I sat for many hours that morning, idle and oppressed by a feeling as of
emptiness. What use to me was all the wealth that I had seen--or, for
the matter of that, to any one? I had no means at my disposal to take a
millionth part of it away.
And then I remembered Amos, and thought it my duty to take what steps I
could to see that that dread man should never solve the riddle of the
Red Fish, though it was unlikely he would find the place without the aid
of my fragment of the map.
The sight of all that gold had, as it were, unnerved me--filled me with
a kind of weariness of life. I cannot say exactly how it was, but I
know that I had lost, on a sudden, all my energy and enthusiasm; and it
was late in the afternoon before I bestirred myself and got to work.
I lowered the great slab and covered it with earth, which I trampled
down with my bare feet. Then I went into the woods and dug up plants
with my Indian knife, and these I stuck in the ground so that I made a
little garden. One shower of tropic rain and they would take root and
grow, and thus hide all trace of how the soil had been disturbed. And
looking up at the sky, where it was visible here and there between the
branches of the trees above me, I saw that such a shower was coming.
The rain fell that evening, when I was camped once more in the woods
towards the east, having gone back the way that I had come, following
the course of the Brook of Scarlet Pebbles. I took shelter from the
rain beneath a tree, the great leaves of which formed a veritable roof
above me, so that not one drop of water fell upon the fire that I had
kindled.
I ate my simple meal, and then lay down, not to sleep, but to think and
to listen to the rain, beating with a noise like many drums upon the
leaves.
Well, I had seen the Treasure of the Incas. With my own eyes I had
beheld it. And I asked myself if I were any the better for it, and
could not see that I was. For gold is mud, and part of man is mud; and
yet there is a great God who is above, around and within us all. And
that night, as I lay awake in the woods, listening to the drumming of
the rain, I tried to think out such problems as man has not yet begun to
understand--problems that, perhaps, he may never solve on this side of
the grave.
No doubt, the constant propinquity of danger had made me serious for my
years. I had lived for many months in the wilderness, and my pulse now
beat in rhythm with the earth. The forest, the majestic mountains I had
seen at sunrise, the sky of stars above the plain--all these were
mysteries to me, wondrous and eternal. But there was neither eternity
nor mystery in the work of man; in gold, in the rusted sword of
Orellano's soldier, or Cahazaxa's Temple.
I saw quite clearly now that this hidden treasure was no affair of mine.
I had lived happily for months as Nature meant me to, and the sum total
of my wealth had been my blow-pipe and the knife that Atupo, the priest,
had given me. I now understood--far better than I had done at the
time--all John Bannister had told me of his dread of cities and of
people. I, too, would like to live my life far from the abodes of men,
with the little shy things as my friends, in the chamber of the Wild.
For the very sight of the Treasure of Kings had frightened me. Four
hundred years it had lain there, beneath the ground, like a great,
harmful dragon; and it seemed to me that to let this monster loose upon
the world would be a bold thing to do--to saddle my conscience with a
load of responsibility such as I was never strong enough to bear. I
wished now that I was not one of the few who had solved this precious
riddle.
And yet I was not sure of anything, for the gold tempted me sorely. I
was tempted more than I can say. If I had now learned to understand
something of John Bannister's ideals, I saw also, with alarming clarity,
the motives that swayed the deeds of Amos Baverstock. Gold to him was a
living force, the origin of all his strength and evil, the prompter of
his actions. Once or twice that night was I tempted to return to the
Red Fish that I might feast my eyes again upon the Treasure.
I told myself that I had not seen enough of it. I was like a drunkard
who had tasted wine. I wondered what worth it had in coinage that I
knew, and I set to thinking how I would spend so vast a sum.
But these were thoughts only of the night-time, in the darkness and the
silence of the woods. I fell asleep at last, sick at heart and
wretched; but dawning day came to me with comfort, and I continued on my
journey with new hopes and prospects.
The dragon was behind my back, buried once again. For all I cared, it
might lie there for ever, untouched by mortal hand, unseen by mortal
eye, to be smothered in the dust of endless ages.
As for myself, when I came forth from the undergrowth of the wood into
the warm light of the evening sun, I turned to the south, and continued
on my way until long after dark. I had made up my mind, and that was
something; I would pass round the Wood of the Red Fish, and journey
westward towards the great mountains. These I would cross, and come
down upon the tableland beyond, where I knew that I would find men who
were as civilised as I. Thence, as best I could, I must find my way
back to England. I had little doubt that I might be able to work a
passage for myself on board a ship that sailed from Callao or Guayaquil.
But I was a fool to think my adventures so nearly at an end. My destiny
was no more in my own hands than that of a withered leaf, carried here
and there by the wind.
I found the western side of the Wood to be very different from the
other. It was a country broken up by rocky spurs that descended from
the foothills just above me; and the ravines or little valleys that lay
between these spurs were densely choked with undergrowth, similar in all
respects to the thickets in the wood.
It was no easy travelling, and yet there was no other road for me to
take, for to the north lay the big morass that I had observed from the
hill-top on the morning when I first looked down upon the Wood.
So I made my way along the crestline of a rocky ridge, setting forth
upon my journey to the Andes early in the morning with the whole day
before me. Though the rays of the sun were powerful, the day was cool,
for a soft breeze was blowing from the mountains. I had not yet
breakfasted, since I thought it likely that in this more open country I
might kill with my blow-pipe some animal that was good to eat; and,
therefore, as I marched upon the way, I kept my eyes open, looking into
the ravines on either side of me, to see if I could catch a glimpse of
any living thing. And I had not gone far before--to my bewilderment--I
set eyes upon the solitary figure of _a man_.
