A DRY BONE
The dishes containing the midday meal were brought to the prisoners by
the two negrito sentinels, who received them from the guard at the
further end of the ledge. The food, abundant in quantity, consisted of a
variety of Chinese viands, strange to the Englishmen's taste, but not
unpalatable.
"The Old Man feeds us well," Beresford remarked, handling his chopsticks
dexterously. "He doesn't want to hasten Nature's destructive work by
starving us. Drinking-water, by the way, is got from a little stream
that trickles into the lake just round the corner. I confess I
shouldn't care to drink the water in which that antediluvian monster
disports himself. We'll take a look at him presently--if we get a
chance, for he appears to be rather shy: I suppose he feels hopelessly
old-fashioned, or perhaps he has an aristocratic pride in his long
descent, and scorns the company of such new creatures as mere men."
"Why isn't the place more stuffy than it is?" Forrester asked. "Where
does the air come from?"
"That puzzled me at first, but I discovered the other day that there is
a constant current of air, slight, but quite perceptible, over the
surface of the lake, through this cavern, and into a narrow cleft which
I'll show you by and by. There must be a passage into the upper air.
The temperature is rather too high to suit me; but the air is pure
enough, and many of the dungeons in medieval castles were much worse
places--barring the peculiarly oppressive effect of the stuff below....
You don't get on very well with your chopsticks. Like everything else,
they require practice."
"One thing I can't make out is why we are allowed such freedom. You
seem to be at liberty to move about as you please, talk to the
prisoners--you speak Chinese?"
"Yes, but only out of earshot of the priest in his sentry-box yonder. I
don't want him to blab to the August and Venerable--not that it matters,
perhaps. The explanation of our freedom is, of course, that it is only
such freedom as birds have in a cage. The passage by which we came is
barred by the guards. There are no tools or implements of any kind
which could be used as weapons; in fact, there's nothing here but
ourselves and a few bamboo rods yonder against the wall, which I fancy
must be used for keeping the sentry-box in repair. It's rather dull work
for the priest, sitting there all day alone and mum; a new fellow comes
every day."
After dinner Beresford led Forrester back to the transmuting cavern, and
across it into a passage similar to that by which they had reached the
spot. It was a cul-de-sac, except that at its further end there was a
narrow cleft in the wall. The opening was barely a foot wide, and the
sides were of solid rock. There were slight marks which seemed to
indicate that at some time or other an attempt had been made to enlarge
the opening by chipping; but the marks were very old, and it was clear
that the task, if attempted, had been abandoned as hopeless. The cleft
had a slight upward slope, but looking along it, Forrester saw no sign
of daylight, nor did he hear any sound from the further end, which was
not visible. They both agreed that no human being could possibly squeeze
himself through so constricted a passage.
Returning to the outer cavern, they went to the entrance and stepped on
to the ledge outside. They peered across the gloomy lake, but failed to
discover the monster whose image they had seen outlined on the wall.
"He is not at home to-day, evidently," said Beresford. "Well, we have
exhausted the objects of interest: all that we can do for the rest of
the day is to sit on our bunkers and 'tell sad stories of the death of
kings' or anything else you like. Later on I'll tackle the prisoners
again. I try to stir them up a bit and get them to talk, without much
success so far except with Wing Wu and his cousin. They are so horribly
depressed, poor wretches! By Jove! I do wish I had my pipe."
It was impossible to gauge the passage of time. The successive days, as
Beresford explained, were marked only by the arrival and departure of
the guardian priests, and by the cessation from work of the man in the
smaller cavern, who returned to his companions when a certain number of
the leaden plates had been changed into gold. These were placed in
charge of the priest on duty, who superintended their removal by the
negritos when relieved next day.
That night, Beresford found the two younger Chinamen a little more
communicative than they had been before. Wing Wu, indeed, evinced much
pleasure in meeting Forrester again, and talked to him with a certain
eagerness in English. He was the eldest son of a mandarin, he
explained, and had kept a few terms at Oxford. Wen Shih, who had passed
with distinction the innumerable examinations inflicted on Chinese
literati, had been for a few months his father's secretary. In some
subtle fashion he had obtained a commanding influence over the young
man. Always courteous and agreeable, he enjoyed the complete confidence
of his master, and gradually Wing Wu found himself consulting the
secretary in every circumstance of his life, however trivial, until he
lost all independence of judgment and even of action. He was at Wen
Shih's beck and call, did his behests even against his own will, and
felt that Wen Shih dictated the words he uttered, and arranged his very
thoughts.
