A movement within the temple caught his attention. He saw a figure emerge from somewhere, the figure of a gnarled and knotted man that rolled on short crooked legs; and then another and another came until there were fully a hundred of the savage creatures approaching slowly toward him. He saw their knotted bludgeons and their knives, and he realized that here was a menace more effective than an unearthly scream.
With a shrug he backed into the passageway. "I cannot fight an army single-handed," he muttered. Slowly he crossed the outer court, passed through the first great wall and stood again upon the plain outside the city. In the distance he saw the dust of the fleeing expedition and, with a grin, he started in pursuit, swinging along at an easy walk as he puffed upon a cigarette. From the top of the rocky hill at his left a little monkey saw him pass—a little monkey, which still trembled from fright, but whose terrified screams had become only low, pitiful moans. It had been a hard day for little Nkima.
So rapid had been the retreat of the expedition that Zveri, with Dorsky and Ivitch, did not overtake the main party until the greater part of it was already descending the barrier cliffs; nor could any threats or promises stay the retreat, which ended only when camp was reached.
Immediately Zveri called Abu Batn, together with Dorsky and Ivitch, into council. The affair had been Zveri's first reverse, and it was a serious one inasmuch as he had relied heavily upon the inexhaustible store of gold to be found in the treasure vaults of Opar. First, he berated Abu Batn, Kitembo, their ancestors and all their followers for cowardice; but all that he accomplished was to arouse the anger and resentment of these two.
"We came with you to fight the white men, not demons and ghosts," said Kitembo. "I am not afraid. I would go into the city, but my men will not accompany me and I cannot fight the enemy alone."
"Nor I," said Abu Batn, a sullen scowl still further darkening his swart countenance.
"I know," sneered Zveri, "you are both brave men, but you are much better runners than you are fighters. Look at us. We were not afraid. We went in and we were not harmed."
"Where is Comrade Romero?" demanded Abu Batn.
"Well, perhaps, he is lost," admitted Zveri. "What do you expect? To win a battle without losing a man?"
"There was no battle," said Kitembo, "and the man who went farthest into the accursed city did not return."
Dorsky looked up suddenly. "There he is now!" he exclaimed, and as all eyes turned up the trail toward Opar, they saw Miguel Romero strolling jauntily into camp.
"Greeting, my brave comrades!" he cried to them. "I am glad to find you alive. I feared that you might all succumb to heart failure."
Sullen silence greeted his raillery, and no one spoke until he had approached and seated himself near them.
"What detained you?" demanded Zveri presently.
"I wanted to see what was beyond the inner wall," replied the Mexican.
"And you saw?" asked Abu Batn.
"I saw magnificent buildings in splendid ruin," replied Romero; "a dead and moldering city of the dead past." "And what else?" asked Kitembo.
"I saw a company of strange warriors, short heavy men on crooked legs, with long powerful arms and hairy bodies. They came out of a great building that might have been a temple. There were too many of them for me. I could not fight them alone, so I came away."
"Did they have weapons?" asked Zveri.
"Clubs and knives," replied Romero.
"You see," exclaimed Zveri, "just a band of savages armed with clubs. We could take the city without the loss of a man."
"What did they look like?" demanded Kitembo. "Describe them to me," and when Romero had done so, with careful attention to details, Kitembo shook his head. "It is as I thought," he said. "They are not men; they are demons."
"Men or demons, we are going back there and take their city," said Zveri angrily. "We must have the gold of Opar."
"You may go, white man," returned Kitembo, "but you will go alone. I know my men, and I tell you that they will not follow you there. Lead us against white men, or brown men, or black men, and we will follow you. But we will not follow you against demons and ghosts."
"And you, Abu Batn?" demanded Zveri.
"I have talked with my men on the return from the city, and they tell me that they will not go back there. They will not fight the jan and ghrol. They heard the voice of the jan warning them away, and they are afraid."
Zveri stormed and threatened and cajoled, but all to no effect. Neither the Arab sheikh nor the African chief could be moved.
"There is still a way," said Romero.
"And what is that?" asked Zveri.
"When the gringo comes and the Philippine, there will be six of us who are neither Arabs nor Africans. We six can take Opar." Paul Ivitch made a wry face, and Zveri cleared his throat.
"If we are killed," said the latter, "our whole plan is wrecked. There will be no one left to carry on."
Romero shrugged. "It was only a suggestion," he said, "but, of course, if you are afraid—"
"I am not afraid," stormed Zveri, "but neither am I a fool."
An ill-concealed sneer curved Romero's lips. "I am going to eat," he said, and, rising, he left them.
The day following his advent into the camp of his fellow conspirators, Wayne Colt wrote a long message in cipher and dispatched it to the Coast by one of his boys. From her tent Zora Drinov had seen the message given to the boy. She had seen him place it in the end of a forked stick and start off upon his long journey. Shortly after, Colt joined her in the shade of a great tree beside her tent.
"You sent a message this morning, Comrade Colt," she said.
He looked up at her quickly. "Yes," he replied.
"Perhaps you should know that only Comrade Zveri is permitted to send messages from the expedition," she told him.
"I did not know," he said. "It was merely in relation to some funds that were to have been awaiting me when I reached the Coast. They were not there. I sent the boy back after them."
"Oh," she said, and then their conversation drifted to other topics.
That afternoon he took his rifle and went out to look for game and Zora went with him, and that evening they had supper together again, but this time she was the hostess. And so the days passed until an excited native aroused the camp one day with an announcement that the expedition was returning. No words were necessary to apprise those who had been left behind that victory had not perched upon the banner of their little army. Failure was clearly written upon the faces of the leaders. Zveri greeted Zora and Colt, introducing the latter to his companions, and when Tony had been similarly presented the returning warriors threw themselves down upon cots or upon the ground to rest.
That night, as they gathered around the supper table, each party narrated the adventures that had befallen them since the expedition had left camp. Colt and Zora were thrilled by the stories of weird Opar, but no less mysterious was their tale of the death of Raghunath Jafar and his burial and uncanny resurrection.
"Not one of the boys would touch the body after that," said Zora. "Tony and Comrade Colt had to bury him themselves."
"I hope you made a good job of it this time," said Miguel.
"He hasn't come back again," rejoined Colt with a grin.
"Who could have dug him up in the first place?" demanded Zveri.
"None of the boys certainly," said Zora. "They were all too much frightened by the peculiar circumstances surrounding his death."
"It must have been the same creature that killed him," suggested Colt, "and whoever or whatever it was must have been possessed of almost superhuman strength to carry that heavy corpse into a tree and drop it upon us."
"The most uncanny feature of it to me," said Zora, "is the fact that it was accomplished in absolute silence. I'll swear that not even a leaf rustled until just before the body hurtled down upon our table."