THE BATS
Rekka was a mile behind.
"It will take us fully an hour yet," said Dr. Cairn, "to reach the
pyramid, although it appears so near."
Indeed, in the violet dusk, the great mastabah Pyramid of Méydûm
seemed already to loom above them, although it was quite four miles
away. The narrow path along which they trotted their donkeys ran
through the fertile lowlands of the Fayûm. They had just passed a
village, amid an angry chorus from the pariah dogs, and were now
following the track along the top of the embankment. Where the green
carpet merged ahead into the grey ocean of sand the desert began, and
out in that desert, resembling some weird work of Nature rather than
anything wrought by the hand of man, stood the gloomy and lonely
building ascribed by the Egyptologists to the Pharaoh Sneferu.
Dr. Cairn and his son rode ahead, and Sime, with Ali Mohammed, brought
up the rear of the little company.
"I am completely in the dark, sir," said Robert Cairn, "respecting the
object of our present journey. What leads you to suppose that we shall
find Antony Ferrara here?"
"I scarcely hope to _find_ him here," was the enigmatical reply, "but
I am almost certain that he _is_ here. I might have expected it, and I
blame myself for not having provided against--this."
"Against what?"
"It is impossible, Rob, for you to understand this matter. Indeed, if
I were to publish what I know--not what I imagine, but what I
know--about the Pyramid of Méydûm I should not only call down upon
myself the ridicule of every Egyptologist in Europe; I should be
accounted mad by the whole world."
His son was silent for a time; then:
"According to the guide books," he said, "it is merely an empty tomb."
"It is empty, certainly," replied Dr. Cairn grimly, "or that apartment
known as the King's Chamber is now empty. But even the so-called
King's Chamber was not empty once; and there is another chamber in the
pyramid which is not empty _now_!"
"If you know of the existence of such a chamber, sir, why have you
kept it secret?"
"Because I cannot _prove_ its existence. I do not know how to enter
it, but I know it is there; I know what it was formerly used for, and
I suspect that last night it was used for that same unholy purpose
again--after a lapse of perhaps four thousand years! Even you would
doubt me, I believe, if I were to tell you what I know, if I were to
hint at what I suspect. But no doubt in your reading you have met with
Julian the Apostate?"
"Certainly, I have read of him. He is said to have practised
necromancy."
"When he was at Carra in Mesopotamia, he retired to the Temple of the
Moon, with a certain sorcerer and some others, and, his nocturnal
operations concluded, he left the temple locked, the door sealed, and
placed a guard over the gate. He was killed in the war, and never
returned to Carra, but when, in the reign of Jovian, the seal was
broken and the temple opened, a body was found hanging by its hair--I
will spare you the particulars; it was a case of that most awful form
of sorcery--_anthropomancy_!"
An expression of horror had crept over Robert Cairn's face.
"Do you mean, sir, that this pyramid was used for similar purposes?"
"In the past it has been used for many purposes," was the quiet reply.
"The exodus of the bats points to the fact that it was again used for
one of those purposes last night; the exodus of the bats--and
something else."
Sime, who had been listening to this strange conversation, cried out
from the rear:
"We cannot reach it before sunset!"
"No," replied Dr. Cairn, turning in his saddle, "but that does not
matter. Inside the pyramid, day and night make no difference."
Having crossed a narrow wooden bridge, they turned now fully in the
direction of the great ruin, pursuing a path along the opposite bank
of the cutting. They rode in silence for some time, Robert Cairn deep
in thought.
"I suppose that Antony Ferrara actually visited this place last
night," he said suddenly, "although I cannot follow your reasoning.
But what leads you to suppose that he is there now?"
"This," answered his father slowly. "The purpose for which I believe
him to have come here would detain him at least two days and two
nights. I shall say no more about it, because if I am wrong, or if for
any reason I am unable to establish my suspicions as facts, you would
certainly regard me as a madman if I had confided those suspicions to
you."
Mounted upon donkeys, the journey from Rekka to the Pyramid of Méydûm
occupies fully an hour and a half, and the glories of the sunset had
merged into the violet dusk of Egypt before the party passed the
outskirts of the cultivated land and came upon the desert sands. The
mountainous pile of granite, its peculiar orange hue a ghastly yellow
in the moonlight, now assumed truly monstrous proportions, seeming
like a great square tower rising in three stages from its mound of
sand to some three hundred and fifty feet above the level of the
desert.
