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Rh the high ground until we found a regular trail leading to the south. Well, our walk took us up to a high cliff overlooking a gorge filled with trees and bushes. We were walking ahead, with Larry at our heels, as we thought, when Boxer chanced to look around, and the boy was gone."

"Gone!" gasped Ben, in horror.

"Yes, gone! We couldn't understand it, and called to him, but he didn't answer. Then we went back about quarter of a mile, past the spot where we had seen him last, and fired the pistol as a signal. But he had disappeared totally, and we couldn't find hide nor hair o' him, try our level best."

The confession was a sickening one, and for several minutes Ben could not trust himself to speak.

"And—and what do you think became of my brother?" he asked, at length.

Both men shrugged their shoulders. "I'm afraid he fell over the cliff," said Boxer. "You see, the footpath was narrow and mighty slippery in spots."

At once Ben's mind went back to that scene in far-away Cuba, when Gerald Holgait had fallen over a cliff. Had a similar fate overtaken his