"You have plenty of cigars?" he said.
"I?"
"Ah, well, I've got some there," growled Bart, and he handed the
prisoner half a dozen roughly-made rolls of the tobacco-leaf. "Now, you
understand," he continued, as he made to go once more, "you're to keep
here till the skipper comes back."
"Are you afraid I shall escape?" said Humphrey, contemptuously.
"Not a bit, captain; but when one man's life depends on another's, it
makes him careful."
The curtain dropped behind him, and Humphrey stood listening and
thinking.
Bart's step could be faintly heard now, and, feeling safe, the prisoner
went back to his couch, and gazed up in the direction from whence the
voice had come.
"Are you still there?" he said, softly.
There was no reply; and a repetition of the question was followed by the
same silence.
"It's strange," he said, gazing up in the gloom overhead to where, in
the midst of a good deal of rough carving, there seemed to be a small
opening, though he could not be sure. "Why should he come and watch me,
and take this interest in my well-being? I am not like an ordinary
prisoner, and his friendly way, his submission to the rough contempt
with which I treated him--it's strange, very strange! What can it
mean?"
He threw himself upon the couch, to lie for some time thinking and
trying to interpret the meaning; but all was black and confused as the
dark mass of carving from which the woman's voice had seemed to come;
and, giving it up at last, he rose, and without any hesitation walked
straight out through the opening, and made his way along the corridor to
where the sun blazed forth and made him stand and shade his eyes, as he
remained considering which way he should go.
The prisoner made a bold dash in a fresh direction, going straight
toward where he believed the men's quarters to be; and, as before, the
moment he had passed behind the ruins he found himself face to face with
a dense wall of verdure, so matted together that, save to a bird or a
small animal, farther progress was impossible.
Defeated here, he tried another and another place, till his perseverance
was rewarded by the finding of one of the dark, maze-like paths formed
by cutting away the smaller growth and zig-zagging through the trees.
Into this dark pathway he plunged, to find that at the end of five
minutes he had lost all idea, through its abrupt turns, of the direction
in which he was going; while before he had penetrated much farther the
pathway forked, and, unable to decide which would lead him in the
required direction, he took the path to the right.
It was plain enough that these green tunnels through the forest had been
cut by the buccaneers for purposes of defence in case of an enemy
carrying their outer works, so that he was in no way surprised to find
the path he had taken led right to a huge crumbling stone building,
whose mossy walls rose up among the trees sombre and forbidding, and
completely barring his way.
It was a spot where a few resolute men might keep quite an army at bay,
for the walls were of enormous extent, the windows mere stone lattices,
and the doorway in front so low that a stooping attitude was necessary
for him who would enter. This was consequent upon the falling of stones
from above, and the blocking partially of the way.
There was a strange, mysterious aspect in the place, overgrown as it was
with the redundant growth, which fascinated the explorer, and feeling
impelled to go on he gave one glance sound, and was about to enter, when
out of the utter stillness he heard a low sound as if someone had been
watching him and given vent to a low exhalation of the breath.
Humphrey started and looked sharply round, unable to restrain a shudder:
but no one was visible, and he was about to go on, feeling ashamed of
his nervousness, when the sound was repeated, this time from above his
head; and glancing up, he leaped back, for twenty feet above his head in
the green gloom there was a curious, impish face gazing down at him; and
as he made out more and more of the object, it seemed as if some strange
goblin were suspended in mid-air and about to drop down upon his head.
"It's the darkness, I suppose," exclaimed Humphrey, angrily, as he
uttered a loud hiss, whose effect was to make the strange object give
itself a swing and reveal the fact that it was hanging by its tail alone
from the end of a rope-like vine which depended from the vast ceiling of
interlacing leaves.
With apparently not the slightest effort the goblin-like creature caught
a loop of the same vine, clung there for a moment to gaze back at the
intruder into this weird domain, displaying its curiously human
countenance, and then sped upwards, when there was a rush as of a wave
high above the visible portion of the interlacing boughs, and Humphrey
knew that he had startled quite a flock of the little forest imps, who
sped rapidly away.
"I must be very weak still," he muttered as he went now right up to the
entrance, and after peering cautiously in for a moment or two he
entered.
