intoit, but the stuff slipped away like fine wood ash, and we went on andon. I knew Holman was in front of me. Occasionally a curse directed atLeith managed to slip out when his mouth was not filled with thesmothering dust. Once I shouted at him, and he answered the cry with agroan that told me how the happening had affected him. The arch ruffianhad checkmated us for the third time inside three days.
We struck the bottom at last, and, like moles, we clawed our way out ofthe pile of soft, feathery stuff that came streaming down upon us like ariver, and for some minutes we were busy wiping the fluffy ash frommouth and eyes and ears. It clung to us like down, and with each breathwe drew it into our lungs till we coughed and sneezed from theirritation it produced. Struggling forward, knee-deep in the fine, drypowder, we reached a spot that was practically clear, and for fiveminutes we were busy endeavouring to relieve our tortured lungs.
"How far did we roll?" asked Holman.
"About half a mile," I replied.
"But straight, Verslun! What do you think?"
"Over a hundred yards; I'm certain of that."
"Well, I'm going to climb back."
"You can't do it!" I gasped. "That stuff is like quicksand."
"All the same I'm going to make a try."
We stumbled back to the gigantic ash pile, and shoulder to shoulder wemade a rush at the immense mountain down which we had rolled. Wecouldn't see it, but we felt it rise around us like a flood as our legssank deeper. It came up to our waists--to our armpits, choking andsmothering us. Coming down we had rolled lightly over its surface, nowour legs bored into it like rods, and we struggled vainly to move. Thepile was like a high snowdrift into which we sank deeper and deeper themore we struggled, and, worn out with our efforts, we fought our wayclear of the smothering ash and made an attempt to review the situation.
"He's beat us," groaned Holman. "He just trotted ahead of us till hehad us on the verge of the thing, and then he side-stepped. O God! Whatasses we have been!"
"We did our best," I said.
"Our best?" repeated Holman. "And the man who tells you that he did hisbest as an excuse for failure should be shot, Verslun."
"We couldn't tell that this infernal trench was in front," I grumbled.
"Then we shouldn't have chased him like a brace of madmen. I wonder ifMaru and Kaipi came near it?"
"We might call out, perhaps they'd hear."
Holman yelled the names of the two natives into the gloom above us, buthis yells only started a million echoes rolling through the tremendousfissure in which we were prisoners.
"They turned back," said Holman. "They had sense enough to stay with OneEye; we hadn't."
It was no use arguing with the youngster. He denounced our stupiditytill his tongue was too dry to utter the charges his half-crazed brainmade against us.
To divert his thoughts I proposed that we make an attempt to explore theplace, and without making any choice regarding direction we moved intothe inky darkness.
"We'll take it in turns to lead," said Holman gruffly. "Then if one ofus topples over a precipice the other has a chance to save himself. I'lltake first try at it, and if I find that I have pushed my foot into ahole I'll yell out a warning."
I agreed, and we moved forward slowly. The chances of ever finding ourway out of that place seemed small at that moment. Leith had put us in aspot where we would not be likely to trouble him for some time, and withbitterness in our hearts we staggered along in the dark, alternatelydamning the treachery of the ruffian and our own stupidity. We had triedto exercise caution, but when we reviewed our actions, it seemed, asHolman had remarked, that we had used the judgment of children.
"Why didn't we wait at the door of that place till the brute came out?"he asked.
I had no answer to give to the question, and after an interval ofsilence he fired others at me.
"Why did you let go of One Eye? Why didn't we examine the cavern nearthe fire before chasing him? The girls might have been somewhere nearthe fire! Do you think they were?"
"I don't think so," I answered, trying to soothe him. "I think Leith wasthe only person at the fire. He picked Soma up just before we reachedthe gulf."
"But where are they? Where has the devil put them?"
"God alone knows!" I cried. "Here, it's my turn to take the lead."
In silence we went stumbling on into the appalling blackness. We couldnot see the dim outlines of each other when we stood only a few inchesapart. The darkness of the Cavern of Skulls had been relieved by thesilver skewers of moonlight, but in the night that rolled around usthere was not a single gleam of light.
We had no matches. Everything that was in our pockets had been joltedout during the mad jaunt to the stone table, and now the revolver andcartridges which we had taken from One Eye had been lost by Holmanduring the slide down the mountain of volcanic ash that brought us tothe bottom of the underground prison.
We plodded on for about an hour, then stopped simultaneously. At first Ithought that the horror of the situation had affected my brain, but thefact that Holman had stopped abruptly at the same moment as I did chokedback the cold fear that had rushed upon me. I was not insane! Holman waslistening too! I seemed to feel that the tiny thread of sound which hadset my pulses beating madly had also keyed him up to the highesttension.
