Queen Sheba's Ring Part 28

I answered that nothing would induce me to do so, for such a job should not be left to one man.

"No, you're right," he said; "I might faint or lose my head or anything.

I wish now that we had arranged to send the spark from the palace, which perhaps we might have done by joining the telephone wire on to the others. But, to tell you the truth, I'm afraid of the batteries.

The cells are new but very weak, for time and the climate have affected them, and I thought it possible the extra difference might make the difference and that they would fail to work. That's why I fixed this as the firing point. Hullo, there's the bell. What have they got to say?"

I s.n.a.t.c.hed the receiver, and presently heard the cheerful voice of Higgs announcing that they had arrived safely in the little anteroom to Maqueda's private apartments.

"The palace seems very empty," he added; "we only met one sentry, for I think that everybody else, except Maqueda and a few of her ladies, have cleared out, being afraid lest rocks should fall on them when the explosion occurs."

"Did the man say so?" I asked of Higgs.

"Yes, something of that sort; also he wanted to forbid us to come here, saying that it was against the Prince Joshua's orders that we Gentiles should approach the private apartments of the Child of Kings. Well, we soon settled that, and he bolted. Where to? Oh! I don't know; to report, he said."

"How's Quick?" I asked.

"Much the same as usual. In fact, he is saying his prayers in the corner, looking like a melancholy brigand with rifles, revolvers, and knives stuck all over him. I wish he wouldn't say his prayers," added Higgs, and his voice reached me in an indignant squeak; "it makes me feel uncomfortable, as though I ought to join him. But not having been brought up a Dissenter or a Moslem, I can't pray in public as he does.

Hullo! Wait a minute, will you?"

Then followed a longish pause, and after it Higgs's voice again.

"It's all right," it said. "Only one of Maqueda's ladies who had heard us and come to see who we were. When she learns I expect she will join us here, as the girl says she's nervous and can't sleep."

Higgs proved right in his antic.i.p.ations, for in about ten minutes we were rung up again, this time by Maqueda herself, whereon I handed the receiver to Oliver and retired to the other end of the room.

Nor, to tell the truth, was I sorry for the interruption, since it cheered up Oliver and helped to pa.s.s the time.

The next thing worth telling that happened was that, an hour or more later, j.a.phet arrived, looking very frightened. We asked him our usual question: if anything was wrong with the wires. With a groan he answered "No," the wires seemed all right, but he had met a ghost.

"What ghost, you donkey?" I said.

"The ghost of one of the dead kings, O Physician, yonder in the burial cave. It was he with the bent bones who sits in the farthest chair. Only he had put some flesh on his bones, and I tell you he looked fearful, a very fierce man, or rather ghost."

"Indeed, and did he say anything to you, j.a.phet?"

"Oh! yes, plenty, O Physician, only I could not understand it all, because his language was somewhat different to mine, and he spat out his words as a green log spits out sparks. I think that he asked me, however, how my miserable people dared to destroy his G.o.d, Harmac. I answered that I was only a servant and did not know, adding that he should put his questions to you."

"And what did he say to that, j.a.phet?"

"I think he said that Harmac would come to Mur and settle his account with the Abati, and that the foreign men would be wise to fly fast and far. That's all I understood; ask me no more, who would not return into that cave to be made a prince."

"He's got hold of what Barung's envoys told us," said Oliver, indifferently, "and no wonder, this place is enough to make anybody see ghosts. I'll repeat it to Maqueda; it will amuse her."

"I wouldn't if I were you," I answered, "for it isn't exactly a cheerful yarn, and perhaps she's afraid of ghosts too. Also," and I pointed to the watch that lay on the table beside the batteries, "it is five minutes to ten."

Oh! that last five minutes! It seemed as many centuries. Like stone statues we sat, each of us lost in his own thoughts, though for my part the power of clear thinking appeared to have left me. Visions of a sort flowed over my mind without sinking into it, as water flows over marble.

All I could do was fix my eyes on the face of that watch, of which in the flickering lamp-light the second-hand seemed to my excited fancy to grow enormous and jump from one side of the room to the other.

Orme began to count aloud. "One, two, three, four, five--_now_!" and almost simultaneously he touched the k.n.o.b first of one battery and next of the other. Before his finger pressed the left-hand k.n.o.b I felt the solid rock beneath us surge--no other word conveys its movement. Then the great stone cross-piece, weighing several tons, that was set as a transom above the tall door of our room, dislodged itself, and fell quite gently into the doorway, which it completely blocked.

Other rocks fell also at a distance, making a great noise, and somehow I found myself on the ground, my stool had slid away from me. Next followed a m.u.f.fled, awful roar, and with it came a blast of wind blowing where wind never blew before since the beginning of the world, that with a terrible wailing howled itself to silence in the thousand recesses of the cave city. As it pa.s.sed our lamps went out. Lastly, quite a minute later I should think, there was a thud, as though something of enormous weight had fallen on the surface of the earth far above us.

Then all was as it had been; all was darkness and utter quietude.

"Well, that's over," said Oliver, in a strained voice which sounded very small and far away through that thick darkness; "all over for good or ill. I needn't have been anxious; the first battery was strong enough, for I felt the mine spring as I touched the second. I wonder," he went on, as though speaking to himself, "what amount of damage nearly a ton and a half of that awful azo-imide compound has done to the old sphinx.

According to my calculations it ought to have been enough to break the thing up, if we could have spread the charge more. But, as it is, I am by no means certain. It may only have driven a hole in its bulk, especially if there were hollows through which the gases could run.

Well, with luck, we may know more about it later. Strike a match, Adams, and light those lamps. Why, what's that? Listen!"

