The Adventures of Captain Horn
Frank Stockton Richard




Frank Richard Stockton

THE ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HORN





CHAPTER I. AN INTRODUCTORY DISASTER


Early in the spring of the year 1884 the three-masted schooner Castor, from San Francisco to Valparaiso, was struck by a tornado off the coast of Peru. The storm, which rose with frightful suddenness, was of short duration, but it left the Castor a helpless wreck. Her masts had snapped off and gone overboard, her rudder-post had been shattered by falling wreckage, and she was rolling in the trough of the sea, with her floating masts and spars thumping and bumping her sides.

The Castor was an American merchant-vessel, commanded by Captain Philip Horn, an experienced navigator of about thirty-five years of age. Besides a valuable cargo, she carried three passengers — two ladies and a boy. One of these, Mrs. William Cliff, a lady past middle age, was going to Valparaiso to settle some business affairs of her late husband, a New England merchant. The other lady was Miss Edna Markham, a school-teacher who had just passed her twenty-fifth year, although she looked older. She was on her way to Valparaiso to take an important position in an American seminary. Ralph, a boy of fifteen, was her brother, and she was taking him with her simply because she did not want to leave him alone in San Francisco. These two had no near relations, and the education of the brother depended upon the exertions of the sister. Valparaiso was not the place she would have selected for a boy’s education, but there they could be together, and, under the circumstances, that was a point of prime importance.

But when the storm had passed, and the sky was clear, and the mad waves had subsided into a rolling swell, there seemed no reason to believe that any one on board the Castor would ever reach Valparaiso. The vessel had been badly strained by the wrenching of the masts, her sides had been battered by the floating wreckage, and she was taking in water rapidly. Fortunately, no one had been injured by the storm, and although the captain found it would be a useless waste of time and labor to attempt to work the pumps, he was convinced, after a careful examination, that the ship would float some hours, and that there would, therefore, be time for those on board to make an effort to save not only their lives, but some of their property.

All the boats had been blown from their davits, but one of them was floating, apparently uninjured, a short distance to leeward, one of the heavy blocks by which it had been suspended having caught in the cordage of the topmast, so that it was securely moored. Another boat, a small one, was seen, bottom upward, about an eighth of a mile to leeward. Two seamen, each pushing an oar before him, swam out to the nearest boat, and having got on board of her, and freed her from her entanglements, they rowed out to the capsized boat, and towed it to the schooner. When this boat had been righted and bailed out, it was found to be in good condition.

The sea had become almost quiet, and there was time enough to do everything orderly and properly, and in less than three hours after the vessel had been struck, the two boats, containing all the crew and the passengers, besides a goodly quantity of provisions and water, and such valuables, clothing, rugs, and wraps as room could be found for, were pulling away from the wreck.

The captain, who, with his passengers, was in the larger boat, was aware that he was off the coast of Peru, but that was all he certainly knew of his position. The storm had struck the ship in the morning, before he had taken his daily observation, and his room, which was on deck, had been carried away, as well as every nautical instrument on board. He did not believe that the storm had taken him far out of his course, but of this he could not be sure. All that he knew with certainty was that to the eastward lay the land, and eastward, therefore, they pulled, a little compass attached to the captain’s watch-guard being their only guide.

For the rest of that day and that night, and the next day and the next night, the two boats moved eastward, the people on board suffering but little inconvenience, except from the labor of continuous rowing, at which everybody, excepting the two ladies, took part, even Ralph Markham being willing to show how much of a man he could be with an oar in his hand.

The weather was fine, and the sea was almost smooth, and as the captain had rigged up in his boat a tent-like covering of canvas for the ladies, they were, as they repeatedly declared, far more comfortable than they had any right to expect. They were both women of resource and courage. Mrs. Cliff, tall, thin in face, with her gray hair brushed plainly over her temples, was a woman of strong frame, who would have been perfectly willing to take an oar, had it been necessary. To Miss Markham this boat trip would have been a positive pleasure, had it not been for the unfortunate circumstances which made it necessary.

On the morning of the third day land was sighted, but it was afternoon before they reached it. Here they found themselves on a portion of the coast where the foot-hills of the great mountains stretch themselves almost down to the edge of the ocean. To all appearances, the shore was barren and uninhabited.

The two boats rowed along the coast a mile or two to the southward, but could find no good landing-place, but reaching a spot less encumbered with rocks than any other portion of the coast they had seen, Captain Horn determined to try to beach his boat there. The landing was accomplished in safety, although with some difficulty, and that night was passed in a little encampment in the shelter of some rocks scarcely a hundred yards from the sea.

The next morning Captain Horn took counsel with his mates, and considered the situation. They were on an uninhabited portion of the coast, and it was not believed that there was any town or settlement near enough to be reached by waiting over such wild country, especially with ladies in the party. It was, therefore, determined to seek succor by means of the sea. They might be near one of the towns or villages along the coast of Peru, and, in any case, a boat manned by the best oarsmen of the party, and loaded as lightly as possible, might hope, in the course of a day or two, to reach some port from which a vessel might be sent out to take off the remainder of the party.

But first Captain Horn ordered a thorough investigation to be made of the surrounding country, and in an hour or two a place was found which he believed would answer very well for a camping-ground until assistance should arrive. This was on a little plateau about a quarter of a mile back from the ocean, and surrounded on three sides by precipices, and on the side toward the sea the ground sloped gradually downward. To this camping-ground all of the provisions and goods were carried, excepting what would be needed by the boating party.

When this work had been accomplished, Captain Horn appointed his first mate to command the expedition, deciding to remain himself in the camp. When volunteers were called for, it astonished the captain to see how many of the sailors desired to go.

The larger boat pulled six oars, and seven men, besides the mate Rynders, were selected to go in her. As soon as she could be made ready she was launched and started southward on her voyage of discovery, the mate having first taken such good observation of the landmarks that he felt sure he would have no difficulty in finding the spot where he left his companions. The people in the little camp on the bluff now consisted of Captain Horn, the two ladies, the boy Ralph, three sailors, — one an Englishman, and the other two Americans from Cape Cod, — and a jet-black native African, known as Maka.

Captain Horn had not cared to keep many men with him in the camp, because there they would have little to do, and all the strong arms that could be spared would be needed in the boat. The three sailors he had retained were men of intelligence, on whom he believed he could rely in case of emergency, and Maka was kept because he was a cook. He had been one of the cargo of a slave-ship which had been captured by a British cruiser several years before, when on its way to Cuba, and the unfortunate negroes had been landed in British Guiana. It was impossible to return them to Africa, because none of them could speak English, or in any way give an idea as to what tribes they belonged, and if they should be landed anywhere in Africa except among their friends, they would be immediately reënslaved. For some years they lived in Guiana, in a little colony by themselves, and then, a few of them having learned some English, they made their way to Panama, where they obtained employment as laborers on the great canal. Maka, who was possessed of better intelligence than most of his fellows, improved a good deal in his English, and learned to cook very well, and having wandered to San Francisco, had been employed for two or three voyages by Captain Horn. Maka was a faithful and willing servant, and if he had been able to express himself more intelligibly, his merits might have been better appreciated.




CHAPTER II. A NEW FACE IN CAMP


The morning after the departure of the boat, Captain Horn, in company with the Englishman Davis, each armed with a gun, set out on a tour of investigation, hoping to be able to ascend the rocky hills at the back of the camp, and find some elevated point commanding a view over the ocean. After a good deal of hard climbing they reached such a point, but the captain found that the main object was really out of his reach. He could now plainly see that a high rocky point to the southward, which stretched some distance out to sea, would cut off all view of the approach of rescuers coming from that direction, until they were within a mile or two of his landing-place. Back from the sea the hills grew higher, until they blended into the lofty stretches of the Andes, this being one of the few points where the hilly country extends to the ocean.

The coast to the north curved a little oceanward, so that a much more extended view could be had in that direction, but as far as he could see by means of a little pocket-glass which the boy Ralph had lent him, the captain could discover no signs of habitation, and in this direction the land seemed to be a flat desert. When he returned to camp, about noon, he had made up his mind that the proper thing to do was to make himself and his companions as comfortable as possible and patiently await the return of his mate with succor.

Captain Horn was very well satisfied with his present place of encampment. Although rain is unknown in this western portion of Peru, which is, therefore, in general desolate and barren, there are parts of the country that are irrigated by streams which flow from the snow-capped peaks of the Andes, and one of these fertile spots the captain seemed to have happened upon. On the plateau there grew a few bushes, while the face of the rock in places was entirely covered by hanging vines. This fertility greatly puzzled Captain Horn, for nowhere was to be seen any stream of water, or signs of there ever having been any. But they had with them water enough to last for several days, and provisions for a much longer time, and the captain felt little concern on this account.

As for lodgings, there were none excepting the small tent which he had put up for the ladies, but a few nights in the open air in that dry climate would not hurt the male portion of the party.

In the course of the afternoon, the two American sailors came to Captain Horn and asked permission to go to look for game. The captain had small hopes of their finding anything suitable for food, but feeling sure that if they should be successful, every one would be glad of a little fresh meat, he gave his permission, at the same time requesting the men to do their best in the way of observation, if they should get up high enough to survey the country, and discover some signs of habitation, if such existed in that barren region. It would be a great relief to the captain to feel that there was some spot of refuge to which, by land or water, his party might make its way in case the water and provisions gave out before the return of the mate.

As to the men who went off in the boat, the captain expected to see but a few of them again. One or two might return with the mate, in such vessel as he should obtain in which to come for them, but the most of them, if they reached a seaport, would scatter, after the manner of seamen.

The two sailors departed, promising, if they could not bring back fish or fowl, to return before dark, with a report of the lay of the land.

It was very well that Maka did not have to depend on these hunters for the evening meal, for night came without them, and the next morning they had not returned. The captain was very much troubled. The men must be lost, or they had met with some accident. There could be no other reason for their continued absence. They had each a gun, and plenty of powder and shot, but they had taken only provisions enough for a single meal.

Davis offered to go up the hills to look for the missing men. He had lived for some years in the bush in Australia, and he thought that there was a good chance of his discovering their tracks. But the captain shook his head.

“You are just as likely to get lost, or to fall over a rock, as anybody else,” he said, “and it is better to have two men lost than three. But there is one thing that you can do. You can go down to the beach, and make your way southward as far as possible. There you can find your way back, and if you take a gun, and fire it every now and then, you may attract the attention of Shirley and Burke, if they are on the hills above, and perhaps they may even be able to see you as you walk along. If they are alive, they will probably see or hear you, and fire in answer. It is a very strange thing that we have not heard a shot from them.”

Ralph begged to accompany the Englishman, for he was getting very restless, and longed for a ramble and scramble. But neither the captain nor his sister would consent to this, and Davis started off alone.

“If you can round the point down there,” said the captain to him, “do it, for you may see a town or houses not far away on the other side. But don’t take any risks. At all events, make your calculations so that you will be back here before dark.”

The captain and Ralph assisted the two ladies to a ledge of rock near the camp from which they could watch the Englishman on his way. They saw him reach the beach, and after going on a short distance he fired his gun, after which he pressed forward, now and then stopping to fire again. Even from their inconsiderable elevation they could see him until he must have been more than a mile away, and he soon after vanished from their view.

As on the previous day darkness came without the two American sailors, so now it came without the Englishman, and in the morning he had not returned. Of course, every mind was filled with anxiety in regard to the three sailors, but Captain Horn’s soul was racked with apprehensions of which he did not speak. The conviction forced itself upon him that the men had been killed by wild beasts. He could imagine no other reason why Davis should not have returned. He had been ordered not to leave the beach, and, therefore, could not lose his way. He was a wary, careful man, used to exploring rough country, and he was not likely to take any chances of disabling himself by a fall while on such an expedition.

Although he knew that the great jaguar was found in Peru, as well as the puma and black bear, the captain had not supposed it likely that any of these creatures frequented the barren western slopes of the mountains, but he now reflected that there were lions in the deserts of Africa, and that the beasts of prey in South America might also be found in its deserts.

A great responsibility now rested upon Captain Horn. He was the only man left in camp who could be depended upon as a defender, — for Maka was known to be a coward, and Ralph was only a boy, — and it was with a shrinking of the heart that he asked himself what would be the consequences if a couple of jaguars or other ferocious beasts were to appear upon that unprotected plateau in the night, or even in the daytime. He had two guns, but he was only one man. These thoughts were not cheerful, but the captain’s face showed no signs of alarm, or even unusual anxiety, and, with a smile on his handsome brown countenance, he bade the ladies good morning as if he were saluting them upon a quarter-deck.

“I have been thinking all night about those three men,” said Miss Markham, “and I have imagined something which may have happened. Isn’t it possible that they may have discovered at a distance some inland settlement which could not be seen by the party in the boat, and that they thought it their duty to push their way to it, and so get assistance for us? In that case, you know, they would probably be a long time coming back.”

“That is possible,” said the captain, glad to hear a hopeful supposition, but in his heart he had no faith in it whatever. If Davis had seen a village, or even a house, he would have come back to report it, and if the others had found human habitation, they would have had ample time to return, either by land or by sea.

The restless Ralph, who had chafed a good deal because he had not been allowed to leave the plateau in search of adventure, now found a vent for his surplus energy, for the captain appointed him fire-maker. The camp fuel was not abundant, consisting of nothing but some dead branches and twigs from the few bushes in the neighborhood. These Ralph collected with great energy, and Maka had nothing to complain of in regard to fuel for his cooking.

Toward the end of that afternoon, Ralph prepared to make a fire for the supper, and he determined to change the position of the fireplace and bring it nearer the rocks, where he thought it would burn better. It did burn better — so well, indeed, that some of the dry leaves of the vines that there covered the face of the rocks took fire. Ralph watched with interest the dry leaves blaze and the green ones splutter, and then he thought it would be a pity to scorch those vines, which were among the few green things about them, and he tried to put out the fire. But this he could not do, and, when he called Maka, the negro was not able to help him. The fire had worked its way back of the green vines, and seemed to have found good fuel, for it was soon crackling away at a great rate, attracting the rest of the party.

“Can’t we put it out?” cried Miss Markham. “It is a pity to ruin those beautiful vines.”

The captain smiled and shook his head. “We cannot waste our valuable water on that conflagration,” said he. “There is probably a great mass of dead vines behind the green outside. How it crackles and roars! That dead stuff must be several feet thick. All we can do is to let it burn. It cannot hurt us. It cannot reach your tent, for there are no vines over there.”

The fire continued to roar and blaze, and to leap up the face of the rock.

“It is wonderful,” said Mrs. Cliff, “to think how those vines must have been growing and dying, and new ones growing and dying, year after year, nobody knows how many ages.”

“What is most wonderful to me,” said the captain, “is that the vines ever grew there at all, or that these bushes should be here. Nothing can grow in this region, unless it is watered by a stream from the mountains, and there is no stream here.”

Miss Markham was about to offer a supposition to the effect that perhaps the precipitous wall of rock which surrounded the little plateau, and shielded it from the eastern sun, might have had a good effect upon the vegetation, when suddenly Ralph, who had a ship’s biscuit on the end of a sharp stick, and was toasting it in the embers of a portion of the burnt vines, sprang back with a shout.

“Look out!” he cried. “The whole thing’s coming down!” And, sure enough, in a moment a large portion of the vines, which had been clinging to the rock, fell upon the ground in a burning mass. A cloud of smoke and dust arose, and when it had cleared away the captain and his party saw upon the perpendicular side of the rock, which was now revealed to them as if a veil had been torn away from in front of it, an enormous face cut out of the solid stone.




