VI
THE CURSE OF MANSICHE
We entered the Prince Edward Albert a few minutes later, one of the newand beautiful family hotels uptown.
Before making any inquiries, Craig gave a hasty look about the lobby.Suddenly I felt him take my arm and draw me over to a little alcove onone side. I followed the direction of his eyes. There I could see youngAlfonso de Moche talking to a woman much older than himself.
"That must be his mother," whispered Craig. "You can see theresemblance. Let's sit here awhile behind these palms and watch."
They seemed to be engaged in an earnest conversation about something.Even as they talked, though we could not guess what it was about, itwas evident that Alfonso was dearer than life to the woman and that theyoung man was a model son. Though I felt that I must admire them eachfor it, still, I reflected, that was no reason why we should notsuspect them--perhaps rather a reason for suspecting.
Senora de Moche was a woman of well-preserved middle age, a largewoman, with dark hair and contrasting full, red lips. Her face, inmarked contradiction to her Parisian costume and refined manners, had aslight copper swarthiness about it which spoke eloquently of herancestry.
But it was her eyes that arrested and held one's attention most.Whether it was in the eyes themselves or in the way that she used them,there could be no mistake about the almost hypnotic power that theirowner possessed. I could not help wondering whether she might not haveexercised it on Don Luis, perhaps was using it in some way to influenceWhitney. Was that the reason why the Senorita so evidently feared her?
Fortunately, from our vantage point, we could see without being in anydanger of being seen.
"There's Whitney," I heard Craig mutter under his breath.
I looked up and saw the promoter enter from his car. At almost the sameinstant the roving eyes of the Senora seemed to catch sight of him. Hecame over and spoke to the de Moches, standing with them severalminutes. I fancied that not for an instant did she allow the gaze ofany one else to distract her in the projection of whatever weird ocularpower nature had endowed her with. If it were a battle of eyes, Irecollected the strange look that I had noted about those of bothWhitney and Lockwood. That, however, was different from the impressionone got of the Senora's. I felt that she would have to be pretty cleverto match the subtlety of Whitney.
Whatever it was they were talking about, one could see that Whitney andSenora de Moche were on very familiar terms. At the same time, young deMoche appeared to be ill at ease. Perhaps he did not approve of theintimacy with Whitney. At any rate, he seemed visibly relieved when thepromoter excused himself and walked over to the desk to get his mailand then out into the cafe.
"I'd like to get a better view of her," remarked Kennedy, rising. "Letus take a turn or two along the corridor and pass them."
We sauntered forth from our alcove and strolled down among the variousknots of people chatting and laughing. As we passed the woman and herson, I was conscious again of that strange feeling, which psychologiststell us, however, has no real foundation, of being stared at frombehind.
At the lower end of the lobby Kennedy turned suddenly and we started toretrace our steps. Alfonso's back was toward us now. Again we passedthem, just in time to catch the words, in a low tone, from the youngman, "Yes, I have seen him at the University. Every one there knowsthat he is--"
The rest of the sentence was lost. But it was not difficult toreconstruct. It referred undoubtedly to the activities of Kennedy inunravelling mysteries.
"It's quite evident," I suggested, "that they know that we areinterested in them now."
"Yes," he agreed. "There wasn't any use of watching them further fromunder cover. I wanted them to see me, just to find out what they woulddo."
Kennedy was right. Indeed, even before we turned again, we found thatthe Senora and Alfonso had risen and were making their way slowly tothe elevators, still talking earnestly. The lifts were around an angle,and before we could place ourselves so that we could observe them againthey were gone.
"I wish there was some way of adding Alfonso's shoe-prints to mycollection," observed Craig. "The marks that I found in the dust of thesarcophagus in the Museum were those of a man's shoes. However, Isuppose I must wait to get them."
He walked over to the desk and made inquiries about the de Moches andWhitney. Each had a suite on the eighth floor, though on opposite sidesand at opposite ends of the hall.
"There's no use wasting time trying to conceal our identity now,"remarked Kennedy finally, drawing a card from his case. "Besides, wecame here to see them, anyhow." He handed the card to the clerk."Senora de Moche, please," he said.
The clerk took the card and telephoned up to the de Moche suite. I mustsay that it was somewhat to my surprise that the Senora telephoned downto say that she would receive us in her own sitting room.
"That's very kind," commented Craig, as I followed him into theelevator. "It saves planning some roundabout way of meeting her andcomes directly to the point."
The elevator whisked us up directly to the eighth floor and we steppedout into the heavily carpeted hallway, passing down to Room 810, whichwas the number of her suite. Further on, in 825, was Whitney's.
Alfonso was not there. Evidently he had not ridden up with his mother,after all, but had gone out through another entrance on the groundfloor. The Senora was alone.
