"Hollow, by Satan!" shouted John Gower, smiting fist on palm. "I suspected as much! Yet who would have thought it, with the lid so cleverly joined to the rest that no crack showed at all? Strike flint and steel here, man, the inside of this strange chest is as dark as Hades."
They bent over it and there was a momentary flash, then they straightened.
"No tinder," snarled Bellefonte, flinging aside his flint and steel. "What saw ye?"
"Naught but one great red gem," said Gower moodily. "But it may be that there is a secret compartment below the bottom where it lies."
He leaned over the altar-chest and thrust his hand therein.
"By Satan," said he, "this cursed gem seems to cling fast to the bottom of the chest as though it were fastened to something—a metal rod from the feel—ha, now it gives and—"
Through his words came a muffled creak as of bolts and levers long unused—a rumble sounded from above, and we all looked up. And then the two buccaneers beside the altar gave a deathly cry and flung up their arms as down from the roof thundered the great central stone. Column, altar and stair crashed into red ruin.
Stunned by the terrible earthquake-like noise, the girl and I lay, eyes fixed with terrible fascination on the great heap of shattered stone in the middle of the temple, from under which oozed a river of dark red.
At last after what seemed a long time, I, moving like a man in a trance, freed myself and unbound the girl. I was very weak and she put out an arm to steady me. We went out of that temple of death, and once in the open, never did free air and light seem so fair to me, though the air was tainted with the swamp reek and the light was strange and shadowy.
Then a wave of weakness flooded body and brain; I fell to the earth and knew no more.
AND LAST
Table of Contents
SOMEONE was laving my brow and at last I opened my eyes.
"Steve, oh, Steve, are you dead?" someone was saying; the voice was gentle and there was a hint of tears.
"Not yet," said I, striving to sit up, but a small hand forced me gently down.
"Steve," said Helen, and I felt a strange delight in hearing her call me by my first name, "I have bandaged you as well as might be with such material as I had—stuff torn from my shirt. We should get out of this low dank place to a fresher part of the island. Do you think you can travel?"
"I'll try," I said, though my heart sank at the thought of the swamp.
"I have found a road," she informed me. "When I went to look for clean water I found a small spring and also stumbled upon what was once a fine road, built with great blocks of stone set deep in mire. The mud overlaps it now some few inches and rushes grow thereon, but it's passable so let us be gone."
She helped me to my feet and, with one arm about me, guided my uncertain steps. In this manner, we crossed the ancient causeway and I found time to marvel again at the nature of that race who had built so strongly and had so terribly protected their secrets.
The journey through the swamp seemed without end, and again through the thick jungle, but at last my eyes, swimming with torment and dizziness, saw the ocean glimmering through the trees. Soon we were able to sink down beside the longboat on the beach, exhausted. Yet Helen would not rest as I urged her to, but took a case of bandages and ointment from the boat and dressed my wounds. With a keen dagger she found and cut out the bullet in my arm, and I thought I would die thereat, and then made shift at setting the broken bone. I wondered at her dexterity, but she told me that from early childhood she had aided in dressing hurts and setting broken limbs—that Roger O'Farrel tended thus to all his wounded himself, having attended a medical university in his youth, and he imparted all his knowledge to her.
Still she admitted that the setting of my arm was a sad job, with the scant material she had, and she feared it would give me trouble. But while she was talking, I sank back and became unconscious, for I had lost an incredible amount of blood, and it was early dawn of the next day before I came to my full senses.
Helen, while I lay senseless, had made me a bed of soft leaves, spreading over me her fine coat, which I fear was none too fine now, what with the blood and stains on it. And when I came to myself, she sat beside me, her eyes wide and sleepless, her face drawn and haggard in the early grey of dawn.
"Steve, are you going to live?" asked she, and I made shift to laugh.
"You have scant opinion of my powers if you think a pistol ball and a musket stock can kill me," I answered. "How feel you, Helen?"
"Tired ... a bit." She smiled. "But remarkably meditative. I have seen men die in many ways, but never a sight to equal that in the temple. Their death shrieks will haunt me to my death. How do you think their end was brought about?"
"All seems mazed and vague now," said I, "but methinks I remember seeing many twisted and broken metal rods among the ruins. From the way the platform and stair shattered, I believe that the whole structure was hollow, like the altar, and the column also. A crafty system of levers must have run through them up to the roof, where the great stone was held in place by bolts or the like. I believe that the gem in the altar was fastened to a lever which, working up through the column, released that stone."
She shuddered.
"Like enough. And the treasure..."
"There never was any. Or if there was, the Caribs flung it into the sea and, knowing some curse lay over the temple, pretended that they had hidden it therein, hoping the Spaniards would come to harm while searching for it. Certainly that thing was not the work of the Caribs, and I doubt if they knew just what sort of fate lay in wait there. But, certes, any man could look on that accursed shrine and instinctively feel that doom overshadowed the place."
"Another dream turned to smoke," sighed she. "La, la, and me a-wishing for rubies and sapphires as large as my fist!"
She was gazing out to sea as she spoke, where the waves were beginning to redden in the glowing light. Now she sprang erect!
"A sail!"
"The Black Raider returning!" I exclaimed.
"No! Even at this distance, I can tell the cut of a man-o'-war! She is making for this island."
"For fresh water, no doubt," said I.
Helen stood twisting her slim fingers uncertainly.
"My fate lies with you. If you tell them I am Helen Tavrel, I will hang between high tide and low, on Execution Dock!"
"Helen," said I, reaching up and taking her small hand and pulling her down beside me, "my opinion of you has changed since first I saw you. I still maintain the Red Trade is no course for a woman to follow, but I realize what circumstances forced you into it. No woman, whatever her manner of life, could be kinder, braver, and more unselfish than you have been. To the men of yonder craft you shall be Helen Harmer, my sister, who sailed with me."
"Two men have I feared," said she with lowered eyes; "John Gower, because he was a beast; Roger O'Farrel, because he was so fine and noble. One man I have respected—O'Farrel. Now I find a second man to respect without fearing. You are a bold, honest youth, Steve, and—"
"And what?"
"Nothing," and she seemed confused.
"Helen," said I, drawing her gently closer to me, "you and I have gone through too much blood and fire together for anything to come between us. Your beauty fascinated me when first I saw you; later I came to understand the sterling worth of the soul which lay beneath your reckless mask. Each soul has its true mate, little comrade, and though I fought the feeling and strove to put it from me, fondness was born in my bosom for you and it has grown steadily. I care not what you may have been, and I am but a sailor, now without a ship, but let me tell yonder seamen when they land that you are, not my sister, but my wife-to- be
A moment she leaned toward me, then she drew away and her eyes danced with the old jaunty fire.