Foot by foot they skirted the clearing, guided by the fitful and flickering light of the camp-fire, and finally gained a position in what they judged was about the rear of the two central huts.
Now there was nothing to do but wait until the majority of the camp should fall asleep, and this proved the most trying ordeal they had yet experienced. At first groups of boisterous children approached their place of concealment, and more than once their hearts leapt into their mouths as it seemed inevitable that they would be discovered by them. As luck would have it, however, the children decided to return to the fire, and so they escaped at least one peril.
Gradually the noises of the camp diminished, and the fire flickered and burnt low. It was now the turn of the jungle insects, and they struck up a chorus that seemed deafening. Also, the mosquitoes issued forth in swarms, and drove the three boys almost frantic, for they did not dare to change their positions or make any effort to ward off the humming pests, as the noise entailed in doing so would have been almost certain to betray them.
There is an end to the longest wait, however, and at Bert's low whisper they crept toward the two huts they had marked in the center of the village. The moon was not yet high over the trees, and threw thick patches of inky blackness, that served our three adventurers well.
At times they could hardly make out each other's forms, so deep were the shadows, and they breathed a prayer of thankfulness for this aid.
The shadows fell at least ten feet short of the huts, however, and across this open space it was evident they would have to dash and take their chances of being seen.
As they had watched from the woods earlier in the evening, they had seen that the guard around the huts consisted of two men for each. The huts were perhaps forty feet apart, and this made it possible for them to attack the sentries guarding the one in which the prisoner was confined without necessarily giving the alarm to those about the other shack.
The boys were near enough to the dusky sentries now to hear their voices as they exchanged an occasional guttural remark. Bert touched the other two lightly, and they stopped. "I'll take the fellow nearest the fire," he breathed, "you two land on the other one. Club him with your revolvers, but whatever you do, don't let him make a sound, or we're gone for sure. Understand?"