CHAPTER III. A CHANGE OF LODGINGS


The great face stared down upon the little party gathered beneath it. Its chin was about eight feet above the ground, and its stony countenance extended at least that distance up the cliff. Its features were in low relief, but clear and distinct, and a smoke-blackened patch beneath one of its eyes gave it a sinister appearance. From its wide-stretching mouth a bit of half-burnt vine hung, trembling in the heated air, and this element of motion produced the impression on several of the party that the creature was about to open its lips.

Mrs. Cliff gave a little scream, — she could not help it, — and Maka sank down on his knees, his back to the rock, and covered his face with his hands. Ralph was the first to speak.

“There have been heathen around here,” he said. “That’s a regular idol.”

“You are right,” said the captain. “That is a bit of old-time work. That face was cut by the original natives.”

The two ladies were so interested, and even excited, that they seized each other by the hands. Here before their faces was a piece of sculpture doubtless done by the people of ancient Peru, that people who were discovered by Pizarro; and this great idol, or whatever it was, had perhaps never before been seen by civilized eyes. It was wonderful, and in the conjecture and exclamation of the next half-hour everything else was forgotten, even the three sailors.

Because the captain was the captain, it was natural that every one should look to him for some suggestion as to why this great stone face should have been carved here on this lonely and desolate rock. But he shook his head.

“I have no ideas about it,” he said, “except that it must have been some sort of a landmark. It looks out toward the sea, and perhaps the ancient inhabitants put it there so that people in ships, coming near enough to the coast, should know where they were. Perhaps it was intended to act as a lighthouse to warn seamen off a dangerous coast. But I must say that I do not see how it could do that, for they would have had to come pretty close to the shore to see it, unless they had better glasses than we have.”

The sun was now near the horizon, and Maka was lifted to his feet by the captain, and ordered to stop groaning in African, and go to work to get supper on the glowing embers of the vines. He obeyed, of course, but never did he turn his face upward to that gaunt countenance, which grinned and winked and frowned whenever a bit of twig blazed up, or the coals were stirred by the trembling negro.

After supper and until the light had nearly faded from the western sky, the two ladies sat and watched that vast face upon the rocks, its features growing more and more solemn as the light decreased.

“I wish I had a long-handled broom,” said Mrs. Cliff, “for if the dust and smoke and ashes of burnt leaves were brushed from off its nose and eyebrows, I believe it would have a rather gracious expression.”

As for the captain, he went walking about on the outlying portion of the plateau, listening and watching. But it was not stone faces he was thinking of. That night he did not sleep at all, but sat until day-break, with a loaded gun across his knees, and another one lying on the ground beside him.

When Miss Markham emerged from the rude tent the next morning, and came out into the bright light of day, the first thing she saw was her brother Ralph, who looked as if he had been sweeping a chimney or cleaning out an ash-hole.

“What on earth has happened to you!” she cried. “How did you get yourself so covered with dirt and ashes?”

“I got up ever so long ago,” he replied, “and as the captain is asleep over there, and there was nobody to talk to, I thought I would go and try to find the back of his head” — pointing to the stone face above them. “But he hasn’t any. He is a sham.”

“What do you mean?” asked his sister.

“You see, Edna,” said the boy, “I thought I would try if I could find any more faces, and so I got a bit of stone, and scratched away some of the burnt vines that had not fallen, and there I found an open place in the rock on this side of the face. Step this way, and you can see it. It’s like a narrow doorway. I went and looked into it, and saw that it led back of the big face, and I went in to see what was there.”

“You should never have done that, Ralph,” cried his sister. “There might have been snakes in that place, or precipices, or nobody knows what. What could you expect to see in the dark?”

“It wasn’t so dark as you might think,” said he. “After my eyes got used to the place I could see very well. But there was nothing to see — just walls on each side. There was more of the passageway ahead of me, but I began to think of snakes myself, and as I did not have a club or anything to kill them with, I concluded I wouldn’t go any farther. It isn’t so very dirty in there. Most of this I got on myself scraping down the burnt vines. Here comes the captain. He doesn’t generally oversleep himself like this. If he will go with me, we will explore that crack.”

When Captain Horn heard of the passage into the rock, he was much more interested than Ralph had expected him to be, and, without loss of time, he lighted a lantern and, with the boy behind him, set out to investigate it. But before entering the cleft, the captain stationed Maka at a place where he could view all the approaches to the plateau, and told him if he saw any snakes or other dangerous things approaching, to run to the opening and call him. Now, snakes were among the few things that Maka was not afraid of, and so long as he thought these were the enemies to be watched, he would make a most efficient sentinel.

When Captain Horn had cautiously advanced a couple of yards into the interior of the rock, he stopped, raised his lantern, and looked about him. The passage was about two feet wide, the floor somewhat lower than the ground outside, and the roof but a few feet above his head. It was plainly the work of man, and not a natural crevice in the rocks. Then the captain put the lantern behind him, and stared into the gloom ahead of them. As Ralph had said, it was not so dark as might have been expected. In fact, about twenty feet forward there was a dim light on the right-hand wall.

The captain, still followed by Ralph, now moved on until they came to this lighted place, and found it was an open doorway. Both heads together, they peeped in, and saw it was an opening like a doorway into a chamber about fifteen feet square and with very high walls. They scarcely needed the lantern to examine it, for a jagged opening in the roof let in a good deal of light.

Passing into this chamber, keeping a good watch out for pitfalls as he moved on, and forgetting, in his excitement, that he might go so far that he could not hear Maka, should he call, the captain saw to the right another open doorway, on the other side of which was another chamber, about the size of the one they had first entered. One side of this was a good deal broken away, and through a fracture three or four feet wide the light entered freely, as if from the open air. But when the two explorers peered through the ragged aperture, they did not look into the open air, but into another chamber, very much larger than the others, with high, irregular walls, but with scarcely any roof, almost the whole of the upper part being open to the sky.

A mass of broken rocks on the floor of this apartment showed that the roof had fallen in. The captain entered it and carefully examined it. A portion of the floor was level and unobstructed by rocks, and in the walls there was not the slightest sign of a doorway, except the one by which he had entered from the adjoining chamber.

“Hurrah!” cried Ralph. “Here is a suite of rooms. Isn’t this grand? You and I can have that first one, Maka can sleep in the hall to keep out burglars, and Edna and Mrs. Cliff can have the middle room, and this open place here can be their garden, where they can take tea and sew. These rocks will make splendid tables and chairs.”

The captain stood, breathing hard, a sense of relief coming over him like the warmth of fire. He had thought of what Ralph had said before the boy had spoken. Here was safety from wild beasts — here was immunity from the only danger he could imagine to those under his charge. It might be days yet before the mate returned, — he knew the probable difficulties of obtaining a vessel, even when a port should be reached, — but they would be safe here from the attacks of ferocious animals, principally to be feared in the night. They might well be thankful for such a good place as this in which to await the arrival of succor, if succor came before their water gave out. There were biscuits, salt meat, tea, and other things enough to supply their wants for perhaps a week longer, provided the three sailors did not return, but the supply of water, although they were very economical of it, must give out in a day or two. “But,” thought the captain, “Rynders may be back before that, and, on the other hand, a family of jaguars might scent us out to-night.”

“You are right, my boy,” said he, speaking to Ralph. “Here is a suite of rooms, and we will occupy them just as you have said. They are dry and airy, and it will be far better for us to sleep here than out of doors.”

As they returned, Ralph was full of talk about the grand find. But the captain made no answers to his remarks — his mind was busy contriving some means of barricading the narrow entrance at night.

When breakfast was over, and the entrance to the rocks had been made cleaner and easier by the efforts of Maka and Ralph, the ladies were conducted to the suite of rooms which Ralph had described in such glowing terms. Both were filled with curiosity to see these apartments, especially Miss Markham, who was fairly well read in the history of South America, and who had already imagined that the vast mass of rock by which they had camped might be in reality a temple of the ancient Peruvians, to which the stone face was a sacred sentinel. But when the three apartments had been thoroughly explored she was disappointed.

“There is not a sign or architectural adornment, or anything that seems to have the least religious significance, or significance of any sort,” she said. “These are nothing but three stone rooms, with their roofs more or less broken in. They do not even suggest dungeons.”

As for Mrs. Cliff, she did not hesitate to say that she should prefer to sleep in the open air.

“It would be dreadful,” she said, “to awaken in the night and think of those great stone walls about me.”

Even Ralph remarked that, on second thought, he believed he would rather sleep out of doors, for he liked to look up and see the stars before he went to sleep.

At first the captain was a little annoyed to find that this place of safety, the discovery of which had given him such satisfaction and relief, was looked upon with such disfavor by those who needed it so very much, but then the thought came to him, “Why should they care about a place of safety, when they have no idea of danger?” He did not now hesitate to settle the matter in the most straightforward and honest way. Having a place of refuge to offer, the time had come to speak of the danger. And so, standing in the larger apartment, and addressing his party, he told them of the fate he feared had overtaken the three sailors, and how anxious he had been lest the same fate should come upon some one or all of them.

Now vanished every spark of opposition to the captain’s proffered lodgings.

“If we should be here but one night longer,” cried Mrs. Cliff, echoing the captain’s thought, “let us be safe.”

In the course of the day the two rooms were made as comfortable as circumstances would allow with the blankets, shawls, and canvas which had been brought on shore, and that night they all slept in the rock chambers, the captain having made a barricade for the opening of the narrow passage with the four oars, which he brought up from the boat. Even should these be broken down by some wild beast, Captain Horn felt that, with his two guns at the end of the narrow passage, he might defend his party from the attacks of any of the savage animals of the country.

The captain slept soundly that night, for he had had but a nap of an hour or two on the previous morning, and, with Maka stretched in the passage outside the door of his room, he knew that he would have timely warning of danger, should any come. But Mrs. Cliff did not sleep well, spending a large part of the night imagining the descent of active carnivora down the lofty and perpendicular walls of the large adjoining apartment.

The next day was passed rather wearily by most of the party in looking out for signs of a vessel with the returning mate. Ralph had made a flag which he could wave from a high point near by, in case he should see a sail, for it would be a great misfortune should Mr. Rynders pass them without knowing it.

To the captain, however, came a new and terrible anxiety. He had looked into the water-keg, and saw that it held but a few quarts. It had not lasted as long as he had expected, for this was a thirsty climate.

The next night Mrs. Cliff slept, having been convinced that not even a cat could come down those walls. The captain woke very early, and when he went out he found, to his amazement, that the barricade had been removed, and he could not see Maka. He thought at first that perhaps the negro had gone down to the sea-shore to get some water for washing purposes, but an hour passed, and Maka did not return. The whole party went down to the beach, for the captain insisted upon all keeping together. They shouted, they called, they did whatever they could to discover the lost African, but all without success.

They returned to camp, disheartened and depressed. This new loss had something terrible in it. What it meant no one could conjecture. There was no reason why Maka should run away, for there was no place to run to, and it was impossible that any wild beast should have removed the oars and carried off the negro.




CHAPTER IV. ANOTHER NEW FACE


As the cook had gone, Mrs. Cliff and Miss Markham prepared breakfast, and then they discovered how little water there was.

There was something mysterious about the successive losses of his men which pressed heavily upon the soul of Captain Horn, but the want of water pressed still more heavily. Ralph had just asked his permission to go down to the beach and bathe in the sea, saying that as he could not have all the water he wanted to drink, it might make him feel better to take a swim in plenty of water. The boy was not allowed to go so far from camp by himself, but the captain could not help thinking how this poor fellow would probably feel the next day if help had not arrived, and of the sufferings of the others, which, by that time, would have begun. Still, as before, he spoke hopefully, and the two women, as brave as he, kept up good spirits, and although they each thought of the waterless morrow, they said nothing about it.

As for Ralph, he confidently expected the return of the men in the course of the day, as he had done in the course of each preceding day, and two or three times an hour he was at his post of observation, ready to wave his flag.

Even had he supposed that it would be of any use to go to look for Maka, a certain superstitious feeling would have prevented the captain from doing so. If he should go out, and not return, there would be little hope for those two women and the boy. But he could not help feeling that beyond the rocky plateau which stretched out into the sea to the southward, and which must be at least two miles away, there might be seen some signs of habitation, and, consequently, of a stream. If anything of the sort could be seen, it might become absolutely necessary for the party to make their way toward it, either by land or sea, no matter how great the fatigue or the danger, and without regard to the fate of those who had left camp before them.

About half an hour afterwards, when the captain had mounted some rocks near by, from which he thought he might get a view of the flat region to the north on which he might discover the missing negro, Ralph, who was looking seaward, gave a start, and then hurriedly called to his sister and Mrs. Cliff, and pointed to the beach. There was the figure of a man which might well be Maka, but, to their amazement and consternation, he was running, followed, not far behind, by another man. The figures rapidly approached, and it was soon seen that the first man was Maka, but that the second figure was not one of the sailors who had left them. Could he be pursuing Maka? What on earth did it mean?

For some moments Ralph stood dumfounded, and then ran in the direction in which the captain had gone, and called to him.

At the sound of his voice the second figure stopped and turned as if he were about to run, but Maka — they were sure it was Maka — seized him by the arm and held him. Therefore this newcomer could not be pursuing their man. As the two now came forward, Maka hurrying the other on, Ralph and his two companions were amazed to see that this second man was also an African, a negro very much like Maka, and as they drew nearer, the two looked as if they might have been brothers.

The captain had wandered farther than he had intended, but after several shouts from Ralph he came running back, and reached the camp-ground just as the two negroes arrived.

At the sight of this tall man bounding toward him the strange negro appeared to be seized with a wild terror. He broke away from Maka, and ran first in this direction and then in that, and perceiving the cleft in the face of the rock, he blindly rushed into it, as a rat would rush into a hole. Instantly Maka was after him, and the two were lost to view.

When the captain had been told of the strange thing which had happened, he stood without a word. Another African! This was a puzzle too great for his brain.

“Are you sure it was not a native of these parts?” said he, directly.

“You know, they are very dark.”

“No!” exclaimed Mrs. Cliff and her companions almost in the same breath, “it was an African, exactly like Maka.”

At this moment a wild yell was heard from the interior of the rocks, then another and another. Without waiting to consider anything, or hear any more, the captain dashed into the narrow passage, Ralph close behind him. They ran into the room in which they had slept. They looked on all sides, but saw nothing. Again, far away, they heard another yell, and they ran out again into the passage.

This narrow entry, as the investigating Ralph had already discovered, continued for a dozen yards past the doorway which led to the chambers, but there it ended in a rocky wall about five feet high. Above this was an aperture extending to the roof of the passage, but Ralph, having a wholesome fear of snakes, had not cared to climb over the wall to see what was beyond.

When the captain and Ralph had reached the end of the passage, they heard another cry, and there could be no doubt that it came through the aperture by which they stood. Instantly Ralph scrambled to the top of the wall, pushed himself head foremost through the opening, and came down on the other side, partly on his hands and partly on his feet. Had the captain been first, he would not have made such a rash leap, but now he did not hesitate a second. He instantly followed the boy, taking care, however, to let himself down on his feet.

The passage on the other side of the dividing wall seemed to be the same as that they had just left, although perhaps a little lighter. After pushing on for a short distance, they found that the passage made a turn to the right, and then in a few moments the captain and Ralph emerged into open space. What sort of space it was they could not comprehend.

