THE LAW OF THE EYE
Some two hours later, Mackenzie awoke, heaving a great sigh.
"Hech! But I've a sore head the morn," he murmured, rubbing his eyes
drowsily as he looked around him. The sight of bare blank walls instead
of the walls of his bungalow, decorated with colour plates from the
illustrated papers, caused him to sit up suddenly and rub his eyes
again. It was a minute or two before full consciousness and the
recollection of recent incidents returned to him. Then he remembered
that his last waking moments had been spent in the rift; but he had
awaked in a stone-walled, stone-floored cell, cubical in shape, and ten
feet in each dimension.
His comrades, still asleep, lay at full stretch on the floor, on either
side of him.
"Eh, Dick! Bob! waken yourselves," he called.
There was no response.
He got up, moved, somewhat totteringly, to Forrester, and prodded him in
the ribs.
"Waken!" he called again. "Man, what's wrong with you?"
He gazed anxiously into his friend's face as Forrester slowly opened his
eyes. Turning away, he hastened to Jackson, poked him, bawled in his
ear, felt his pulse; then, assured that he was not dead, as he had begun
to fear, raised him in his arms and shook him vigorously.
"Haven't got the ball, you ass!" Jackson spluttered.
"This isn't rugger, old man," said Forrester with a light laugh, coming
to his side. "Wake up and see where the beggars have carried us."
Jackson recovered his wits more tardily than the others.
"His face is green," Forrester whispered uneasily.
"So is yours," said Mackenzie.
"And yours too, by Jove!" cried Forrester, after a good look at him.
"What the mischief have they been doing to us?"
"I cannot say. I know that my head is sore."
"I've a headache, if that's what you mean," said Forrester.
"So have I, splitting," added Jackson, sitting up, but still resting his
hands on the floor. "By Jinks, the stone is warm!"
"It is that," said Mackenzie, feeling it. "They're wishful we shan't
take a chill, by the look of it."
They gazed around their narrow chamber. Walls and floor appeared to be
of solid rock. In the centre of one wall was a door of stout timber,
without lock or handle. High in another was an opening, like the arrow
slits in medieval castles, through which a white light filtered.
"Get on my back, Dick, and keek out," said Mackenzie.
In a moment Forrester was mounted.
"I see nothing but a blank wall twenty feet away," he called down. "And
not much of that. It looks like the wall of the rift. I tell you what:
this room must be cut out of the wall this side. When you called it a
castle, you spoke better than you knew, Mac."
"Ay, so it seems," Mackenzie replied, as Forrester sprang down. "But
I'm fair flummoxed. The room's perfectly light, though yon slit isn't
more than twelve by two. Where does the light come from? It's greenish,
too, which accounts for our delicate complexions. And look! you see
that?"
He pointed to the faint shadow of a fourth human figure that passed
across the wall opposite to the window. It flitted through their own
shadows, and disappeared.
A moment's glance assured them that it had not been cast from without;
yet the wall appeared solid, in no degree transparent.
There was no furniture in the room. Silently they sat upon the floor,
watching the wall nervously for a return of the mysterious inexplicable
shadow. But it did not reappear. The strange light, the stranger
apparition, brought back upon them redoubled the uneasiness they had
felt ever since they entered the rift, and especially after seeing the
ghostly procession on the wall. At that moment they could have believed
that they lay in the haunt of some necromancer, whose magic art might
manifest itself in terrors unconceived.
"They must have hocussed us," murmured Forrester at length, his thoughts
reverting to his last conscious moments in the rift.
"Ay, put us to sleep with some narcotic gas," said Mackenzie. "What'll
they do next?"
"What have they done with our men?" said Jackson.
"Separated the goats from the sheep," replied Mackenzie sardonically.
"They are evidently respecters of persons!"
