At 8 dial that bright day of January 5, 2001, an expectant and
anxious party left the deck of the San Francisco, and landed at the
mole of Noniva. The Doctor had two men from the ship to carry the
stretcher--he was a thoughtful man, and always had a stretcher along
for emergencies--and the tools and such things as he believed might be
needed. In the town, saddle mules were obtained, and the party of five
quietly left the vicinity, as if for a day's camping in the hills.
The journey was through a broken and thickly-wooded country, and
the traveling slow and tedious. It was long past the meridian when
the party reached and passed up the dry bed of the Ninta River, and
nearly 15 dial when "The Finger of God," which all recognized from the
description furnished by the natives of Noniva, was reached.
The gray cliffs on either bank of the river were steep and rugged.
Huge festoons of tropical growth covered them from top to bottom,
and stunted pines stood nodding their crested heads among the rocky
crevices. Already the shadow of the rock was creeping up the eastern
bank, and by its position the pathway ledge was easily found.
Leaving the two seamen at the base of the rock, Dr. Town, with the
tools which he had brought, and followed by the two girls, carefully
made his way up the narrow, overhanging ledge, and stood near the
point of the dark shadow on the face of the rock. With watch in hand,
which he had set to the meridian of Guadalupe, he awaited the time
of 16 dial, or 4 P. M., as recorded by the author of the letter of
instructions.
The minutes passed slowly--too slowly for the two girls, who stood
by his side. Their feelings were wrought to a fever heat; their
hearts beat a tattoo within their bosoms, and a fear of some dreadful
revelation possessed their souls.
The shadow crept on; the sun was going down to its bed in the ocean,
which spread out in every direction. On moved the shadow; it had
reached a dense cluster of mountain-ivy, which completely hid the rock
from view: the hour was 15:55 dial.
Seizing a large knife from his bundle of tools, the doctor sprang
quickly to the spot, and with dispatch, cleared away the evergreen,
exposing the solid rock of the cliffs. With his eyes upon his watch, he
noted the passing moments.
"Sixteen dial!" he cried, and placed the point of his knife at the end
of the shadow of the "Finger of God."
Carefully marking the spot, he diligently searched for the letters
mentioned in the communication. Not a trace of a letter was visible;
the virgin rock lay bare, and undefiled by human hands. Above, below,
and on either side, his search was equally unsuccessful, and as
he communicated the result of his examination to Mollie and Marie,
consternation seized upon them. Could it be that they had been
deceived, and that the contents of the letter were false, and made for
some purpose of alluring Junius Cobb to this spot? They looked at each
other in bewilderment.
Suddenly the doctor exclaimed:
"Ah! It may be that!"
"What, doctor?" they both cried, excitedly.
But the doctor made no reply; he was climbing up the cliff, straight up
from the knife-mark in the rock. With the celerity of a man intensely
excited, he cut and slashed away the ivy, and threw it into the ravine;
then, looking at his watch, he noted that twenty-five minutes had
passed since the shadow of the rock had reached the point which he had
marked. Noting the variation of the shadow from the vertical for these
twenty-five minutes, he drew his knife slowly and carefully up the face
of the cliff, from the mark which he had made to where the shadow of
the "Finger of God" then rested, the knife describing the path of the
shadow.
Turning to Mollie, who had been watching his movements in wonder, he
said:
"If the instructions are correct, then will the characters 'J. C.' be
found near the line which my knife has described; for the letter, if
true, as I have remarked, was written a long time ago, and the 'Finger
of God' was taller then than it is to-day, as the elements must have
worn many inches from its top in the course of a great number of years;
its shadow was higher up the cliff, at any particular hour of the day,
at a remote period, than it is to-day. Now come and examine closely
along the line I have described."
With diligence and care, all three scanned the face of the rock,
scraped away the mold, and sought to find the key to the mysterious
cavern.
Suddenly Mollie gave a scream--an exultant scream--and cried:
"Here it is! Here it is! I have found them!"
Crowding about her, the other two saw before them the letters in the
rock. Small, discolored, and covered with a green moss, it was a wonder
they had been discovered at all. Yes, there they were, "J. C." Leaning
over, Dr. Town took his penknife and carefully dug the moss away from
the point of the J, and exposed the hole mentioned in the letter.
There was no farce, no falsehood in the communication, after all; at
least, not as regards the letters "J. C." and the hole in the J. The
decisive moment had arrived.