“It seemed to me,” said Ralph, afterwards, “as if I had fallen into the sky at night. I was afraid to move, for fear I should tumble into astronomical distances.”

The captain stared about him, apparently as much confounded by the situation as was the boy. But his mind was quickly brought to the consideration of things which he could understand. Almost at his feet was Maka, lying on his face, his arms and head over the edge of what might be a bank or a bottomless precipice, and yelling piteously. Making a step toward him, the captain saw that he had hold of another man, several feet below him, and that he could not pull him up.

“Hold on tight, Maka,” he cried, and then, taking hold of the African’s shoulders, he gave one mighty heave, lifted both men, and set them on their feet beside him.

Ralph would have willingly sacrificed the rest of his school-days to be able to perform such a feat as that. But the Africans were small, and the captain was wildly excited.

Well might he be excited. He was wet! The strange man whom he had pulled up had stumbled against him, and he was dripping with water. Ralph was by the captain, tightly gripping his arm, and, without speaking, they both stood gazing before them and around them.

At their feet, stretching away in one direction, farther than they could see, and what at first sight they had taken to be air, was a body of water — a lake! Above them were rocks, and, as far as they could see to the right, the water seemed to be overhung by a cavernous roof. But in front of them, on the other side of the lake, which here did not seem to be more than a hundred feet wide, there was a great upright opening in the side of the cave, through which they could see the distant mountains and a portion of the sky.

“Water!” said Ralph, in a low tone, as if he had been speaking in church, and then, letting go of the captain’s arm, he began to examine the ledge, but five or six feet wide, on which they stood. At his feet the water was at least a yard below them, but a little distance on he saw that the ledge shelved down to the surface of the lake, and in a moment he had reached this spot, and, throwing himself down on his breast, he plunged his face into the water and began drinking like a thirsty horse. Presently he rose to his knees with a great sigh of satisfaction.

“Oh, captain,” he cried, “it is cold and delicious. I believe that in one hour more I should have died of thirst.”

But the captain did not answer, nor did he move from the spot where he stood. His thoughts whirled around in his mind like chaff in a winnowing-machine. Water! A lake in the bosom of the rocks! Half an hour ago he must have been standing over it as he scrambled up the hillside. Visions that he had had of the morrow, when all their eyes should be standing out of their faces, like the eyes of shipwrecked sailors he had seen in boats, came back to him, and other visions of his mate and his men toiling southward for perhaps a hundred miles without reaching a port or a landing, and then the long, long delay before a vessel could be procured. And here was water!

Ralph stood beside him for an instant. “Captain,” he cried, “I am going to get a pail, and take some to Edna and Mrs. Cliff.” And then he was gone.

Recalled thus to the present, the captain stepped back. He must do something — he must speak to some one. He must take some advantage of this wonderful, this overpowering discovery. But before he could bring his mind down to its practical workings, Maka had clutched him by the coat.

“Cap’n,” he said, “I must tell you. I must speak it. I must tell you now, quick. Wait! Don’t go!”




CHAPTER V. THE RACKBIRDS


The new African was sitting on the ground, as far back from the edge of the ledge as he could get, shivering and shaking, for the water was cold. He had apparently reached the culmination and termination of his fright. After his tumble into the water, which had happened because he had been unable to stop in his mad flight, he had not nerve enough left to do anything more, no matter what should appear to scare him, and there was really no reason why he should be afraid of this big white man, who did not even look at him or give him a thought.

Maka’s tale, which he told so rapidly and incoherently that he was frequently obliged to repeat portions of it, was to the following effect: He had thought a great deal about the scarcity of water, and it had troubled him so that he could not sleep. What a dreadful thing it would be for those poor ladies and the captain and the boy to die because they had no water! His recollections of experiences in his native land made him well understand that streams of water are to be looked for between high ridges, and the idea forced itself upon him very strongly that on the other side of the ridge to the south there might be a stream. He knew the captain would not allow him to leave the camp if he asked permission, and so he rose very early, even before it was light, and going down to the shore, made his way along the beach — on the same route, in fact, that the Englishman Davis had taken. He was a good deal frightened sometimes, he said, by the waves, which dashed up as if they would pull him into the water. When he reached the point of the rocky ridge, he had no difficulty whatever in getting round it, as he could easily keep away from the water by climbing over the rocks.

He found that the land on the other side began to recede from the ocean, and that there was a small sandy beach below him. This widened until it reached another and smaller point of rock, and beyond this Maka believed he would find the stream for which he was searching. And while he was considering whether he should climb over it or wade around it, suddenly a man jumped down from the rock, almost on top of him. This man fell down on his back, and was at first so frightened that he did not try to move. Maka’s wits entirely deserted him, he said, and he did not know anything, except that most likely he was going to die.

But on looking at the man on the ground, he saw that he was an African like himself, and in a moment he recognized him as one of his fellow-slaves, with whom he had worked in Guiana, and also for a short time on the Panama Canal. This made him think that perhaps he was not going to die, and he went up to the other man and spoke to him. Then the other man thought perhaps he was not going to die, and he sat up and spoke.

When the other man told his tale, Maka agreed with him that it would be far better to die of thirst than to go on any farther to look for water, and, turning, he ran back, followed by the other, and they never stopped to speak to each other until they had rounded the great bluff, and were making their way along the beach toward the camp. Then his fellow-African told Maka a great deal more, and Maka told everything to the captain.

The substance of the tale was this: A mile farther up the bay than Maka had gone, there was a little stream that ran down the ravine. About a quarter of a mile up this stream there was a spot where, it appeared from the account, there must be a little level ground suitable for habitations. Here were five or six huts, almost entirely surrounded by rocks, and in these lived a dozen of the most dreadful men in the whole world. This Maka assured the captain, his eyes wet with tears as he spoke. It must truly be so, because the other African had told him things which proved it.

A little farther up the stream, on the other side of the ravine, there was a cave, a very small one, and so high up in the face of the rock that it could only be reached by a ladder. In this lived five black men, members of the company of slaves who had gone from Guiana to the isthmus, and who had been brought down there about a year before by two wicked men, who had promised them well-paid work in a lovely country. They had, however, been made actual slaves in this barren and doleful place, and had since worked for the cruel men who had beguiled them into a captivity worse than the slavery to which they had been originally destined.

Eight of them had come down from the isthmus, but, at various times since, three of them had been killed by accident, or shot while trying to run away. The hardships of these poor fellows were very great, and Maka’s voice shook as he spoke of them. They were kept in the cave all the time, except when they were wanted for some sort of work, when a ladder was put up by the side of the rock, and such as were required were called to come down. Without a ladder no one could get in or out of the cave. One man who had tried to slip down at night fell and broke his neck.

The Africans were employed in cooking and other rough domestic or menial services, and sometimes all of them were taken down to the shore of the bay, where they saw small vessels, and they were employed in carrying goods from one of these to another, and were also obliged to carry provisions and heavy kegs up the ravine to the houses of the wicked men. The one whom he had brought with him, Maka said, had that day escaped from his captors. One of the Rackbirds, whom in some way the negro had offended, had sworn to kill him before night, and feeling sure that this threat would be carried out, the poor fellow had determined to run away, no matter what the consequences. He had chosen the way by the ocean, in order that he might jump in and drown himself if he found that he was likely to be overtaken, but apparently his escape had not yet been discovered.

Maka was going on to tell something more about the wicked men, when the captain interrupted him. “Can this friend of yours speak English?” he asked.

“Only one, two words,” replied Maka.

“Ask him if he knows the name of that band of men.”

“Yes,” said Maka, presently, “he know, but he no can speak it.”

“Are they called the Rackbirds?” asked Captain Horn.

The shivering negro had been listening attentively, and now half rose and nodded his head violently, and then began to speak rapidly in African.

“Yes,” said Maka, “he says that is name they are called.”

At this moment Ralph appeared upon the scene, and the second African, whose name was something like Mok, sprang to his feet as if he were about to flee for his life. But as there was no place to flee to, except into the water or into the arms of Ralph, he stood still, trembling. A few feet to the left the shelf ended in a precipitous rock, and on the right, as has been said, it gradually descended into the water, the space on which the party stood not being more than twenty feet long and five or six feet wide. When he saw Ralph, the captain suddenly stopped the question he was about to ask, and said in an undertone to Maka:

“Not a word to the boy. I will tell.”

“Oh,” cried Ralph, “you do not know what a lively couple there is out there. I found that my sister and Mrs. Cliff had made up their minds that they would perish in about two days, and Mrs. Cliff had been making her will with a lead-pencil, and now they are just as high up as they were low down before. They would not let me come to get them some water, though I kept telling them they never tasted anything like it in their whole lives, because they wanted to hear everything about everything. My sister will be wild to come to this lake before long, even if Mrs. Cliff does not care to try it. And when you are ready to come to them, and bring Maka, they want to know who that other colored man is, and how Maka happened to find him. I truly believe their curiosity goes ahead of their thirst.” And so saying he went down to the lake to fill a pail he had brought with him.

The captain told Ralph to hurry back to the ladies, and that he would be there in a few minutes. Captain Horn knew a great deal about the Rackbirds. They were a band of desperadoes, many of them outlaws and criminals. They had all come down from the isthmus, to which they had been attracted by the great canal works, and after committing various outrages and crimes, they had managed to get away without being shot or hung. Captain Horn had frequently heard of them in the past year or two, and it was generally supposed that they had some sort of rendezvous or refuge on this coast, but there had been no effort made to seek them out. He had frequently heard of crimes committed by them at points along the coast, which showed that they had in their possession some sort of vessel. At one time, when he had stopped at Lima, he had heard that there was talk of the government’s sending out a police or military expedition against these outlaws, but he had never known of anything of the sort being done.

Everything that, from time to time, had been told Captain Horn about the Rackbirds showed that they surpassed in cruelty and utter vileness any other bandits, or even savages, of whom he had ever heard. Among other news, he had been told that the former leader of the band, which was supposed to be composed of men of many nationalities, was a French Canadian, who had been murdered by his companions because, while robbing a plantation in the interior, — they had frequently been known to cross the desert and the mountains, — he had forborne to kill an old man because as the trembling graybeard looked up at him he had reminded him of his father. Some of the leading demons of the band determined that they could not have such a fool as this for their leader, and he was killed while asleep.

Now the band was headed by a Spaniard, whose fiendishness was of a sufficiently high order to satisfy the most exacting of his fellows. These and other bits of news about the Rackbirds had been told by one of the band who had escaped to Panama after the murder of the captain, fearing that his own talents for baseness did not reach the average necessary for a Rackbird.

When he had made his landing from the wreck, Captain Horn never gave a thought to the existence of this band of scoundrels. In fact, he had supposed, when he had thought of the matter, that their rendezvous must be far south of this point.

But now, standing on that shelf of rock, with his eyes fixed on the water without seeing it, he knew that the abode of this gang of wretches was within a comparatively short distance of this spot in which he and his companions had taken refuge, and he knew, too, that there was every reason to suppose that some of them would soon be in pursuit of the negro who had run away.

Suddenly another dreadful thought struck him. Wild beasts, indeed!

He turned quickly to Maka. “Does that man know anything about Davis and the two sailors? Were they killed?” he asked.

Maka shook his head and said that he had already asked his companion that question, but Mok had said that he did not know. All he knew was that those wicked men killed everybody they could kill.

The captain shut his teeth tightly together. “That was it,” he said. “I could not see how it could be jaguars, although I could think of nothing else. But these bloodthirsty human beasts! I see it now.” He moved toward the passage. “If that dirty wretch had not run away,” he thought, “we might have stayed undiscovered here until a vessel came. But they will track his footsteps upon the sand — they are bound to do that.”




CHAPTER VI. THREE WILD BEASTS


When the captain joined the two ladies and the boy, who were impatiently waiting for him on the plateau, he had made up his mind to tell them the bad news. Terrible as was the necessity, it could not be helped. It was very hard for him to meet those three radiant faces, and to hear them talk about the water that had been discovered.

“Now,” said Mrs. Cliff, “I see no reason why we should not live here in peace and comfort until Mr. Rynders chooses to come back for us. And I have been thinking, captain, that if somebody — and I am sure Ralph would be very good at it — could catch some fish, it would help out very much. We are getting a little short of meat, but as for the other things, we have enough to last for days and days. But we won’t talk of that now. We want to hear where that other colored man came from. Just look at him as he sits there with Maka by those embers. One might think he would shiver himself to pieces. Was he cast ashore from a wreck?”

The captain stood silent for a moment, and then, briefly but plainly, and glossing over the horrors of the situation as much as he could, he told them about the Rackbirds. Not one of the little party interrupted the captain’s story, but their faces grew paler and paler as he proceeded.

When he had finished, Mrs. Cliff burst into tears. “Captain,” she cried, “let us take the boat and row away from this dreadful place. We should not lose a minute. Let us go now!”

But the captain shook his head. “That would not do,” he said. “On this open sea they could easily see us. They have boats, and could row much faster than we could.”

“Then,” exclaimed the excited woman, “we could turn over the boat, and all sink to the bottom together.”

To this the captain made no answer. “You must all get inside as quickly as you can,” he said. “Maka, you and that other fellow carry in everything that has been left out here. Be quick. Go up, Ralph, and take the flag down, and then run in.”

When the others had entered the narrow passage, the captain followed. Fortunately, he had two guns, each double-barrelled, and if but a few of the Rackbirds came in pursuit of the escaped negro, he might be a match for them in that narrow passage.

Shortly after the party had retired within the rocks, Miss Markham came to the captain, who was standing at the door of the first apartment. “Captain Horn,” said she, “Mrs. Cliff is in a state of nervous fear, and I have been trying to quiet her. Can you say anything that might give her a little courage? Do you really think there is any chance of our escape from this new danger?”

“Yes,” said the captain, “there is a chance. Rynders may come back before the Rackbirds discover us, and even if two or three of them find out our retreat, I may be able to dispose of them, and thus give us a little more time. That is our only ground of hope. Those men are bound to come here sooner or later, and everything depends upon the return of Rynders.”

“But,” urged Miss Markham, “perhaps they may not come so far as this to look for the runaway. The waves may have washed out his footsteps upon the sand. There may be no reason why they should come up to this plateau.”

The captain smiled a very sombre smile. “If any of them should come this way,” he said, “it is possible that they might not think it worth while to cease their search along the beach and come up to this particular spot, were it not that our boat is down there. That is the same thing as if we had put out a sign to tell them where we are. The boat is hauled up on shore, but they could not fail to see it.”

“Captain,” said Miss Markham, “do you think those Rackbirds killed the three sailors?”

“I am very much afraid of it,” he answered. “If they did, they must have known that these poor fellows were survivors of a shipwreck, and I suppose they stole up behind them and shot them down or stabbed them. If that were so, I wonder why they have not sooner been this way, looking for the wreck, or, at least, for other unfortunates who may have reached shore. I suppose, if they are making this sort of a search, they went southward. But all that, of course, depends upon whether they really saw Davis and the two other men. If they did not, they could have no reason for supposing there were any shipwrecked people on the coast.”

“But that thought is of no use to us,” said Miss Markham, her eyes upon the ground, “for, of course, they will be coming after the black man. Captain,” she continued quickly, “is there anything I can do? I can fire a gun.”

He looked at her for a moment. “That will not be necessary,” he said.

“But there is something you can do. Have you a pistol?”

“Yes,” said she, “I have. I put it in my pocket as soon as I came into the cave. Here it is.”

