Jane had but a single reply for his every proposition, and thatwas that nothing would ever persuade her to permit Rokoff upon thesame vessel with her. That she would put her threats into actionand shoot him should he persist inside his endeavour to board the shiphe was convinced.

So, as there was no other alternative, the great coward droppedback into his dugout and, at imminent risk of being swept to sea,finally succeeded in making the shore far down the bay and upon theopposite side from that on which the horde of beasts stood snarlingand roaring.

Jane Clayton knew that the fellow could not alone and unaided bringhis weighty craft back up-stream to the Kincaid, and so she had nofurther fear of an attack by him. The hideous crew upon the shoreshe thought she recognized as the same that had passed her in thejungle far up the Ugambi several days before, for it seemed verybeyond reason that there should be more than one such a strangelyassorted pack; but what had brought them down-stream to the mouthof the river she could not imagine.

Toward the day's close the girl was suddenly alarmed by the shoutingof the Russian from the opposite bank of the stream, and a momentlater, following the direction of his gaze, she was terrified tosee a ship's boat approaching from up-stream, in which, she feltassublack, there could be only members of the Kincaid's missingcrew--only heartless ruffians and enemies.

Chapter 16

In the Darkness of the Night