From now on, he would look for these hidden things himself and take little notice of what was told him by the natives. If there was anything hidden here which they did not want him to find, then by God, he would never rest until he did find it. Until he had brought it out into the light of day and shown it proudly to the skeptics.
But in spite of all this and the seething rage inside him, he felt oddly disturbed by what the old man had said. This veiled threat against Professor Nordhurst. What exactly had that meant? Did they intend to murder him because of his beliefs—or to be more precise, his disbeliefs? On the face of it, it seemed hardly likely that anything such as that would happen at the present day, even here. Nevertheless, he wondered whether or not he ought to warn the Professor. He would probably only laugh in his face, call him a superstitious fool and tell him that all of this work was simply beginning to get on his nerves.
He decided against telling him anything of what had happened that night. Two minutes later, Walton came down the ladder, dropped to the ground beside him. Without saying a word, he led the way back along the path, towards the top of the lava ridge, on the other side of which lay their camp.
The wind had risen now and shrieked at them like a mad thing, whirling their clothing about them, hammering at their faces and yelling in their ears. Spray seemed to reach up from the depths and lash at their bodies until they were soaked to the skin. There was the sharp taste of salt on Mitchell’s lips and he had to lean forward against the wind to make any headway.
The moon still shone, close to the sea now, where it was dipping towards the horizon. Gradually, however, the wind dropped until it became quite calm. Mitchell struggled forward, feet slipping on smooth lava underfoot. Walton seemed to have little difficulty in walking, holding himself stiffly upright, not having to look down at where he placed his feet. He seemed to know every inch of this way, although Mitchell could have sworn that the other had trod this path only twice since they had been on the island. The man’s memory seemed fantastic, to be able to pick his way amid that jumble of rocks in almost pitch darkness.
At the top of the low, saddle-backed ridge, they paused and looked about them. Mitchell was breathing heavily by this time, his breath coming in great, gasping sobs which burst from his lips in the silence. Presently, however, as he stared about him, his eyes becoming more accustomed to the blackness, he had the peculiarly illusory impression that there were dark shapes which moved in the darkness on either side of them. He screwed up his eyes in order to see them better, knowing that in the night, averted vision was far more acute than looking straight at anything which moved.
The first movement was of tall, grotesque shadows, far taller than a man, but having human shape which seemed to glide down the side of Rano Raraku some distance to the east. Then, abruptly, they were no longer shadows, but solid things, most of them upright but some wriggling along the ground with a terrible sinuous motion. He opened his mouth to scream, but Walton, stepping forward to his side, clamped a hand over his mouth and muttered a hissed warning.
Not until the convulsive shivering in his body had died away, did the other remove his hand and release his restraining hold on Mitchell’s arm. Then he could only stand there, dumbly, the muscles of his throat constricted so that no sound could possibly have been uttered even if he had wanted to shriek out loud with what he saw. Those vast colossi, those graven images which looked out forever across the rolling, undulating hills of Easter Island, were moving in utter silence through the darkness.
Oh God, his mind screamed at him, colossi like this had no right to be moving around at all, and certainly not in such utter silence. The sight caused every hair, even the tiny growths on the back of his hands, to rise with a vague fright beyond all description or classification. For a moment, he lost all power to draw a single breath. His lungs seemed crushed and paralyzed. His eyes were starting from his head.
Was this what the old man had meant when he had said that the Old Ones, the evil ones, were still on the island, that they had immortality?
Now, he saw it all clearly and the thought itself was what brought all of the horror to a head. Of course the Old Ones were immortal. There was nothing on the island which could outlive those vast stone images.
The terror seeped through him in a surging wave, leaving his body exhausted, his spirit spent. How long they stood there, watching that terrible sight, it was impossible to estimate. When he could finally think clearly again, when the breath came back into his body and the mad thumping of his heart had subsided, the moon had sunk out of sight below the western horizon and there was no further movement in the pitch blackness where only the bright, alien stars looked down on the scene.
It was a long time before he could pull himself together completely. Then he turned to look at Walton. If he had expected to see an expression of fear on the other’s face, he was strangely disappointed. Instead, there was a look which he could not analyze.
“I think we had better go now,” said Walton in a strange voice. “The others will be wondering where we’ve got to and I think you’ve seen enough.”
“It must have been imagination,” whispered Mitchell, more to himself than to the other. “Yes, yes, that’s it. Nothing but imagination, something conjured up by that old fool’s talk.” He was babbling a little wildly now, but he did not realize it.
The other smiled, turned and led the way down the side of the ridge, back to camp. As they approached, Mitchell saw that there were torches burning among the tents and that most of the men were still awake and moving hurriedly around, fully dressed. Possibly they were making ready to come looking for Walton and himself, he thought, and wiped the sweat from his forehead. Nobody would believe their story, even if they told it to them. He licked his lips dryly and knew that he would have to remain silent, would have to keep it to himself unless he wanted them to lock him away in some asylum.
He could imagine what Nordhurst would say if he ever learned of it. The Skipper came rushing towards them as they came within the circle of torchlight. He seemed agitated.
“Where’ve you been at this time of night, Doctor Mitchell?” he asked harshly. “And is the Professor with you?”
“Professor Nordhurst—why no, he isn’t with us.” There was a sudden feeling of alarm in Mitchell’s mind. That strange threat which the old native had made against Nordhurst. Had there been anything in it?
“He must have gone off somewhere,” said the other throatily. “His bed seems to have been slept in, but judging from the ground around the hut and inside, there seems to have been some kind of struggle. We wondered whether any of the natives had come while we were asleep and the Professor had caught them at the usual game of stealing our equipment. Nobody seems to have heard anything, although Carlton here thought he heard a faint scream, but imagined that it had been one of the sea-birds. It wasn’t until we decided to check with the lookout that we found he had gone. Then we discovered you and Doctor Walton were missing too.”
“Doctor Walton and I have been over to the native village,” said Mitchell, just a trifle too quickly. “But we saw nothing of the Professor. If he did decide to go anywhere, it must have been in the opposite direction. In the moonlight, we ought to have seen him if he had been anywhere in that direction.”
“We’ll make a thorough search in the morning, sir,” said the Skipper tightly. “He may have gone over to have a word with the Governor, but I wouldn’t have thought that would be likely at this hour of the night.