A LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS AND WHAT CAME OF IT
As I learned from Marjorie later, the slit extended for only a few
feet. Then the roof sloped up again. Marjorie found herself in a
narrow passage with the fresh breeze blowing on her face. In fact, the
draught was so great that the candle went out directly and she had to
put on her shoes and grope her way forward in pitch darkness.
Her great fear was that the passage might lead to others and that
before she knew it, she would be involved in a maze of subterranean
galleries and, if the worst came to the worst, not even be able to
rejoin me. She tried to maintain her direction by keeping always close
to the right-hand wall and by counting her steps. But the gallery was
so dark and it twisted so frequently that she soon lost count. At last
she went blindly along, stopping at intervals to satisfy herself that
she still felt the wind on her cheek.
She had halted irresolute and was thinking about turning back when, out
of the darkness in front of her, a little glow appeared. At first a
mere suggestion of light, it grew to a steady yellow radiance that lit
up, though but dimly, the rocky roof of the corridor. The light itself
appeared to be concealed by a bend in the gallery.
Marjorie remained perfectly still, her heart beating fast. Foot-steps
were approaching; then the murmur of voices reached her ear. Her first
instinct was to turn tail and flee; but then the foot-steps stopped and
the light stood still.
"Four and twenty hours already are they away," said a deep rumbling
voice in German, "and not back yet! Der Stelze is too confident, Herr
Leutnant...."
"Yet the doctor described exactly where he tied up the launch,"
answered another voice, hard and metallic, with a more refined
enunciation. "Do you know what I think, Schröder? This English
nobleman and his orderly have seized the launch----"
"_Aber nein_, Herr Leutnant?"
"And gone off to fetch their yacht back. She only went to Alcedo, at
least so the doctor told us...."
"Then the yacht may be back quite soon, Herr Leutnant?"
"Certainly! That's my conviction. And to think that Grundt had this
cursed _Engländer_ in his power and let him go!"
"Bah!" said Schröder, "he grows old, _der Stelze_! Here three days are
gone and not a trace of the treasure. In a little while, who knows?
these damned _Engländer_ will be here and our chance of making our
fortunes will be gone for ever...."
"You speak true, Schröder! If only I had any support I would depose
Grundt and take charge myself. But with these filthy Spanish
monkeys...."
"Speak softly, Herr Leutnant...."
Intent as she was upon this conversation, Marjorie did not notice the
light advancing until it was too late. Round the bend in the passage
came a big, yellow-bearded German sailor swinging a ship's lantern, the
blonde young German officer, Ferdinand von Hagel, at his heels. In an
instant they were on her and gripping her by the wrists dragged her
down the gallery in the direction from which they had come. In silence
they hustled her along for some hundred paces, then stopped at a bend.
"Wait here!" whispered the officer to Schröder, an evil smile on his
face, "I go to reconnoitre. This will be a pleasant surprise for our
comrades...."
He tip-toed away. Suddenly, from without, a harsh voice cried loudly:--
"You idle rascals, the launch must be there!"
There was a confused murmur and the voice spoke again:--
"Then the English yacht may be back at any time now...."
Von Hagel appeared in the gallery.
"Bring her along!" he ordered softly, beckoning with his hand.
The harsh voice shouted:--
"Well, we shall have to fight for it yet!"
"No, Herr Doktor!" said von Hagel at the mouth of the gallery, "No!
There need be no fight!"
They had emerged into a rocky hollow, flooded with brilliant sunshine
which almost blinded Marjorie coming from the dank, dark recesses of
the cliff. An arm of vivid green tree hung across the opening of the
passage and beyond it there was a glimpse of gorgeous-hued bushes, over
which the painted butterflies hovered, of bright blue sky and, in the
distance, sparkling green sea. And across the scene the keen
sea-breeze romped, blowing the hair about the girl's eyes, a breath of
life after the clammy atmosphere of the cave.
His back to a tree, a ragged blanket cast across his knees, the Man
with the Clubfoot lay. His face was pallid and his huge body shook
with ague. Before him stood two uncouth figures, each with a rifle and
blanket slung, poncho-fashion, across him, the centre of an excited,
gesticulating group.
"Sir Garth," the German lieutenant added, bringing Marjorie forward,
"will surely listen to reason when he hears that his charming daughter
is the guest of Herr Dr. Grundt! And, maybe, even the spy, Okewood,
will come to terms...."
"_So, so!_"
Clubfoot's thick lips bared his yellow teeth in a grim smile.
"_Das ist ja hoechst interessant! Jawohl!_"
He raised his eyes to the girl, dark eyes that burnt with fever
beetling from under the enormously bushy eyebrows, eyes that gleamed
hard and menacing.
But now the crowd, which had fallen back at von Hagel's dramatic
interruption, surged about him and Marjorie, shouting and
gesticulating. The hollow rang with German and Spanish.
"Where is the Englishman?" they yelled. "Grundt, what of the treasure
you promised us? The girl knows! Make the girl tell!...."
Grundt raised a great hand and, for the moment, the hubbub was stilled.
"Old Clubfoot is not at the end of his resources. _Kinder_, we have a
hostage, a hostage we mean to keep. Let the yacht return; as long as
the gnädiges Fräulein is our guest, we shall have no trouble from the
stupid Englishmen. And as for our clever young friend, Okewood....
Herr Leutnant!"
"Herr Doktor?"
"The _Engländer_ was last seen in company with the girl. Take two men
and search the gallery!"
Von Hagel coloured up at the brusqueness of Grundt's tone.
