Part 14 (1/2)
”Oh, yes,” answered Ned, ”you can do that easily enough, I should think; and I should like you to make the attempt, if only to find out whether you could accomplish the ascent at some future time, if necessary. I will go before and clear the way for you, using the axe if we meet with any very serious obstacles; but I think you will be able to manage without much difficulty. Ah, here, you see, is the landing at the bottom of the flight”--and Ned indicated to his companion a flat ledge about a yard square, close to the surface of the water.
The dinghy was carefully secured, and then, stepping on to the ledge, Ned a.s.sisted his companion ash.o.r.e.
There could be no doubt as to the fact that from this ledge or landing a flight of step-like projections led diagonally up the face of the cliff; and, thickly overgrown as they were, there could be as little doubt that, if not entirely artificial, nature had been largely a.s.sisted by the hand of man in their formation. The flight averaged pretty evenly about a yard in width, each step being about six inches high; so that but for the dense growth of shrubs upon them, the ascent would have been exceedingly easy. Even as things were, Sibylla experienced far less difficulty than she had antic.i.p.ated; Ned going before and then pressing the shrubs aside to facilitate her pa.s.sage, using his axe here and there to remove such growth as stood fairly in the middle of the way. Nor was the ascent nearly so dangerous as might have been expected, the dense growth all along the outer edge of the stairway forming a sort of bulwark which rendered a fall almost impossible. So safe, indeed, and comparatively easy was the ascent that it was accomplished in about twenty minutes: when, after pointing out the holes in the upper platform, and fully explaining the structure and uses of the sheers which he believed to have once stood there, Ned led the way into the cave.
For a few minutes after entering everything was so dark compared with the brilliant daylight without that nothing could be seen. At length, however, their eyes became accustomed to the soft twilight gloom of the place, when Ned at once began to direct Sibylla's attention to the various articles that were stored there. The first objects examined were the weapons, all of which were stacked in one corner. The s.h.i.+elds--for such they actually proved to be--were circular, about two feet in diameter, and made of a metal which, when cleared of its thick coating of grime and a small portion of its surface sc.r.a.ped with a knife, turned out to be bra.s.s. The outer and inner surfaces were both perfectly plain, or, if ornamented at all, the ornamentation could not be discovered without resort to a much more effectual cleaning process than Ned felt disposed to bestow upon them. On the inside two leather straps were rivetted, one for the arm to pa.s.s through and the other for the hand to grasp; but so old and decayed were these straps that they crumbled into black dust at a touch. This was also the case with the wooden shafts of the spears, which powdered away like touchwood. And, as for the spear-heads and the blades of the axes, they were so rust- eaten that little more than a rough jagged indication of their original shape remained.
The earthen jars, of which there were twenty-four, next claimed Ned's attention. These vessels stood about two feet high, and were about ten inches diameter, of peculiar though not ungraceful shape, and they were singularly heavy; as Ned discovered when he seized one with the intention of moving it forward into a lighter part of the cave. The mouth was covered with four thicknesses of a kind of wax-cloth, such as Ned had never seen before; the cloth being bound round the neck of the jar with several turns of fine cord, which, like the cloth, seemed to have been treated with a waxy coating, doubtless to a.s.sist in its preservation. If such was the purpose of the treatment, it had succeeded fairly well; but the outer or top layer of the cloth covering the mouth of the jar had rotted and split here and there. The second layer, however, was in a very fair state of preservation, and the other two layers were perfect, proving on examination to be a coa.r.s.e kind of linen which had either been steeped in or painted over with a composition which felt waxy to the touch, and imparted a yellowish tinge to the fabric.
Ned's knife quickly severed the cord, which, however, was so rotten that it came to pieces during the process of unwinding, and he then uncovered the mouth of the jar and peered down into it. The vessel was full of a coa.r.s.e, dull, yellow glistening sand, a handful of which the young fellow quickly removed and carried out into the daylight. He was back again in a moment, exclaiming to Sibylla in a tone of exultant astonishment:
”It is _gold-dust_, Miss Stanhope! gold-dust, and our fortunes are made!”
”I am very glad indeed to hear it,” answered Sibylla. ”But are you quite sure you are not mistaken? How do you know it is gold-dust?”
”I know by the look and weight of it,” answered Ned. ”I have seen too much gold-dust in Australia to be deceived in such a matter. Look at it and feel it for yourself--note the weight of a handful of it, and you will be satisfied that I am right. I expect the contents of all these jars are the same, but I will open one or two more just to satisfy myself.”
He did so, and found his conjecture to be correct--the additional three which he opened were all full of gold-dust like the first.
”What shall we tackle next?” asked Ned. ”That big bale looks as though it ought to contain something valuable; I think I will pursue my investigations in that direction.”
The bale, which had an outer covering of wax-cloth of a much coa.r.s.er texture than that which closed the mouth of the jars, proved to be too heavy for Ned to move unaided; so his knife was again brought into requisition, and the cloth--which was still tough enough to offer a slight resistance to the blade--was ripped open from end to end of the bale. The orifice thus made disclosed to view a firmly packed ma.s.s of several sorts of fabrics, neatly folded, and laid one upon the top of the other. The first three or four layers consisted of fine linen cloth dyed a deep rich purple hue. Then came several pieces of a heavy, rich kind of brocade; then a quant.i.ty of thin filmy muslin, fine as if woven of a cobweb, and exquisitely embroidered with a beautiful and intricate design in very fine gold thread. The brocades had been greatly admired by Sibylla, but these embroidered muslins simply threw her into ecstasies.
”Oh!” she exclaimed, clasping her hands in almost childish delight, ”they are lovely; never in my life have I ever seen anything half so exquisitely beautiful!”