The captain took the pistol from her hands and examined it. “Five chambers,” he said, “all charged. Be very careful of it,” — handing it back to her. “I will put your brother and Mrs. Cliff in your charge. At the slightest hint of danger, you must keep together in the middle room. I will stand between you and the rascals as long as I can, but if I am killed, you must do what you think best.”

“I will,” said she, and she put the pistol back in her pocket.

The captain was very much encouraged by the brave talk of this young woman, and it really seemed as if he now had some one to stand by him, some one with whom he could even consult.

“I have carefully examined this cavern,” said the captain, after a moment’s pause, “and there are only two ways by which those men could possibly get in. You need not be afraid that any one can scramble down the walls of that farthest apartment. That could not be done, though they might be able to fire upon any one in it. But in the middle room you will be perfectly secure from gunshots. I shall keep Maka on guard a little back from the entrance to the passage. He will lie on the ground, and can hear footsteps long before they reach us. It is barely possible that some of them might enter by the great cleft in the cave on the other side of the lake, but in that case they would have to swim across, and I shall station that new African on the ledge of which you have heard, and if he sees any of them coming in that direction, I know he will give very quick warning. I hardly think, though, that they would trust themselves to be picked off while swimming.”

“And you?” said she.

“Oh, I shall keep my eyes on all points,” said he, “as far as I can. I begin to feel a spirit of fight rising up within me. If I thought I could keep them off until Rynders gets here, I almost wish they would then come. I would like to kill a lot of them.”

“Suppose,” said Edna Markham, after a moment’s reflection, “that they should see Mr. Rynders coming back, and should attack him.”

“I hardly think they would do that,” replied the captain. “He will probably come in a good-sized vessel, and I don’t think they are the kind of men for open battle. They are midnight sneaks and assassins. Now, I advise all of you to go and get something to eat. It would be better for us not to try to do any cooking, and so make a smoke.”

The captain did not wish to talk any more. Miss Markham’s last remark had put a new fear into his mind. Suppose the Rackbirds had lured Rynders and his men on shore? Those sailors had but few arms among them. They had not thought, when they left, that there would be any necessity for defence against their fellow-beings.

When Edna Markham told Mrs. Cliff what the captain had said about their chances, and what he intended to do for their protection, the older woman brightened up a good deal.

“I have great faith in the captain,” she declared, “and if he thinks it is worth while to make a fight, I believe he will make a good one. If they should be firing, and Mr. Rynders is approaching the coast, even if it should be night, he would lose no time in getting to us.”

Toward the close of that afternoon three wild beasts came around the point of the bluff and made their way northward along the beach. They were ferocious creatures with shaggy hair and beards. Two of them carried guns, and each of them had a knife in his belt. When they came to a broad bit of beach above the reach of the waves, they were very much surprised at some footsteps they saw. They were the tracks of two men, instead of those of the one they were looking for. This discovery made them very cautious. They were eager to kill the escaped African before he got far enough away to give information of their retreat, for they knew not at what time an armed force in search of them might approach the coast. But they were very wary about running into danger. There was somebody with that black fellow — somebody who wore boots.

After a time they came to the boat. The minute they saw this, each miscreant crouched suddenly upon the sand, and, with cocked guns, they listened. Then, hearing nothing, they carefully examined the boat. It was empty — there were not even oars in it.

Looking about them, they saw a hollow behind some rocks. To this they ran, crouching close to the ground, and there they sat and consulted.

It was between two and three o’clock the next morning that Maka’s eyes, which had not closed for more than twenty hours, refused to keep open any longer, and with his head on the hard, rocky ground of the passage in which he lay, the poor African slept soundly. On the shelf at the edge of the lake, the other African, Mok, sat crouched on his heels, his eyes wide open. Whether he was asleep or not it would have been difficult to determine, but if any one had appeared in the great cleft on the other side of the lake, he would have sprung to his feet with a yell — his fear of the Rackbirds was always awake.

Inside the first apartment was Captain Horn, fast asleep, his two guns by his side. He had kept watch until an hour before, but Ralph had insisted upon taking his turn, and, as the captain knew he could not keep awake always, he allowed the boy to take a short watch. But now Ralph was leaning back against one of the walls, snoring evenly and steadily. In the next room sat Edna Markham, wide awake. She knew of the arrangement made with Ralph, and she knew the boy’s healthy, sleepy nature, so that when he went on watch she went on watch.

Outside of the cave were three wild beasts. One of them was crouching on the farther end of the plateau. Another, on the lower ground a little below, stood, gun in hand, and barely visible in the starlight. A third, barefooted, and in garments dingy as the night, and armed only with a knife, crept softly toward the entrance of the cave. There he stopped and listened. He could plainly hear the breathing of the sleepers. He tried to separate these sounds one from another, so that he should be able to determine how many persons were sleeping inside, but this he could not do. Then his cat-like eyes, becoming more and more accustomed to the darkness within the entrance, saw the round head of Maka close upon the ground.

The soul of the listening fiend laughed within him. “Pretty watchers they are,” he said to himself. “Not three hours after midnight, and they are all snoring!” Then, as stealthily and as slowly as he had come, he slipped away, and joining the others, they all glided through the darkness down to the beach, and then set off at their best speed back to their rendezvous.

After they had discovered that there were people in the cave, they had not thought of entering. They were not fully armed, and they did not know how many persons were inside. But they knew one thing, and that was that these shipwrecked people — for that was what they must be — kept a very poor watch, and if the whole band came on the following night, the affair would probably be settled with but very little trouble, no matter how large the party in the cave might be. It was not necessary to look any further for the escaped negro. Of course, he had been picked up by these people.

The three beasts reached their camp about daybreak, and everybody was soon awakened and the tale was told.

“It is a comfort,” said the leader, lighting the stump of a black pipe which he thrust under his great mustache, and speaking in his native tongue, which some of them understood, and others did not, “to know that to-night’s work is all cut out for us. Now we can take it easy to-day, and rest our bones. The order of the day is to keep close. No straggling, nor wandering. Keep those four niggers up in the pigeonhole. We will do our own cooking to-day, for we can’t afford to run after any more of them. Lucky the fellow who got away can’t speak English, for he can’t tell anything about us, any more than if he was an ape. So snooze to-day, if you want to. I will give you work to do for to-night.”




CHAPTER VII. GONE!


That morning, when the party in the cavern had had their breakfast, with some hot tea made on a spiritlamp which Mrs. Cliff had brought, and had looked cautiously out at the sunlit landscape, and the sea beyond, without seeing any signs or hearing any sound of wicked men, there came a feeling of relief. There was, indeed, no great ground for such a feeling, but as the Rackbirds had not come the day before nor during the night, perhaps they would not come at all. It might be they did not care whether the black man ran away or not. But Captain Horn did not relax his precautions. He would take no chances, and would keep up a watch day and night.

When, on the night before, the time had come for Ralph’s watch to end, his sister had awakened him, and when the captain, in his turn, was aroused, he had not known that it was not the boy who had kept watch during his sleep.

In the course of the morning Mrs. Cliff and Edna, having been filled with an intense desire to see the wonderful subterranean lake, had been helped over the rocky barrier, and had stood at the edge of the water, looking over to where it was lighted by the great chasm in the side of the rocks, and endeavoring to peer into the solemn, cavernous distance into which it extended on the right. Edna said nothing, but stood gazing at the wonderful scene — the dark, mysterious waters before her, the arched cavern above her, and the picture of the bright sky and the tops of the distant mountains, framed by the sides of the great opening which stretched itself upward like a cathedral window on the other side of the lake.

“It frightens me,” said Mrs. Cliff. “To be sure, this water was our salvation, for we should have been dead by this time, pirates or no pirates, if we had not found it. But it is terrifying, for all that. We do not know how far it stretches out into the blackness, and we do not know how far down it goes. It may be thousands of feet deep, for all we know. Don’t go so near the edge, Ralph. It makes me shudder.”

When the little party had returned to the cavern, the captain and the two ladies had a long talk about the lake. They all agreed that the existence of this great reservoir of water was sufficient to account for the greenness and fertility of the little plateau outside. Even if no considerable amount of water trickled through the cracks in the rocks, the moisture which arose from the surface of the water found its way out into the surrounding atmosphere, and had nourished the bushes and vines.

For some time they discussed their new-found water-supply, and they were all glad to have something to think about and talk about besides the great danger which overhung them.

“If it could only have been the lake without the Rackbirds,” said Mrs. Cliff.

“Let us consider that that is the state of the case,” remarked Edna. “We have the lake, and so far we have not had any Rackbirds.”

It was now nearly noon, and the captain looked around for Ralph, but did not see him. He went to search for him, and finding that the boy had not passed Maka, who was on watch, he concluded he must have gone to the lake. There was no reason why the restless youth should not seek to enliven his captivity by change of scene, but Captain Horn felt unwilling to have any one in his charge out of sight for any length of time, so he went to look for Ralph.

He found no one on the rocky shelf. As there had been little reason to expect a water attack at this hour, Mok had been relieved from guard for a meal and a nap. But as Ralph was not here, where could he be? A second glance, however, showed the captain the boy’s clothes lying close by, against the upright side of the rock, and at that moment he heard a cry. His eyes flashed out toward the sound. There on the other side of the water, sitting on a bit of projecting rock not far from the great opening in the cave, he saw Ralph. At first the captain stood dumb with amazement, and he was just about to call out, when Ralph shouted again.

“I swam over,” he said, “but I can’t get back. I’ve got the cramps. Can’t you make some sort of a raft, and come over to me! The water’s awfully cold.”

Raft, indeed! There was no material or time for anything of the kind. If the boy dropped off that bit of rock, he would be drowned, and the captain did not hesitate a moment. Throwing aside his jacket and slipping off his shoes, he let himself down into the water and struck out in Ralph’s direction. The water was, indeed, very cold, but the captain was a strong swimmer, and it would not take him very long to cross the lake at this point, where its width was not much more than a hundred feet. As he neared the other side he did not make immediately for Ralph. He thought it would be wise to rest a little before attempting to take the boy back, and so he made for another point of rock, a little nearer the opening, urging the boy, as he neared him, to sit firmly and keep up a good heart.

“All right,” said Ralph. “I see what you are after. That is a better place than this, and if you land there I think I can scramble over to you.”

“Don’t move,” said the captain. “Sit where you are until I tell you what to do.”

The captain had not made more than two or three strokes after speaking when his right hand struck against something hard, just below the surface of the water. He involuntarily grasped it. It was immovable, and it felt like a tree, a few inches in diameter, standing perpendicularly in the lake. Wondering what this could be, he took hold of it with his other hand, and finding that it supported him, he let his feet drop, when, to his surprise, he found that they rested on something with a rounded surface, and the idea instantly came into his mind that it was a submerged tree, the trunk lying horizontally, from which this upright branch projected. This might be as good a resting-place as the rock to which he had been going, and standing on it, with his head well out of the water, he turned to speak to Ralph. At that moment his feet slipped from the slimy object on which he stood, and he fell backward into the water, still grasping, however, his upright support. But this did not remain upright more than an instant, but yielded to his weight, and the end of it which he held went down with him. As he sank, the captain, in his first bewilderment, did not loosen his grasp upon what had been his support, and which still prevented him from sinking rapidly. But in a moment his senses came to him, he let go, and a few downward strokes brought him to the surface of the water. Then he struck out for the point of rock for which he had been aiming, and he was soon mounted upon it.

“Hi!” shouted Ralph, who had been so frightened by the captain’s sudden sinking that he nearly fell off his narrow seat, “I thought something had pulled you down.”

The captain did not explain. He was spluttering a little after his involuntary dive, and he wanted to get back as soon as possible, and so wasted no breath in words. In a few minutes he felt himself ready for the return trip, and getting into the water, he swam to Ralph. Following the directions given him, the boy let himself down into the water behind the captain, and placed his hands upon the latter’s hips, firmly grasping the waistband of his trousers. Then urging the boy not to change his position, nor attempt to take hold of him in any other way, the captain struck out across the lake, Ralph easily floating behind him.

When they stood upon the shelf on the other side, and Ralph, having rubbed himself down with the captain’s jacket, put on his clothes, Captain Horn rather sternly inquired of him how he came to do such a foolish and wicked thing as to run the risk of drowning himself in the lake at a time when his sister and his friends had already trouble enough on their minds.

Ralph was sorry, of course, that the captain had to come after him, and get himself wet, but he explained that he wanted to do something for the good of the party, and it had struck him that it would be a very sensible thing to investigate the opening on the other side of the lake. If he could get out of that great gap, he might find some way of climbing out over the top of the rocks and get to the place where his flag was, and then, if he saw Mr. Rynders coming, he could wave it. It would be a great thing if the people in the vessel which they all expected should see that flag the moment they came in sight of the coast. They might get to shore an hour or two sooner than if they had not seen it.

“If the cramp in this leg had kept off five minutes longer,” he said, “I would have reached that big hole, and then, if I could have climbed over the top of the rocks, I could have come down on the other side to the front door, and asked Maka to get me my clothes, so I would not have had to swim back at all.”

“That will do,” said the captain. “And now that you are dressed, you can go inside and get me that woollen shirt and trousers that I use for a pillow, for I must take off these wet things.”

When the boy came back with the clothes, the captain told him that he need not say anything to his sister or Mrs. Cliff about the great danger he had been in, but before he had finished his injunction Ralph interrupted him.

“Oh, I have told them that already,” said he. “They wanted to know where I had been, and it did not take a minute to tell them what a splendid swimmer you are, and how you came over after me without taking as much as two seconds to think about it. And I let them know, too, that it was a mighty dangerous thing for you to do. If I had been one of those fellows who were not used to the water, and who would grab hold of any one who came to save them, we might both have gone to the bottom together.”

The captain smiled grimly. “It is hard to get ahead of a boy,” he said to himself.

It was late that afternoon when Captain Horn, with Ralph and the two ladies, were standing on the rocks in the inner apartment, trying to persuade themselves that they were having a cosey cup of tea together, when suddenly a scrambling sound of footsteps was heard, and Maka dashed through the two adjoining apartments and appeared before them. Instantly the captain was on his feet, his gun, which had been lying beside him, in his hand. Up sprang the others, mute, with surprise and fear on their faces. Maka, who was in a state of great excitement, and seemed unable to speak, gasped out the one word, “Gone!”

“What do you mean?” cried the captain.

Maka ran back toward the passage, and pointed inward. Instantly the captain conjectured what he meant. Mok, the second African, had been stationed to watch the lake approach, and he had deserted! Now the hot thought flashed upon the captain that the rascal had been a spy. The Rackbirds had known that there were shipwrecked people in these caves. How could they help knowing it, if they had killed Davis and the others? But, cowardly hounds as they were, they had been afraid to attack the place until they knew how many people were in it, what arms they had, and in what way the place could best be assailed. This Mok had found out everything. If the boy could swim across the lake, that black man could do it, and he had gone out through the cleft, and was probably now making his report to the gang.

All this flashed through the captain’s brain in a few seconds. He set his teeth together. He was ashamed that he had allowed himself to be so tricked. That African, probably one of the gang, and able to speak English, should have been kept a prisoner. What a fool he had been to treat the black-hearted and black-bodied wretch as one of themselves, and actually to put him on guard!

Of course, it was of no use to go to look for him, and the captain had put down his gun, and was just about to turn to speak to the others, when Maka seized him by the coat. The negro seemed wildly excited and still unable to speak. But it was plain that he wanted the captain to follow him along the passage. There was no use in asking questions, and the captain followed, and behind him came Ralph, Edna, and Mrs. Cliff.

