Kitabı oku: «Commodore Junk», sayfa 19
Chapter Thirty Five
A Fresh Alarm
“Yes; who called?” cried Humphrey, starting up.
“Hist! Be careful. It is me.”
Humphrey sprang front his couch, and was about to speak, when the curtain was thrown roughly aside, and Bart entered quickly.
“What’s the matter!” he said, roughly.
“Matter!” said Humphrey. “I – I – must have been dreaming.”
Bart looked at him sourly, and then gave a suspicious look round.
“What time is it?” said Humphrey, hastily.
“Time! What do we know about time here? ’Bout four bells.”
Humphrey gazed excitedly at the dimly-seen figure, visible by a faint light which streamed in beside the curtain, and then as the curtain fell he advanced slowly till he could peer through and see that Bart had gone right to the far end of the corridor, where he had a lantern set in a stone recess, beside which he ensconced himself, and played sentry once again.
“Escape is impossible unless I choose the gates of death,” muttered Humphrey, as he stole back cautiously, and then in a low voice said —
“Hist! Did anyone call?”
“Yes. Is it safe to whisper?” came from above.
“Mistress Greenheys!” cried Humphrey, joyfully. “Speak low, don’t whisper; it penetrates too far. How I have longed to hear from you!”
“Oh, sir, pray, pray, save him!”
“Dinny!” said Humphrey, starting.
“Yes. He is to be killed, and it was for your sake he ran that risk. Pray, try and save him.”
“What can I do?”
“Implore the captain. He may listen to you. I cannot bear it, sir; it makes me feel half mad!”
“Have you seen him?”
“Seen him? No, sir. He’s kept closely shut up in one of the stone chambers by the captain’s quarters, and two men watch him night and day.”
“As I am watched,” said Humphrey, bitterly.
“Yes, sir; but you have not been untrue to your captain. You are not sentenced to death, and every man eager to see you hung. My poor Dennis! It is my fault, too. Why did we ever meet?”
Humphrey was silent.
“You will see the captain, sir, and ask him to spare his life?”
Humphrey ground his teeth. To ask Dinny’s life was to ask a favour of Mary Dell, and to place himself under greater obligations still.
“That is not all the trouble,” said the woman, who was evidently sobbing bitterly. “That wretch Mazzard is still at liberty.”
“Not escaped?” cried Humphrey.
“Not escaped! – not taken!” said the woman. “He is in hiding about the place, and I have seen him.”
She seemed to shudder, and her sobs grew more frequent.
“He has not dared to come to you?”
“No, sir; but he came near enough to speak to and threaten me. He will come some night and drag me away, and it would be better to die. Ah!”
She uttered a low cry; and as Humphrey listened he heard low, quick talking, a faint rustling overhead, and then the sound of the voices died away.
“Discovered!” said Humphrey, bitterly. “Fate is working against me now. Better, as she said, to die.”
A quarter of an hour’s silence ensued, and conscious that at any moment he might be watched, as far as the deep gloom would allow, Humphrey seated himself upon the edge of the old stone altar, and folded his arms, to see what would be the next buffet of fate he was to bear.
He had not long to wait.
There was the sound of a challenge at the end of the corridor, and a quick reply, followed by an angry muttering, and Humphrey laughed mockingly.
“Master and dog!” he said, bitterly. “Mistress and dog, I ought to say.”
He drew himself up, for he heard a well-known step coming quickly along the passage. The curtain was snatched aside, and the buccaneer took a dozen strides into the place and stopped, looking round.
“Where are you?” cried the buccaneer, in a harsh, imperious voice, deep almost as that of a man.
There was no reply.
“Where are you, I say?” was repeated imperiously. “Are you ashamed to speak?”
“No! What do you want?”
The buccaneer started in surprise, and faced round.
“Are you there? Coward! Traitor! This explains all. This is the meaning of the haughty contempt – the miserable coldness. And for a woman like that – the mistress of the vilest slave among the men. Humphrey Armstrong – you, the brave officer, to stoop to this! Shame upon you! Shame!”