Putting the point of the steel rod, which he had brought along for the
purpose, into the hole, the doctor drove it in to its full length. A
creaking, cracking sound followed, and the rock in front of them sank
into the side of the cliff, leaving exposed a doorway about six feet
high by three in width. Involuntarily all started back as the yawning,
dark passage was exposed, and a cry of alarm escaped the lips of Marie.
The opening had been made, but the interior was dark and unknown.
"I will go in," said the doctor, "and explore the place; I will return,
and inform you if it is safe."
"Oh, I am not afraid," returned Mollie; "certainly there can be nothing
there to harm us."
"Oh, but there may be!" broke in Marie.
"Go in, doctor; we will follow you," not heeding Marie's alarm.
Dr. Town lighted a lantern, and, followed by the girls, passed in
through the opening. A passage of some fifteen feet in length hewed
into the solid rock, led them into a large chamber with a high and
arched roof. As the light of the lantern threw its rays about the room,
its contents were plainly discernible by all.
The walls were draped with beautiful silks and plushes; chandeliers
were suspended from the arched roof; costly chairs with embroidered
cushions were upon every side; books and works of art lay upon the
massive center-table and about the room. A thousand objects of beauty
and richness adorned the large chamber.
As they walked across the room, a light cloud of dust rose at their
feet as the carpet gave way in its rottenness. Reaching out her hand,
Mollie took a book from the table, and was about to open it, when
it fell to the floor in a mass of rotten fibre. A beautiful picture
hanging on the wall, its oil coloring still fresh and its gilded frame
yet bright and handsome, was accidentally struck by the doctor, and
came tumbling to the ground, in a heap of decayed wood and canvas. The
table, with all its beautiful ornaments, was but a phantom; for, as
they endeavored to move it to one side, it fell to the floor in ruins.
Time and nature had caused such decay that it seemed to need but the
touch of man to change the vision of enchantment into a scene of ruin
and chaos.
There was no moisture, no mold; but apparently a dry-rotting process
had been at work for years, and the destructible articles of the
chamber were ready to fall in pieces at the least shock.
From the first chamber opened a second, to the left, and here was
found what appeared to have been a kitchen. Utensils of all kinds were
scattered about as if left where they had been last used; dishes of
finest china lay broken on the floor, where also lay the once beautiful
sideboard, now fallen by its weight and rottenness; decay worse than
was found in the first chamber pervaded the place. A large oil-stove in
one corner, and glass bottles with seals upon them, gave evidence of
the methods which had been pursued in this the culinary department of
the establishment.
From this room a long passage opened to the right, and led deep into
the cliff. With feelings of awe, not unmixed with terror on the part
of Marie, the three moved forward. The light flashed upon the dark,
rocky walls, and was absorbed in their dingy gray.
Moving cautiously forward, a dozen steps brought them to a third
chamber, small and low. Mollie, who was close in rear of the doctor,
glanced in as the light penetrated the darkness of the room. With a
scream, she drew back, shuddering with fear, and clasped Marie in her
arms:
"A skeleton!" she cried. "A coffin!"
[Illustration]
The fear was contagious; Marie sank to the ground, trembling like
a leaf, and, in her fall, dragged Mollie with her. There they lay,
frightened, and with chattering teeth.
"Come, young ladies," brusquely said the doctor, "there is nothing to
be afraid of. Scared at a skeleton, eh? I thought you had more nerve,"
to Mollie.
"But it was so sudden," she gasped; "and it seems so terrible."
"Well, there is nothing to fear," as he assisted them to their feet.
"O Mollie! Let us go!" cried Marie.
"Stuff and nonsense!" broke in the doctor. "Let us fathom this mystery.
We will go in."
In the center of the chamber and on a high bier, covered with black
velvet, which fell in great folds to the floor, lay a golden casket.
It bore no ornamentation, save the beading of silver about its edges.
Its top was of glass, and a wreath of the most exquisite flowers lay
near the head. On the four corners of the great black pall were sprigs
of immortelles, and at the head of the casket, a wreath of orange
blossoms. The floor of the chamber was of slabs of white marble,
skillfully laid and joined together.
At the side of the room, upon a low couch, lay the skeleton of a human
being; the grinning skull was turned upon one side, with its yawning,
eyeless sockets turned toward the casket in the center of the chamber.
The garments which had been worn in life, still clung about the form,
and showed it to have been a man. Upon a small table, at the head of
the couch, stood a bronze lamp, from which the oil had long since
passed into vapor; a paper lay by its side, and at the foot of the
couch stood an iron box.