Maka was about to climb over the rocky partition which divided the passage, but the captain stopped him. “Stay here,” said he, “and watch the passage. I will see what is the matter over there.” And then he and Ralph jumped over and hurried to the lake. As they came out on the little platform of rock, on which the evening light, coming through the great; cleft, still rendered objects visible, they saw Mok crouching on his heels, his eyes wide open as usual.

The captain was stupefied. That African not gone! If it were not he, who had gone?

Then the captain felt a tight clutch upon his arm, and Ralph pulled him around. Casting eyes outward, the captain saw that it was the lake that had gone!

As he and Ralph stood there, stupefied and staring, they saw, by the dim light which came through the opening on the other side of the cavern, a great empty rocky basin. The bottom of this, some fifteen or twenty feet below them, wet and shining, with pools of water here and there, was plainly visible in the space between them and the open cleft, but farther on all was dark. There was every reason to suppose, however, that all the water had gone from the lake. Why or how this had happened, they did not even ask themselves. They simply stood and stared.

In a few minutes they were joined by Edna, who had become so anxious at their absence and silence that she had clambered over the wall, and came running to them. By the time she reached them it was much darker than when they had arrived, but she could see that the lake had gone. That was enough.

“What do you suppose it means?” she said presently. “Are we over some awful subterranean cavern in which things sink out of sight in an instant?”

“It is absolutely unaccountable,” said the captain. “But we must go back to Mrs. Cliff. I hear her calling. And if Maka has come to his senses, perhaps he can tell us something.”

But Maka had very little to tell. To the captain’s questions he could only say that a little while before, Mok had come running to him, and told him that, being thirsty, he had gone down to the edge of the lake to get a drink, and found that there was no water, only a great hole, and then he had run to tell Maka, and when Maka had gone back with him, so greatly surprised that he had deserted his post without thinking about it, he found that what Mok had said was true, and that there was nothing there but a great black hole. Mok must have been asleep when the water went away, but it was gone, and that was all he knew about it.

There was something so weird and mysterious about this absolute and sudden disappearance of this great body of water that Mrs. Cliff became very nervous and frightened.

“This is a temple of the devil,” she said, “and that is his face outside. You do not know what may happen next. This rocky floor on which we stand may give way, and we may all go down into unknown depths. I can’t think of staying here another minute. It is dark now. Let us slip away down to the beach, and take the boat, and row away from this horrible region where human devils and every other kind seem to own the country.”

“Oh, no,” said the captain, “we can’t consider such wild schemes as that. I have been thinking that perhaps there may be some sort of a tide in this lake, and in the morning we may find the water just as it was. And, at any rate, it has not entirely deserted us, for in these pools at the bottom we can find water enough for us to drink.”

“I suppose I would not mind such things so much,” said Mrs. Cliff, “if they happened out of doors. But being shut up in this cave with magical lakes, and expecting every minute to see a lot of bloodthirsty pirates bursting in upon us, is enough to shake the nerves of anybody.”

“Captain,” said Ralph, “I suppose you will not now object to letting me go in the morning to explore that opening. I can walk across the bottom of the lake without any danger, you know.”

“Don’t you try to do anything of the kind,” said the captain, “without my permission.”

“No, indeed!” exclaimed Mrs. Cliff. “Supposing the water were to suddenly rise just as you were half-way across. Now that I think of it, there are springs and bodies of water which rise and fall this way, some of them in our own Western country, but none of them are as large as this. What if it should rise in the night and flood the cave while we are asleep?”

“Why, dear Mrs. Cliff,” said Edna, “I am not afraid of the water’s rising or of the earth’s sinking. Don’t let us frighten ourselves with imaginations like that. Perhaps there may not even be any real thing to be afraid of, but if there should be, let us keep courage for that.”

The disappearance of the lake gave the captain an uneasiness of which the others had not thought. He saw it would be comparatively easy for the Rackbirds to gain access to the place through the cleft in the eastern wall of the lake cavern. If they should discover that aperture, the cavern might be attacked from the rear and the front at the same time, and then the captain feared his guns would not much avail.

Of course, during the darkness which would soon prevail there was no reason to expect a rear attack, and the captain satisfied himself with leaving Mok at his former post, with instructions to give the alarm if he heard the slightest sound, and put Maka, as before, in the outer passage. As for himself, he took an early nap in the evening, because at the very first break of dawn it would be necessary for him to be on the alert.

He did not know how much he had depended upon the lake as a barrier of defence, but now that it had gone, he felt that the dangers which threatened them from the Rackbirds were doubled.




CHAPTER VIII. THE ALARM


It was still dark when the captain woke, and he struck a match to look at his watch. It was three o’clock.

“Is that you, captain?” said a voice from the next room. “Is it time for you to begin watch again?”

“Yes,” said the captain, “it is about time. How do you happen to be awake, Miss Markham? Ralph! I believe the boy is snoring.”

“Of course he is,” said Edna, speaking in a low voice. “We cannot expect such a boy to keep awake, and so I have been on watch. It was easy enough for me to keep my eyes open.”

“It is too bad,” said the captain, and then, listening for a moment, he said: “I truly believe that Maka is snoring, too, and as for that black fellow over there, I suspect that he sleeps all the time. Miss Markham, you have been the only person awake.”

“Why shouldn’t I be?” said she. “I am sure that a woman is just as good as a man for keeping watch.”

“If they should come,” thought the captain, as he again sat in the dark, “I must not try to fight them in the passage. That would have been my best chance, but now some of them might pick me off from behind. No, I must fight them in this chamber. I can put everybody else in the middle apartment. Perhaps before to-morrow night it might be well to bring some of those loose rocks here and build a barricade. I wish I had thought of that before.”

The captain sat and listened and thought. His listening brought him no return, and his thinking brought him too much. The most mournful ideas of what might happen if more than two or three of the desperadoes attacked the place crowded into his mind. If they came, they came to rob, and they were men who left behind them no living witnesses of their whereabouts or their crimes. And if two or three should come, and be repulsed, it would not be long before the rest would arrive. In fact, the only real hope they had was founded on the early return of Rynders — that is, if Rynders and his men were living.

The captain waited and listened, but nothing came but daylight. As soon as he was able to discern objects outside the opening on the plateau, he awoke Maka, and, leaving him on guard, he made his way to the lake cavern.

Here the light was beginning to come freely through the chasm which faced nearly east. Mok was sitting with his eyes open, and showed that he was alive by a little grunt when the captain approached. If there were such a thing here as a subterranean tide, it had not risen. There was no water where the lake had been.

Gazing across the empty basin, the captain felt a strong desire to go over, climb up to the opening, and discover whether or not the cavern was accessible on that side. It would be very important for him to know this, and it would not take long for him to make an investigation. One side of the rocky shelf which has been before mentioned sloped down to the lake, and the captain was just about to descend this when he heard a cry from the passage, and, at the same moment, a shout from Mok which seemed to be in answer to it. Instantly the captain turned and dashed into the passage, and, leaping over the barrier, found Maka standing near the entrance.

As soon as the negro saw him, he began to beckon wildly for him to come on. But there was no need now of keeping quiet and beckoning. The first shout had aroused everybody inside, and the two ladies and Ralph were already in the passage. The captain, however, made them keep back, while he and Maka, on their hands and knees, crawled toward the outer opening. From this point one could see over the plateau, and the uneven ground beyond, down to the beach and the sea; but there was still so little light upon this western slope that at first the captain could not see anything noticeable in the direction in which Maka was pointing. But in a few moments his mariner eyes asserted themselves, and he saw some black spots on the strip of beach, which seemed to move. Then he knew they were moving, and moving toward him — coming up to the cave! They were men!

“Sit here,” said the captain to Maka, and then, with his gun in his hand, he rushed back to the rest of the party.

“They seem to be coming,” said he, speaking as calmly as he could, “but we have discovered them in good time, and I shall have some shots at them before they reach here. Let us hope that they will never get here at all. You two,” said he to Mrs. Cliff and Ralph, “are to be under command of Miss Markham. You must do exactly what she tells you to.” Then, turning to Edna, he said, “You have your pistol ready?”

“Yes,” said she, “I am ready.”

Without another word, the captain took his other gun and all his ammunition, and went back into the passage. Here he found Mok, who had come to see what was the matter. Motioning the negro to go back to his post, the captain, with his loaded guns, went again to the entrance. Looking out, he could now plainly see the men. There were four of them. It was lighter down toward the sea, for the rocks still threw a heavy shadow over the plateau. The sight sent a thrill of brave excitement through the captain.

“If they come in squads of four,” thought he, “I may be a match for them. They can’t see me, and I can see them. If I could trust Maka to load a gun, I would have a better chance, but if I could pick off two, or even one, that might stop the others and give me time to reload. Come on, you black-hearted scoundrels,” he muttered through his teeth, as he knelt outside the cave, one gun partly raised, and the other on the ground beside him. “If I could only know that none of your band could come in at that hole in the back of the cave, I’d call the odds even.”

The dawn grew brighter, and the four men drew nearer. They came slowly, one considerably ahead of the others. Two or three times they stopped and appeared to be consulting, and then again moved slowly forward straight toward the plateau.

When the leading man was nearly within gunshot, the captain’s face began to burn, and his pulses to throb hard and fast.

“The sooner I pick off the head one,” he thought, “the better chance I have at the others.”

He brought his gun to his shoulder, and was slowly lowering the barrel to the line of aim, when suddenly something like a great black beast rushed past him, pushing up his arm and nearly toppling him over. It came from the cave, and in a second it was out on the plateau. Then it gave a leap upward, and rushed down toward the sea. Utterly astounded, the captain steadied himself and turned to Maka.

“What was that?” he exclaimed.

The African was on his feet, his body bent forward, his eyes peering out into the distance.

“Mok!” said he. “Look! Look!”

It was Mok who had rushed out of the cave. He was running toward the four men. He reached them, he threw up his arms, he sprang upon the first man. Then he left him, and jumped upon the others. Then Maka gave a little cry and sprang forward, but in the same instant the captain seized him.

“Stop!” he cried. “What is it?”

The African shouted: “Mok’s people! Mok knowed them. Look! Look — see! Mok!”

The party was now near enough and the day was bright enough for the captain to see that on the lower ground beyond the plateau there were five black men in a state of mad excitement. He could hear them jabbering away at a great rate. So far as he could discover, they were all unarmed, and as they stood there gesticulating, the captain might have shot them down in a bunch, if he had chosen.

“Go,” said he to Maka, “go down there and see what it all means.”

The captain now stepped back into the passage. He could see Miss Markham and Ralph peering out of the doorway of the first compartment.

“There does not seem to be any danger so far,” said he. “Some more Africans have turned up. Maka has gone to meet them. We shall find out about them in a few minutes,” and he turned back to the entrance.

He saw that the six black fellows were coming toward him, and, as he had thought, they carried no guns.




CHAPTER IX. AN AMAZING NARRATION


When the captain had gone out again into the open air, he was followed by the rest of the party, for, if there were no danger, they all wanted to see what was to be seen. What they saw was a party of six black men on the plateau, Maka in the lead. There could be no doubt that the newcomers were the remainder of the party of Africans who had been enslaved by the Rackbirds, and the desire of the captain and his companions to know how they had got away, and what news they brought, was most intense.

Maka now hurried forward, leading one of the strangers. “Great things they tell,” said he. “This Cheditafa. He speak English good as me. He tell you.”

“The first thing I want,” cried the captain, “is some news of those Rackbirds. Have they found we are here? Will they be coming after these men, or have they gone off somewhere else? Tell me this, and be quick.”

“Oh, yes,” cried Maka, “they found out we here. But Cheditafa tell you — he tell you everything. Great things!”

“Very well, then,” said the captain. “Let him begin and be quick about it.”

The appearance of Cheditafa was quite as miserable as that of poor Mok, but his countenance was much more intelligent, and his English, although very much broken, was better even than Maka’s, and he was able to make himself perfectly understood. He spoke briefly, and this is the substance of his story:

About the middle of the afternoon of the day before, a wonderful thing happened. The Rackbirds had had their dinner, which they had cooked themselves, and they were all lying down in their huts or in the shadows of the rocks, either asleep, or smoking and telling stories. Cheditafa knew why they were resting. The Rackbirds had no idea that he understood English, for he had been careful to keep this fact from them after he found out what sort of men they were, — and this knowledge had come very soon to him, — and they spoke freely before him. He had heard some of the men who had been out looking for Mok, and who had come back early that morning, tell about some shipwrecked people in a cave up the coast, and had heard all the plans which had been made for the attack upon them during the night. He also knew why he and his fellows had been cooped up in the cave in the rock in which they lived, all that day, and had not been allowed to come down and do any work.

They were lying huddled in their little cave, feeling very hungry and miserable, and whispering together, — for if they spoke out or made any noise, one of the men below would be likely to fire a load of shot at them, — when suddenly a strange thing happened.

They heard a great roar like a thousand bulls, which came from the higher part of the ravine, and peeping out, they saw what seemed like a wall of rock stretching across the little valley. But in a second they saw it was not rock — it was water, and before they could take two breaths it had reached them. Then it passed on, and they saw only the surface of a furious and raging stream, the waves curling and dashing over each other, and reaching almost up to the floor of their cave.

They were so frightened that they pressed back as far as they could get, and even tried to climb up the sides of the rocky cavity, so fearful were they that the water would dash in upon them. But the raging flood roared and surged outside, and none of it came into their cave. Then the sound of it became not quite so loud, and grew less and less. But still Cheditafa and his companions were so frightened and so startled by this awful thing, happening so suddenly, as if it had been magic, that it was some time — he did not know how long — before they lifted their faces from the rocks against which they were pressing them.

Then Cheditafa crept forward and looked out. The great waves and the roaring water were gone. There was no water to be seen, except the brook which always ran at the bottom of the ravine, and which now seemed not very much bigger than it had been that morning.

But the little brook was all there was in the ravine, except the bare rocks, wet and glistening. There were no huts, no Rackbirds, nothing. Even the vines and bushes which had been growing up the sides of the stream were all gone. Not a weed, not a stick, not a clod of earth, was left — nothing but a great, rocky ravine, washed bare and clean.

Edna Markham stepped suddenly forward and seized the captain by the arm.

“It was the lake,” she cried. “The lake swept down that ravine!”

“Yes,” said the captain, “it must have been. But listen — let us hear more. Go on,” he said to Cheditafa, who proceeded to tell how he and his companions looked out for a long time, but they saw nor heard nothing of any living creature. It would be easy enough for anybody to come back up the ravine, but nobody came.

They had now grown so hungry that they could have almost eaten each other. They felt they must get out of the cave and go to look for food. It would be better to be shot than to sit there and starve.

Then they devised a plan by which they could get down. The smallest man got out of the cave and let himself hang, holding to the outer edge of the floor with his hands. Then another man put his feet over the edge of the rock, and let the hanging man take hold of them. The other two each seized an arm of the second man, and lowered the two down as far as they could reach. When they had done this, the bottom man dropped, and did not hurt himself. Then they had to pull up the second man, for the fall would have been too great for him.

After that they had to wait a long time, while the man who had got out went to look for something by which the others could help themselves down — the ladder they had used having been carried away with everything else. After going a good way down the ravine to a place where it grew much wider, with the walls lower, he found things that had been thrown up on the sides, and among these was the trunk of a young tree, which, after a great deal of hard work, he brought back to the cave, and by the help of this they all scrambled down.