“Woman, are you mad!”
“Yes! Mad!” cried the buccaneer, fiercely. “I scorn myself for my weak, pitiful fancy for so despicable a creature as you. So this is the brave captain, holding nightly meetings with a woman like that!”
“As I would with anyone who could help me to escape from this vile bondage,” said Humphrey.
“Vile! Who has made it vile?”
“You,” said Humphrey, sternly; “and as if I were not degraded low enough by your base passion and declaration, you come here in the night to insult me by such an insinuation as that.”
There was utter silence for a few moments, and then a quick step forward; and before Humphrey Armstrong could realise the fact, Mary Dell had cast herself down, thrown her arms around him, and laid her cheek against his feet.
“Trample on me and crush me, or kill me,” she moaned. “I am, mad. I did not think it. Humphrey, have pity on me. You do not knew.”
He trembled as she spoke, and clenched his fists tightly; but making an effort over himself, he said coldly —
“You have imprisoned the woman’s lover, and she says he is to die. She came there, as she has come many times before, to plan escape with me and the man I persuaded to be the partner of my flight. For this he is to die.”
“It is the men’s will,” groaned the prostrate woman.
“She has been praying to me to save her lover. I felt I could not ask you; but I do ask. Spare the poor fellow’s life, and set him free.”
“Do you wish it?”
“Yes.”
“He shall be set free. You see, I can be merciful, while you alone are stern and cold. How long am I to suffer this?”
“How long will you keep me here a prisoner?”
“How long will you keep yourself a prisoner, you should say. It is for you to be master here; for me to be your slave. How can I humble myself – degrade myself – more?”
Humphrey drew his breath in an angry, impatient hiss.
“For Heaven’s sake, rise!” he cried. “You lower yourself. You humble me. Come: let us talk sensibly. I do not want to be hard upon you. I will not say bitter things. Give me your hand.”
He took the hand nearest to him as he bent down, and raised the prostrate woman.
“Be seated,” he said, gravely. “Let me talk to you as I would to some one who can listen in an unprejudiced spirit.”
There was no reply.
“In your character of the captain of these buccaneers you asked me, an English officer, to be your friend and companion – to share with you this command. Is that all?”
Still no reply.
“Let us tear away the veil,” he continued; “for surely I am no egotist when I say to you that from the beginning it was more than this.”
“No; I did not know then. I thought that you might be my friend; that I should keep up this disguise until the end,” was faltered piteously.
“Impossible!” cried Humphrey, sternly. “Let me be plain with you. Let me tell you that I have sat here alone thinking, reading your character, pitying you for all that is past.”
“Pity!” came in a deep, low voice.
“Yes,” he said, gently, “pity. Let me try, too, and be grateful. For you spared my life at first; you saved it afterwards.”
“Go on. You torture me.”
“I must torture you, for I have words to speak that must be uttered.”
He paused for a few moments; and then went on, speaking now quickly and agitatedly, as if the words he uttered gave him pain at the same time that they inflicted it upon another.
“When I was chosen to command this expedition, against one who had made the name of Commodore Junk a terror all round the gulf and amid the isles, I knew not what my fate might be. There were disease and death to combat, and I might never return.”
He paused again. Then more hurriedly —
“There was one to whom – ”
“Stop!” came in a quick, angry voice. “I know what you would say; but you do not love another. It is not true.”
Humphrey Armstrong paused again, and then in a low, husky voice —
“I bade farewell to one whom I hoped on my return to make my wife. It pains me to say these words, but you force them from me.”
“Have I not degraded myself enough? Have I not suffered till I am nearly mad that you tell me this?” came in piteous tones.
“Was I to blame!”
