Part 8 (1/2)

I did not translate the whole of this speech to Pablo, for talk even in fun about eating El Sabio was rather a delicate matter, considering how close a shave that worthy animal had had to being eaten in dead earnest; but I did tell him that the Senor Young felt sure that he could swing El Sabio up through the air to where the stair began. And with Pablo--who also could use his hands well--most willingly helping, Young contrived in a surprisingly short time to make a rough windla.s.s, that was effective enough for the work to be done with it, and to pull it up bit by bit into the chamber in the rock and there fit it together over the hole. El Sabio, being brought into the recess behind the idol, regarded us all with a doubting expression that even Pablo's repeated a.s.surances that we meant well by him could not change into a look of trustfulness.

Pablo declared, however, that in his heart of hearts the Wise One knew that we all were his friends, and that even though we should hurt him a little he would understand that it was for his good. And the conduct of the a.s.s during the exceedingly bad half-hour that he then went through seemed fully to bear out Pablo's words. Around his small body, with stays running forward around his neck and aft to his tail, we rigged looped ropes--which ropes were gathered together above his back and there made fast to the line that was pendent from the windla.s.s above.

From time to time, as this operation was going forward, El Sabio turned his head upon one shoulder or the other and gazed with a wistful expression at what we were doing to him; and the slow shake that he gave his head, whereby his great ears were set to wagging mournfully, as he finished each of these inspections, betrayed the grave wonder that was within him as to what it all could mean, together with a not unnatural apprehension of what might be its ultimate outcome.

By a good chance, the effect upon the Wise One of finding the solid earth drop suddenly from beneath his feet--when at last all was in readiness, and Young and Rayburn began to hoist away at the windla.s.s--was to render him quite rigid with terror; and there was a most agonized look upon his face as he went sailing up through the air.

Pablo, standing below with me, that we might steady the a.s.s with a guy-rope during his ascent, addressed to him all manner of tender and comforting words; but for once the Wise One seemed to be insensible to his master's voice. Neither with his eyes nor his ears did he respond; and he well enough might have been taken for a dead a.s.s going heavenward, but for the sharp twitchings of his tail. And when at last he was safely within the upper chamber, he fairly fell down upon the rocky floor of it in sheer exhaustion begot of fright. It was not until we had pa.s.sed up a bucket of water to him, whereof he drank the very last drop, and had been soothed by Pablo's fondling of him and by Pablo's gentle words, that his broken spirit revived. And so limp and weak was he that it was a long while before we could in conscience urge him to ascend the stair. When at last he set himself to this undertaking, he was far from accomplis.h.i.+ng it in the bounding and deer-like manner that Pablo had promised for him; but he certainly did at last get to the top--which was all that was required of him--and there drank gratefully the bucketful of water that Pablo had carried up that great height for his comforting when his toilsome climbing should end. And Pablo went down into the valley once more that night in order to bring back to his friend a hearty supper of rich gra.s.s.

[Ill.u.s.tration: EL SABIO'S PREDICAMENT]

By the time that all this hard work was accomplished the day was nearly at an end; and even had there been light for us to see our way by we were too tired to go on--for every bone and muscle in our bodies was weary and sore. Therefore we made our camp for the night on the flat expanse of rock where the stair ended; and we were thankful that enough of the eagle remained to us for our supper--and, indeed, we made our breakfast on him also, for he was a prodigiously large bird. Very different were our feelings as we wrapped ourselves in our blankets and settled ourselves to sleep on that open mountain-top--with the path clear before us, and with the cheering hope in our hearts that among the mountains we should find a plenty of wild creatures suitable for food--from the dull despairing languor that had possessed us as we sank to sleep the night before. And with our joy was also a reverent thankfulness--that was more strongly stimulated by certain words which Fray Antonio spoke ere we lay down to rest--that our deliverance was accomplished from that death-stricken valley wherein we ourselves so surely had expected that we must die.

XIV.

THE HANGING CHAIN.