Reverently they moved toward the casket, and, with feelings wrought up
to the highest pitch, looked through the glass top. Again did the girls
cry out in their wonder and awe; and the doctor, accustomed though he
was to sights of death, pressed his hand to his head, and stared with
eyes almost starting from their sockets.
Within the casket, upon the whitest silk, lay the form of a woman of
wondrous beauty--a form of the most exquisite shape, a face of the
rarest mold; hair of the fairest golden blonde, and hands and feet as
delicate and small as a girl's. Naked from her feet to her loins, and
exposing a bust of wondrous form, she lay among the folds of the white
silk lining. A swathing of bandages covered the abdomen, and the mouth
was wrapped in cloth. By her side lay a golden saucer, and another,
filled with a black substance, lay at her head.
Silently they stood and gazed upon the motionless form. Within her
casket she lay in death before them, but such a death as none had ever
seen before. The eyelids closed, the face as white as the driven snow,
the hands folded upon her bosom, it seemed to all that sacrilege had
been committed by intruding within the sacred precincts of her tomb.
The awe-inspiring silence was at last broken by the voice of the
doctor, who had recovered himself, and whose thoughts had come back
again to the duty of the present.
"This is a most remarkable discovery, ladies," he slowly said; "but we
should look for a further solution of the mystery. We can do nothing by
standing here and gazing at this wondrous vision."
Laying his hand on the pall near the head of the casket, the velvet
fell in dust and rags to the floor, and the sprig of immortelles,
striking the marble slab, became mashed and battered. Picking up the
flowers, he examined them carefully.
"Why, they are made of gold and silver and precious stones," he
exclaimed, in astonishment.
Then they examined the three remaining sprigs, and the wreath of orange
blossoms at the head of the casket; all were of the finest gold and
silver, and diamonds were the petal-points of the flowers. Wondering
much, the doctor then took those from the top of the casket, and found
them, likewise, of the same precious materials. But in removing the
last bunch of flowers, a discovery had been made. Where the wreath of
golden flowers had lain, was now seen a silver plate, covered with
engraved letters.
"Perhaps we have a clue to the identity of the beautiful woman who lies
in this casket," exclaimed the doctor, as he threw the rays of the
light upon the plate on the top of the casket.
Crowding close to him, all three read the words cut in the silver plate:
"MY DAUGHTER: To God I trust thee; into His keeping I give thee.
O Junius! If thou hast, in years past and numbered in the great
cycle of time, loved, and loved with steadfast heart, then arise
and rescue that love from oblivion; but--and search thy heart to
its utmost depths--if such love has never been, or is past and
gone, turn back again, and leave to eternal rest the being who lies
entombed before you--my daughter, Marie Colchis.
"Within the second chamber are batteries and means of obtaining
heat, and fluids of life-giving principles. Cause the chamber to
be warmed, arrange the batteries for current, and prepare the
nourishment which you will find in the glass jars. When all is
ready, cover your nostrils well, break the top glass of the casket,
quickly seize the form therein lying, and bear it to the second
chamber.
"Once within the warmth of that room, tear off the bandages, and
apply the poles of the battery to the heart, in front, and over the
fifth rib, in the back. Let the current come with all its force. If
it be God's will, the form will shake, will quiver, open its eyes,
will breathe, and become a living woman once again. Nourishment and
care are all that will be required to complete the resurrection.
Within the folds of the bandages over the heart lies a golden case
containing a letter which is to be read by my daughter alone. Give
it to her when she is recovered, and may God be with you.
"JEAN COLCHIS."
"Ah!" sighed Mollie, with tears in her eyes; "I see it all--I know it
all!" Then, with all semblance of fear vanished from her heart, she
cried:
"To work, doctor! To work!"
Dr. Town was a man quick to grasp a situation. He did not stop to
wonder or ask questions. To be sure, he was very much surprised at what
he saw, and at Mollie's exclamation, but he was prepared to rescue a
woman therein entombed--this from a knowledge of the contents of the
letter found in the copper cylinder, and which Mollie had shown him.
Wasting no time in speculation, the instructions engraved upon the
tablet on the top of the casket were carefully followed out. Returning
to the second chamber, they commenced their work. Oil was found in
the sealed bottles, and put into the stove, whose asbestos wick would
still perform its functions. The stove was soon aglow with a bright
flame, and its warmth diffused about the chamber. The batteries were
ready for adjustment, and only required the dropping of the carbons
into the electropoion fluid. The bottles of beef extract and fluids of
nourishment were opened, and their contents prepared upon the stove.