“You? No. It was our fate. What a triumph was mine, to find that I, the master who had lived so long with my secret known but to poor Bart, was now beaten, humbled – to find that day by day I was less powerful of will – that my men were beginning to lose confidence in me, and were ready to listen to the plots and plans of one whom I had spared, for him to become a more deadly enemy day by day. Humphrey Armstrong, have you no return to offer me for all I have suffered – all I have lost? Tell me this is false. You do not – you cannot – love this woman.”
He was silent.
“Is she so beautiful? Is she so true? Will she give you wealth and power? Would she lay down her life for you? Would she degrade herself for you as I have done, and kneel before you, saying, ‘Have pity on me – I love you’?”
“Hush, woman!” cried Humphrey, hoarsely; “and for pity’s sake – the pity of which you speak – let us part and meet no more. I cannot, I will not listen to your words. Give me my liberty, and let me go.”
“To denounce me and mine?”
“Am I such a coward, such a wretch, that I should do this?” he cried, passionately.
“Then stay. Listen: I will give you love such as woman never gave man before. I loved your cousin as a weak, foolish girl loves the first man who whispers compliments and sings her praises. It is to her all new and strange, the realisation of something of which she had dreamed. But as the veil fell from my eyes, and I saw how cowardly and base he was, that love withered away, and I thought that love was dead. But when you came my heart leaped, and I trembled and wondered. I shrank from you, telling myself that it was a momentary fancy; and I lied, for it was the first strong love of a lonely woman, thirsting for the sympathy of one who could love her in return.”
“Oh! hush – hush!” cried Humphrey. “I have told you that it can never be.”
“And she will never love you as I would – as I do,” came in a low, imploring whisper.
“Yes, yes, a thousand times yes!” cried Humphrey.
“Even if it were not so I could not – No, I will not speak. I only say, for pity’s sake let us part.”
He paused, for there was no reply.
“You do not answer,” he said, gently. “Think of what I say. I cannot give you love. I should be unworthy of yours if I could. My friendship I can give, and it shall be devoted to saving you from this life.”
Still no reply; and the silence and darkness seemed deeper than before.
“You do not take my hand!” he said, bitterly. “You do not listen to my words! Come, for heaven’s sake be just to me. Say that I have spoken well.”
Still no reply, and he listened as he leaned forward; but there was nothing to be heard but the beating of his own heart.
He leaned forward with outstretched hand, and bending down it touched the cold stone of the altar.
He swept his hand to left and right, listening intently; but there was no sound.
“Why do you not speak?” he said, sternly, as he realised the folly of his first surmise.
His words seemed to murmur in the roof and die away, but there was no reply.
He took a few steps in different directions, suddenly and quickly, listening intently the while, feeling certain that he would hear her try to avoid him; but all was silent, and at last he made for the entrance, drew aside the curtain, and stood listening there.
Feeling sure that his visitor could not have gone that way he turned back, and with outstretched hands paced the great chamber to and fro till at each crossing he touched the stone wall.
Satisfied at length that he was alone, and that the great stone which formed his couch had not been moved, he went once more to the great curtain, pulled it aside, and passed through so as to go along the corridor, for now that his visitor had left him the desire to speak again came strongly.
Half-way down the passage he suddenly became aware of an advancing light, and directly after he saw that it was gleaming from the brown face of Bart.
“Hallo! What now?” he growled. “Where are you going?”
“The captain! Did you meet the captain?” said Humphrey hastily.
“Meet him! No. He came to me and sent me back,” said Bart, grimly.
“Where is he, then?”
“At his quarters, of course.”
Humphrey Armstrong turned upon his heel frowning, as he felt that a great deal of what he had been saying must have been addressed to vacancy.
He did not turn his head as he paced the corridor, but he was aware that he was followed by Bart, whose lantern shed its faint yellow gleam upon the great curtain till he had passed through, and all was in darkness as he crossed the great chamber and threw himself upon the couch. But the place was feebly illuminated directly after, as Bart drew the drapery aside and peered in, holding the lantern well above his head to satisfy himself that his prisoner was there.