By the winding way which we followed along the mountain-top (and that this was the way we wished to follow the King's symbol and the pointing arrow plainly showed), we came presently close beside the rift in the cliffs through which the waters of the upper lake had been discharged upon the city in the valley below and so had buried it. And here we made a very surprising discovery--which was no less than that the great rift in the rocks through which the water had been let loose was not, as we had supposed, the result of some fierce convulsion of nature, but very plainly was the fiercer work of man. Along the face of the opening whence the water had poured forth the rock was grooved, showing that drill-holes had been made, close together, from the edge of the cliff backward to the lake that once had filled all the valley now lying bare and empty before us; and with the field-gla.s.s we could see that there was a like channelling of the rock upon the farther side of the break.

And all doubt in our minds in regard to this matter was removed by our finding a vastly long drill--made of the bright, hard metal that we now were familiar with, yet could not at all understand its composition--lying close beside the chasm upon the bare rock.

”There has been the devil's own work here!” said Rayburn, as he fully took in this extraordinary situation. ”Whoever did this must have spent months over it, perhaps years, working with such tools as these. They evidently went at it systematically, with the deliberate intention of drowning the whole crowd down below. From an engineering stand-point I must say that it's a good piece of work. See how cleverly they've picked out this particular spot, where the wall of rock went down almost perpendicularly into the lake, and so got the full value of the thrust of the water when their cuts were finished. If I'm not mistaken, there was a third line of drill-holes sunk in the middle of the ma.s.s that they meant to cut loose. That's the way I should have done it: then there would have been a little giving in the centre that would have helped to loosen the sides. But what a lot of incarnate devils they must have been to go at such a job!”

Truly, there was something chilling to the blood in the thought of the slow labor of them who had toiled here, day after day and month after month, until their ghastly purpose was accomplished, and they had slain a whole city without striking a single honest blow. Such vengeance upon an enemy as here was taken never had its equal for cold, malignant cruelty since the world began. Down in the valley below we had seen gleaming beneath the calm surface of the lake the bones of the thousands who had perished when this diabolical work was completed, and the waters bounded forth, s.h.i.+ning and sparkling in the sunlight, on their mission of death. And whoever let them loose must have stood just where we now were standing; and at sight of what came of their long labor there must have been such joy as no h.e.l.l could adequately punish in their black hearts.

Our bodies shuddered as we turned and left the scene of this tremendous tragedy; that was the more appalling to us because of the profound mystery in which was buried everything related to it save the fact that it had been.

For a long distance our way went onward beside the bare, deep valley that had been the basin of the lake, and so the thought of the horror which had been wrought so devilishly with its innocent waters lingered gloomily in our minds. Involuntarily we a.s.sociated the unknown people of a long past time who had perpetrated this hideous wholesale murder with the people for whom we now were searching, and an uncertain dread filled our souls as to what might be our own fate should we end by finding what we sought. From the tender mercies of a race in which stealthy craft and cold, malignant cruelty evidently were such conspicuous characteristics, little was to be expected. Therefore, it was in a sombre mood, and with but little talk among us, that we went forward upon our way.

The path that we followed showed the same care in the making of it that we had found in the path leading down from the canon into the valley where the drowned city was. Throughout the length of it, by carrying it skilfully along the windings of the mountain-sides, an equable, easy grade was maintained; where it led across open s.p.a.ces the loose stones had been cleared away and stood heaped along each side of it; where it skirted precipices the solid rock had been cut out in order to give a wider and a surer foothold; and here and there in its course crevices which traversed it were bridged with great slabs of stone. Rayburn was lost in admiration of the engineering skill that was shown in its construction, and declared that a very little extra work put on it would fit it for the laying of a line of rails.

The valley on our right, in which the lake had been, narrowed as we advanced; and as the path that we followed had a steadily rising grade (according to Rayburn's estimate, of a trifle more than three per cent.), the bottom of it fell away rapidly. As we reached what had been, as we found, the foot of the lake, we discovered fresh evidence of the enormous amount of labor that had been expended in order to make its waters an effective engine of destruction. Far in the depths beneath us, extending across the whole width of the valley--but here the valley had so narrowed that it was less a valley than a canon--we saw a high and vastly broad stone wall. It was then that we perceived fully the whole of the devilish design, and realized the years that must have been given to its execution. By the building of the wall the level of the lake had been raised fully three hundred feet, and so a head of water had been obtained strong enough to thrust out the ma.s.s of rock that had been loosened by drilling through its centre and at its sides. It would have been possible, also, for the rock that was to be broken away to be greatly thinned by quarrying its open face while the water was rising slowly after the great dam was built. Clearly, the whole work had been planned with a calm, diabolical ingenuity that a.s.sured with absolute certainty the accomplishment of the horrible purpose that those who labored at it had in view. It seemed impossible, but for the proof that we here had of it, that human hearts could have in them enough of purely devilish cruelty to spend years in thus working out to perfection so hideous a vengeance; and to me it seemed all the more dreadful because of the time that had pa.s.sed since this most evil deed was done.