"But----"
Forrester's voice ceased. The door had swung open, and there entered
two small black men, almost wholly naked, with the uncouth bodies,
hideous features, and coarse woolly hair of the wild pigmy races. Each
carried a large bowl, one containing water, the other a sticky mess
resembling porridge, and three spoons. Through the open doorway, in a
brighter greenish light, the prisoners descried a group of similar
negroes, armed with short spears and knives, like the dwarfs of the
procession. The two food-bearers laid down the bowls and went out
silently, the door swung to, a bolt grated in its sockets, and the
prisoners were again alone.
Forrester bent over the larger bowl, smelling its contents.
"D'you think it's poisoned?" he asked.
"No, no," replied Mackenzie. "They wouldn't keep us alive to poison us
out of hand. I'm for having a go. We've had nothing to eat since
noon."
He spooned up a quantity of the stuff and tasted it.
"Sticky but not bad: would be the better of a pinch of salt. Hunger is
the best condiment; dip your spoons."
By the time they had finished their meal and emptied both the bowls the
daylight had faded, and the window slit was black. Yet the greenish rays
that pervaded the room were as strong as ever. They sat discussing the
strange phenomenon. Mackenzie advanced the theory that the rock was
phosphorescent, and Jackson claimed that he had disproved it when, after
rubbing his hand on the warm floor, there was no emanation of light from
his fingers. Presently, tired out, and lulled by the warm close air,
they fell asleep.
They were awakened by finding themselves gently shaken. The door had
been silently opened, and two visitors were in the room. The prisoners
recognised them at once. They were the two Chinamen with whom they had
unforgettable links.
"Arise!" said the lad in his hushed faltering tone. "Arise! The August
and Venerable commands you to his presence."
"The August and Venerable isn't this one-armed villain after all,"
whispered Forrester. "We must go with them: there's no help for it."
They noticed that the one-armed man had changed his dress. He wore now
a long, white, full-sleeved garment with a green girdle about his waist.
He signed to them to precede him through the open doorway. On passing
out into a vaulted corridor, which, like their room, seemed to have been
hewn out of the solid rock, they found awaiting them an escort of a
dozen little black men like those they had already seen, and similarly
armed. They followed them through corridor after corridor, the floors
of which sloped gradually upward, then into a kind of ante-chamber, and
finally into a huge rectangular hall. The greenish light had grown
stronger and stronger as they proceeded, and the hall was brilliantly
illuminated, though the illumination had no visible source. Like
diffused daylight, when the sun has gone down, it came apparently from
no definite direction: it was everywhere.
At first the three white men took in no details of the scene before
them. They were dazzled by the brightness, oppressed with a sense of
mystery, an apprehension of they knew not what, the dead silence that
prevailed. But when their first sensations had passed, they gazed about
them with a tingling curiosity. The walls, glowing with the
all-pervading greenish light, were decorated with Chinese designs. The
predominant feature of the scheme was a figure which at first sight
might have been mistaken for the conventional Chinese dragon; but, on
closer examination, it seemed to the spectators to resemble more nearly
the reconstruction of some prehistoric sea-monster, such as European
zoologists have attempted on the basis of fossil discoveries. The
figures were arranged in a regular order. Some were large, some small,
but all were of the same type, and they were rendered more life-like,
and at the same time more hideous, by the fact that their eyes glowed
with a green light much more intense than the light that filled the hall
itself.
Silent though it was, the hall was not unpeopled. Drawn up in two
crescent ranks stood, motionless as statues, perhaps two hundred
Chinamen, young and old. The cheeks of all alike were clean shaven, but
there were differences between the first two ranks. The heads of those
in the first were absolutely hairless: their scalps shone like balls of
old polished ivory. They were clad in long sleeveless robes resembling
ecclesiastical copes, white with an edging of gold, and a large blue
monster, like those on the walls, ramping across the middle of the back.
The men in the second row were moustachioed, and had a topknot of hair.
Their principal garment was a full-sleeved tunic, white also, but
without embroidery of any kind. It was among these that Wen Shih, the
one-armed Chinaman, placed himself after leaving his young compatriot
and the three Englishmen with their escort just inside the doorway.
The silent assembly faced a huge dais or throne at the farther end of
the hall, rising six or eight feet from the floor. It was of Chinese
design; the material of which it was made shone like gold; and its
surface was marked with images of the symbolic monster, sculptured in
high relief.