"Schröder here," he said without a shred of respect in his manner, "has
explored the gallery. It leads to a small air-hole through which he
believes the girl crawled. No man, he says, could possibly get
through...."
"Then," said Clubfoot, "the _Engländer_ will be in one of the caves on
the topmost terrace. Unless he has escaped?....
And he shot a quick glance at the officer.
"Impossible," replied the other. "There is only the one practicable
descent and it is guarded...."
Clubfoot nodded. Then he raised his hand.
"Go now," he said, "and leave me with the girl!"
On that von Hagel bent down and spoke softly in his ear. He seemed to
be urging something with great insistence. Suddenly one of the
Spaniards--a short man with a fat grey face covered with blue stubble
and little pig eyes--danced to the front of the group. He burst into a
torrent of voluble Spanish, shaking his fist repeatedly at Clubfoot.
The latter did not move a muscle but looked at the speaker with
contempt in every line of his face.
It was not until some of the Germans broke in, that Marjorie could
understand what the scene was about.
"We're sick of being fooled," cried the big seaman they called
Schröder. "The Kaiser's deposed, d'ye hear, and we're all equal!
You've bungled things long enough, Grundt. You let the cursed English
spy slip through your fingers with the hiding-place of the treasure in
his head! You're past your work, Grundt! You've botched our business
long enough!"
"_Ganz recht!_" ejaculated another German. "And poor Neque got a
bullet in the guts for saying as much to you in the woods yesterday!"
This explained the single shot we had heard in the forest when we were
on the rock.
"And the doctor murdered by this _verdammt Engländer_!" shouted a voice
from the rear.
"Three days we've waited here and not a sign of the treasure," said von
Hagel, looking round the group. "What have you to say to that, Grundt?"
Clubfoot, who had remained impassive under all this abuse, now
staggered to his feet. No man lent a hand to help him. He stood and
faced them, towering above them all. Ill though he was, his
personality dominated every man in that place. A flame of colour
mounted in his haggard face; two veins stood out like knots in his
temples and his eyes blazed. His two hands, crossed on the crutch of
his stick shook.
"Are you a candidate for my succession, Herr Leutnant?"
He addressed himself to von Hagel alone and his voice was calm and
steady. But then his feelings seemed to overcome him and with a roar
he shouted:--
"You insubordinate rascal! I can afford to let these curs yelp but
when the whipper-in joins them, it's time for the master to use the
lash!"
With that he raised his heavy stick and struck the other full across
the face. With a scarlet weal barring his pink-and-white cheek von
Hagel sprang at his aggressor, but a big automatic which Grundt had
plucked from his pocket brought him up short.
"I used only one bullet on Neque," Clubfoot warned him in a quiet, grim
voice. "There's one left for you, Herr Leutnant, aye, and more to
spare for other mutinous blackguards like you...."
Von Hagel stepped back, broken, cowed. And Clubfoot cried:--
"While this puppy wastes our time, the man we want, the man who can
lead us to the five hundred thousand dollars in gold, is skulking
trapped in a cave not a thousand yards away. Fools that you are, don't
you understand that you have but to let him know that the English girl
is in our hands and he will throw up the sponge? Otherwise...."
He paused deliberately and looked at Marjorie from under his heavy
brows. The crowd shouted back at him in German the word on which he
had rested.
"_Sonst?_"
"Otherwise he must know that I shall hand this delicate English lady to
the tender mercies of any of our brave companions who has fallen a
victim to her beauty--Black Pablo, for instance, or our handsome
steward, Pizarro...."
At that the crowd roared approval. Black Pablo, his guitar slung
across his back, a squat, toad-like creature, obese and disgusting,
slouched over to the girl. He contrived to summon up from the depths
of his single dull and fish-like eye an expression which made her
shrink back in horror. Then, amid a burst of laughter, "handsome"
Pizarro, the stunted mulatto cook, was pushed out of the grass. He
shambled towards Marjorie, his eyeballs flashing white in his yellow
pock-marked face.
"Go, children!" cried Clubfoot. "Drag this spy from his hole and bring
him to me. This time he shall speak, by God!--or we shall finish with
it once and for all!"
Again he looked at Marjorie. The gold in his teeth flashed as he
smiled with cruel malice. Then, as though overcome by the demand he
had made on his strength, he dropped back on his blankets once more.
The hollow was all astir as the men set out. They had camped at the
foot of the terraced rock on the high ground overlooking the clearing
with the grave, beyond it the broad sweep of Horseshoe Bay between the
curved arms of land enclosing the lagoon.
"Take ropes!" counselled Clubfoot from his bed beneath the tree. "You
may have to descend into the caves...."
The seaman, Schröder, brought out some lengths of rope and hurried
after the string of men, who, in Indian file, streamed out of the
hollow, talking and laughing like a pack of schoolboys. Not a man
remained behind. Even Pizarro, the coloured cook, went along. Black
Pablo, the leader of the party, who was the last to go, wanted to leave
a guard over Marjorie. But Clubfoot would not hear of it.
"_Amigo mio_," he said. "El Cojo is not so old as that young
jackanapes would make out. I cannot climb while this cursed fever is
on me. But I can look after myself--and anybody else who does me the
honour of spending this pleasant afternoon in company...."
Black Pablo laughed stridently. They heard his feet ring sharply on
the rocky ground. The next moment he was gone, and the peace of a
summer afternoon descended upon the hollow, the soothing quiet of
droning insects, of a little breeze stirring gently in the thick
foliage, the distant drumming of the sea.
Clubfoot began to speak to Marjorie.