of his father. Some of the leading demons of the band determined that
they could not have such a fool as this for their leader, and he was
killed while asleep.

Now the band was headed by a Spaniard, whose fiendishness was of a
sufficiently high order to satisfy the most exacting of his fellows.
These and other bits of news about the Rackbirds had been told by one of
the band who had escaped to Panama after the murder of the captain,
fearing that his own talents for baseness did not reach the average
necessary for a Rackbird.

When he had made his landing from the wreck, Captain Horn never gave a
thought to the existence of this band of scoundrels. In fact, he had
supposed, when he had thought of the matter, that their rendezvous must
be far south of this point.

But now, standing on that shelf of rock, with his eyes fixed on the water
without seeing it, he knew that the abode of this gang of wretches was
within a comparatively short distance of this spot in which he and his
companions had taken refuge, and he knew, too, that there was every
reason to suppose that some of them would soon be in pursuit of the negro
who had run away.

Suddenly another dreadful thought struck him. Wild beasts, indeed!

He turned quickly to Maka. "Does that man know anything about Davis and
the two sailors? Were they killed?" he asked.

Maka shook his head and said that he had already asked his companion that
question, but Mok had said that he did not know. All he knew was that