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At first Rutler found the points of support allowed him to rapidly climb a third of the face of the cliff. Then serious obstacles began to present themselves; but with dogged courage he surmounted them.
"I stifle! take off the cloak at once, I will not make any outcry," murmured Croustillac, believing that the colonel would discover his error. Rutler removed the cloak which enveloped the face of the adventurer, who saw a man kneeling beside him and threatening him with a dagger.
The wildcats had descended the precipice, scented the corpse of John, approached it first timidly, then, emboldened, had devoured it. The colonel heard and knew not what to think of these ferocious cries. At daybreak, thanks to the gluttony of these animals, the obstacle which prevented Rutler from leaving the cavern had entirely disappeared.
Then Rutler advanced and seized the sailor's leg. The leg was already cold and stiff; for the venom of the serpent works rapidly. A new cause for fear assailed the colonel. The serpent, not finding an egress in the cavern, might return the same way it had gone. Rutler seemed already to hear a slight noise behind him.
In order to explain the hostile assault of these carnivorous beasts which surrounded the chevalier, who had been discovered by their powerful sense of scent, we must return to the cavern in which Colonel Rutler was immured. We know that the corpse of the sailor John, dead from the sting of the serpent, completely obstructed the subterranean passage by which Rutler could alone leave the cavern.
The chevalier, profoundly moved by the recital of Monmouth, furtively brushed aside his tears, and said, "I understand now what that animal Rutler, with his everlasting dagger, meant by speaking to me of my execution."
Whether his strength was paralyzed, he being in such a cramped position, or whether the poison had already distended the body, Rutler could not extricate it.
This is just her own vessel she had prepared hastily to furnish her and the duke a means of escape, when she saw me carried off by Colonel Rutler; one of the negro fishermen was doubtless sent ahead to deliver her directions." The Gascon, after some little reflection, said aloud, "Yes, those memories are terrible to you, I know it, madame." "Then, your highness, have you the heart "
"Listen, my lord," said Rutler after some moments of silence, "for your grace's greater convenience, I can free you from the cloak which enwraps you; but, I repeat, at the slightest cry from madame the duchess, the slightest indication of a rescue by your slaves, I shall be compelled to kill you. I have promised the king, my master, to bring you to him, dead or alive."
We will leave De Chemerant advancing slowly toward Devil's Cliff, and will rejoin Father Griffen at Macouba, and Colonel Rutler at the bottom of the precipice, where he had arrived by way of the subterranean passage, after the wildcats, by devouring the corpse of John, had removed the obstacle which before had held the English envoy in the cavern of the Caraibe.
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