They hurried down the ravine, and as they approached the lower part, where it became wider before opening into the little bay into which the stream ran, they found that the flood, as it had grown shallower and spread itself out, had left here and there various things which it had brought down from the camp — bits of the huts, articles of clothing, and after a while they came to a Rackbird, quite dead, and hanging upon a point of projecting rock. Farther on they found two or three more bodies stranded, and later in the day some Rackbirds who had been washed out to sea came back with the tide, and were found upon the beach. It was impossible, Cheditafa said, for any of them to have escaped from that raging torrent, which hurled them against the rocks as it carried them down to the sea.

But the little party of hungry Africans did not stop to examine anything which had been left. What they wanted was something to eat, and they knew where to get it. About a quarter of a mile back from the beach was the storehouse of the Rackbirds, a sort of cellar which they had made in a sand-hill. As the Africans had carried the stores over from the vessel which had brought them, and had afterwards taken to the camp such supplies as were needed from time to time, of course they knew where to find them, and they lost no time in making a hearty meal.

According to Cheditafa’s earnest assertions, they had never eaten as they had eaten then. He believed that the reason they had been left without food was that the Rackbirds were too proud to wait on black men, and had concluded to let them suffer until they had returned from their expedition, and the negroes could be let down to attend to their own wants.

After they had eaten, the Africans went to a spot which commanded a view up the ravine, as well as the whole of the bay, and there they hid themselves, and watched as long as it was daylight, so that if any of the Rackbirds had escaped they could see them. But they saw nothing, and being very anxious to find good white people who would take care of them, they started out before dawn that morning to look for the shipwrecked party about whom Cheditafa had heard the Rackbirds talking, and with whom they hoped to find their companion Mok, and thus it was that they were here.

“And those men were coming to attack us last night?” asked the captain.

“You are sure of that?”

“Yes,” said Cheditafa, “it was last night. They not know how many you are, and all were coming.”

“And some of them had already been here?”

“Yes,” replied the African. “One day before, three went out to look for Mok, and they found his track and more track, and they waited in the black darkness, and then came here, and they heard you all sleep and snore that night. They were to come again, and if they — ”

“And yesterday afternoon the lake came down and swept them out of existence!” exclaimed Mrs. Cliff.




CHAPTER X. THE CAPTAIN EXPLORES


Captain Horn had heard the story of Cheditafa, he walked away from the rest of the party, and stood, his eyes upon the ground, still mechanically holding his gun. He now knew that the great danger he had feared had been a real one, and far greater than he had imagined. A systematic attack by all the Rackbirds would have swept away his single resistance as the waters had swept them and their camp away. As to parley or compromise with those wretches, he knew that it would have been useless to think of it. They allowed no one to go forth from their hands to reveal the place of their rendezvous.

But although he was able to appreciate at its full force the danger with which they had been threatened, his soul could not immediately adjust itself to the new conditions. It had been pressed down so far that it could not easily rise again. He felt that he must make himself believe in the relief which had come to them, and, turning sharply, he called out to Cheditafa:

“Man, since you have been in this part of the country, have you ever seen or heard of any wild beasts here? Are there any jaguars or pumas?”

The African shook his head. “No, no,” said he, “no wild beasts. Everybody sleep out of doors. No think of beasts — no snakes.”

The captain dropped his gun upon the ground. “Miss Markham!” he exclaimed. “Mrs. Cliff! I truly believe we are out of all danger — that we — ”

But the two ladies had gone inside, and heard him not. They appreciated to the full the danger from which they had been delivered. Ralph, too, had gone. The captain saw him on his post of observation, jamming the end of his flagpole down between two rocks.

“Hello!” cried the boy, seeing the captain looking up at him, “we might as well have this flying here all the time. There is nobody to hurt us now, and we want people to know where we are.”

The captain walked by the little group of Africans, who were sitting on the ground, talking in their native tongue, and entered the passage. He climbed over the barrier, and went to the lake. He did not wish to talk to anybody, but he felt that he must do something, and now was a good time to carry out his previous intention to cross over the empty bed of the lake and to look out of the opening on the other side. There was no need now to do this for purposes of vigilance, but he thought that if he could get out on the other side of the cave he might discover some clew to the disappearance of the lake.

He had nearly crossed the lake bottom, when suddenly he stopped, gazing at something which stood before him, and which was doubtless the object he had struck when swimming. The sun was now high and the cave well lighted, and with a most eager interest the captain examined the slimy and curious object on which his feet had rested when it was submerged, and from which he had fallen. It was not the horizontal trunk of a tree with a branch projecting from it at right angles. It was nothing that was natural or had grown. It was plainly the work of man. It was a machine.

At first the captain thought it was made of wood, but afterwards he believed it to be of metal of some sort. The horizontal portion of it was a great cylinder, so near the bottom of the lake that he could almost touch it with his hands, and it was supported by a massive framework. Prom this projected a long limb or bar, which was now almost horizontal, but which the captain believed to be the thick rod which had stood upright when he clutched it, and which had yielded to his weight and had gone down with him. He knew now what it was: it was a handle that had turned.

He hurried to the other end of the huge machine, where it rested against the rocky wall of the cavern. There he saw in the shadow, but plain enough now that he was near it, a circular aperture, a yard or more in diameter. Inside of this was something which looked like a solid wheel, very thick, and standing upright in the opening. It was a valve. The captain stepped back and gazed for some minutes at this great machine which the disappearance of the water had revealed. It was easy for him to comprehend it now.

“When I slipped and sank,” he said to himself, “I pulled down that lever, and I opened the water-gate and let out the lake.”

The captain was a man whose mind was perfectly capable of appreciating novel and strange impressions, but with him such impressions always connected themselves, in one way or another, with action: he could not stand and wonder at the wonderful which had happened — it always suggested something he must do. What he now wanted to do was to climb up to the great aperture which lighted the cavern, and see what was outside. He could not understand how the lake could have gone from its basin without the sound of the rushing waters being heard by any one of the party.

With some difficulty, he climbed up to the cleft and got outside. Here he had a much better view of the topography of the place than he had yet been able to obtain. So far as he had explored, his view toward the interior of the country had been impeded by rocks and hills. Here he had a clear view from the mountains to the sea, and the ridge which he had before seen to the southward he could now examine to greater advantage. It was this long chain of rocks which had concealed them from their enemies, and on the other side of which must be the ravine in which the Rackbirds had made their camp.

Immediately below the captain was a little gorge, not very deep nor wide, and from its general trend toward the east and south the captain was sure that it formed the upper part of the ravine of the Rackbirds. At the bottom of it there trickled a little stream. To the northeast ran another line of low rock, which lost itself in the distance before it blended into the mountains, and at the foot of this must run the stream which had fed the lake.

In their search for water, game, or fellow-beings, no one had climbed these desolate rocks, apparently dry and barren. But still the captain was puzzled as to the way the water had gone out of the lake. He did not believe that it had flowed through the ravine below. There were no signs that there had been a flood down there. Little vines and plants were growing in chinks of the rocks close to the water. And, moreover, had a vast deluge rushed out almost beneath the opening which lighted the cave, it must have been heard by some of the party. He concluded, therefore, that the water had escaped through a subterranean channel below the rocks from which he looked down.

He climbed down the sides of the gorge, and walked along its bottom for two or three hundred yards, until around a jutting point of rock he saw that the sides of the defile separated for a considerable distance, and then, coming together again below, formed a sort of amphitheatre. The bottom of this was a considerable distance below him, and he did not descend into it, but he saw plainly that it had recently contained water, for pools and puddles were to be seen everywhere.

At the other end of it, where the rocks again approached each other, was probably a precipice. After a few minutes’ cogitation, Captain Horn felt sure that he understood the whole matter: a subway from the lake led to this amphitheatre, and thus there had been no audible rush of the waters until they reached this point, where they poured in and filled this great basin, the lower end of which was probably stopped up by accumulations of sand and deposits, which even in that country of scant vegetation had accumulated in the course of years. When the waters of the lake had rushed into the amphitheatre, this natural dam had held them for a while, but then, giving way before the great pressure, the whole body of water had suddenly rushed down the ravine to the sea.

“Yes,” said the captain, “now I understand how it happened that although I opened the valve at noon, the water did not reach the Rackbirds until some hours later, and then it came suddenly and all at once, which would not have been the case had it flowed steadily from the beginning through the outlet made for it.”

When the captain had returned and reported his discoveries, and he and his party had finished their noonday meal, which they ate outside on the plateau, with the fire burning and six servants to wait on them, Mrs. Cliff said:

“And now, captain, what are we going to do? Now that our danger is past, I suppose the best thing for us is to stay here in quiet and thankfulness, and wait for Mr. Rynders. But, with the provisions we have, we can’t wait very long. When there were but five of us, we might have made the food hold out for a day or two longer, but now that we are ten, we shall soon be without anything to eat.”

“I have been talking to Maka about that,” said the captain, “and he says that Cheditafa reports all sorts of necessary things in the Rackbirds’ storehouse, and he proposes that he and the rest of the black fellows go down there and bring us some supplies. They are used to carrying these stores, and six of them can bring us enough to last a good while. Now that everything is safe over there, I can see that Maka is very anxious to go, and, in fact, I would like to go myself. But although there doesn’t seem to be any danger at present, I do not want to leave you.”

“As for me,” said Miss Markham, “I want to go there. There is nothing I like better than exploring.”

“That’s to my taste, too,” said the captain, “but it will be better for us to wait here and see what Maka has to say when he gets back. Perhaps, if Mr. Rynders doesn’t turn up pretty soon, we will all make a trip down there. Where is Ralph? I don’t want him to go with the men.”

“He is up there on his lookout, as he calls it,” said his sister, “with his spy-glass.”

“Very good,” said the captain. “I will send the men off immediately. Maka wants to go now, and they can come back by the light of the young moon. When they have loads to carry, they like to travel at night. We shall have to get our own supper, and that will give Ralph something to do.”

The party of Africans had not gone half-way from the plateau to the beach before they were discovered by the boy on the outlook rock, and he came rushing down to report that the darkies were running away. When he was told the business on which they had gone, he was very much disappointed that he was not allowed to go with them, and, considerably out of temper, retired to his post of observation, where, as it appeared, he was dividing his time between the discovery of distant specks on the horizon line of the ocean and imaginary jaguars and pumas on the foot-hills.




CHAPTER XI. A NEW HEMISPHERE


With a tin pail in his hand, the captain now went to the cavern of the lake. He wished very much to procure some better water than the last that had been brought, and which Mok must have dipped up from a very shallow puddle. It was possible, the captain thought, that by going farther into the cavern he might find a deeper pool in which water still stood, and if he could not do this, he could get water from the little stream in the ravine. More than this, the captain wished very much to take another look at the machine by which he had let out the water. His mind had been so thoroughly charged with the sense of danger that, until this had faded away, he had not been able to take the interest in the artificial character of the lake which it deserved.

As the captain advanced into the dimmer recesses of the cavern, he soon found a pool of water a foot or more in depth, and having filled his pail at this, he set it down and walked on to see what was beyond. His eyes having now conformed themselves to the duskiness of the place, he saw that the cavern soon made a turn to the left, and gazing beyond him, he judged that the cave was very much wider here, and he also thought that the roof was higher. But he did not pay much attention to the dimensions of the cavern, for he began to discern, at first dimly and then quite plainly, a large object which rose from the bottom of the basin. He advanced eagerly, peering at what seemed to be a sort of dome — like formation of a lighter color than the rocks about him, and apparently about ten feet high.

Carefully feeling his way for fear of pitfalls, the captain drew close to the object, and placed his hand upon it. He believed it to be of stone, and moving his hand over it, he thought he could feel joints of masonry. It was clearly a structure built by men. Captain Horn searched his pockets for a match, but found none, and he hastened back to the cave to get the lantern, passing, without noticing it, the pail which he had filled with water. He would have brought the lantern with him when he first came, but they had no oil except what it contained, and this they had husbanded for emergencies. But now the captain wanted light — he cared not what might happen afterwards. In a very short time, with the lantern in his hand, which lighted up the cave for a considerable distance about him, the captain again stood at the foot of the subterranean dome.

He walked around it. He raised and lowered his lantern, and examined it from top to bottom. It was one half a sphere of masonry, built in a most careful manner, and, to all appearances, as solid as a great stone ball, half sunken in the ground. Its surface was smooth, excepting for two lines of protuberances, each a few inches in height, and about a foot from each other. These rows of little humps were on opposite sides of the dome, and from the bottom nearly to the top. It was plain they were intended to serve as rude ladders by which the top of the mound could be gained.

The captain stepped back, held up his lantern, and gazed in every direction. He could now see the roof of the cavern, and immediately above him he perceived what he was sure were regular joints of masonry, but on the sides of the cave he saw nothing of the sort. For some minutes he stood and reflected, his brain in a whirl. Presently he exclaimed:

“Yes, this cave is man’s work! I am sure of it. It is not natural. I wondered how there could be such a cave on the top of a hill. It was originally a gorge, and they have roofed it over, and the bottom of the basin has been cut out to make it deeper. It was made so that it could be filled up with water, and roofed over so that nobody should know there was any water here, unless they came on it by means of the passage from our caves. That passage must have been blocked up. As for the great opening in the side of the cave, the rocks have fallen in there — that is easy enough to see. Yes, men made this cave and filled it with water, and if the water were high enough to cover the handle of that machine, as it was when I struck it, it must also have been high enough to cover up this stone mound. The lake was intended to cover and hide that mound. And then, to make the hiding of it doubly sure, the men who built all this totally covered up the lake so that nobody would know it was here. And then they built that valve apparatus, which was also submerged, so that they could let out the water when they wanted to get at this stone thing, whatever it is. What a scheme to hide anything! Even if anybody discovered the lake, which would not be likely until some part of the cave fell in, they would not know it was anything but a lake when they did see it. And as for letting off the water, nobody but the people who knew about it could possibly do that, unless somebody was fool enough to take the cold bath I was obliged to take, and even then it would have been one chance in a hundred that he found the lever, and would know how to turn it when he did find it. This whole thing is the work of the ancient South Americans, and I imagine that this stone mound is the tomb of one of their kings.”

At this moment the captain heard something, and turned to listen. It was a voice — the voice of a boy. It was Ralph calling to him. Instantly the captain turned and hurried away, and as he went he extinguished his lantern. When he reached his pail of water he picked it up, and was very soon joined by Ralph, who was coming to meet him over the bottom of the lake.

“I have been looking for you everywhere, captain,” said he. “What have you been after? More water? And you took a lantern to find it, eh? And you have been ever so far into the cave. Why didn’t you call me? Let me have the lantern. I want to go to explore.”

But the captain did not give him the lantern, nor did he allow him to go to explore.

“No, sir,” said he. “What we’ve got to do is to hurry outside and help get supper. We must wait on ourselves to-night.”

When supper was over, that evening, and the little party was sitting out on the plateau, gazing over the ocean at the sunlit sky, Mrs. Cliff declared that she wished they could bring their bedding and spread it on the ground out there, and sleep.

“It is dry enough,” she said, “and warm enough, and if there is really nothing to fear from animals or men, I don’t want ever to go inside of those caves again. I had such horrible fears and ideas when I was sitting trembling in those dismal vaults, expecting a horde of human devils to burst in upon us at any moment, that the whole place is horrible to me. Anyway, if I knew that I had to be killed, I would rather be killed out here.”

The captain smiled. “I don’t think we will give up the caves just yet. I, for one, most certainly want to go in there again.” And then he told the story of the stone mound which he had discovered.

