Part 16 (1/2)

”For my part,” said one, ”I entirely disagree with Fray Felipe. I believe the English heretics have escaped, and by that open door; for, if not, where are they? They cannot be in the other part of the establishment, for, if so, they must have been seen by someone--unless, indeed, they are in league with the devil and have the power of disappearing at will. And they are not in this church; because if they had come here they must have seen that open door, and n.o.body shall persuade me that, seeing it, they would not avail themselves of the opportunity which it offers.”

”Nay, brother,” answered the other; ”I think Fray Felipe is right; and so would you, had you seen the two men. They looked and were dressed like savages, and could never--”

”Pooh!” interrupted the first, impatiently, ”that is all nonsense. If they looked as conspicuous as all that what was there to prevent them from entering the vestry and appropriating a couple of the spare habits that are always hanging there? If they did that they could walk out of the church in broad daylight, and n.o.body would dream of challenging them. Now, if they are in the church at all, it is my belief that they will be found behind this tapestry. You take that side, brother, and I will take this. Just run your hand along the length of the tapestry; and if they are lurking behind it, you will soon find them.”

”Ay,” grumbled the other, ”and, as like as not, be slain by them for my pains. I tell you, brother, that I like it not. No, they are not here,” he concluded, as he ran his hand along the tapestry in an exceedingly perfunctory manner without discovering any sign of the missing prisoners. ”I am beginning to think, with you, Brother Jose, that the rascals have escaped.”

”Of course they have,” agreed the first speaker. ”No, they are not on this side either. Ah!”--as a great bell began to toll somewhere aloft--”there is the bell for Ma.s.s, thank heaven! and now this foolish search will be brought to an end.” Therewith the footsteps retired, much to the relief of the concealed Englishmen, who were momentarily dreading that it might occur to one or the other of the searchers to turn up the tapestry and peep into the opening beneath and behind the altar. But it did not--possibly neither of the worthy brothers was particularly anxious to find himself suddenly face to face with a couple of desperate Englishmen--and presently the sound of retreating footsteps died away in the distance and all was still in the great church.

But not for long; the lurking pair had only time to dispose themselves a little more comfortably on the hard marble pavement when other footsteps were faintly heard, accompanied by the occasional sc.r.a.pe of a chair in the distance, and the fugitives knew that a congregation was a.s.sembling.

Then the great bell ceased to toll, the organ once more poured forth its sweet and solemn notes, a door opened, measured footsteps were heard approaching, there was a slight momentary bustle as the brethren of the Order filed in and took their places; and then the service began, and the Englishmen, who were both lovers of music, enjoyed an hour of such keen delight as they had not experienced for many a long day.

In due time the solemn service came to an end, the congregation retired, there ensued an opening and closing of doors, the sounds of which echoed and reverberated hollowly along the aisles and among the arches of the sacred building, and then a great silence fell. For a time the fugitives remained huddled up in their hiding-place, silent and listening; but at length, convinced that the church was indeed empty, they began in low, whispered tones to discuss their situation. The two priests who unwittingly came so near to finding them had furnished them with a hint--if they cared to avail themselves of it--as to how they might make good their escape even in broad daylight, and, so far as d.i.c.k was concerned, he would have been quite willing to act upon it by raiding the vestry there and then, appropriating one of the habits which Fray Jose had said were to be found there, and sallying forth into the city without more ado, for his bones were by this time growing sore with lying so long upon the hard, cold marble. But although Phil's bones were aching quite as much as d.i.c.k's, the elder of the two was very strongly disinclined to run the slightest unnecessary risk; he argued that, the church having once been subjected to a tolerably thorough search, he and d.i.c.k were reasonably safe, so long as they chose to remain where they were, and that, to venture abroad prematurely, even in disguise, for the mere sake of avoiding a few hours of further discomfort, would be the very height of folly. For, how could they tell at what moment a door might open and someone enter the church and discover them--supposing them to be so foolish as to venture out of their place of concealment? And who knew how many more services were to be held during the day? If it happened that there were no more, then indeed it might be safe enough for them to venture out and go in search of the vestry and those spare habits; but not otherwise. Moreover, how could they be sure that the habits, if found, would actually prove to be as effective a disguise as Fray Jose had a.s.serted they would? Phil knew enough about the Roman Catholic religion to be fully aware that those who professed it were sometimes prompted to stop the first priest they might chance to meet, and discuss with him some spiritual difficulty, or even to invoke his aid in some merely temporal trouble; and what sort of a figure, he asked d.i.c.k, would they cut in such a case as that? No; hungry and thirsty as he was, and sore as were his limbs through long contact with the hard pavement, he was all for remaining where they were, at least until nightfall, when probably, if they could procure effective disguises, they might venture to sally forth and essay the attempt to get out of the city. And so cogent were his arguments that at length he succeeded in silencing d.i.c.k, if he did not altogether convince him.