Then he drew back, the great curtain fell into its place, and Humphrey’s jailer went slowly to his niche, where he set down his light, seated himself, and with arms folded and chin resting upon his breast, moodily brooded over the position.
“A curse!” he muttered more than once – “a curse! If he were dead there would be peace once more, for she would forget him.”
“Suppose,” he thought, after a while – “suppose he was to be gone next time she came. Well, he might have escaped, and after a time she’d be at rest. It would be so easy, and it would be for her. And yet he’s so brave and so handsome, such a man for her! Better see her happy and kill myself. Not that I need!” he said, bitterly; “for she said she’d do that if aught happened to him.”
“It’s hard work,” he muttered, after a while, “seeing the woman you love care for some one else, and him lying there, and as good us asking you to put him out of the way.”
Bart’s head sank lower as he crouched there, struggling with the great temptation of his life, till at last he slowly rose, and, shading the lantern within his breast, stepped cautiously toward the curtain which draped the door. Stretching out his hand, he was in the act of drawing it softly aside when there was a firm clutch at his shoulder, and a low voice whispered in his ear —
“What are you going to do?”
Bart drew back, let fall the certain, and faced his leader.
“Nothing!” he said, abruptly.
“You villain!” whispered the buccaneer. “I read murder in your eye!”
“I’m tired of it,” growled Bart. “I give it up. I know what I am. I hopes for nothing; but when I see you go mad for one who hates you, and who will bring ruin on us all, as well as make you unhappy, it makes me mad too. He’s an enemy, and I could kill anybody as gives you pain!”
“As I could, and would, slay you if you hurt a hair of the head of the man I love!”
“The man you love!” muttered Bart, bitterly. “Time back it was the other Captain Armstrong. Now it’s him. Anybody but a poor fellow like me!”
“You have told me again and again you were content to be my friend. Go back to the quarters, and I’ll watch myself. I have no one here I can trust!”
Bart’s face worked as they slowly returned along the corridor, and rage and pain were marked in turn upon his features.
As they reached the place where he set down his lantern, he stood in a bent attitude, as if pondering upon the words which had been said.
“Why are you waiting?” said the captain, imperiously.
“Them words o’ yours,” said Bart. “You said you could kill me.”
“As I would have done,” was the fierce reply, “if harm had befallen him!”
“Better it had!” said Bart, bitterly. “Better it had, and you’d killed me. Saved you from pain, and me from a life of misery. Am I to go?”
“Yes,” said the captain, less firmly, as the man’s tones betrayed the agony of his spirit. “Go; I have no one now whom I can trust!”
“Don’t say that to me,” said the poor fellow, hoarsely, as he fell upon his knees and clasped his hands. “Kill me if you like, captain, but don’t doubt me. All these years I’ve done nothing but try and serve you faithful and well.”
“And you would have slain the man I love!”
“Something tempted me, and it said that it was for your good, and when it was like that I felt I could do anything.”
“You would have betrayed me!”
“I would have killed him as give you pain, him who has changed you, and broken you down to what you are. I knew as I now know, that it’s ruin to you!”
“Silence, man, and go!”
“What has he done for you!” cried Bart. “Nought but give you hard words, and curse you ever since he has been here, and yet you go on loving him!”
“What have I ever done for you, Bart, but give you hard words and cold looks, and yet you have gone on loving me!”
“True,” said Bart, hoarsely; “and so I shall till I die!”
“And so shall I, Bart, till I die!”
“Don’t talk like that,” he groaned. “It’s better to live and suffer than to talk of death. I give in – once more I give in!”
“Then go; I will watch!”
“No, captain; don’t send me away! Trust me this once. I am faithful to you!”
“Ay; but not to him.”
There was a pause, and Bart seemed to be struggling hard with himself, till he had won some terrible victory.
“Tell me,” he said at last, “tell me to swear. I’ll be as true to him as I’ve been to you, and I’ll swear it. I’ll die for him, if you say I am!”
