so that after it had hung in the blaze for two or three minutes it began to boil, and coffee was soon ready. At this point Jose ran in, and after he had drunk a large mugful he told them what he had learned.

"When I left Dias at the mouth of the ravine," he said, "everything seemed quiet. I walked along the edge of the stream for fifty yards, keeping my ears open, you may be sure, and I saw a light glow close under the rocks some distance on the other side of the river. I followed the stream down till I came to a place where there was a quiet pool, and there I swam across, then very carefully I made my way to where I could see the light. It was quite three hundred yards from the river. As I got near I could hear talking; I crawled along like a cat, and took good care not to disturb a leaf, or to put a hand or a knee upon a dried stick, for I could not tell whether they had anyone on watch near the fire. I perceived no one, and at last came to a point where I could see the flame. It was in an opening running a hundred feet into the mountains, and perhaps forty feet across at the mouth.

"In this were sixty or seventy savages sitting or standing round a fire, which had evidently been made there so that anyone coming down to the mouth of the ravine should not see it. The fire was not a very large one, and a good many of the men were gathered outside the little hollow. Some of them were talking loudly, and it seemed to me that they were quarrelling over something. Sometimes they pointed up to the top of the hills, sometimes towards the mouth of our ravine. I would have got close if I had understood their language. Presently I saw some of them lying down, so that I could see that the quarrel, whatever it was about, was coming to an end, and that they were going to lie down for the night. As I could learn nothing further I crawled away and went down to the place where I had swum the river before, and then crept quietly up to Dias, who was on the look-out; for although I had seen no one as I had pa.s.sed before, there might still have been some of them on the watch."

"You have done very well, Jose," Harry said. "We have learned two things. First, that they are not keeping watch at the mouth of the ravine, either because they feel sure that we will not try to escape, or because they wish us to leave and are giving us the opportunity of doing so. In the second place, you have learned what force they have got down there, their exact position, and the fact that they were evidently arguing how they had best attack us. Well, from what you say there is every chance that we shall be able to come upon them without being noticed till we are close enough to throw our fireworks among them. Really the only thing for us to learn is whether many of them are still at the top of the hill."

"I hardly think there can be many; only a few have shown themselves to-day. They must know very well that we would not venture to climb up during the day, and that it would be next to impossible for us to do so in the dark, even if we made up our minds to abandon the animals and all our stores."

"Well, I should say, Dias, there is no reason why we should put the matter off. It will not take us long to load all the squibs to-morrow.

My opinion is that at dusk we had better saddle the mules and pack everything on them in readiness for a start; then at ten o'clock we can go down and attack the savages. The best moment for doing so will be when they are just lying down. When we have sent them flying we will come up the torrent again, and start with the mules as soon as it is daylight. It would be next to impossible to get them down in the dark, as they might very easily break their legs, or by rubbing against the wall shift their packs and tumble them into the water."

"It would be a pity to waste time, senor. I will get some torches made to-morrow. Some of the trees have resin, and by melting this I can make torches that would do very well. By their aid we could get the mules down without waiting for daylight. As they have already come up the torrent, they will have less fear in going down, for the stream will help them instead of keeping them back. I will go first with Jose and his mule; she is as steady as a rock, and where she goes the others will follow; and with five torches along the line they will be able to see well enough."

"Four torches, Dias. Your wife rode coming up, and she had better ride going down."

"She can hold a torch as she sits; it does not matter to us if we get wet to the waist, but it would be very uncomfortable for her. We shall have to put the largest burdens on to the mules. One of the riding mules could carry the two llamas, or if you think that that is too much, we can tie each across a separate mule. They were more trouble coming up than all the mules put together. We had pretty nearly to carry them through the deep places, though at other points they leapt from rock to rock cleverly enough."

"I am not going to be left behind if you are going to the fight, senor," Donna Maria said, "if you will give me one of your pistols."

"We could manage that, I should think," Harry said. "We can put you on one of the steadiest mules when we first go down, and with one at each side of you we can manage it very well. Jose must go on a hundred yards ahead to see whether any of the savages are on the watch at their end, and if so, you must wait till we have cleared them out. You see, we shall have no hesitation in shooting any of them if necessary, and though that would bring the rest of them down on us, yet when our squibs and crackers begin to fly among them, you may be sure they won't face us for an instant."

Dias grumbled that his wife had better stay where she was till they went back for the mules; but Harry said: "I do think, Dias, that she had better go with us. It would be cruel to leave her now that we are going into a fight--leave her all alone to tremble for our lives, with a knowledge that if things should go wrong with us the savages will soon be up here."

"Well, senor, if you think so, there is no more to be said."

"I am not going to be made a trouble of," Maria said. "I shall go down on foot like the rest of you. I will take some other clothes with me, so that when you all come back for the mules I can change into them."

"Perhaps that would be the best plan," Harry agreed. "Now I will go back and take Bertie's place. It is my turn to be on watch, and he will be wanting to hear the news."

"Well, Harry, is it all right?" Bertie asked as he heard his brother coming up to him.

"It couldn't be better! There are sixty or seventy of them in a sort of little ravine three hundred yards away, on the left-hand side of the river. They don't seem to be keeping guard at all, and if they are not more careful to-morrow night we shall take them completely by surprise.

We are going to saddle all the mules directly it gets too dark for any of the fellows on the hills to see us, then we must set to work and pull down enough of the barricade here to allow them to pa.s.s. We ourselves, when we go down, will cross at that shallow place above here, and go down the river at that side, otherwise we sha'n't be able to cross it except at some distance beyond the other end of the torrent. Of course the mules must go down this side, as we shall want to turn to the right when we get off. We shall make our attack about ten o'clock."