"As I half suspected," said Beresford, who had been listening intently,
"these peripatetic priests are accomplished hypnotists. Under hypnotic
influence a susceptible subject will declare black white, swear that his
own blood is ink, and imagine himself his own grandfather, or any other
absurdity. Go on, please."
Wing Wu explained that one day Wen Shih announced that he was going a
journey, and that the lad was to accompany him. The command was obeyed
unquestioningly. All the details of the journey were a blank to Wing Wu
until the adventure with the elephant, which seemed to have shocked him
temporarily into his right mind. Here Forrester took up the tale,
describing the peculiar dazed sensation which both he and Jackson had
experienced once or twice on the march.
"He was trying his powers on you, of course," said Beresford. "Your
friend Jackson was the most susceptible of the three, Mackenzie the
least. You may be sure Wen Shih gave a full account of his experiments
to his august master, and I can imagine the old villain taking a
fiendish delight in sapping away at Mackenzie, the toughest of you. I
only wonder he didn't send Mackenzie down here. We'll see if Chung Tong
can tell us any more."
He addressed the cousin in Chinese, trying with infinite patience to
allure his mind from the present circumstances to his past life. Chung
Tong's story, such as it was, told haltingly, resembled Wing Wu's in
almost every particular. He added a detail which Beresford seized on,
keeping the man's wandering attention fixed on it as firmly as possible.
It came out that for many years past there had occurred at intervals
mysterious disappearances in his family. Young men in the twenties had
left their homes suddenly, leaving no clue to their destination, and
never returning.
"A light dawns!" cried Beresford, in unacademic excitement. "The Old
Man must have a spite against this particular family, and wreaks it upon
them by stealing away these youths, doing them to death in this fatal
laboratory of his. But why?--why? What have they done to incur
vengeance so horrible?"
But no further information could be elicited from the prematurely aged
young Chinaman. His enfeebled brain was exhausted by its unaccustomed
groping into the past. Beresford did not press him, but worried the
problem, as a dog worries a bone, for hours before he slept.
Next morning, the priest whose spell of duty had concluded, after a
brief conversation with his newly arrived colleague, signified that
Beresford was to accompany him on his return to the upper quarters.
Forrester shook when he understood.
"Must you go?" he implored, the scenes in the Temple appearing luridly
before his mind's eye.
"I shall go," Beresford replied tranquilly. "Buck up, my dear fellow.
The August and Venerable won't demolish me yet. I expect it's a little
cat-and-mouse performance. What if I bell the cat!"
"At any rate do take the screen with you!"
"Not at all. I don't want to lose that. We haven't discovered its
secret yet. If I _shouldn't_ come back--well, keep up your courage.
Pin your faith to Redfern: I needn't say any more."
Forrester wrung his hand, and watched him pass along the half ledge,
across the crazy bridge, over the rest of the ledge and into the passage
beyond. At the entrance Beresford turned and waved his hand, smiling
with the serenity of a man whose mind is at ease.
Two or three hours went by. Forrester paced up and down the cavern in
uncontrollable agitation. The thought of losing this cheery companion
was torture. He wondered with a carking anxiety what had happened to
Mackenzie and Jackson--to Hamid Gul, too, the faithful servant whose
little odd turns of phrase assumed almost a pathetic winningness as they
recurred to his mind. But always his thoughts came back to Beresford;
his imagination focussed that solitary figure confronting the cold,
implacable personification of Fate on his golden throne.
Many times he went to the entrance, not heeding, unheeded by, the mute
effigy in the sentry-box, and gazed across the lake into the opening
beyond. For what seemed an eternity no vision of the lithe sturdy form
came to gladden his eyes. But on one of these occasions his anxious ear
caught the dull tramp of many feet, and presently, at the head of a
negrito escort, appeared Beresford himself.
"Back again!" he shouted, his strong voice rolling over the lake.
Forrester met him at the entrance of the cave, and clasped his hand in a
nervous grip.