“And you believe,” cried Mrs. Cliff, leaning forward, “that it is really the tomb of an ancient king?”

“If it isn’t that, I don’t know what it can be,” said the captain.

“The grave of a king!” cried Ralph. “A mummy! With inscriptions and paintings! Oh, captain, let’s go open it this minute, before those blackies get back.”

The captain shook his head. “Don’t be in such a hurry,” he said. “It will not be an easy job to open that mound, and we shall need the help of the blackies, as you call them, if we do it at all.”

“Do it at all!” cried Ralph. “I’ll never leave this place until I do it myself, if there is nobody else to help.”

Miss Markham sat silent. She was the only one of the company who had studied the history of South America, and she did not believe that the ancient inhabitants of that country buried their kings in stone tombs, or felt it necessary to preserve their remains in phenomenal secrecy and security. She had read things, however, about the ancient peoples of this country which now made her eyes sparkle and her heart beat quickly. But she did not say anything. This was a case in which it would be better to wait to see what would happen.

“Captain!” cried Ralph, “let’s go to see the thing. What is the use of waiting? Edna and Mrs. Cliff won’t mind staying here while you take me to see it. We can go in ten minutes.”

“No,” said Mrs. Cliff, “there may be no danger, but I am not going to be left here with the sun almost down, and you two out of sight and hearing.”

“Let us all go,” said Edna.

The captain considered for a moment. “Yes,” said he, “let us all go. As we shall have to take a lantern anyway, this is as good a time as another.”

It was not an easy thing for the two ladies to get over the wall at the end of the passage, and to make their way over the rough and slippery bottom of the lake basin, now lighted only by the lantern which the captain carried. But in the course of time, with a good deal of help from their companions, they reached the turning of the cave and stood before the stone mound.

“Hurrah!” cried Ralph. “Why, captain, you are like Columbus! You have discovered a new hemisphere.”

“It is like one of the great ant-hills of Africa,” said Mrs. Cliff, “but, of course, this was not built by ants I wonder if it is possible that it can be the abode of water-snakes.”

Edna stood silent for a few moments, and then she said, “Captain, do you suppose that this dome was entirely covered by water when the lake was full?”

“I think so,” said he. “Judging from what I know of the depth of the lake, I am almost sure of it.”

“Ralph!” suddenly cried Mrs. Cliff, “don’t try to do that. The thing may break under you, and nobody knows what you would fall into. Come down.”

But Ralph paid no attention to her words. He was half-way up the side of the mound when she began to speak, and on its top when she had finished.

“Captain,” he cried, “hand me up the lantern. I want to see if there is a trap-door into this affair. Don’t be afraid, Mrs. Cliff. It’s as solid as a rock.”

The captain did not hand up the lantern, but holding it carefully in one hand, he ascended the dome by means of the row of protuberances on the other side, and crouched down beside Ralph on the top of it.

“Oh, ho!” said he, as he moved the lantern this way and that, “here is a square slab fitted into the very top.”

“Yes,” said Ralph, “and it’s got different mortar around the edges.”

“That is not mortar,” said the captain. “I believe it is some sort of resin. Here, hold the lantern, and be careful of it.” The captain took his jack — knife out of his pocket, and with the large blade began to dig into the substance which filled the joint around the slab, which was about eighteen inches square. “It is resin,” said he, “or something like it, and it comes out very easily. This slab is intended to be moved.”

“Indeed it is!” exclaimed Ralph, “and we’re intended to move it. Here, captain, I’ll help you. I’ve got a knife. Let’s dig out that stuff and lift up the lid before the darkies come back. If we find any dead bodies inside this tomb, they will frighten those fellows to death, if they catch sight of them.”

“Very good,” said the captain. “I shall be only too glad to get this slab up, if I can, but I am afraid we shall want a crowbar and more help. It’s a heavy piece of stone, and I see no way of getting at it.”

“This isn’t stone in the middle of the slab,” said Ralph. “It’s a lot more resinous stuff. I had the lantern over it and did not see it. Let’s take it out.”

There was a circular space in the centre of the stone, about eight inches in diameter, which seemed to be covered with resin. After a few minutes’ work with the jack-knives this substance was loosened and came out in two parts, showing a bowl-like depression in the slab, which had been so cut as to leave a little bar running from side to side of it.

“A handle!” cried Ralph.

“That is what it is,” said Captain Horn. “If it is intended to be lifted, I ought to be able to do it. Move down a little with the lantern, and give me room.”

The captain now stood on the top of the mound, with the slab between his feet, and stooping down, he took hold of the handle with both hands. He was a powerful man, but he could not lift the stone. His first effort, however, loosened it, and then he began to move it from side to side, still pulling upward, until at last he could feel it rising. Then, with a great heave, he lifted it entirely out of the square aperture in which it had been fitted, and set it on one side.

In an instant, Ralph, lantern in hand, was gazing down into the opening. “Hello!” he cried, “there is something on fire in there. Oh, no,” he added quickly, correcting himself, “it’s only the reflection from our light.”




CHAPTER XII. A TRADITION AND A WAISTCOAT


Captain Horn, his face red with exertion and excitement, stood gazing down into the square aperture at his feet. On the other edge of the opening knelt Ralph, holding the lantern so that it would throw its light into the hole. In a moment, before the boy had time to form a question, he was pushed gently to one side, and his sister Edna, who had clambered up the side of the mound, knelt beside him. She peered down into the depths beneath, and then she drew back and looked up at the captain. His whole soul was in his downward gaze, and he did not even see her.

Then there came a voice from below. “What is it?” cried Mrs. Cliff. “What are you all looking at! Do tell me.”

With half-shut eyes, Edna let herself down the side of the mound, and when her feet touched the ground, she made a few tottering steps toward Mrs. Cliff, and placing her two hands on her companion’s shoulders, she whispered, “I thought it was. It is gold! It is the gold of the Incas.” And then she sank senseless at the feet of the older woman.

Mrs. Cliff did not know that Miss Markham had fainted. She simply stood still and exclaimed, “Gold! What does it mean?”

“What is it all about?” exclaimed Ralph. “It looks like petrified honey.

This never could have been a beehive.”

Without answering, Captain Horn knelt at the edge of the aperture, and taking the lantern from the boy, he let it down as far as it would go, which was only a foot or two.

“Ralph,” he said hoarsely, as he drew himself back, “hold this lantern and get down out of my way. I must cover this up, quick.” And seizing the stone slab by the handle, he lifted it as if it had been a pot-lid, and let it down into its place. “Now,” said he, “get down, and let us all go away from this place. Those negroes may be back at any moment.”

When Ralph found that his sister had fainted, and that Mrs. Cliff did not know it, there was a little commotion at the foot of the mound. But some water in a pool near by soon revived Edna, and in ten minutes the party was on the plateau outside the caverns. The new moon was just beginning to peep over the rocks behind them, and the two ladies had seated themselves on the ground. Ralph was pouring out question after question, to which nobody paid any attention, and Captain Horn, his hands thrust into his pockets, walked backward and forward, his face flushed and his breath coming heavily, and, with his eyes upon the ground, he seemed to think himself entirely alone among those desolate crags.

“Can any of you tell me what it means?” cried Mrs. Cliff. “Edna, do you understand it? Tell me quickly, some of you!”

“I believe I know what it means,” said Edna, her voice trembling as she spoke. “I thought I knew as soon as I heard of the mound covered up by the lake, but I did not dare to say anything, because if my opinion should be correct it would be so wonderful, so astounding, my mind could hardly take hold of it.”

“But what is it?” cried Mrs. Cliff and Ralph, almost in one breath.

“I scarcely know what to say,” said Edna, “my mind is in such a whirl about it, but I will tell you something of what I have read of the ancient history of Peru, and then you will understand my fancies about this stone mound. When the Spaniards, under Pizarro, came to this country, their main object, as we all know, was booty. They especially wished to get hold of the wonderful treasures of the Incas, the ancient rulers of Peru. This was the reason of almost all the cruelties and wickedness of the invaders. The Incas tried various ways of preserving their treasures from the clutch of the Spaniards, and I have read of a tradition that they drained a lake, probably near Cuzco, the ancient capital, and made a strong cellar, or mound, at the bottom of it in which to hide their gold. They then let the water in again, and the tradition also says that this mound has never been discovered.”

“Do you believe,” cried the captain, “that the mound back there in the cavern is the place where the Incas stored their gold?”

“I do not believe it is the place I read about,” said Miss Markham, “for that, as I said, must have been near Cuzco. But there is no reason why there should not have been other places of concealment. This was far away from the capital, but that would make the treasure so much the safer. The Spaniards would never have thought of going to such a lonely, deserted place as this, and the Incas would not have spared any time or trouble necessary to securely hide their treasures.”

“If you are right,” cried the captain, “this is, indeed, astounding! Treasure in a mound of stone — a mound covered by water, which could be let off! The whole shut up in a cave which must have originally been as dark as pitch! When we come to think of it,” he continued excitedly, “it is an amazing hiding-place, no matter what was put into the mound.”

“And do you mean,” almost screamed Mrs. Cliff, “that that stone thing down there is filled with the wealth of the Incas! — the fabulous gold we read about?”

“I do not know what else it can be,” replied Edna. “What I saw when I looked down into the hole was surely gold.”

“Yes,” said the captain, “it was gold — gold in small bars.”

“Why didn’t you get a piece, captain?” asked Ralph. “Then we could be sure about it. If that thing is nearly filled, there must be tons of it.”

“I did not think,” said the captain. “I could not think. I was afraid somebody would come.”

“And now tell me this,” cried Mrs. Cliff. “Whom does this gold belong to?

That is what I want to know. Whose is if?”

“Come, come!” said the captain, “let us stop talking about this thing, and thinking about it. We shall all be maniacs if we don’t quiet ourselves a little, and, besides, it cannot be long before those black fellows come back, and we do not want to be speaking about it then. To-morrow we will examine the mound and see what it is we have discovered. In the meantime, let us quiet our minds and get a good night’s sleep, if we can. This whole affair is astounding, but we must not let it make us crazy before we understand it.”

Miss Markham was a young woman very capable of controlling herself. It was true she had been more affected in consequence of the opening of the mound than any of the others, but that was because she understood, or thought she understood, what the discovery meant, and to the others it was something which at first they could not appreciate. Now she saw the good common sense of the captain’s remarks, and said no more that evening on the subject of the stone mound.

But Mrs. Cliff and Ralph could not be quiet. They must talk, and as the captain walked away that they might not speak to him, they talked to each other.

It was nearly an hour after this that Captain Horn, standing on the outer end of the plateau, saw some black dots moving on the moonlit beach. They moved very slowly, and it was a long time — at least, it seemed so to the captain — before Maka and his companions reached the plateau.

The negroes were heavily loaded with bags and packages, and they were glad to deposit their burdens on the ground.

“Hi!” cried the captain, who spoke as if he had been drinking champagne, “you brought a good cargo, Maka, and now don’t let us hear any tales of what you have seen until we have had supper — supper for everybody. You know what you have got, Maka. Let us have the best things, and let every one of you take a hand in making a fire and cooking. What we want is a first-class feast.”

“I got ‘em,” said Maka, who understood English a good deal better than he could speak it, — ”ham, cheese, lots things. All want supper — good supper.”

While the meal was being prepared, Captain Horn walked over to Mrs. Cliff and Ralph. “Now, I beg of you,” he said, “don’t let these men know we have found anything. This is a very important matter. Don’t talk about it, and if you can’t keep down your excitement, let them think it is the prospect of good victuals, and plenty of them, that has excited you.”

After supper Maka and Cheditafa were called upon to tell their story, but they said very little. They had gone to the place where the Rackbirds had kept their stores, and had selected what Maka considered would be most desirable, including some oil for the lantern, and had brought away as much as they could carry. This was all.

When the rest of his party had gone inside, hoping to get their minds quiet enough to sleep, and the captain was preparing to follow them, Maka arose from the spot on the open plateau where the tired negroes had stretched themselves for the night, and said:

“Got something tell you alone. Come out here.”

When the two had gone to a spot a little distance from the cavern entrance, where the light of the moon, now nearly set, enabled objects to be seen with some distinctness, Maka took from inside his shirt a small piece of clothing. “Look here,” said he. “This belong to Davis.”

The captain took the garment in his hand. It was a waistcoat made of plaid cloth, yellow, green, and red, and most striking in pattern, and Captain Horn instantly recognized it as the waistcoat of Davis, the Englishman.

“He dead,” said Maka, simply.

The captain nodded. He had no doubt of it.

“Where did you find it?” he asked.

“Sticking on rock,” said the African. “Lots things down there. Some one place, some another place. Didn’t know other things, but know this. Davis’ waistcoat. No mistake that. Him wear it all time.”

“You are a good fellow, Maka,” said the captain, “not to speak of this before the ladies. Now go and sleep. There is no need of a guard to-night.”

The captain went inside, procured his gun, and seated himself outside, with his back against a rock. There he sat all night, without once closing his eyes. He was not afraid that anything would come to molest them, but it was just as well to have the gun. As for sleeping, that was impossible. He had heard and seen too much that day.




CHAPTER XIII. “MINE!”


Captain Horn and his party sat down together the next morning on the plateau to drink their hot coffee and eat their biscuit and bacon, and it was plain that the two ladies, as well as the captain, had had little sleep the night before. Ralph declared that he had been awake ever so long, endeavoring to calculate how many cubic feet of gold there would be in that mound if it were filled with the precious metal. “But as I did not know how much a cubic foot of gold is worth,” said he, “and as we might find, after all, that there is only a layer of gold on top, and that all the rest is Incas’ bones, I gave it up.”

The captain was very grave — graver, Miss Markham thought, than the discovery of gold ought to make a man.

“We won’t worry ourselves with calculations,” said he. “As soon as I can get rid of those black fellows, we will go to see what is really in that tomb, or storehouse, or whatever it is. We will make a thorough investigation this time.”

When the men had finished eating, the captain sent them all down to look for driftwood. The stock of wood on the plateau was almost exhausted, and he was glad to think of some reasonable work which would take them away from the cavern.

As soon as they had gone, the captain rose to get the lantern, and called Ralph to accompany him to the mound.

When they were left alone, Edna said to Mrs. Cliff, “Let us go over there to that shady rock, where we can look out for a ship with Mr. Rynders in it, and let us talk about our neighbors in America. Let us try to forget, for a time, all about what the captain is going to investigate. If we keep on thinking and talking of it, our minds will not be in a fit condition to hear what he will have to tell us. It may all come to nothing, you know, and no matter what it comes to, let us keep quiet, and give our nerves a little rest.”

“That is excellent advice,” said Mrs. Cliff. But when they were comfortably seated in the shade, she said: “I have been thinking, Edna, that the possession of vast treasures did not weaken the minds of those Incas, I supposed, until yesterday, that the caverns here were intended for some sort of temple for religious ceremonies, and that the great face on the rock out here was an idol. But now I do not believe that. All openings into the cave must once have been closed up, but it would not do to hide the place so that no one could ever find it again, so they carved that great head on the rocks. Nobody, except those who had hid the treasure, would know what the face meant.”

Edna gave a little smile and sighed. “I see it is of no use to try to get that mound out of our minds,” she said.

“Out of our minds!” exclaimed Mrs. Cliff. “If one of the Rothschilds were to hand you a check for the whole of his fortune, would you expect to get that out of your mind?”