As he spoke, from somewhere came a series of tiny noises, that, though they were so faint and small, suggested rifles fired at a great distance. Crack, crack, crack! went the infinitesimal noises.

I groped about, and finding the receiver of the field telephone, set it to my ear. In an instant all grew plain to me. Guns were being fired near the other end of the wire, and the transmitter was sending us the sound of them. Very faintly but with distinctness I could hear Higgs's high voice saying, "Look out, Sergeant, there's another rush coming!"

and Quick answering, "Shoot low, Professor; for the Lord's sake shoot low. You are empty, sir. Load up, load up! Here's a clip of cartridges.

Don't fire too fast. Ah! that devil got me, but I've got him; he'll never throw another spear."

"They are being attacked!" I exclaimed. "Quick is wounded. Now Maqueda is talking to you. She says, 'Oliver, come! Joshua's men a.s.sail me.

Oliver, come!'"

Then followed a great sound of shouting answered by more shots, and just as Orme s.n.a.t.c.hed the receiver from my hand the wire went dead. In vain he called down it in an agonized voice. As well might he have addressed the planet Saturn.

"The wire's cut," he exclaimed, das.h.i.+ng down the receiver and seizing the lantern which j.a.phet had just succeeded in re-lighting; "come on, there's murder being done," and he sprang to the doorway, only to stagger back again from the great stone with which it was blocked.

"Good G.o.d!" he screamed, "we're shut in. How can we get out? How can we get out?" and he began to run round and round the room, and even to spring at the walls like a frightened cat. Thrice he sprang, striving to climb to the coping, for the place had no roof, each time falling back, since it was too high for him to grasp. I caught him round the middle, and held him by main force, although he struck at me.

"Be quiet," I said; "do you want to kill yourself? You will be no good dead or maimed. Let me think."

Meanwhile j.a.phet was acting on his own account, for he, too, had heard the tiny, ominous sounds given out by the telephone and guessed their purport. First he ran to the ma.s.sive transom that blocked the doorway and pushed. It was useless; not even an elephant could have stirred it.

Then he stepped back, examining it carefully.

"I think it can be climbed, Physician," he said. "Help me now," and he motioned to me to take one end of the heavy table on which the batteries stood. We dragged it to the doorway, and, seeing his purpose, Oliver jumped on to it with him. Then at j.a.phet's direction, while I supported the table to prevent its oversetting, Orme rested his forehead against the stone, making what schoolboy's call "a back," up which the mountaineer climbed actively until he stood upon his shoulders, and by stretching himself was able to grasp the end of the fallen transom.

Next, while I held up the lamp to give him light, he gripped the roughnesses of the hewn stone with his toes, and in a few moments was upon the coping of the wall, twenty feet or more above the floor line.

The rest was comparatively easy, for taking off his linen robe, j.a.phet knotted it once or twice, and let it down to us. By the help of this improvised rope, with Orme supporting me beneath, I, too, was dragged up to the coping of the wall. Then both of us pulled up Oliver, who, without a word, swung himself over the wall, hanging to j.a.phet's arms, and loosing his hold, dropped to the ground on the farther side. Next came my turn. It was a long fall, and had not Oliver caught me I think that I should have hurt myself. As it was, the breath was shaken out of me. Lastly, j.a.phet swung himself down, landing lightly as a cat. The lamps he had already dropped to us, and in another minute they were all lighted, and we were speeding down the great cavern.

"Be careful," I cried; "there may be fallen rocks about."

As it happened I was right, for at that moment Oliver struck his legs against one of them and fell, cutting himself a good deal. In a moment he was up again, but after this our progress grew slow, for hundreds of tons of stone had been shaken from the roof and blocked the path. Also, whole buildings of the ancient and underground city had been thrown down, although these were mostly blown inward by the rush of air. At length we came to the end of the cave, and halted dismayed, for here, where the blast of the explosion had been brought to a full stop, the place seemed to be crowded with rocks which it had rolled before it.

"My G.o.d! I believe we are shut in," exclaimed Oliver in despair.

But j.a.phet, lantern in hand, was already leaping from block to block, and presently, from the top of the debris, called to us to come to him.

"I think there is a road left, though a bad one, lords," he said, and pointed to a jagged, well-like hole blown out, as I believe, by the recoil of the blast. With difficulty and danger, for many of the piled up stones were loose, we climbed down this place, and at its bottom squeezed ourselves through a narrow aperture on to the floor of the cave, praying that the huge door which led to the pa.s.sage beyond might not be jammed, since if it were, as we knew well, our small strength would not avail to move it. Happily, this fear at least proved groundless, since it opened outward, and the force of the compressed air had torn it from its ma.s.sive stone hinges and thrown it shattered to the ground.

We scrambled over it, and advanced down the pa.s.sage, our revolvers in our hands. We reached the audience hall, which was empty and in darkness. We turned to the left, crossing various chambers, and in the last of them, through which one of the gates of the palace could be approached, met with the first signs of the tragedy, for there were bloodstains on the floor.

Orme pointed to them as he hurried on, and suddenly a man leapt out of the darkness as a buck leaps from a bush, and ran past us, holding his hands to his side, where evidently he had some grievous hurt. Now we entered the corridor leading to the private apartments of the Child of Kings, and found ourselves walking on the bodies of dead and dying men.

One of the former I observed, as one does notice little things at such a moment, held in his hand the broken wire of the field telephone. I presume that he had s.n.a.t.c.hed and severed it in his death pang at the moment when communication ceased between us and the palace.

We rushed into the little antechamber, in which lights were burning, and there saw a sight that I for one never shall forget.