[Illustration: Forrester met him at the entrance of the cave.]
"I've had quite a good time," said Beresford, linking arms. "The Old
Man has been puzzling his wicked old head over my tablet, and he'll
puzzle till doomsday for me! He orated solemnly, of course, about the
Law of the Eye, and very cleverly hinted, without actually saying so,
that the Law demanded an exact translation of the Brahmi writing. I
told him, quite politely, to go to Jericho. He, quite politely,
regretted that I had made such a poor use of my opportunities of
learning wisdom. A mischievous impulse seized me to give him a shock,
so I let out a few home-truths--in Chinese! Believe me, he didn't turn
a hair: I don't believe he has one to turn. He scored there, but on the
whole I think we may consider it a drawn game. He recommended me to
persevere in the pursuit of wisdom, wrapped himself in his mist-blanket,
and no doubt crept back like a disappointed spider to his web."
Beresford found next day, however, that the Old Man's politeness had its
reverse side. When the new priest arrived, he signified that the
Englishman was to do a day's work in the inner cavern.
"It's not meant in kindness," Beresford remarked to Forrester, "but I
couldn't have wished for anything better. I shall work quicker than the
Chinamen, and when my tale of bricks is complete I shall have a good
part of the day to myself. Lend me that screen of yours, will you?"
Forrester waited impatiently for the day to end. When Beresford
returned, very white and tired, he said:--
"I've something to tell you. Give me forty winks after supper and I'll
be as fresh as a lark."
A little later, in their quiet corner, Beresford began:--
"That slab! I'm convinced that it's nothing but a sort of cement, made
of the dust that has fallen from the roof, and that this screen is of
the same material. I believe that the mysterious force from below,
while it turns lead into gold, makes powder of all other substances
exposed to its rays. This dust is no longer subject to its influence,
and forms a shield against it. But for the dust, it would have bored a
hole right through the roof to the upper air ages ago; but the coating
of dust on the sides and roof of the cavity has preserved it. Of
course, the slight earth tremors that are constantly occurring,
unnoticed by us, shake down particles of the dust, and leave portions of
the rock surface exposed to the action of the rays. So there's a very
gradual process of eating away going on, and in course of time the rock
above the cavern will be pierced clean through."
"I see," said Forrester. "The force must have been in action for ages,
so that it may be ages before the hole is made. Anyway, it doesn't
matter to us."
"I'm not so sure of that," returned Beresford quietly. "If we could
only hasten the process, and get a ladder, we might pay our venerable
host a surprise visit one of these days, for I'm pretty sure, thinking
over the direction of the passages we came through on the way here, that
we're almost directly under the Temple. That itself is underground, or
it wouldn't glow with the green light; and you may be sure it's
connected with the Old Man's pagoda. It would give me great joy to
intrude upon his solitude, and see him in his bath, so to speak."
"I'd rather give him a wide berth," said Forrester. "Anyhow, it doesn't
seem possible."
"We have no ladder, and certainly we can't emulate the Earth-shaker, and
engineer a series of mild earthquakes expressly for our own convenience.
Ah well! like the heathen, I daresay we imagine a vain thing. What's
that line of Virgil?--_animum pictura_ ... you remember the passage;
where AEneas is looking at the frescoes in Dido's palace, 'and with an
empty picture feeds his mind.' Well, better feed the mind even on
fancies than let it starve, like these poor Chinamen. And now for
sleep."
It became clear that the Old Man had set himself pitilessly to undermine
Beresford's courage. Instead of taking his turn with the Chinamen in
rotation at the enervating work in the inner cavern, Beresford was given
the task every second day. Robust as he was, and endowed with great
strength of will, the electric atmosphere wrought its devitalising
effect on him, and Forrester, after a week, noticed with sickening dread
that his eyes were less bright, his cheeks less rounded, his voice less
resonant. An offer to replace him was rejected by the priest; Forrester
wondered why he himself was being spared.
The hours dragged very heavily while Beresford was absent at his work.
Forrester had nothing to do. He roamed about the cavern, talked a
little to Wing Wu, looked in at Beresford occasionally; but during the
greater part of the day he had only his thoughts to occupy him. But it
happened one day, as he passed the spot where the spare bamboo poles
were laid, that an idea flashed into his mind. It seemed fantastic,
probably impracticable; but it might at least be attempted: anything was
better than this stagnant life in death.