The Englishmen noticed that, immediately opposite the throne, there was
a gap in the ranks of the company, eight or ten paces wide. Beyond this
gap--that is, nearer to the end of the hall at which they had
entered--stood a low pedestal, like the pedestal of a statue. But there
was no statue upon it. Nor was the throne occupied. The eyes of the
silent throng, indeed, appeared to be fixed on a doorway in the wall
behind and above the throne. It was covered with a cream-coloured
hanging of some rich material, ornamented with monsters embroidered in
gold. From it to the rear of the throne a broad stairway led.
The hush of expectancy which brooded over the whole assembly seized upon
the three strangers. Their fascinated eyes were drawn as by some
magnetic attraction to the curtained doorway. Not one of them was
tempted to speak: they were possessed by awe the same in kind as that
which holds the worshippers in some vast cathedral.
Presently they became aware of a trembling in the air immediately above
the throne, like that which is sometimes seen above the funnel of a
locomotive engine at rest. By degrees a screen of mist, delicate as
muslin, formed itself in front of the throne, the outlines of which
became blurred and were finally blotted out altogether. There was a
momentary rustle, like the breaking of surf upon a long shore; then the
same deathly stillness; the Chinamen had bent forward simultaneously
with the precision of trained soldiers, until their brows touched the
floor. Of all the men in the hall, only the three Englishmen at the end
stood upright upon their feet.
They gazed in mute amazement, tensely awaiting the explanation of this
extraordinary scene. Presently they caught the gleam of gold through
the shimmering screen; the mist slowly dispersed; the outlines of the
throne were once more clear and distinct; and they thrilled as with an
electric shock when they beheld, seated motionless upon the throne, a
remarkable figure.
It was the figure of an old, old man, low in stature, bent and frail,
but indued with a certain impressiveness and majesty. A long ivory-hued
cope, stiff with gold, and emblazoned with purple monsters, descended to
his feet, concealing a frame which the three spectators divined to be
spare and emaciated. His head was covered with a towering head-dress
like a bishop's mitre, but loftier, fantastically shaped, and gleaming
with gold and jewels.
But the eyes of the beholders were drawn away from his gorgeous
trappings to his countenance. Ivory pale, lined and wizened with great
age, it was rendered strangely impressive by the eyes, which beamed with
the lustre and brilliance of youth. His glance passed over the
prostrate forms of the assembly, and fastened for one brief moment on
the three straight figures at the end of the hall. Then in a clear
bell-like voice, surprising in so old a man, he uttered one word. The
men prostrate below him rose to their feet; there was a brief pause;
then for the space of several minutes a sort of litany was chanted, the
old man reciting a sentence, the others making responses in monotone.
There was no gesture, no movement save the motions of their lips.
When the litany came to an end, at a word from the old man Wen Shih left
his place in the second rank, and approached the Englishmen. He made
them understand by signs that they were to accompany him to the foot of
the throne. Moving as under a spell, they passed through the gap,
scarcely conscious of the eyes of the men around, and halted a few paces
from the seated patriarch. Wen Shih returned to his place. All was
silent as the grave.
The old man gazed fixedly at them for a moment, and his searching look,
bright as an eagle's, yet cold and paralysing, filled them with a chill
foreboding. His lips moved, and in spite of themselves they started in
amazement as they heard the first words that fell.
"What brings you striplings here?"
[Illustration: His lips moved, and in spite of themselves they started
as they heard his first words: "What brings you striplings here?"]
The face was Chinese, beyond possibility of error; but the words were
English, slowly spoken, with only a faint trace of a foreign accent.
The tone was authoritative, compelling, that of one who would not be
gainsaid. Forrester, always the readiest of the three, felt
instinctively that no prevarication would avail, that the best chance of
coming safely through whatever ordeal was before them lay in perfect
frankness. Steadying his voice, and looking up into the old man's face,
he explained, so rapidly that his words as it were tumbled over one
another, that he had come with his comrades for the purpose of
liberating a fellow countryman whom they believed to be held captive in
this region, and he begged that the prisoner might be surrendered, and
that all might be suffered to depart in peace.