There is nothing more awesome in the world than to find one's self at
night, far from all fellow-men, in the shadow of one of those edifices
raised by unknown hands, by unknown means, to an unknown end; for,
despite all the wisdom of our modern inquirers, these stupendous
relics remain unsolved riddles set to posterity by a mysterious
people.
Neither Sime nor Ali Mohammed were of highly strung temperament,
neither subject to those subtle impressions which more delicate
organisations receive, as the nostrils receive an exhalation, from
such a place as this. But Dr. Cairn and his son, though each in a
different way, came now within the _aura_ of this temple of the dead
ages.
The great silence of the desert--a silence like no other in the world;
the loneliness, which must be experienced to be appreciated, of that
dry and tideless ocean; the traditions which had grown up like fungi
about this venerable building; lastly, the knowledge that it was
associated in some way with the sorcery, the unholy activity, of
Antony Ferrara, combined to chill them with a supernatural dread which
called for all their courage to combat.
"What now?" said Sime, descending from his mount.
"We must lead the donkeys up the slope," replied Dr. Cairn, "where
those blocks of granite are, and tether them there."
In silence, then, the party commenced the tedious ascent of the mound
by the narrow path to the top, until at some hundred and twenty feet
above the surrounding plain they found themselves actually under the
wall of the mighty building. The donkeys were made fast.
"Sime and I," said Dr. Cairn quietly, "will enter the pyramid."
"But--" interrupted his son.
"Apart from the fatigue of the operation," continued the doctor, "the
temperature in the lower part of the pyramid is so tremendous, and the
air so bad, that in your present state of health it would be absurd
for you to attempt it. Apart from which there is a possibly more
important task to be undertaken here, outside."
He turned his eyes upon Sime, who was listening intently, then
continued:
"Whilst we are penetrating to the interior by means of the sloping
passage on the north side, Ali Mohammed and yourself must mount guard
on the south side."
"What for?" said Sime rapidly.
"For the reason," replied Dr. Cairn, "that there is an entrance on to
the first stage--"
"But the first stage is nearly seventy feet above us. Even assuming
that there were an entrance there--which I doubt--escape by that means
would be impossible. No one could climb down the face of the pyramid
from above; no one has ever succeeded in climbing up. For the purpose
of surveying the pyramid a scaffold had to be erected. Its sides are
quite unscaleable."
"That may be," agreed Dr. Cairn; "but, nevertheless, I have my reasons
for placing a guard over the south side. If anything appears upon the
stage above, Rob--_anything_--shoot, and shoot straight!"
He repeated the same instructions to Ali Mohammed, to the evident
surprise of the latter.
"I don't understand at all," muttered Sime, "but as I presume you have
a good reason for what you do, let it be as you propose. Can you give
me any idea respecting what we may hope to find inside this place? I
only entered once, and I am not anxious to repeat the experiment. The
air is unbreathable, the descent to the level passage below is stiff
work, and, apart from the inconvenience of navigating the latter
passage, which as you probably know is only sixteen inches high, the
climb up the vertical shaft into the tomb is not a particularly safe
one. I exclude the possibility of snakes," he added ironically.
"You have also omitted the possibility of Antony Ferrara," said Dr.
Cairn.
"Pardon my scepticism, doctor, but I cannot imagine any man
voluntarily remaining in that awful place."
"Yet I am greatly mistaken if he is not there!"
"Then he is trapped!" said Sime grimly, examining a Browning pistol
which he carried. "Unless--"
He stopped, and an expression, almost of fear, crept over his stoical
features.
"That sixteen-inch passage," he muttered--"with Antony Ferrara at the
further end!"
"Exactly!" said Dr. Cairn. "But I consider it my duty to the world to
proceed. I warn you that you are about to face the greatest peril,
probably, which you will ever be called upon to encounter. I do not
ask you to do this. I am quite prepared to go alone."
"That remark was wholly unnecessary, doctor," said Sime rather
truculently. "Suppose the other two proceed to their post."
"But, sir--" began Robert Cairn.
"You know the way," said the doctor, with an air of finality. "There
is not a moment to waste, and although I fear that we are too late, it
is just possible we may be in time to prevent a dreadful crime."
The tall Egyptian and Robert Cairn went stumbling off amongst the
heaps of rubbish and broken masonry, until an angle of the great wall
concealed them from view. Then the two who remained continued the
climb yet higher, following the narrow, zigzag path leading up to the
entrance of the descending passage. Immediately under the square black
hole they stood and glanced at one another.