"I hope that you will pardon me for intruding," began Craig, with asplausible an explanation as he could muster, "but I have becomeinterested in an opportunity to invest in a Peruvian venture, and Ihave heard that you are a Peruvian. Your son, Alfonso, I have alreadymet, once. I thought that perhaps you might be able to give me someadvice." She looked at us keenly, but said nothing. I fancied that shedetected the subterfuge. Yet she had not tried, and did not try now toavoid us. Either she had no connection with the case we wereinvestigating or she was an adept actress.
On closer view, her eyes were really even more remarkable than I hadimagined at a distance. They were those of a woman endowed with anabundance of health and energy, eyes that were full of what the oldcharacter readers used to call "amativeness," denoting a nature capableof intense passion, whether of love or hate. Yet I confess that I couldnot find anything especially abnormal about them, as I had about theeyes of Lockwood and Whitney.
It was some time before she replied, and I gave a hasty glance aboutthe apartment. Of course, it had been rented furnished, but she hadrearranged it, adding some touches of her own which gave it quite aPeruvian appearance, due perhaps more to the pictures and the ornamentswhich she had introduced rather than anything else.
"I suppose," she replied, at length, slowly, and looking at us as ifshe would bore right through into our minds, "I suppose you mean theschemes of Mr. Lockwood--and Mr. Whitney."
Kennedy was not to be taken by surprise. "I have heard of theirschemes, too," he replied noncommittally. "Peru seems to be a veritablestorehouse of tales of buried treasure."
"Let me tell you about it," she hastened, nodding at the very words"buried treasure." "I suppose you know that the old Chimu tribes in thenorth were the wealthiest at the time of the coming of the Spaniards?"
Craig nodded, and a moment later she resumed, as if trying to marshalher thoughts in a logical order. "They had a custom then of buryingwith their dead all their movable property. Graves were not dugseparately. Therefore, you see, sometimes a common grave, or huaca, asit is called, would be given to many. That huaca would become a cacheof treasure in time. It was sacred to the dead, and hence it was wickedto touch it."
The Senora's face betrayed the fact that, whatever modern civilizationhad done for her, it had not yet quite succeeded in eliminating the oldideas.
"Back in the early part of the seventeenth century," she continued,leaning forward in her chair eagerly as she talked, "a Spaniard openeda Chimu huaca and found gold that is said to have been worth more thana million dollars. An Indian told him about it. Who the Indian was doesnot matter. But the Spaniard was an ancest
or of Don Luis de Mendoza,who was found murdered to-day."
She stopped short, seeming to enjoy the surprised look on our faces atfinding that she was willing to discuss the matter so intimately.
"After the Indian had shown the Spaniard the treasure in the mound,"she pursued, "the Indian told the Spaniard that he had given him onlythe little fish, the peje chica, but that some day he would give himthe big fish, the peje grande. I see that you already know at least apart of the story, anyhow."
"Yes," admitted Kennedy, "I do know something of it. But I shouldrather get it more accurately from your lips than from the hearsayof any one else."
She smiled quietly to herself. "I don't believe," she added, "that youknow that the _peje grande_ was not ordinary treasure. It was thetemple gold. Why, some of the temples were literally plated overheavily with pure gold. That gold, as well as what had been buried inthe huacas, was sacred. Mansiche, the supreme ruler, laid a curse onit, on any Indian who would tell of it, on any Spaniard who might learnof it. A curse lies on the finding--yes, even on the searching for thesacred Gold of the Gods. It is one of the most awful curses that haveever been uttered, that curse of Mansiche."
Even as she spoke of it she lowered her voice. I felt that no matterhow much education she had, there lurked back in her brain some of theprimitive impulses, as well as beliefs. Either the curse of Mansiche onthe treasure was as real to her as if its mere touch were poisonous, orelse she was going out of her way to create that impression with us.
"Somehow," she continued, in a low tone, "that Spaniard, the ancestorof Don Luis Mendoza, obtained some idea of the secret. He died," shesaid solemnly, flashing a glance at Craig from her wonderful eyes tostamp the idea indelibly. "He was stabbed by one of the members of thetribe. On the dagger, so I have heard, was marked the secret of thetreasure."
I felt that in a bygone age she might have made a great priestess ofthe heathen gods. Now, was she more than a clever actress?
She paused, then added, "That is my tribe--my family."
Again she paused. "For centuries the big fish was a secret, is still asecret--or, at least, was until some one got it from my brother down inPeru. The tradition and the dagger had been intrusted to him. I don'tknow how it happened. Somehow he seemed to grow crazy--until he talked.The dagger was stolen from him. How it happened, how it came intoProfessor Norton's hands, I do not know.
"But, at any rate," she continued, in the same solemn tone, "the cursehas followed it. After my brother had told the secret of the dagger andlost it, his mind left him. He threw himself one day into LakeTiticaca."