Centuries had vanished, and the slayers--living out the few years of their lifetime--had perished from off the earth as utterly as had the slain; yet here the whole proof of the great crime that had been wrought lived on in enduring stone that was like to last until the very end of the world should come. Thus had these sinners left behind them, raised by their own hands, a monument telling of their sin; which sin had not even the redeeming quality of pa.s.sionateness, but was slow and subtle and cruelly cold.

We were glad to turn from sight of this place and press onward into the canon, for such the valley now had become; and we found in the dark shadows which enveloped us in this deep cleft between the mountains a sombreness in keeping with the feelings in our hearts. So high above us towered the cliffs that at their top they seemed almost to meet, showing between them only a narrow ribbon of bright blue sky, and below us the chasm went down sheer for a thousand feet; a gloomy depth that our eyes could not have penetrated had there not gleamed at the bottom of it the foam and sparkle of a little stream. Here the path was hewn almost continuously out of the solid rock; and we could see that a like path was cut in the rock on the other side. That so prodigious a piece of work should be thus duplicated seemed to us a very astonis.h.i.+ng waste of energy; for even Young did not have much faith in his own suggestion that two prehistoric railway companies had secured rights of way along the opposite sides of the canon, and had begun the building there of rival lines.

But the matter was explained, presently, by our finding that this other path was but a doubling of the path that we were on. As we rounded a turn in the canon we came suddenly to a broad natural ledge in the rock, over which hung a great projection of the cliff so that the sky above was hid from us. Here our path went off into the air, and began again on the other side of the vastly deep chasm, a good sixty feet away. ”Rather long for a jump,” was Rayburn's curt comment as we pulled up on the edge of the precipice and looked at each other blankly. Yet it was evident that those who had made with such great expense of toil and time these path-ways on the opposite sides of the canon had crossed in some way from the one to the other at this point, and the only surmise that seemed to fit the facts of the case was that there had been stretched across the chasm a swinging bridge of _lianas_--such as still are to be found spanning streams in the hot lands of Mexico--and that in the course of ages this had rotted entirely away. But as this bridge, if ever there had been one here, was absolutely gone, we found ourselves in as shrewdly strait a place as men well could be in. To go ahead was as clearly impossible as was the hopelessness of turning back upon our path. At the most, we could only return to the valley out of which we had climbed with such thankfulness; and rather than go back to die of starvation in that place, so beautiful and so desolate, there was not one of us but would have chosen to end all quickly by springing into the gulf above which we stood.

But while we thus stood in dreary contemplation of the miserable prospect before us, Young, as his habit was, was spying about him sharply, and so spied out a way of deliverance for us. The announcement of his discovery was made in a very characteristic way.

”You set up to be some punkins of an engineer, now don't you?” he said, addressing Rayburn. ”But did you ever happen to hear of a bridge that was hung up at one end an' that was operated by swingin' it backward an'

forward like a pendulum?”

”No,” Rayburn answered, promptly and decisively, ”I never did.”

”So I thought,” Young went on. ”Well, you've admitted that in sev'ral things th' man who was in charge of construction on this line could have given you points, an' this swingin' bridge notion is one of 'em. I can't say that I think much of it. It wouldn't do in railroads, for sure; but there is a good deal to be said in favor of it when it helps folks out of such a hole as we're in now--an' if it still is in workin' order, that is just what it's going to do. There it is. Do you catch on?”

We all looked in the direction in which Young pointed, for his gesture was so earnest that even Fray Antonio and Pablo caught the meaning of it, and so saw--pendent from a point far up on the overhang of rock, and but indistinctly showing in the shadow--a great chain that at its lower end was caught in a metal hook set in the face of the cliff at the extreme back of the ledge on which we stood. For my part, I did not at once catch the meaning of Young's words even when I saw the chain, but Rayburn understood it all in a moment.