Part 26 (2/2)

We camped that night in the open air, a mile or so to the south of the mora.s.s; and the following morning continued our journey, keeping the Wood to our left.

We had not gone far before we discovered the figure of a man, who came running towards us from the direction of the hills. I noticed that he advanced with a peculiar limp, and on this account, for the moment, I believed it to be Rushby, most marvellously recovered of his wound.

But when the runner had drawn quite near to us, I was surprised beyond measure to recognise my old friend, Atupo, the Peruvian priest, whom I had befriended in the vault beneath the Temple of Cahazaxa.

Though I called him by his name, he cast never so much as a glance at me or any of the others, save Bannister, at whose feet he threw himself, as pagans prostrate themselves before the idols that they wors.h.i.+p.

”My master!” he exclaimed, and went on, in his quaint, broken English, in some such strain as this: ”I never thought to live to set eyes on you again.”

Bannister lifted him to his feet and, laying a hand affectionately upon his shoulder, asked him what news he had of his friends and brethren, who had fled from their dwellings before the wrath of Amos.

Atupo told him that the majority had sought refuge in the woods, where many of their number had been treacherously murdered by the wild men. He himself, however, had founded a small colony of some score of persons who were living by the side of the ravine that crossed the plain, not so far beyond the hills that we could see. All these, he said, were anxious to return to Cahazaxa's Temple, but dared not do so, believing Amos to be still abroad.

Bannister at once set the man's mind at rest, a.s.suring him that it was not only safe for them to return, but that Amos himself was dead and the Greater Treasure undisturbed.

At that, Atupo threw up his hands by way of a gesture of delight; and then, looking about him, for the first time recognised both Mr. Forsyth and myself. And it is doubtful which of the two of us he was most surprised to see.

Myself he regarded as a trusted friend; but he knew that Forsyth had been one of Baverstock's party, and he was astounded to behold that gentleman alive. Being told by Bannister that he had naught to fear, he pointed straight at Forsyth.

”But that man should be dead!” he cried. ”With my own eyes I saw him shot with an arrow, the point of which was steeped in deadly poison.”

And then it was that Mr. Gilbert Forsyth told us the truth, which I have set down already: how, with a fort.i.tude that one cannot but admire, he had burned the poison from his flesh, and thus saved his life, though he had fallen into a fever.

Atupo, soon afterwards, expressed himself anxious to return to his own friends; but Bannister was one whose custom it was to look well ahead, and he knew that the ancient Peruvians had been well skilled in medicine.

”Friend Atupo,” said he, ”we have need of your a.s.sistance; for there is one of our number who is sorely wounded. You and your comrades owe not a little to us; and I will, therefore, ask you to go back to the Temple, and there await our coming. Prepare such drugs as you may have for a man who has a wound in the leg that will not heal.”

”Does the sun ask the moon to s.h.i.+ne?” inquired the Peruvian. ”What of the white man's medicines?”

Bannister threw out his hands.

”Alas!” he exclaimed. ”We have none; we have used all we had.”

And so the matter was settled; Atupo, the priest, returning to the Temple, and ourselves veering round to the west, between the Wood and the mora.s.s, towards the place where we had left William Rushby.

CHAPTER XXVIII--CONCLUSION

Early that afternoon we arrived at our destination, and found that we were none too soon. For Rushby had long since consumed all the water we had left him, but had managed somehow to move himself, though in the greatest pain, to the bank of the stream that flowed near at hand, where he was able, from time to time, to fill his pannikin with water. Also, that very morning, he had eaten the last of the food that we had left him. So it was well we came no later.

He told us that he had slept daily for many hours; and on one occasion he had awakened quite suddenly, to find one of those small deer that were numerous in the Wood staring at him with its soft, mild eyes, from a distance of not more than ten yards.

I asked him if he had not been afraid that some wild beast of prey might find him in the night. But he told me that he had never bothered himself about such matters, since both by day and night he had kept a fire alight. He had heard the report of the first shot, that which had brought about the death of Joshua Trust, though he had heard nothing of the other shots, upon the far side of the Wood, fired in the glade where Amos Baverstock had met his tragic end.

”I have lain here for days,” said he, ”wondering what was happening, and whether I would ever set eyes upon any one of you again.”

When we told him the story of the death of Amos, he seemed little enough impressed; for he was a rough-and-ready seaman, without the gift of imagination, and he had not been there himself to behold with his own eyes the terror of that incident or to hear the wild laughter of the fugitive as he fled before us through the Wood.

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