“Such a check,” said Edna, “would be a certain fortune. We have not heard yet what this is.”

“I think we are the two meekest and humblest people in the whole world!” exclaimed Mrs. Cliff, walking up and down the sand. “I don’t believe any other two persons would be content to wait here until somebody should come and tell them whether they were millionaires or not. But, of course, somebody must stay outside to keep those colored people from swarming into the cave when they come back.”

It was not long after this that Mrs. Cliff and Edna heard the sound of quickly advancing feet, and in a few moments they were joined by Ralph and the captain.

“Your faces shine like gold,” cried Edna. “What have you found?”

“Found!” cried Ralph. “Why, Edna, we’ve got — ”

“Be quiet, Ralph,” exclaimed Edna. “I want to hear what the captain has to say. Captain, what is in the mound?”

“We went to the mound,” said he, speaking very rapidly, “and when we got to the top and lifted off that stone lid — upon my soul, ladies, I believe there is gold enough in that thing to ballast a ship. It isn’t filled quite up to the top, and, of course, I could not find out how deep the gold goes down; but I worked a hole in it as far down as my arm would reach, and found nothing but gold bars like this.” Then, glancing around to see that none of the Africans were returning, he took from his pocket a yellow object about three inches in length and an inch in diameter, shaped like a rough prism, cast in a rudely constructed mortar or mould. “I brought away just one of them,” he said, “and then I shut down the lid, and we came away.”

“And is this gold?” exclaimed Edna, eagerly seizing the bar. “Are you sure of it, captain?”

“I am as sure of it as I am that I have a head on my shoulders,” said he, “although when I was diving down into that pile I was not quite sure of that. No one would ever put anything but gold in such a hiding-place. And then, anybody can see it is gold. Look here: I scraped that spot with my knife. I wanted to test it before I showed it to you. See how it shines! I could easily cut into it. I believe it is virgin gold, not hardened with any alloy.”

“And that mound full of it!” cried Mrs. Cliff.

“I can’t say about that,” said the captain. “But if the gold is no deeper than my arm went down into it, and all pure metal at that, why — bless my soul! — it would make anybody crazy to try to calculate how much it is worth.”

“Now, then,” exclaimed Mrs. Cliff, “whom does all this gold belong to? We have found it, but whose is it?”

“That is a point to be considered,” said the captain. “What is your opinion?”

“I have been thinking and thinking and thinking about it,” said Mrs. Cliff. “Of course, that would have been all wasted, though, if it had turned out to be nothing but brass, but then, I could not help it, and this is the conclusion I have come to: In the first place, it does not belong to the people who govern Peru now. They are descendants of the very Spaniards that the Incas hid their treasure from, and it would be a shame and a wickedness to let them have it. It would better stay there shut up for more centuries. Then, again, it would not be right to give it to the Indians, or whatever they call themselves, though they are descendants of the ancient inhabitants, for the people of Spanish blood would not let them keep it one minute, and they would get it, after all. And, besides, how could such treasures be properly divided among a race of wretched savages? It would be preposterous, even if they should be allowed to keep it. They would drink themselves to death, and it would bring nothing but misery upon them. The Incas, in their way, were good, civilized people, and it stands to reason that the treasure they hid away should go to other good, civilized people when the Incas had departed from the face of the earth. Think of the good that could be done with such wealth, should it fall into the proper hands! Think of the good to the poor people of Peru, with the right kind of mission work done among them! I tell you all that the responsibility of this discovery is as great as its value in dollars. What do you think about it, Edna?”

“I think this,” said Miss Markham: “so far as any of us have anything to do with it, it belongs to Captain Horn. He discovered it, and it is his.”

“The whole of it?” cried Ralph.

“Yes,” said his sister, firmly, “the whole of it, so far as we are concerned. What he chooses to do with it is his affair, and whether he gets every bar of gold, or only a reward from the Peruvian government, it is his, to do what he pleases with it.”

“Now, Edna, I am amazed to hear you speak of the Peruvian government,” cried Mrs. Cliff. “It would be nothing less than a crime to let them have it, or even know of it.”

“What do you think, captain?” asked Edna.

“I am exactly of your opinion, Miss Markham,” he said. “That treasure belongs to me. I discovered it, and it is for me to decide what is to be done with it.”

“Now, then,” exclaimed Ralph, his face very red, “I differ with you! We are all partners in this business, and it isn’t fair for any one to have everything.”

“And I am not so sure, either,” said Mrs. Cliff, “that the captain ought to decide what is to be done with this treasure. Each of us should have a voice.”

“Mrs. Cliff, Miss Markham, and Ralph,” said the captain, “I have a few words to say to you, and I must say them quickly, for I see those black fellows coming. That treasure in the stone mound is mine. I discovered the mound, and no matter what might have been in it, the contents would have been mine. All that gold is just as much mine as if I dug it in a gold-mine in California, and we won’t discuss that question any further. What I want to say particularly is that it may seem very selfish in me to claim the whole of that treasure, but I assure you that that is the only thing to be done. I know you will all agree to that when you see the matter in the proper light, and I have told you my plans about it. I intended to claim all that treasure, if it turned out to be treasure. I made up my mind to that last night, and I am very glad Miss Markham told me her opinion of the rights of the thing before I mentioned it. Now, I have just got time to say a few words more. If there should be any discussion about the ownership of this gold and the way it ought to be divided, there would be trouble, and perhaps bloody trouble. There are those black fellows coming up here, and two of them speak English. Eight of my men went away in a boat, and they may come back at any time. And then, there were those two Cape Cod men, who went off first. They may have reached the other side of the mountains, and may bring us assistance overland. As for Davis, I know he will never come back. Maka brought me positive proof that he was killed by the Rackbirds. Now, you see my point. That treasure is mine. I have a right to it, and I stand by that right. There must be no talk as to what is to be done with it. I shall decide what is right, and I shall do it, and no man shall have a word to say about it. In a case like this there must be a head, and I am the head.”

The captain had been speaking rapidly and very earnestly, but now his manner changed a little. Placing his hand on Ralph’s shoulder, he said: “Now don’t be afraid, my boy, that you and your sister or Mrs. Cliff will be left in the lurch. If there were only us four, there would be no trouble at all, but if there is any talk of dividing, there may be a lot of men to deal with, and a hard lot, too. And now, not a word before these men. — Maka, that is a fine lot of fire-wood you have brought. It will last us a long time.”

The African shrugged his shoulders. “Hope not,” he said. “Hope Mr. Rynders come soon. Don’t want make many fires.”

As Captain Horn walked away toward Ralph’s lookout, he could not account to himself for the strange and unnatural state of his feelings. He ought to have been very happy because he had discovered vast treasures. Instead of that his mind was troubled and he was anxious and fearful. One reason for his state of mind was his positive knowledge of the death of Davis. He had believed him dead because he had not come back, but now that he knew the truth, the shock seemed as great as if he had not suspected it. He had liked the Englishman better than any of his seamen, and he was a man he would have been glad to have had with him now. The Cape Cod men had been with him but a short time, and he was not well acquainted with them. It was likely, too, that they were dead also, for they had not taken provisions with them. But so long as he did not really know this, the probability could not lower his spirits.

But when he came to analyze his feelings, which he did with the vigorous directness natural to him, he knew what was the source of his anxiety and disquietude. He actually feared the return of Rynders and his men! This feeling annoyed and troubled him. He felt that it was unworthy of him. He knew that he ought to long for the arrival of his mate, for in no other way could the party expect help, and if help did not arrive before the provisions of the Rackbirds were exhausted, the whole party would most likely perish. Moreover, when Rynders and his men came back, they would come to rare good fortune, for there was enough gold for all of them.

But, in spite of these reasonable conclusions, the captain was afraid that Rynders and his men would return.

“If they come here,” he said to himself, “they will know of that gold, for I cannot expect to keep such fellows out of the cavern, and if they know of it, it will be their gold, not mine. I know men, especially those men, well enough for that.”

And so, fearing that he might see them before he was ready for them, — and how he was going to make himself ready for them he did not know, — he stood on the lookout and scanned the ocean for Rynders and his men.




CHAPTER XIV. A PILE OF FUEL


Four days had passed, and nothing had happened. The stone mound in the lake had not been visited, for there had been no reason for sending the black men away, and with one of them nearer than a mile the captain would not even look at his treasure. There was no danger that they would discover the mound, for they were not allowed to take the lantern, and no one of them would care to wander into the dark, sombre depths of the cavern without a light.

The four white people, who, with a fair habitation in the rocks, with plenty of plain food to eat, with six servants to wait on them, and a climate which was continuously delightful, except in the middle of the day, and with all fear of danger from man or beast removed from their minds, would have been content to remain here a week or two longer and await the arrival of a vessel to take them away, were now in a restless and impatient condition of mind. They were all eager to escape from the place. Three of them longed for the return of Rynders, but the other one steadily hoped that they might get away before his men came back.

How to do this, or how to take with him the treasure of the Incas, was a puzzling question with which the captain racked his brains by day and by night. At last he bethought himself of the Rackbirds’ vessel. He remembered that Maka had told him that provisions were brought to them by a vessel, and there was every reason to suppose that when these miscreants went on some of their marauding expeditions they travelled by sea. Day by day he had thought that he would go and visit the Rackbirds’ storehouse and the neighborhood thereabout, but day by day he had been afraid that in his absence Rynders might arrive, and when he came he wanted to be there to meet him.

But now the idea of the boat made him brave this possible contingency, and early one morning, with Cheditafa and two other of the black fellows, he set off along the beach for the mouth of the little stream which, rising somewhere in the mountains, ran down to the cavern where it had once widened and deepened into a lake, and then through the ravine of the Rackbirds on to the sea. When he reached his destination, Captain Horn saw a great deal to interest him.

Just beyond the second ridge of rock which Maka had discovered, the stream ran into a little bay, and the shores near its mouth showed evident signs that they had recently been washed by a flood. On points of rock and against the sides of the sand mounds, he saw bits of debris from the Rackbirds’ camp. Here were sticks which had formed the timbers of their huts; there were pieces of clothing and cooking-utensils; and here and there, partly buried by the shifting sands, were seen the bodies of Rackbirds, already desiccated by the dry air and the hot sun of the region. But the captain saw no vessel.

“Dat up here,” said Cheditafa. “Dey hide dat well. Come ‘long, captain.”

Following his black guide, the captain skirted a little promontory of rocks, and behind it found a cove in which, well concealed, lay the Rackbirds’ vessel. It was a sloop of about twenty tons, and from the ocean, or even from the beach, it could not be seen. But as the captain stood and gazed upon this craft his heart sank. It had no masts nor sails, and it was a vessel that could not be propelled by oars.

Wading through the shallow water, — for it was now low tide, — the captain climbed on board. The deck was bare, without a sign of spar or sail, and when, with Cheditafa’s help, he had forced the entrance of the little companionway, and had gone below, he found that the vessel had been entirely stripped of everything that could be carried away, and when he went on deck again he saw that even the rudder had been unshipped and removed. Cheditafa could give him no information upon this state of things, but after a little while Captain Horn imagined the cause for this dismantled condition of the sloop. The Rackbirds’ captain could not trust his men, he said to himself, and he made it impossible for any of them to escape or set out on an expedition for themselves. It was likely that the masts and sails had been carried up to the camp, from which place it would have been impossible to remove them without the leader knowing it.

When he spoke to Cheditafa on the subject, the negro told him that after the little ship came in from one of its voyages he and his companions had always carried the masts, sails, and a lot of other things up to the camp. But there was nothing of the sort there now. Every spar and sail must have been carried out to sea by the flood, for if they had been left on the shores of the stream the captain would have seen them.

This was hard lines for Captain Horn. If the Rackbirds’ vessel had been in sailing condition, everything would have been very simple and easy for him. He could have taken on board not only his own party, but a large portion of the treasure, and could have sailed away as free as a bird, without reference to the return of Rynders and his men. A note tied to a pole set up in a conspicuous place on the beach would have informed Mr. Rynders of their escape from the place, and it was not likely that any of the party would have thought it worth while to go farther on shore. But it was of no use to think of getting away in this vessel. In its present condition it was absolutely useless.

While the captain had been thinking and considering the matter, Cheditafa had been wandering about the coast exploring. Presently Captain Horn saw him running toward him, accompanied by the two other negroes.

“’Nother boat over there,” cried Cheditafa, as the captain approached him, — ”’nother boat, but badder than this. No good. Cook with it, that’s all.”

The captain followed Cheditafa across the little stream, and a hundred yards or so along the shore, and over out of reach of the tide, piled against a low sand mound, he saw a quantity of wood, all broken into small pieces, and apparently prepared, as Cheditafa had suggested, for cooking-fires. It was also easy to see that these pieces of wood had once been part of a boat, perhaps of a wreck thrown up on shore. The captain approached the pile of wood and picked up some of the pieces. As he held in his hand a bit of gunwale, not much more than a foot in length, his eyes began to glisten and his breath came quickly. Hastily pulling out several pieces from the mass of debris, he examined them thoroughly. Then he stepped back, and let the piece of rudder he was holding drop to the sand.

“Cheditafa,” said he, speaking huskily, “this is one of the Castor’s boats. This is a piece of the boat in which Rynders and the men set out.”

The negro looked at the captain and seemed frightened by the expression on his face. For a moment he did not speak, and then in a trembling voice he asked, “Where all them now?”

The captain shook his head, but said nothing. That pile of fragments was telling him a tale which gradually became plainer and plainer to him, and which he believed as if Rynders himself had been telling it to him. His ship’s boat, with its eight occupants, had never gone farther south than the mouth of the little stream. That they had been driven on shore by the stress of weather the captain did not believe. There had been no high winds or storms since their departure. Most likely they had been induced to land by seeing some of the Rackbirds on shore, and they had naturally rowed into the little cove, for assistance from their fellow-beings was what they were in search of. But no matter how they happened to land, the Rackbirds would never let them go away again to carry news of the whereabouts of their camp. Almost unarmed, these sailors must have fallen easy victims to the Rackbirds.

It was not unlikely that the men had been shot down from ambush without having had any intercourse or conversation with the cruel monsters to whom they had come to seek relief, for had there been any talk between them, Rynders would have told of his companions left on shore, and these would have been speedily visited by the desperadoes. For the destruction of the boat there was reason enough: the captain of the Rackbirds gave his men no chance to get away from him.

With a heart of lead, Captain Horn turned to look at his negro companions, and saw them all sitting together on the sands, chattering earnestly, and holding up their hands with one or more fingers extended, as if they were counting. Cheditafa came forward.

“When all your men go away from you?” he asked.

The captain reflected a moment, and then answered, “About two weeks ago.”

“That’s right! That’s right!” exclaimed the negro, nodding violently as he spoke. “We talk about that. We count days. It’s just ten days and three days, and Rackbirds go ‘way, and leave us high up in rock-hole, with no ladder. After a while we hear guns, guns, guns. Long time guns shooting. When they come back, it almost dark, and they want supper bad. All time they eat supper, they talk ‘bout shooting sharks. Shot lots sharks, and chuck them into the water. Sharks in water already before they is shot. We say then it no sharks they shot. Now we say it must been — ”

The captain turned away. He did not want to hear any more. There was no possible escape from the belief that Rynders and all his men had been shot down, and robbed, if they had anything worth taking, and then their bodies carried out to sea, most likely in their own boat, and thrown overboard.

There was nothing more at this dreadful place that Captain Horn wished to see, to consider, or to do, and calling the negroes to follow him, he set out on his return.




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