they were in the bushrangers' cave. A fat lamp shed a dim illumination on the rough interior, the rock walls, the slab table on its stone supports, the settle, the ration bags heaped in a corner. Except for the lamp there was no sign of human presence.
Elsie took up the lamp, and with a knowledge of the cave which surprised Frank, who had not fully grasped the circumstances of her recent incarceration, flashed it into each of the other chambers, and returned to the central cave having found no one. She gave a small "Coo-ee," but there was no answer.
"He must be outside in the crater," she cried. "We must look for him there. Oh! to think of this time lost!"
They went out into the great green space enclosed by its mountain walls, into which the moon shone with a clear and wondrous brilliancy. Frank gazed about him with wonder and admiration. He saw the blue waterhole of unfathomable depth, the growing corn, the animals stabled securely in their volcanic paddock. It was marvellous to him that this place should have existed all his lifetime—countless ages before him—under his very eyes as it were, and he had never known of it. He made some remark of this kind to Elsie, but she paid no heed.
"Help me to find him!" she cried, in agony. "Go that way, and Iwill go this—and coo-ee, softly—no, it does not matter. No one could hear unless they were in the cave itself."
But her first coo-ee echoing back was answered by a voice on the other side of the crater, and presently she could see the fire-tip of a cigar thrown to the earth. Blake advanced, not at first certain who his visitors were and prepared for resistance, his revolver in his hand.
"It is I—Elsie," she cried, "Elsie and Frank Hallett. We have come to warn you. The troopers are on your track. They may be here now."
"Who has betrayed me?" he asked calmly, as he approached them.