It was dim outside in the forest; here, after picking his way cautiously
for a stop or two, it was nearly black. The place had probably been
fairly lit when it was first constructed, far back in the dim past
before the forest invaded the district and hid away these works of man;
but now the greatest caution was needed to avoid the fallen blocks of
masonry, and the explorer took step after step with the care of one who
dreaded some chasm in his way.
He stopped and listened, for suddenly from his left there was a faint
echoing splash so small and fine that it must have been caused by the
drip of a bead of water from the roof, but it had fallen deep down into
some dark hollow half filled with water, and a shiver ran through
Humphrey's frame as he thought of the consequences of a slip into such a
place, far from help, and doomed to struggle for a few minutes grasping
at the dripping stony walls, seeking a means of climbing out, and then
falling back into the darkness of the great unknown.
He felt as if he must turn back, but his eyes were now growing
accustomed to the obscurity, and he made out that just in front there
was, faintly marked out, the opening of a doorway leading into a chamber
into which some faint light penetrated.
Going cautiously forward, he entered, to find to his astonishment that
he was in a fair sized room whose stone walls were elaborately carved,
as were the dark recesses or niches all around, before each of which
sat, cross-legged, a well-carved image which seemed to be richly
ornamented in imitation of its old highly-decorated dress. For a moment
in the obscurity it seemed as if he had penetrated into the abode of the
ancient people who had built the ruined city, and that here they were
seated around in solemn conclave to discuss some matter connected with
the long low form lying upon the skin spread floor, while to make the
scene the more incongruous, these strangely-carved figures were looking
down upon the object, which was carefully draped with a large Union
Jack.
Humphrey paused just inside the threshold and removed his cap, for Sarah
Greenheys' words recurred to him, and it seemed that he must have
strayed into one of the many old temples of the place which had been
turned by Commodore Junk into a mausoleum for the remains of the woman
he was said to have loved, the draped object being without doubt the
coffin which held her remains.
He stood gazing down at the coloured flag for a time; then with a glance
round at the olden idols or effigies of the departed great of the place,
and the dark niches at the mouths of which they sat, he went softly out,
glanced to his right, and saw an opening which evidently gave, upon the
chasm where he had heard the water drip, and stepped out once more into
the comparative daylight of the forest.
The place might be used as a retreat, he thought, but its present use
was plain enough, and he walked quickly back to where the path had
branched, and took the other fork.
This narrow tunnel through the forest suddenly debouched upon another
going across it at right, angles, and after a moment's hesitation the
prisoner turned to the left, and to his great delight found that he had
solved one of the topographical problems of the place, for this led
towards what was evidently the outer part of the buccaneers' settlement,
and of this he had proof by hearing the smothered sound of voices, which
became clear as he proceeded, and at last were plainly to be made out as
coming from a ruined building standing upon a terrace whose stones were
lifted in all directions by the growth around.
This place had been made open by the liberal use of the axe and fire,
half-burned trunks and charred roots of trees lying in all directions,
the consequence being that Humphrey had to stop short at the mouth of
the forest path unless he wanted to be seen. For, to judge from the
eager talking, it was evident that a number of men were gathered in the
great building at whose doorless opening the back of one of the
buccaneers could be seen as he leaned against the stone, listening to
someone who, in a hoarse voice which the listener seemed to recognise,
was haranguing the rest.
Humphrey could not hear all that was said, but a word fell upon his ear
from time to time, and as he pieced these words together it seemed as if
the speaker were declaiming against tyranny and oppression, and calling
upon his hearers to help him to put an end to the state of affairs
existing.
Then came an excited outburst, as the speaker must have turned his face
toward the door, for these words came plainly:
"The end of it will be that they'll escape, and bring a man-of-war down
upon us, and all through his fooling." A murmur arose.
"He's gone mad, I tell you all; and if you like to choose a captain for
yourselves, choose one, and I'll follow him like a man; but it's time
something was done if we want to live." Another burst of murmurs rose
here.
"He's mad, I tell you, or he wouldn't keep him like that. So what's it
to be, my lads, a new captain or the yard-arm?"