“Then swear, Bart. Swear that I may depend on you as I would on myself! That, for my sake, you will defend him from all evil, come when it may!”
“Because you love him?” said Bart, slowly.
“Because I love him, man!”
There was a painful silence for a few minutes, and then, as he knelt there, on the time-worn stones, the simple-hearted single-natured man said, in a low husky voice —
“I swear it: so help me God!”
Bart rose slowly, with his breath coming and going as if after some terrible struggle, and, as he stood there trembling, he felt his hand seized and held tightly between two warm, moist palms.
He let it rest there for a few moments, and then snatched it away.
“What are you going to do?” whispered the buccaneer.
“Obey orders,” said Bart relapsing, as it were, to his former manner.
“No; stay. I have only you to trust.”
“And you’ll leave me now along of him?”
“Without a feeling of dread, Bart; because the temptation would come in vain.”
“Are we all mad!” said Bart, softly, as he stood listening to the retiring footsteps; and then he sank down upon the stones, with his back to the wall, and the light shining upon his rugged head.
Chapter Thirty Six
One Prisoner Free
“Dinny! You here!”
“Yes, sor – it’s me.”
“But at liberty?”
“Yes, sor; and I’m to attend on ye as I did avore.”
“But – ”
“Oh, it’s all right, sor! The captain’s a bit busy, and I’m not to be hung at present. I’m to be kept till there’s a big holiday, and be strung up then. It’s the fashion out in this part of the counthry.”
“My poor fellow,” cried Humphrey, “I am glad to see you safe again!”
“Safe, sir! and d’ye call it safe, whin the first time, perhaps, as the skipper gets in a passion I shall be hung up in all me youth and beauty, like one o’ the big drooping flowers on a tree!”
“Nonsense, man!”
“Oh, it’s sinse, sor; and I shall droop, too, wid all my moight!”
“No, no,” said Humphrey, as he pondered upon the past, and saw in Dinny’s reprieve a desire to gratify him. “No, my lad. I appealed to the captain to spare your life, and this is the result.”
“Did ye, now, sor! Sure, an’ I thought that the pretty little darlin’ had been down on her knees to him; and, knowing what a timpting little beauty she is, it made me shiver till I began to consider what sort of a man the captain is, and how, when the boys have been capturing the women, and sharing ’em out all round, the skipper niver wance took a fancy to a single sowl. Faix, and he’s always seemed to take to you, sor, more than to annyone else. Some men’s of a marrying sort, and some ar’n’t. The skipper’s one of the ar’n’ts.”
Humphrey looked at the man curiously, but it was evident that he had no hidden meaning.
“Sure, sor,” continued Dinny, “when I think about you two, it has always seemed to me as if the captain wanted to be David to your Jonathan, only the other way on, for the skipper isn’t a bit like King David.”
“Have you suffered much!”
“Suffered, sor!”
“I mean in prison.”
“Divil a bit, sor! I’ve lived like a foighting-cock. They always fade a man up well in this part of the counthry before they finish him off.”
“You may make your mind easy, Dinny,” said Humphrey, thoughtfully; “the captain will not take your life unless he takes mine too.”
“An’ is it mak me moind aisy, sor, when I can’t get spache of the darlin’, and that Black Mazzard in hiding somewhere and freckening the poor sowl to death!”
“Surely, there is nothing to fear from him now?”
“Faix, and I don’t know that same. I shall always be freckened about him till a dacent praste has tied us two together toightly, and then I sha’n’t be happy till I know that Black Mazzard’s nailed up bechuckst four boards; and if I’ve annything to do wid it they shall be as thick as trees and nailed wid screws.”
“He has made his escape somewhere?”
“Not he, sor; and I don’t like the look o’ things. I’ve been too much shut up to see annything, being more like a cockroach in a whishky bottle and the cork tied down than annything else. But I’m skeart, captain darlin’; and if annything happens – whisht! have ye kept my saycret?”