I dropped, on the instant, flat upon my face--for I was now a savage in
more ways than one. I had all the instincts of the wild man who knows
that danger may lurk behind every tree and shrub and rock. I lay upon
the ground, still as a lizard, with my eyes upon the stranger. And the
more I looked at him the more I wondered.
The Forest Indians were small in stature, as I have observed in the
proper place. But this man was six feet in height. He was as brown as
I; and yet he wore clothes--clothes which were all in rags and tatters,
and a pair of boots, split open at the toe-caps and bound with string
about his ankles. Moreover, he carried in his hand a rifle; and this
rifle he used as a staff, placing the butt upon the ground and leaning
with his whole weight upon it as he limped slowly and painfully upon his
way down the ravine immediately beneath me.
I have said that I had the instincts of a wild man. I was cautious, shy
and cunning. I had learned to trust no one, to be suspicious of every
one. And so I lay and watched him.
It occurred to me, by degrees, that I had seen him before. I could not
for the life of me remember where. Then he sat down, with his face
toward me.
He had a rough, weather-beaten, and yet a kindly, face. He had
steel-grey eyes, and a rough, tangled beard. He was so close to me that
I could see that his bare arms were tattooed; and it was this, perhaps,
that gave me the clue I wanted. I looked at his beard again, and,
unkempt as it was, it reminded me somehow of the beard of a Russian
Czar. This man was William Rushby.
I was not sure of it at first. He was greatly changed from the honest
sailor who had befriended me on board the _Mary Greenfield_. But when
my mind was made up, and I was well-nigh carried away by mingled
feelings of astonishment and gladness, I got to my feet and went towards
him with my blow-pipe in my hand.
Without any ado, he whipped the butt of his rifle into the hollow of his
shoulder, and I saw the sights were directed straight upon my heart.
"Hands up!" he cried to me in English. "Hands up, you brown barbarian,
or else I shoot you dead!"
[Illustration: "'HANDS UP!' HE CRIED. 'HANDS UP, YOU BROWN BARBARIAN,
OR ELSE I SHOOT YOU DEAD!'"]
I grasped the truth in an instant; and it is well I did, for I have
little doubt that he would have shot me where I stood. If William
Rushby had changed in personal appearance since last we met, of a
certainty I myself had changed still more. He took me for a wild man of
the woods, though he yelled at me in English, and would have killed me
out of hand, had I not lifted my arms and answered him, and laughed.
"Rushby!" I cried. "Do you not know me? It is I--Dick Treadgold."
He brought down his rifle, and stared at me like one who sees a ghost.
"Dick!" said he, and then came forward, holding out his great hand, into
which I placed my own.
And there we stood, and shook hands with one another, as though we had
met at Charing Cross. And he was near as naked as I, and we were both
so burned by the sun that the whites of our eyes were almost comical,
and our hair was long like that of gipsies, and the skin upon our legs
and arms had been scratched in scores of places by the thorn-trees in
the forest.
"Dick!" he cried again. "I can see it now, though I would never have
believed it."
"It is I who am asked to believe the most," said I. "How came you here,
of all people in the world?"
"There's a yarn at the back of that," said he. "But, first, you must
tell me how you escaped from Amos."
He seated himself, as he spoke, upon a boulder that lay in the ravine;
and when he moved I was reminded of a fact I had perceived
already--Rushby was badly wounded and lame of a leg.
For all that, I saw that he would glean little in the way of information
if we did nothing but ask one another questions; so I mastered my own
curiosity, and replied to him.
"Why," I told him, "Amos tied me to a tree, and left me in the
wilderness to starve. And then I fell into the hands of savage men, to
whom I shall be ever grateful. From their dwellings in the forest I
journeyed alone to Cahazaxa's Temple, and thence across the plain to the
Wood of the Red Fish, where I find an old friend, and still believe that
I am dreaming. It is months now since I last set eyes upon a white man,
and that was Amos Baverstock himself."
"Months!" cried Rushby in amazement. "You've not seen Baverstock--for
months!"
He looked at me as if he thought that I was lying. I was at a loss to
know what he was driving at, though I assured him that I spoke the
truth.
"Months!" he repeated, holding his head between his hands, as if his
puzzled brains were paining him. "But we were told, two days ago, that
Amos held you prisoner."
"Who told you?" I demanded.
I was now as surprised as he, and even more astonished when I heard his
answer.
"Baverstock himself," said Rushby.
"Amos!" I exclaimed. "You have seen him, then?"
"He lied to me!" cried Rushby, driving his clenched fist into the palm
of a hand. "He lied to me! And Bannister was right."
"Bannister!" I echoed.
But Rushby, rocking his shoulders from side to side like a man who
suffers anguish, stamped a foot upon the ground.
"Oh, but I have done a fool's thing!" he cried. "I have been fooled,
and I have sent John Bannister to death!"
I stood before him, speechless, gasping. Though I could make neither
head nor tail of what he had told me, I could see with my eyes that the
man was suffering torture in his soul. If Bannister was in danger, if
it was possible to save anything from the fire, it was I myself--and I
alone--who was capable of action, since Rushby was dead lame. And yet I
must first know the truth of the matter, for I was wholly in the dark.
I went to Rushby and laid a hand upon his shoulder.
"Come, tell me what it all means," said I. "Tell me your story from the
first."
He looked up at me, and then for the first time smiled--a sad smile,
none the less.
"Sit down," he answered, in a calmer voice. "I will tell you all from
the beginning, as quickly as I can."