Her voice broke dramatically in her passionate outpouring of thetragedies that had followed the hidden treasure and the Inca dagger.
"Now, here in New York, comes this awful death of Senor Mendoza," shecried. "I don't know, no one knows, whether he had obtained the secretof the gold or not. At any rate, he must have thought he had it. He hasbeen killed suddenly, in his own home. That is my answer to yourinquiry about the treasure-hunting company you mentioned, whatever itmay be. I need say no more of the curse of Mansiche. Is the Gold of theGods worth it?"
There could be no denying that it was real to her, whatever we mightthink of the story. I recollected the roughly printed warnings that hadbeen sent to Norton, Leslie, Kennedy, and myself. Had they, then, somesignificance? I had not been able to convince myself that they were thework of a crank, alone. There must be some one to whom the execution ofvengeance of the gods was an imperative duty. Unsuperstitious as I was,I saw here a real danger. If some one, either to preserve the secretfor himself or else called by divine mandate to revenge, should take anotion to carry out the threats in the four notes, what might nothappen?
"I cannot tell you much more of fact than you probably already know,"she remarked, watching our faces intently and noting the effect ofevery word. "You know, I suppose, that the treasure has always beenbelieved to be in a large mound, a tumulus I think you call it, visiblefrom our town of Truxillo. Many people have tried to open it, but themass of sand pours down on them and they have been discouraged."
"No one has ever stumbled on the secret?" queried Kennedy.
She shook her head. "There have been those who have sought, there areeven those who are seeking, the point just where to bore into themounds. If they could find it, they plan to construct a well-timberedtunnel to keep back the sand and to drive it at the right point toobtain this fabulous wealth."
She vouchsafed the last information with a sort of quiet assurance thatconveyed the idea, without her saying it directly, that any suchventure was somehow doomed to failure, that desecrators were merelytoying with fate.
All through her story one could see that she felt deeply the downfalland betrayal of her brother, followed by the tragedy to him after theage-old secret had slipped from his grasp. Was there still to bevengeance for his downfall? Surely, I thought to myself, Don Luis deMendoza could not have been in possession of the secret, unless he hadarrived at it, with Lockwood, in some other way than by deciphering thealmost illegible marks of the dagger. I thought of Whitney. Had heperhaps had something to do with the nasty business?
I happened to glance at a huge pile of works on mining engineering onthe table, the property of Alfonso. She saw me looking at them, and hereyes assumed a far-away, dreamy impression as she murmured something.
"You must know that we real Peruvians have been so educated that wenever explore ruins for hidden treasure, not even if we have theknowledge of engineering to do so. It is a sort of sacrilege to us todo that. The gold was not our gold, you see. Some of it belongs to thespirits of the departed. But the big treasure belonged to the godsthemselves. It was the gold which lay in sheets over the temple walls,sacred. No, we would not touch it."
I wondered cynically what would happen if some one at that moment hadappeared with the authenticated secret. She continued to gaze at thebooks. "There are plenty of rare chances for a young mining engineer inPeru without that."
Apparently she was thinking of her son and his studies at theUniversity as they affected his future career.
One could follow her thoughts, even, as they flitted from the treasure,to the books, to her son, and, finally, to the pretty girl for whomboth he and Lockwood were struggling.
"We are a peculiar race," she ruminated. "We seldom intermarry withother races. We are as proud as Senor Mendoza was of his Castiliandescent, as proud of our unmixed lineage as any descendant of a 'beltedearl.'"
Senora de Moche made the remarks with a quiet dignity which left nodoubt in my mind that the race feeling cut deeply.
She had risen now, and in place of the awesome fear of the curse andtragedy of the treasure her face was burning and her eyes flashed.
"Old Don Luis thought I was good enough to amuse his idle hours," shecried. "But when he saw that Alfonso was in love with his daughter,that she might return that love, then I found out bitterly that heplaced us in another class, another caste."
Kennedy had been following her closely, and I could see now that thecross-currents of superstition, avarice, and race hatred in the casepresented a tangle that challenged him.
There was nothing more that we could extract from her just then. Shehad remained standing, as a gentle reminder that the interview hadalready been long.
Kennedy took the hint. "I wish to thank you for the trouble you havegone to," he bowed, after we, too, had risen. "You have told me quiteenough to make me think seriously before I join in any suchundertaking."
She smiled enigmatically. Whether it was that she had enjoyedpenetrating our rather clumsy excuse for seeing her, or that she feltthat the horror of the curse had impressed us, she seemed well content.
We bowed ourselves out, and, after waiting a few moments about thehotel without seeing Whitney anywhere, Craig called a car.
"They were right," was his only comment. "A most baffling woman,indeed."