The old man's countenance was utterly expressionless. It gave as little
sign as a mask of what was passing through his mind. Forrester having
ended, somewhat breathlessly, the low mellow voice spoke again.
"All are welcome to the Temple of the Eye. I repel none, I invite none.
Those who come by their own choice, or are led hither by the hand of
Fate, must abide by their choice, or by Fate's decree. The rest of
their lives hereafter must they spend in the service of the Temple,
fulfilling such offices as they may be best fitted to undertake. That
is the Law of the Eye."
His utterance was slow and deliberate, like that of a man searching for
words at one time familiar, but now half forgotten. The cold
dispassionate tones struck a chill upon the listeners' hearts. They had
in them the ring of finality, of inexorableness: the old man might have
been the very mouthpiece of Fate pronouncing doom.
The three men felt the utter hopelessness of argument or protest. Their
spirits, under the spell of that calm silvery voice, died within them.
When Wen Shih came again to them to lead them back to their former
station, they accompanied him with the tranced meekness of men drugged
for the gallows.
A few moments after they reached the end of the hall they were roused
from their stupor by the appearance of a small black man, led between
two bald white-clad Chinamen like those in the first rank. His limbs
were quivering, his teeth chattered; his staring eyes regarded the awful
Presence on the throne with the same helpless terror as a bird
fascinated by the baleful eye of a snake. The priests of the Eye lifted
him on to the pedestal in a line with the gap, and fastened his
collapsing form upright to a light framework which they slid up from the
base. Then they placed themselves on either side, and made three low
obeisances to the venerable figure on the throne.
The man on the left uttered a few sentences in Chinese, and bowed again.
His fellow followed with a word or two. It seemed to the Englishmen
that they were giving testimony against the quivering figure on the
pedestal above them. The second man ceased, and made his obeisance;
then both took places quietly at the ends of the front row near the gap.
The Englishmen expected that the criminal, if such he was, would be
called on for his answer to the charges made against him. But the old
man said never a word. Amid a breathless stillness he arose slowly and
majestically to his feet. Was he about to pronounce judgment? The
Englishmen wondered what the punishment was to be. Recollections of the
horrors of Chinese torture made them quake; but there was no sign of
instruments of torture, no movement in the silent ranks, except that
they turned and faced the victim. Their garments rustled, then all was
still as before.
The old man moved his head from side to side, the movements being so
slight that they might have passed unnoticed by any one observing him
less closely than the three Englishmen. Presently all motion ceased.
The silence seemed even deeper than before. Then, with startling
suddenness, from a point in the old man's head-dress, immediately above
the centre of his brow, a swift thin beam of bright green light flashed
along the hall, over the gap, past the pedestal, and on to the wall. It
was gone in a moment. A low sound like the indrawing of breath ran
through the assembly. A flicker of emotion stirred the stolid faces of
the Chinamen; a look of horror distorted the more expressive faces of
the negrito guards. And the Englishmen were suddenly aware that the
pedestal was vacant. The limp shrinking form had vanished; only a
little dust hung in the air.
While the Englishmen were still in their amazement, the ranks faced
about again, and the two priests who had led the victim to the spot drew
near to it with the solemn gait of acolytes. One carried a golden
trowel, the other a small gold-handled brush. Standing on either side of
the pedestal, the one swept a quantity of dust on its surface into the
trowel held by the other. The latter, holding the trowel at arm's
length in front of him, bore it slowly towards the throne, and after a
profound obeisance offered it to the old man, and withdrew. Lifting his
skinny right arm, the old man extended the trowel towards the assembled
priests, moved it from side to side, lightly sprinkling the dust on the
floor, and in his cold clear voice spoke with impressive deliberateness
a single sentence. Once more the assembly fell prostrate, the air above
the throne quivered, and the mist gradually rose before it, blotting it
and its motionless occupant from sight.