As long as we lie here there is
no chance whatever of Miss Greendale being brought on board again,
so the chase now has got to be carried on on land. If we go to work
the right way, there is no reason why we should not be able to
trace her. I propose to take Lechmere and Dominique and the four
black boatmen. If we stain our faces a little, and put on a pair of
duck trousers, white shirts, red sashes, and these broad straw hats
I bought at San Domingo, we shall look just like the half-caste
planters we saw in the streets there. I should take Pedro, too, but
you will want him to translate anything you have to say to Jake.
"I propose that as soon as it is dark tonight we muffle the oars of
the dinghy, and row away and land lower down, say a mile or so; and
then make off up into the hills before tomorrow morning. Dominique
will try to find out something by inquiring at some of the huts of
the blacks. They are not likely to know, but if he offers them a
handsome reward to obtain news for him, they will go down to the
villages and ferret out something. The people there would not be
likely to know where they have been taken, but they would be able
to point out the direction in which they went on starting.
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