He put his lips close to the prisoner’s ears, and whispered as he gave a knowing look at the couch.
“It is a secret still, Dinny.”
“Good luck to ye, sor! Thin, if annything happens, just you go there and lie shnug till I come to ye; and if ye’ll tak’ my advice ye’ll keep on putting a dhrop o’ wine in the cellar and shtoring up a bit o’ food; and if it isn’t wanted, why ye’re no worse off.”
“Explain yourself, my lad,” said the prisoner, for the lively chatter of the Irishman relieved the tedium of his confinement.
“Hist!”
“Murther!” ejaculated Dinny, as a faint signal came from overhead. “Sure an’ I was niver cut out for a prophet afther all.”
“Dinny! – Captain Armstrong!” came from above.
“Good luck to ye, darlin’! kape on shpaking,” whispered Dinny, excitedly. “It does me good to hear ye; but niver mind the captain, darlin’. Shpake to me.”
“I came here – at great risk,” came down, as if the speaker was panting heavily. “There’s something wrong – I want to put you on your guard. Tell the captain. Quick! I dare not stay.”
“But, darlin’, what’s wrong? Whisht! shpake out, and let’s hear ye. Look at that, now! Why, she’s gone!”
For there was a faint rustling overhead, and then all was silence once again.
“Sure, sor, would ye look at me,” cried Dinny, with a most perplexed expression of countenance, “and tell me if I’m awake or it’s only a dhrame.”
“Dinny,” said Humphrey, “she would not have come in such haste if there had not been good cause. Go and warn the captain. Quick!”
The day passed without news, and, weary with his tedious pacing of his great cell, Humphrey Armstrong threw himself upon his couch, where he lay, with the great solemn face of the old stone idol seeming to loom down mysteriously from above.
It was not until the next morning that he saw Dinny again. The night had passed quietly, and the day found Humphrey still watching. He, however, dropped into a pleasant slumber as the sun rose, in which sleep he was still plunged when Dinny came.
“Jist nawthing at all, sor,” he said. “The darlin’ must have got a craze in her head, for when I told the captain he trated me wid scorn, and Bart asked me if I was playing the fool.”
“Then there is no danger!”
“Divil a bit, sor, that I can think out,” said Dinny.
“But Mistress Greenheys.”
“What about her, sor?”
“What did she say?”
“Sure an’ you heard it all, sor. I couldn’t repate it now if I thried.”
“But you have seen her since?”
“Sin her! Bedad I’d only like to – if it was only to shpake wan word to her wid me oi. No, sor, I can’t get spache of her.”
“But is all quiet in the place?”
“An’ is it quiet? Why, a tomb in Aygypt is a lively place to it. The schooner’s getting rotting for want o’ work, and the men do nothing but dhrink and shlape, and the captain’s shut up all alone whin he isn’t down in the forest saying his prayers.”
“Is it the calm that comes before the storm, Dinny?” said Humphrey.
“Sure an’ I don’t know, sor; but I’ll kape watch if I can, and give ye word if there’s annything wrong; but me poor head’s in a mix, and since I’ve been out of prishn I seem to see nothing but Black Mazzard shwarming all over the place and takkin’ me darling away. Did ye intersade wid the captain, sor?”
“Dinny, I have not seen him again,” said Humphrey, frowning.
“Not seen him, sor! Why, he has been here half a dozen toimes.”
“Been here? No.”
“Sure and I saw him wid me own ois, sor. Twice he came to the windy there and four toimes along by the big passage. Sure I thought ye’d been colloguing.”
“I was not aware of it,” said Humphrey, calmly; but his words did not express the feelings that were raging within his breast, and as soon as he was alone he tried to analyse them.
He must flee. He could do nothing else, and growing momentarily more excited, he tried to force himself to act and think.
The old temple. He would flee there for the present, he said. It would remove him from Mary’s pursuit, for she would never dream of his seeking refuge there, and from that place he might perhaps be able to open up communication with Dinny.