The success or failure of the scheme that had occurred to him depended
on the accuracy of Beresford's theory that the dust formed by the action
of the rays on the cavern roof protected the rock from further
destruction. If this was correct, and the dust could be removed,
exposing fresh surfaces, the piercing of the chimney could be
accelerated far beyond its normal rate. With a sufficiently long pole
the dust coating could be brought down during the intervals when the
rays were shut off by the slab. Such a pole might be constructed from
the bamboo rods.
A difficulty arose from the fact that the cavern was never dark. It was
always pervaded by the dim green light emanating from the walls. But
the rods were partially screened by the sentry-box, and Forrester
thought that in the dead of night, when the priest was asleep, and the
negritos more or less drowsy, he might succeed in purloining the bamboo,
and carrying it into the passage beyond the inner cavern.
Without mentioning the matter to Beresford, he waited till all was
quiet, then stole round the wall towards the rods, picked up as many as
he could carry, and made his way undetected to the place determined on.
Next night he removed a few more in the same way. Their disappearance
had apparently not been noticed by the priest.
The following day was Beresford's turn of duty. In the early morning,
after the new priest had arrived, Forrester told his companion what he
had done.
"_Fiat experimentum!_" cried Beresford delightedly. "I will tell you
the result to-night. But not a word to Wing Wu. One of these days Wen
Shih may occupy the sentry-box, and the poor lad will blab everything."
As soon as he had completed the transmutation of the allotted number of
plates, Beresford fitted two of the bamboo rods together telescopically,
tied his coat by its sleeves to the end of the pole thus formed, and
inserting this wad into the cavity, thoroughly scoured its roof. A
considerable quantity of fine dust fell on to the slab and the floor
around. He then raised the slab, allowing the rays to play on the roof
for a longer time than when the leaden plates were sunk in the pit.
This process he repeated again and again, heedless of his increasing
weariness and a stupefying headache, until Forrester rushed in hurriedly
to say that the priest, evidently surprised at his unusually prolonged
absence, was coming towards the passage to seek its explanation.
Beresford instantly untied his coat, donned it, while Forrester laid the
pole in the recess; then, taking Forrester's arm, met the priest at the
entrance, feigning a deeper exhaustion than he actually felt. The
priests seldom entered the inner cavern; this man threw a casual glance
around it, and followed the prisoners back to the outer cavern,
suspecting nothing.
"It works!" Beresford whispered when he got to his customary place, and
at once fell into a dead sleep.
Later on, he told Forrester that the experiment had succeeded beyond his
hope.
"As nearly as I could measure with the pole," he said, "the cavity is
lengthened by at least a foot. The rays act with tremendous rapidity.
In a few days, unless we are much deeper than I think, we shall have cut
a hole right through to the level of the Temple floor."
"But what then?" asked Forrester dejectedly. "I thought of it merely as
giving us something to do--you are doing it all!--something that would
buck you up if it proved your theory; but it will do us no good."
"It will at least scare the Old Man. If we are careful, he will never
suspect that we have anything to do with it. He may even think the
place no longer safe for his old carcase, and decamp."
"Leaving us to perish!"
"There's an old saw, 'Never go up to the chimney-pots to look for the
rain.' We'll take things as they come. By the way, do you feel able to
take a turn to-night, when all's quiet? The clink of the chain can't be
heard here, and it will quicken the job."
"I'll try," said Forrester at once. "I've felt mean ever since they put
you on and left me out."
"Thanks! One thing we must be very careful about: to brush away the
dust to the sides of the cavern. We mustn't arouse suspicion. Will you
do that before you leave? Don't work for more than an hour or two, as
nearly as you can guess, and come away at once if you feel faint. Lay
the pole against the wall of the farther passage; the Chinamen never go
there, and thank goodness the priests are shy of the place, small blame
to them!"
The work thus begun was continued at every opportunity during the
succeeding days and nights. The pole had to be lengthened by the
addition of another rod: foot by foot the chimney was excavated, the
width of it remaining uniform, corresponding to the shape of the hole in
the floor.
Every night before they slept the Englishmen talked over the progress
made during the day.