Phil's conjecture that there might be further services in the church before the day was over proved to be correct, there being two, the last of which occurred late enough in the evening to necessitate the lighting of the lamps in the building. And it was while the lamps were being lighted that the two Englishmen learned, from the gossip of those engaged in illuminating the grand altar, that much perplexity and uneasiness had resulted from the fact that, despite the most rigorous search of the entire city, no trace of the missing prisoners had thus far been discovered, and that the conclusion had therefore been at length arrived at that they must have got clear away. This knowledge was eminently satisfactory to the two whom it most intimately concerned, for it seemed to indicate that those engaged in the search had at length lost heart, and that if the hunt was still to be maintained it would only be in a more or less perfunctory manner, and that consequently the fugitives might, by the exercise of a proper amount of caution, hope to make good their escape from the city.

At length the last service of the day was over, the lurking pair heard the closing and locking of the various doors by which the general public entered the building, and this was followed by the shuffling of feet here and there as the lamps and candles were extinguished, one after the other, the low murmur of voices gradually died away, and finally there came the loud slamming of a door which, from the direction of the sound, the fugitives conjectured to be the door beneath the organ loft, by which they had entered the church during the morning, then followed the grating of a key in a lock, the rattle which indicated the withdrawal of the key, and--silence. At last, thought the weary pair behind the altar, the church was empty, and closed for the night.

To make a.s.surance doubly sure, however, they agreed to remain where they were for another half-hour; but when at length they judged that period to have elapsed they crept very cautiously out of the place of concealment which had served them so well, and made their way to the choir stalls, upon the soft cus.h.i.+ons of which they rested their weary limbs for a short time while their eyes were growing accustomed to the gloom of the place. Then, having agreed that a certain small door, immediately opposite that by which they had found their way into the church, must be the one giving access to the vestry, they stole silently across the pavement, and Phil, having first satisfied himself that the room, or whatever it was that lay beyond, was in darkness, found the handle and proceeded to turn it as cautiously as though he believed the place on the other side to be full of people. The door proved to be unlocked; and a minute later the fugitives found themselves, as they had expected, in the vestry of the church. The room was a small one, but it was lighted by a fairly large window, and as the night happened to be brilliantly fine and starlit, the gloom here was not nearly so intense as it had been in the interior of the church, consequently they were able to distinguish without much difficulty that there were indeed, as Fray Jose had said, a number of garments of some sort hanging from pegs on one of the walls. Why these garments should be kept there the fugitives never troubled themselves to conjecture, the fact that they were there was sufficient for them; and they lost no time in appropriating and donning two of them. They were long black garments reaching from shoulder to ankle, with large hoods which might be drawn up over the head, almost entirely concealing the features when the wearer was out of doors, and were confined round the waist by a girdle of knotted rope. Attired in these, the pair felt that they might safely brave any but the very closest scrutiny, and they therefore had no scruples about sallying forth into the open forthwith.

The window of the vestry overlooked a portion of the extensive garden, a glimpse of which they had gained through the great west door of the church earlier in the day, and, peering out through it, the two friends saw that there was a thick shrubbery at no great distance that looked as though it might afford them good cover from which to reconnoitre the ground prior to their attempt to gain the street beyond, and they at once decided to make for it in the first instance. Another moment and they were at the outer door, which proved to be locked. But the key was, luckily, in the lock, and on the inner side of the door, that slight difficulty was therefore soon got over; and a minute later the pair drew a great breath of relief as they found themselves once more in the open air--and free.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

HOW THEY ESCAPED FROM THE INQUISITION.

Yes; free--in a sense; yet not wholly so; for they were still within the boundaries of the Holy Inquisition, although outside the building. To have done so much as they had, however; to have evaded capture for the best part of a day, and finally to have won outside the walls, undetected, was no mean achievement; and they felt that, having accomplished so much, the rest ought to be an easy matter.

Standing within the deep shadow of the doorway for a minute or two after they had silently closed the door behind them, the pair searched with their gaze as much of the garden as came within the range of their vision, and nowhere could they detect any sign of human presence within it; indeed they scarcely expected to do so, for it was now altogether too dark for anything in the nature of gardening operations; moreover, they surmised that it was about the hour when everybody connected with the establishment would be at supper. Therefore, feeling that the moment was propitious, they left the shelter of the doorway, and, keeping as closely within the shadow of the building as they could, moved off toward the shrubbery, into the dense obscurity of which they plunged a minute or two later. Here, as they wound their way cautiously among the bushes, they suddenly found themselves close to a long low block of buildings which, being entirely in darkness, they surmised must be sheds devoted to the storage of the gardeners' tools, implements, and paraphernalia generally, and they at once halted and subjected the buildings to careful examination; for, their weapons having been taken away from them by the soldiers who had seized them, weapons of some sort were now a first necessity with them, and they hoped that the sheds might at least afford them a knife apiece, if nothing better.

Investigation, however, resulted in the discovery that the sheds were locked; but this difficulty was soon overcome by the simple process of breaking a pane of gla.s.s, inserting a hand, unfastening the hasp, and entering through the open window, when their enterprise was eventually rewarded by the discovery of several formidable pruning knives, two of which, together with a couple of short, stout iron bars, and a length of thin, strong rope, they unhesitatingly appropriated.