"We may as well leave our outer garments here," said Sime. "I note
that you wear rubber-soled shoes, but I shall remove my boots, as
otherwise I should be unable to obtain any foothold."
Dr. Cairn nodded, and without more ado proceeded to strip off his
coat, an example which was followed by Sime. It was as he stooped and
placed his hat upon the little bundle of clothes at his feet that Dr.
Cairn detected something which caused him to stoop yet lower and to
peer at that dark object on the ground with a strange intentness.
"What is it?" jerked Sime, glancing back at him.
Dr. Cairn, from a hip pocket, took out an electric lamp, and directed
the white ray upon something lying on the splintered fragments of
granite.
It was a bat, a fairly large one, and a clot of blood marked the place
where its head had been. For the bat was decapitated!
As though anticipating what he should find there, Dr. Cairn flashed
the ray of the lamp all about the ground in the vicinity of the
entrance to the pyramid. Scores of dead bats, headless, lay there.
"For God's sake, what does this mean?" whispered Sime, glancing
apprehensively into the black entrance beside him.
"It means," answered Cairn, in a low voice, "that my suspicion, almost
incredible though it seems, was well founded. Steel yourself against
the task that is before you, Sime; we stand upon the borderland of
strange horrors."
Sime hesitated to touch any of the dead bats, surveying them with an
ill-concealed repugnance.
"What kind of creature," he whispered, "has done this?"
"One of a kind that the world has not known for many ages! The most
evil kind of creature conceivable--a man-devil!"
"But what does he want with bats' heads?"
"The Cynonycteris, or pyramid bat, has a leaf-like appendage beside
the nose. A gland in this secretes a rare oil. This oil is one of the
ingredients of the incense which is never named in the magical
writings."
Sime shuddered.
"Here!" said Dr. Cairn, proffering a flask. "This is only the
overture! No nerves."
The other nodded shortly, and poured out a peg of brandy.
"Now," said Dr. Cairn, "shall I go ahead?"
"As you like," replied Sime quietly, and again quite master of
himself. "Look out for snakes. I will carry the light and you can keep
yours handy in case you may need it."
Dr. Cairn drew himself up into the entrance. The passage was less than
four feet high, and generations of sand-storms had polished its
sloping granite floor so as to render it impossible to descend except
by resting one's hands on the roof above and lowering one's self foot
by foot.
A passage of this description, descending at a sharp angle for over
two hundred feet, is not particularly easy to negotiate, and progress
was slow. Dr. Cairn at every five yards or so would stop, and, with
the pocket-lamp which he carried, would examine the sandy floor and
the crevices between the huge blocks composing the passage, in quest
of those faint tracks which warn the traveller that a serpent has
recently passed that way. Then, replacing his lamp, he would proceed.
Sime followed in like manner, employing only one hand to support
himself, and, with the other, constantly directing the ray of his
pocket torch past his companion, and down into the blackness beneath.
Out in the desert the atmosphere had been sufficiently hot, but now
with every step it grew hotter and hotter. That indescribable smell,
as of a decay begun in remote ages, that rises with the impalpable
dust in these mysterious labyrinths of Ancient Egypt which never know
the light of day, rose stiflingly; until, at some forty or fifty feet
below the level of the sand outside, respiration became difficult, and
the two paused, bathed in perspiration and gasping for air.
"Another thirty or forty feet," panted Sime, "and we shall be in the
level passage. There is a sort of low, artificial cavern there, you
may remember, where, although we cannot stand upright, we can sit and
rest for a few moments."
Speech was exhausting, and no further words were exchanged until the
bottom of the slope was reached, and the combined lights of the two
pocket-lamps showed them that they had reached a tiny chamber
irregularly hewn in the living rock. This also was less than four feet
high, but its jagged floor being level, they were enabled to pause
here for a while.
"Do you notice something unfamiliar in the smell of the place?"
Dr. Cairn was the speaker. Sime nodded, wiping the perspiration from
his face the while.
"It was bad enough when I came here before," he said hoarsely. "It is
terrible work for a heavy man. But to-night it seems to be reeking. I
have smelt nothing like it in my life."
"Correct," replied Dr. Cairn grimly. "I trust that, once clear of this
place, you will never smell it again."
"What is it?"
"It is the _incense_," was the reply. "Come! The worst of our task is
before us yet."