"If we only had a ladder!" said Beresford once. "I agree with you: the
mere cutting of the chimney will be an empty triumph. We shouldn't be
properly constituted men if we didn't wish to profit by our energies.
Every man who isn't a mug, as soon as he has conquered one difficulty,
burns to tackle another. I've puzzled and puzzled, but I see no way
whatever of using the chimney as a channel of escape."
"Couldn't we make a ladder of bamboo?"
"Quite impossible! To begin with, there isn't enough of it; then, we
have no tools. It is tantalising in the extreme."
"There's this to be said. Even if we did break through, it would only
be to find ourselves in the midst of our enemies. It would mean the Eye
for both of us."
"I have been wondering lately whether that wouldn't after all be better
than to stay here much longer. Forrester, the Old Man has beaten me at
last. If he sends for me again, I'm afraid I shall ignominiously cave
in. It was one thing to pity those poor Chinamen when we had no real
personal knowledge of what they were suffering. It is quite another to
share it, to feel the steady sapping of one's vigour, the horrible
blankness that comes over one's mind. I know for the first time in my
life what it is to writhe in the clutches of Giant Despair."
In his many blank moments, Forrester reflected in utter desolation of
spirit on their desperate case. Ill and miserable as he himself felt,
he dwelt, not on his own condition, but on the appalling change that was
creeping over the once buoyant-hearted companion of his imprisonment.
The cheeriness was gone. It was an effort now to Beresford to talk.
The sickly hue induced by the greenish light had become on his
countenance a ghastly pallor. His limbs shook, his gait was slow and
stumbling, his once upright frame was beginning to stoop like that of an
old man. On his days off duty he lay like a log, sleeping, or simply
existing in apathy and listlessness. Was he to drift thus on a slow
tide towards death?
One night, Forrester was wearily laying the pole in its resting-place,
when he heard a sudden click near by, such as might be caused by the
fall of some hard substance on the floor. He looked down, but there was
nothing on the smooth rock to account for the sound. In a moment it was
followed by a second click, apparently a little nearer, and from the
direction of the cleft in the wall. His curiosity thoroughly aroused,
Forrester stooped and glanced in. The light in the cleft was dim, but
after peering for a few seconds, he caught sight of a small object at a
distance of perhaps ten or twelve feet away. He had not noticed it when
looking into the cleft before, but that might merely have been because
he was not expecting to see anything, nor indeed making a keen
examination. But it seemed that the object must have moved; otherwise
the click was scarcely explicable; and Forrester was sufficiently
interested to wish to get hold of it. It was far beyond reach; the
cleft was too narrow to admit his head and shoulders; but he could edge
one of the shorter bamboo rods sideways into the hole, and then worry
the object forward until he could grasp it.
This was the work of less than a minute. To his intense mortification,
the thing, when it came to hand, turned out to be nothing but a bone.
He was on the point of throwing it back, when the idea struck him that
the discovery might give a momentary fillip to Beresford's flagging
spirits. So he slipped the bone into his pocket, and returned to the
outer cavern.
Next morning he accompanied Beresford, as he sometimes did, to the
entrance of the transmuting chamber, and watched him commence his daily
task. He had forgotten the incident of the night. But when the place
was irradiated with the brilliant rays, he chanced to put his hand into
his pocket, felt the bone, and drew it out, thinking now so little of it
as to purpose casting it into the open pit. But as he turned it over in
his hand, he caught sight of some thin white scratches upon it, at first
sight irregular and fortuitous, but, at a second glance, forming, as it
seemed to him, the initials of his name, R.F.
Puzzled, and a little excited, he looked at it more carefully. It was
not an old bone; a fragment of tendon, still supple, adhered to it.
Examining it end-wise, he saw that the interior was filled with a fine
substance that might be desiccated marrow. He shook it; some of the
powdery contents fell to the floor. He knocked it against his boot, and
almost shouted with amazement: for at his feet lay a tiny spill of
paper, apparently rice paper, very tightly wound.
[Illustration: He shook it: some of the powdery contents fell to the
floor.]
Hot now with excitement, he unrolled the paper with nervous fingers, and
saw on it, in small characters written, as it seemed, with the
fire-blackened end of a sharp stick, the words, "Give me my bone."