He had no weapon, so he caught up a large table-knife and stuck it in his waistband. It was not much, but something, and at that moment he recalled Mary Dell’s history – how she had told him that they had begun with a canoe; through that captured a larger boat; that larger boat had enabled them to take a vessel; and so on till the swift schooner had been obtained.
In the same way that knife should grow into a sword, he said to himself; and then he felt a sensation of half-blind rage at himself for making the comparison.
“What is this hateful unsexed creature to me!” he said, angrily, as he stood thinking as to his next step.
Food! He must have food. In his excitement and the fury of the haste that was upon him, the trouble of taking it angered him; but he knew that he must have it, and gathering together what he could, he paused once more to think and listen.
All was silent, and the drawing aside of the great curtain proved that Bart was not on guard, for there was no dull, yellow gleam of his lantern at the end of the corridor, and once more it came over the prisoner as a feeling of wonder that he should not again and again have taken such steps as these. Almost unguarded, his prison doors and windows always open, and freedom given him to wander about the ruins, and yet like a pinioned bird he had stayed.
“They know that the sea before, the forest and mountain behind, are stronger than bolt and bar,” something seemed to whisper to him as he stood hesitating.
“But not to a determined man, ready to do or die!” he cried, as if forced to answer aloud; and he set his teeth as he still hesitated and paused before hurrying out of the great dark place.
He stopped. What would she do when she found that he had gone? What would she say of the man whom, with all her faults, she evidently dearly loved, and would sacrifice all to win?
Humphrey Armstrong stamped fiercely upon the old stone flooring, making the vaulted roof echo as he thrust his fingers into his ears in a child-like attempt to shut out and deafen himself to the silent whisperings which assailed him.
He gave one glance round, trying to penetrate the darkness, and hesitated no longer, but strode away, passing out of the long corridor out among the ruins, and, well accustomed to the place now, making straight for the pathway which, at its division, turned toward the old temple.
All was still; but it seemed lighter away to his left than he could quite account for, and he was starting again when a distant shout as of many voices came through the silence of the night and died away.
“Carousing,” he muttered, and he hesitated again.
If the men were carousing the watch kept would be less strict, and there might be some chance of obtaining a boat.
“To start alone on a cruise,” he said, half aloud. “What madness!” Then passionately: “It all seems madness, and I can do nothing but drift with fate.”
Fighting down the strange hesitancy which kept assailing in various forms, especially now in that of conjuring up difficulties in the way of escape, he plunged sturdily into the forest path, and, as fast as the darkness allowed, went on straight for the old temple, a grim place of refuge, with its ghastly relics; of Abel Dell lying, as it were, in state; and the horrible, haunting recollections of the huge cavernous cenote where the would-be assassin had met his fate, and the other had been consigned as to his tomb.
It was painful work. Every now and then some thorny creeper of rapid growth hung across and tore his skin; at some sudden turn he came in contact with tree-trunk or mouldering stone; but the greater the difficulties in the darkness, the greater the rest seemed to Humphrey Armstrong’s brain, and he kept on till a sudden turn brought him close to the fork, where one path went winding to the left toward the men’s and the captain’s quarters, the other to the temple.
As he approached he became conscious of a rustling sound, as of a wild creature passing through the forest, and he snatched his knife from his waist, ready to strike for life if attacked; but, firmly convinced that there were no denizens of the wild there but such as were more likely to avoid him, he kept on again, to reach the dividing path just as he became aware that it was no creature passing through the wilderness of trees, but someone, like himself, hurrying along the track from the men’s quarters so rapidly, that they came in contact, and a hand seized him by the throat, and the point of some weapon seemed to be pressed against his breast, as a voice exclaimed in a hoarse whisper —
“Make the slightest sound and it is your last.”
And as these words seemed to be hissed into his face, a shout arose from some distance along the path, and the tramping of feet and rustling of branches intimated that people were rapidly coming in pursuit.
