ALL HOPE VANISHES.
"We are approaching the outlet of the lake, Sir Arthur," said Guy. "It
is better that all should be awake in case we encounter bad water."
"Yes, yes; very true. You want me to hold the torch, I suppose. Gad!
what a dream I had! I was dining with Lord Balsover. I'd give my title
and fortune to be back in London this minute."
"Hold your torch straight," said the colonel dryly, and then under the
regular strokes of four paddles the canoe moved swiftly toward the
distant sound of running water.
Every instant it grew louder and more distinct, and soon their voices
were almost drowned in the roar.
It was a period of terrible anxiety. That it was the outlet of the lake
they were approaching no one for an instant doubted. Their chief concern
was for a safe passage into the river beyond, for the angry splash of
the water told plainly its turbulent and dangerous nature.
"Keep a little off from the shore," cried Guy. "It won't do to make too
sharp a curve or we shall upset. We must strike the current fairly in
the center and keep the canoe straight as an arrow. Whatever happens,
don't drop the torch," he added warningly.
Close as they now were to the outlet, no signs of any current were yet
visible. The colonel called attention to this strange fact, but Guy
explained it by remarking that the current probably passed directly
through the center of the lake and that dead water continued to the very
edge.
"I can see a white gleam ahead," he cried suddenly; "now paddle off from
shore a little more and head the canoe as I tell you."
His orders were obeyed in silence. Straight out from the shore the canoe
shot deftly. A couple of quick strokes forward and backward and its bow
faced the angry waters that raged and foamed thirty yards distant.
The radius of the torch cast a faint gleam on the very edge of the
glistening spray. It seemed to beckon them onward.
"Now give way," cried Guy. Four paddles dipped and rose as one, the
shining drops rolled from their blades like so many diamonds in the
torch-glare, and then Guy sprang to his feet with a loud cry.
The paddles wavered in mid-air. "Go ahead," he shouted fiercely. "Paddle
with all your strength."
Once more they dipped the water, the canoe moved slowly--with an
effort, and as the paddles a second time paused in air, the canoe shot
swiftly--not forward to the embrace of the angry waters, but back--_back
at dizzy speed into the dark and dismal recesses of the lake_.
Even then the awful, unspeakable horror of the situation never flashed
upon them, Guy alone perhaps excepted.
"We've blundered again," cried the colonel in hollow tones. "We have
returned to the starting point. In some manner we have missed the
outlet, and now all must be done over again."
"Could the canoe have been turned completely about during our journey?"
exclaimed Forbes.
"Impossible," said the colonel. "I can prove it instantly. When we
started away from the spot where the river enters on our trip around the
lake, the shore was on our right. When we arrived here just now it was
still on our right, whereas, had we unconsciously turned the canoe about
and reversed our course, the shore would be on our left. We have
circumnavigated the lake and returned to our starting point, and in some
way missed the outlet."
"No," cried Chutney in tones that chilled his hearers with horror. "We
did not miss the outlet."
"What do you mean?" cried the colonel.
"I say we did not miss the outlet," continued Guy, "because there was
no outlet to miss. No exit from the lake exists. We are entombed forever
and ever. None of us will ever see the light of day again. We shall die
here in the bowels of the earth, and the serpents will mangle us as they
mangled those poor unfortunates yonder on the island. Better to know the
truth now than later. It is useless to hope. I tell you we are doomed
men and----" Here Guy's voice faltered, and sinking down into the canoe,
he covered his face with his hands.
Sir Arthur uttered a heartrending cry and fell back in a faint. He lay
unnoticed. The torch dropped from the Greek's nerveless hands and
expired with a hiss. In darkness and silence they floated on and on
until the roar of the inflowing water became fainter and fainter. Then
it died out entirely and all was intensely quiet.
The darkness was grateful to their stricken hearts. They wanted time to
realize the awful misfortune that had fallen so suddenly and heavily
upon them.
It was impossible to grasp the truth in a moment, especially when that
truth meant utter hopelessness and a terrible death. So they drifted in
silence under the great vault of the cavern, living-dead in a living
tomb.
Long afterward--it might have been an hour and it might have been a day,
for all passage of time was lost--Chutney rose to a sitting posture.
His brain was dizzy and reeling. The aching misery lay heavy on his
heart, and yet one faint spark of hope lingered amid the black despair,
the natural buoyancy of his nature that refused even to submit to the
decrees of the inevitable.
It was he who had first spoken the words of doom to his companions, and
now he told himself he would show them the way to safety. He fumbled in
his clothes for a match, and striking it deliberately, lit a fresh
torch.
The pale, haggard faces that looked into each other as the bright light
shone over the water were ghastly and unnatural. Abject misery and
hopelessness were stamped on each one.
The colonel and Forbes faced Guy calmly. Canaris looked up with a
shudder and then dropped his head again. Sir Arthur lay among the rugs
as though asleep.
At that instant the canoe struck some obstacle with a slight tremor and
stopped.
The colonel with a slight gesture pointed to the right, and there before
them lay the _Isle of Skeletons_. A strange fatality had drifted them a
second time to this awful spot.
Guy shuddered, but the colonel rose, and brushing past him stepped on
shore.
Forbes followed him in silence, and then Canaris staggered blindly
past.
After a brief hesitation Guy stepped out, and dragged the canoe half way
up the sand. Sir Arthur never moved. He was sleeping and no one dared
disturb him. They sat down in a row on the sand.
"It's as good a place as any to die," said Forbes hoarsely. "The bones
will soon have company."
He paused, frightened at his own voice, and no one replied. For a while
they sat in silence.
Guy stuck the torch in the sand and it blazed away with a merry light.
Somehow or other the ray of hope that had animated him a little while
before had vanished, leaving only a dull despair, a reluctance to face
the horror of the situation.
"Is there no--no chance--for us?" he ventured to say timidly.
"Absolutely none," replied the colonel, in a firm voice. "You told us a
while ago, Chutney, that our doom was sealed. I have faced the situation
as calmly and clearly as possible from every conceivable aspect, and I
now tell you on my own responsibility that we will never leave this
cavern. The fatal error was made when we took the right-hand channel of
the two, or rather when the current led us to the right. That was not
our blunder, of course. We were in the hands of destiny. We are now, as
you know, on the bosom of a vast lake. Water of an unknown depth is
beneath us. Overhead is a vaulted dome of great height, probably the
hollowed interior of a mountain; on all sides are massive and
perpendicular walls of rock, impregnable and insurmountable.
"The lake is undoubtedly ten miles or more in circumference, and, as you
know well, there is no surface outlet. There is an entrance, but we can
no more force our way back through that entrance than we could swim up
through the Falls of Niagara or ride the Nile Cataracts in a Rob Roy
canoe. As long as our provisions last we shall live. When we no longer
have anything to eat we shall die, and the next explorer who enters this
lake will find our bones mingled with those lying behind us."
"And what will _he_ do?" asked Guy.
"Perish like those before him," said the colonel. "This death trap
caught many a victim and will catch many more. The light of day will
never pierce this gloom."
The colonel spoke as though he were demonstrating a problem in Euclid or
laying down plans for a campaign.
"I don't call myself a philosopher," he went on, "nor am I a fatalist,
but I think that most men can face the inevitable with a certain
calmness that is only born of absolute despair. Did you ever see a man
hanged? I did once. He walked to the gallows as coolly and deliberately
as though he were going to breakfast. A week before he had been
defiant, blustering, terror-stricken. When he realized that he had
absolutely no loophole of escape, he faced the inevitable with steady
nerves. When you realize your position fully, you will be like that man.
You will accept your fate."