The two adventurers now felt that, whatever might befall them, they were no longer altogether defenceless, and leaving the sheds behind them, they again plunged into the shrubbery, their object now being to discover a way of escape from the garden into the streets of the city.

The first obstacle which they encountered was a stone wall about fifteen feet high, surmounted by _chevaux de frise_; and deciding that this was rather too formidable to be tackled until they had made a further search, they followed the wall for some distance, and eventually arrived at a stout wicket gate built of wood. Of course, it was locked; but upon examination they soon came to the conclusion that, with the help of their pruning knives and bars, it would not be a difficult matter to burst the lock open. Unfortunately, however, this could not be done without making a considerable amount of noise, and they had already ascertained, while examining the lock, that a good many people were still abroad in the city, for they heard footsteps frequently pa.s.sing on the other side of the wicket; they therefore decided to seek further before attempting to force a way out, their decision being influenced by the fact that it was evidently still early in the evening, or there would not be so many people moving about, and that consequently it might be wise to delay their final escape until the bulk of the population had retired to rest. Soon afterward, however, while pursuing their investigations, they reached a spot where the wall ended and where the grounds were enclosed for some distance by a lofty iron railing which, despite the fact that it was formidably spiked at the top, they thought might be easily scaled by two men who were accustomed, as they were, to climbing the masts and rigging of a s.h.i.+p. But on the other side of the railing was a wide, open street, along which people were constantly pa.s.sing to and fro; the adventurers therefore retired to the shelter and concealment of the shrubbery, having come to the resolution not to run any unnecessary risk by undue precipitancy, since they had managed so excellently thus far.

At length, however, the sounds of traffic in the streets began to diminish sensibly, and finally they died away altogether; the good people of Cuzco seemed to have gone home to bed at last; so, throwing off his disguise for the moment, d.i.c.k essayed to climb the high railing which was now the only barrier between them and liberty. The task was not at all difficult, except when it came to his clambering over the complicated arrangement of spikes at the top; but a steady head and a little patience were all that were needed; and in about two minutes young Chichester was standing on the pavement outside, once more in his clerical disguise, receiving the few articles that Phil pa.s.sed through the railings to him before the latter in his turn climbed over the obstacle. As it chanced, they only just accomplished the feat in time, for as Stukely reached the pavement on the right side of the railing, footsteps were heard approaching, and Phil scarcely had time to don his priest's habit, draw the hood well over his head, and conceal his bar and pruning knife in the ample folds of the garment when a belated frequenter of one of the numerous posadas of the city staggered past, humming in maudlin tones the refrain of a baccha.n.a.lian song which he cut short when he realised that the two dark figures which he jostled were, as he supposed, connected with the dread inst.i.tution which lay back there frowning in the distance.

As soon as this roysterer was fairly out of the way the adventurers looked about them to get their bearings. Their purpose was to leave the city by the same way that they had come into it, and then strike eastward until they again came to the river, which, in accordance with Vilcamapata's instructions, they were to follow to its source.

Recalling the several twists and turns which they had taken through the building after their encounter with the jailer that morning, they finally decided that they must follow the footsteps of the drunken man until they reached the first street bearing to the right, which would be the street by which they had been conducted to the Inquisition that morning; once arrived in which they were convinced that they could find their way over the remainder of the route. Accordingly they started briskly off, and in the course of a few minutes reached the street which they sought, and which they presently verified as the right one by pa.s.sing the great entrance gateway by which they had been admitted to the Inquisition building that morning. That morning! It seemed much more like a week ago! Still walking briskly, yet without exhibiting undue haste, and meeting only an occasional wayfarer here and there who took no notice of them except to stand respectfully aside and yield the narrow pavement to them as they pa.s.sed, the two Englishmen wound hither and thither along the streets, occasionally identifying some building that they remembered to have pa.s.sed before, until, in a little, narrow street, Phil suddenly halted before a small building which bore across its narrow front a sign reading, in Spanish, of course--”Mateo Cervantes. Armourer. Plate and chain mail. Blades of the finest, imported direct from Toledo in Old Spain; musquets; pistolettes; and ammunition for the same.”

”Ah!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Phil, with a sigh of satisfaction; ”here we are at last. This is the place that I have been looking for. I was beginning to fear that I had missed it.”

”And what a plague want ye with it, now that you have found it?”

demanded d.i.c.k, peevishly; for he was beginning to feel sleepy, and knew that many a weary mile must yet be walked before he could hope to get any rest.

”What want I with it?” reiterated Phil. ”My gentle mutton-head, read the sign over the shop; there is light enough for that, surely, though it is but starlight.”

d.i.c.k read the sign, and his eyes brightened. ”Ah!” he said, ”of course; I begin to understand. I have been wondering, all along, what we should do without weapons, if we chanced to make good our escape. These bars and pruning knives are well enough in their way, and are better than nothing at all, of course; but they won't help us to get game--”