Clothing from their own persons was prepared by the two girls, as none
could be found about the place.
When all was ready, the doctor prepared to break the glass top of the
casket.
"Remain here," he said to them, "and I will bring her to you;" then,
modestly: "and you shall strip off the bandages and cover her form; but
leave bare her bosom and back."
Having given his instructions, he proceeded to the chamber wherein
Marie Colchis lay.
A moment of silence followed, then a crash was heard, and the doctor
came staggering into the room with the drooping, lifeless form of Marie
Colchis in his arms. Laying her upon a bed, which had been improvised
from their wraps, he cried, as he turned away:
"Quick! Strip off the bandages, and tell me when you are ready!"
A moment later, when the girls had performed their work and had
called upon him to come, he was by their side, and had adjusted the
copper plates; then, pushing down the carbons into the batteries, he
seized her hand and placed his finger on her pulse. As the current of
electricity passed through her heart, there was a spasmodic contraction
of the muscles of the body, a quivering of the flesh, a gasp, and her
lovely bosom rose and fell as the air was inhaled and expelled; then
the lips parted, and a low, deep sigh escaped, her eyes opened, and she
lived.
"What is it?" she asked, in a quiet, weak voice.
"Hush! You must not speak; you are ill," hastily said the doctor.
"Drink this, and you will feel better," and he put the cup of liquid to
her lips.
Mechanically the girl obeyed the order, and drank the warm broth; then,
closing her eyes, she became motionless, save a slight rising and
falling of the bosom in breathing. Gently throwing aside her clothing,
the doctor commenced a brisk rubbing of the legs, arms, and body along
the spine. The heat of the fire, together with the friction of the
rubbing, soon caused a free circulation of the blood, which had but
barely moved through her arteries and veins for years. The color came
slowly to her face, her breathing became stronger, she was receiving
back the life which had been on the point of leaving her body. Once
more the eyes opened, and she spoke, but in a stronger voice:
"Who are you? Where is my father?"
"Marie, dear girl," cried Mollie, bending over her, while tears of joy
fell from her eyes, "we are your friends, your dearest friends. You are
ill now; do not speak or ask questions. All will be made known to you
soon."
Dressing her in warm clothing taken from their own bodies, they bore
her to the litter which the doctor had ordered brought to the door of
the cavern.
An hour later the whole party was en route to Noniva. The litter was
strung between two mules, with a man on each side to steady it, while
Mollie and Marie followed, mounted on their mules. The doctor led the
way down the creek, across the country to the town. Mollie had the
little gold case which had been found among the bandages, Marie the
golden flowers, and the doctor carried the iron box in front of him on
the saddle.
It was 2 dial the next day when the party reached Noniva, as they had
been compelled to travel very slowly. A fear that the lipthalener had
departed caused Mollie much uneasiness, for they should have been
back at 20 dial. But, no; as they entered the town, they saw the San
Francisco's lights streaming over the waters. Captain Gordon had not
found it in his heart to leave until the girls had joined the vessel.
Two days later, bidding a kind farewell to Captain Gordon and Dr. Town,
the girls, with their charge, and the things brought from the cavern,
left the deck of the cruiser in the Bay of San Francisco. Landing at
Mission street dock, a drag was taken, and the home of Mollie's aunt
Lora soon reached.
The weeks followed, and by careful nursing from her two faithful
attendants, Marie Colchis regained her health, strength and beauty.
The letter in the golden case had been read by all the girls, and long
and earnest were the conversations which had followed. Marie learned
of the resurrection of her lover, and of his entrance into the family
of the President; she became fully informed concerning the period of
time it was in the world's history, and all the details attending her
own lifeless sleep and miraculous return to the world of the living.
It seemed but a day since she was with her father in the cavern on
Guadalupe Island; it was but a moment that her thoughts had been away
from her lover.
With all the fire and passion of her former life not decreased, but
increased, by long years of patient waiting, she longed for the time
when she could meet him, could see him, and hear his loved voice. She
had been told of his apparent lack of interest, his seemingly moody
ways, and his careworn and sad expression of countenance. She felt the
cause; she knew it: he still loved his little girl-wife of Duke's Lane.
And she? Ah, God! she worshiped him!