Possibly he had arranged to be taken off within a fixed time.
But a sampan, laden with Dyak pirates, came first, and the intrepid explorer's bones rested near the well, whilst his head had gone to decorate the hut of some fierce village chief.

The murderers, after burying their own dead--for the white man fought hard, witness the empty cartridges--searched the island.

Some of them, ignorantly inquisitive, descended into the hollow.

They remained there.

The others, superstitious barbarians, fled for their lives, embarking so hastily that they took from the cave neither tools nor oil, though they would greatly prize these articles.
Such was the tragic web he spun, a compound of fact and fancy.