The continuation of the passage now showed as an opening no more than
fifteen to seventeen inches high. It was necessary, therefore, to lie
prone upon the rubbish of the floor, and to proceed serpent fashion;
one could not even employ one's knees, so low was the roof, but was
compelled to progress by clutching at the irregularities in the wall,
and by digging the elbows into the splintered stones one crawled upon!
For three yards or so they proceeded thus. Then Dr. Cairn lay suddenly
still.
"What is it?" whispered Sime.
A threat of panic was in his voice. He dared not conjecture what would
happen if either should be overcome in that evil-smelling burrow, deep
in the bowels of the ancient building. At that moment it seemed to
him, absurdly enough, that the weight of the giant pile rested upon
his back, was crushing him, pressing the life out from his body as he
lay there prone, with his eyes fixed upon the rubber soles of Dr.
Cairn's shoes, directly in front of him.
But softly came a reply:
"Do not speak again! Proceed as quietly as possible, and pray heaven
we are not expected!"
Sime understood. With a malignant enemy before them, this hole in the
rock through which they crawled was a certain death-trap. He thought
of the headless bats and of how he, in crawling out into the shaft
ahead, must lay himself open to a similar fate!
Dr. Cairn moved slowly onward. Despite their anxiety to avoid noise,
neither he nor his companion could control their heavy breathing. Both
were panting for air. The temperature was now deathly. A candle would
scarcely have burnt in the vitiated air; and above that odour of
ancient rottenness which all explorers of the monuments of Egypt know,
rose that other indescribable odour which seemed to stifle one's very
soul.
Dr. Cairn stopped again.
Sime knew, having performed this journey before, that his companion
must have reached the end of the passage, that he must be lying
peering out into the shaft, for which they were making. He
extinguished his lamp.
Again Dr. Cairn moved forward. Stretching out his hand, Sime found
only emptiness. He wriggled forward, in turn, rapidly, all the time
groping with his fingers. Then:
"Take my hand," came a whisper. "Another two feet, and you can stand
upright."
He proceeded, grasped the hand which was extended to him in the
impenetrable darkness, and panting, temporarily exhausted, rose
upright beside Dr. Cairn, and stretched his cramped limbs.
Side by side they stood, mantled about in such a darkness as cannot be
described; in such a silence as dwellers in the busy world cannot
conceive; in such an atmosphere of horror that only a man morally and
physically brave could have retained his composure.
Dr. Cairn bent to Sime's ear.
"We _must_ have the light for the ascent," he whispered. "Have your
pistol ready; I am about to press the button of the lamp."
A shaft of white light shone suddenly up the rocky sides of the pit in
which they stood, and lost itself in the gloom of the chamber above.
"On to my shoulders," jerked Sime. "You are lighter than I. Then, as
soon as you can reach, place your lamp on the floor above and mount up
beside it. I will follow."
Dr. Cairn, taking advantage of the rugged walls, and of the blocks of
stone amid which they stood, mounted upon Sime's shoulders.
"Could you carry your revolver in your teeth?" asked the latter. "I
think you might hold it by the trigger-guard."
"I proposed to do so," replied Dr. Cairn grimly. "Stand fast!"
Gradually he rose upright upon the other's shoulders; then, placing
his foot in a cranny of the rock, and with his left hand grasping a
protruding fragment above, he mounted yet higher, all the time holding
the lighted lamp in his right hand. Upward he extended his arms, and
upward, until he could place the lamp upon the ledge above his head,
where its white beam shone across the top of the shaft.
"Mind it does not fall!" panted Sime, craning his head upward to watch
these operations.
Dr. Cairn, whose strength and agility were wonderful, twisted around
sideways, and succeeded in placing his foot on a ledge of stone on the
opposite side of the shaft. Resting his weight upon this, he extended
his hand to the lip of the opening, and drew himself up to the top,
where he crouched fully in the light of the lamp. Then, wedging his
foot into a crevice a little below him, he reached out his hand to
Sime. The latter, following much the same course as his companion,
seized the extended hand, and soon found himself beside Dr. Cairn.
Impetuously he snatched out his own lamp and shone its beams about the
weird apartment in which they found themselves--the so-called King's
Chamber of the pyramid. Right and left leapt the searching rays,
touching the ends of the wooden beams, which, practically fossilised
by long contact with the rock, still survive in that sepulchral place.
Above and below and all around he directed the light--upon the litter
covering the rock floor, upon the blocks of the higher walls, upon the
frowning roof.
They were alone in the King's Chamber!