Bertie went off, and three hours later Dias relieved Harry. As soon as it was light the next morning Bertie and Jose set to work to fill the cases--there were a hundred squibs and fifty large crackers.

Donna Maria after breakfast went out and returned with a number of flexible sticks of about half an inch in diameter; these she carried into her tent, where she shut herself up for the forenoon. When, at one o'clock, she came out with the result of her work, it resembled a chair without legs and with a back about a foot wide and three feet high.

"What in the world have you got there, Donna Maria?" Bertie asked.

"Don't you know?"

"No, I have never seen a thing like it before."

"This is the thing the porters use for carrying weights, and sometimes people, over the Cordilleras. You see that strap near the top goes round the man's forehead, and when there is a weight in the chair these other straps pa.s.s over his shoulders and under his arms, and then round whatever is on the seat."

"But what is going to be on the seat?"

"I am," she laughed. "Dias is so overbearing. It had all been arranged nicely, as you know; and then when he spoke to me afterwards he said, 'The first thing to-morrow morning, Maria, you will set to work to make a porter's chair, and I shall carry you down the stream. No words about it, but do as you are told.' Generally Dias lets me have my own way, senor, but when he talks like that, I know that it is useless to argue with him. And perhaps it is best after all, for, as he said to me afterwards, it is a nasty place for men to get along, but for a woman, with her petticoats dragging and trailing round her, it would be almost impossible for her to keep her footing."

"Well, I thought the same thing myself when we were talking about it yesterday," Bertie said. "Of course I did not say anything, but I am sure Dias is right. I found it very hard work to keep my footing, and I really don't believe that I could have done it if I had been dressed as a woman. And Dias can carry you like that?"

"Carry me, senor! he could carry three times that weight. He has cut himself a staff seven or eight feet long this morning to steady himself, but I don't think there was any need for it. Why, it is a common thing for people to be carried over the Cordilleras so, and Dias is stronger a great deal than many of the men who do it. As he said, if I had been going through on foot you would all have been bothering about me. And it is not as if two people could go abreast, and one help the other. There is often only room between the rocks for one to pa.s.s through, and it is just there where the rush of the water is strongest."

CHAPTER IX

THE SIGNAL STAR

During the afternoon Dias, who had been keeping a careful look-out at the cliffs, said to Harry: "I think, senor, that the savages are leaving the hills. An hour ago I saw a man walking along where we generally see them; he was going straight along as if for some fixed purpose, and I thought at once that he might be bringing them some message from the people below us. I lost sight of him after a bit, but presently I could make out some men moving in the other direction. They were keeping back from the edge, but I several times caught sight of their heads against the sky-line when there happened to be some little irregularity in the ground. They were not running, but seemed to me to be going at a steady pace. Since then I have been watching carefully, and have seen no one on the other side. I think they have all been sent for, and will be a.s.sembled this afternoon at the mouth of the torrent."

"I am very glad to hear it, Dias; that is just what we wanted."

"In one way--yes," Dias said. "It would be a great thing for us to catch them all together, for I have no fear that they will stand when these fireworks begin to go off among them."

"What is the drawback, then?"

"It is, senor, that they have either been collected because they have given up the hope of catching us at present, and are going to scatter and hunt till we venture out, which would be the worst thing possible; or they have made up their minds to make a rush upon us."

"Don't you think that we can beat them back?"

"Not if they are determined, senor. You see, we can't make them out till they are within twenty or thirty yards of us. At most you and your brother could fire four shots, then you would take up your rifles. We shall have then only four shots left. If they continue their rush where shall we be? There would be two of us on one wall and two on the other.

There would be four shots to fire from one side and four from the other. Then the end would come. Two on each side would not be able to keep back the rush of two or three score. In two minutes it would be all over."

"Yes, Dias, I see that if they were determined to storm the place and take us alive they could do it; but we have the fireworks."

"I did not think of that. Yes; but having once worked themselves up and being mad with excitement, even that might not stop them, though I should think it would. Yes, I believe we might feel a.s.sured that we should beat them back, and if so, we should hear no more of them."

"If I knew that they would come," Harry said, "I would certainly say we had best stay and defend ourselves; but we can't be sure that that is their motive for a.s.sembling. They may, as you say, be going to move off, leaving perhaps half a dozen men to watch the entrance and report if we attempt to escape. That would be fatal, and our only chance would be to leave everything behind and endeavour to climb up one side or the other; and even that might not avail us, as there may be one or two men up there to see if we make off that way. I am more inclined to think that this is the course that they will take rather than risk a heavy loss of life. They must have a good idea of what it would cost them to take the place."

"What do you think we had better do, then, senor?"

"I think we had better attack them as soon as possible after nightfall.

It is likely that they will do nothing before morning; as you say, they do not like moving at night, and if they attack it will not be until shortly before daybreak. There is sure to be a palaver when the men who have been on the hills come down. It will be too late then for them to go back before night, so that I think we are pretty sure to find them all in the ravine this evening. If, when we get there, we find the place empty, we must come to a decision as to what our best course will be. In that case I think we ought to climb the hills and make our way up the mountains as rapidly as possible. We could calculate on eight or ten hours' start, and by keeping as much as possible on the rocks, might hope to get so high among the mountains that they would not be able to follow our traces and overtake us before we reach a point where they would not dare follow us. In that case, of course we should have to give up all hope of finding the gold valley, and lose the mules with all our belongings, which would cripple us terribly."