”Then,” said Ned, in the most matter of fact way, ”I'll tell you what we will do. The next time we come here we will be provided with the means of carrying off enough of the stuff to make you a dress or two. We cannot do so now, as the men would see it, and questions would be asked; which would never do. But next trip we will contrive to carry away a bolt or two of it.”
Sibylla was a true woman; and even in her present predicament her feminine love of things beautiful was strong enough to win from her a ready a.s.sent to Ned's proposition. In the meantime the muslins were carefully re-folded--a task of some little difficulty, owing to their filmy texture--and replaced in the bale.
Quite a large pile of small brick-like parcels next came in for a share of Ned's attention. They, like the bales, were enveloped in wax-cloth, and like the jars were singularly heavy. Ned opened one, and on removing the cloth wrapper disclosed to view a block of dull yellow virgin gold. The block was about the same shape as, but a little larger than an ordinary English brick, and stamped or moulded on each side was a sign or symbol of hieroglyphic character.
Ned did not consider it necessary to open any more of the brick-like parcels, as, after his experience with the jars, he felt fairly satisfied that, if opened, each parcel would be found to contain a gold brick similar to the one already disclosed. He was therefore about to suggest a descent to the boat, under the impression that his inspection of the cave and its contents had been completed, when it occurred to him that he might as well strike a match or two and throw a little light into the extreme corner of the cave, in which, now that his eyes were growing somewhat accustomed to the gloom, he fancied he could detect a pile or stack of some kind. He accordingly drew from his pocket a box of matches, and, placing some half a dozen of them together, ignited them. This afforded him light enough to see that there really _was_ a stack of long dark curved objects piled in the angle. To get at these it was necessary for him to climb over the heap of gold bricks, which formed a kind of barrier across the corner, and in so doing his eye fell upon one brick quite at the rear of the stack which was very considerably larger than the others.
Reaching the mysterious stack in the corner he selected one of the long curved objects and, brus.h.i.+ng the dust from it as well as he could, proceeded to sc.r.a.pe through the remaining coat of dirt with his knife.
By this means he soon reached a hard bone-like substance, upon which he presently sc.r.a.ped a white surface, when the expenditure of a few more matches revealed the fact that he had been operating upon an elephant's tusk, of which nearly a hundred he thought must be stacked in that dark corner.
On his return to the lighter part of the cave where he had left Sibylla, his attention was again attracted by the extra large brick-like parcel, which he thought he might as well examine. He accordingly raised it from the floor to carry it further forward into the light, when, though tolerably heavy, the comparative ease with which he lifted it at once a.s.sured him that, whatever else it might be, it certainly was not gold.
The grimy cloth wrapping was soon removed, and a casket of discoloured but still recognisable bra.s.s of elaborate and curious workmans.h.i.+p was disclosed. The lid was not secured in any way, otherwise than by the hinges; and so perfect had been the protection afforded by the wax-cloth wrapping that these worked without difficulty. The lid was quickly raised, and the casket--which measured about fifteen inches long by nine inches wide, and perhaps ten inches deep--was found to contain a number of neat wax-cloth parcels. The first which came to hand--and which, by the way, was by far the largest one--was at once opened, and there before the eyes of the admiring pair, fresh as if just removed from the sh.e.l.l, lay some two hundred or more magnificent pearls--magnificent not only in respect of their unusual size, but also of their exquisite l.u.s.tre and perfect globular form. Needless to say that in presence of these superb and incomparable gems Sibylla's admiration of the embroidered muslins dwindled away to insignificance, and her minute examination of the pearls plunged her into a perfect trance of delight.
The other parcels were found to contain rubies, sapphires, emeralds, diamonds, and other precious stones, all in their rough state just as they had been unearthed from the mine, but all without exception of extraordinary size. At first the fortunate finders were not greatly impressed at the sight of these stones, for neither of them quite knew what they were--though they judged them to be valuable from the circ.u.mstance that they had been deemed worthy of a place in the same receptacle with the pearls--and it was only the gleam of the diamonds which at last awakened in their minds a suspicion that the stones were really precious. When at length, however, this suspicion fairly dawned upon them Ned positively gasped for breath.
”Why,” he exclaimed, ”we are _rich_! rich beyond the power of computation. There must be at least a hundred magnificent fortunes in this veritable cave of Aladdin; and now all that we have to do is to give those ruffians the slip, when I will find means to return here and recover all this treasure. Now,” he went on, ”I'll tell you what we will do. We will divide the contents of this box into two about equal portions, one of which we will convey from time to time on board the s.h.i.+p, whilst the other shall remain here; and in this way I think we may make reasonably sure of securing one half of the gems whatever happens.
The gold we must leave, I think, as too c.u.mbersome to be dealt with under our present circ.u.mstances, but the dresses you certainly _shall_ have. Now, slip those pearls into your pocket, and I will take as many of the diamonds and what not as I can stow away, after which I think we had better see about getting back to the s.h.i.+p.”
”But,” interposed Sibylla, ”have we any right to touch these things?
Surely they must belong to some one?”
”I have not the slightest idea who was the former rightful owner of all this property,” replied Ned, laughing; ”but, whoever he was, he has been dust and ashes ages ago, and so too have the rovers who, I expect, brought them to this out-of-the-way place and hid them in this cave.
Why, by the look alone of the things, the arms especially, they must have been here at least hundreds of years! There is no doubt a deeply interesting story attaching to this h.o.a.rd, but what it is we shall probably never know. Of one thing, however, you may rest a.s.sured, and that is that we, as the finders, have a better right to everything in this cave than anyone now living.”