After a minute of intense silence he put a question.
"Did you hear anything?"
"Did you?" I stammered.
"Are we mad, Verslun?" he asked hoarsely. "I thought--" He stopped andmoved close to me. I heard his quick breathing as he groped to find me.
"Verslun, did you hear?" he whispered, gripping my arm. "I heard herspeak."
"I thought I did," I breathed. "Perhaps--perhaps it was an echo."
For a few minutes we stood, our ears searching for the sound that haddisturbed us. We seemed afraid to call out--afraid to quench the littlespark of hope which had suddenly flared up in the despair that filledour breasts. We knew that our ears had lied, and we tried to lengthenthe thrill by remaining perfectly silent.
The sound came again, and Holman sent a wild cry into the night thathemmed us in. We were not insane! The spark of hope blazed as we rushedheadlong forward. The silvery voice of Barbara Herndon had come to usagain through the terrible gloom!
CHAPTER XXI
TOGETHER AGAIN
It is impossible to set down any statement that will enable the readerto form a mental picture of the meeting which took place in that spot ofeternal night. Hands groped for hands in the darkness, and sobs andcries and words of comfort went out into the silence. Edith and BarbaraHerndon wept, the Professor shrieked out denunciations of Leith, andHolman and I were nearly choked by the lumps that rose in our throats.
Explanations came in broken sentences. The Professor's anger preventedhim from giving the story in detail, and the girls were not in acondition to give a lucid account of their sufferings since the nightwe had left them to investigate the light in the hills. We gathered fromthe hysterical utterances, however, that Leith had rushed them to thehills on hearing from the escaped dancer that we had dodged the fate heintended for us when he had dispatched us to the table of the centipede.The reduction in his bodyguard caused him to make immediately for thesecret retreat, and as he considered it inadvisable to press hisargument with the Professor and Edith at that moment, he had lowered histhree prisoners into the devil chamber into which we had accidentallyfallen.
"This is the place you mentioned to me the night you left the camp,"said the Professor.
"We mentioned?" repeated Holman in amazement. "We didn't know the placeexisted till we rolled into it!"
"But you read it out of the note that Soma dropped," cried thescientist. "Don't you remember where he threatened to put the fivebabies?"
"The Black Kindergarten!" I stammered.
"The Black Kindergarten," said the old man. "That is what the inhumanbrute called the place when he lowered us into it. We are to stay heretill I sign papers that will give him possession of my prope
rty, andtill--till Edith consents to marry him!"
He flung the words out into the stillness, and for a few minutes no onespoke. The horror of the situation had the same effect upon me as a blowfrom a sandbag. Three days before, we were in possession of Leith'sletter to the one-eyed man, in which he had remarked that we would beoccupants of the place of eternal night, and yet we had not been able toavert the fate which the brute had in store for us in case the Professorand Edith Herndon refused to consider his villainous proposals. TheProfessor's money and the girl's hand! The words made me physicallysick, and I sat down upon the floor of the place till the dizziness hadpassed from my brain.
"And food?" Holman put the question, but the words seemed to come to mefrom a great distance.
"He told us he would lower it to us once a day till we--till we came toour senses," said Edith Herndon quietly. "We received our first supplysome hours ago."
She tried to speak bravely, but the little catch in her voice belied thecourageous front which she endeavoured to assume under cover of thedarkness. Barbara was silent, except for an occasional sob which she wasunable to stifle, while the Professor poured forth his story of Leith'sdeception when he first met him in Sydney, and where the big scoundrelhad poured into the ears of the laurel-hungry scientist the tales ofskulls and ruins which he would find upon the Isle of Tears. The skullsand ruins were there, but it looked as if we would add our own skeletonsto the crumbling bones of the long-dead Polynesians, the peculiaritiesof whose whitened brain cases were to supply the subject matter of thelearned treatise that was to bring fame to the archaeologist. It was anindescribably mournful reunion. We could not see each other, and whensilence fell upon us I had a horrible sensation that the choking,depressing darkness of the place was wafting Edith Herndon away from me.I longed to find and clasp the hand that had taken mine the night onboard _The Waif_ when I made an offer of my services.
The Professor had explained that the opening through which they had beenlowered was immediately above their heads. They had not moved from thespot lest they would not be able to find it again to obtain the foodwhich Leith had promised to send till they saw fit to accede to hisproposals, and when Holman suggested moving forward upon a tour ofinvestigation the old man combated the idea vigorously.
"We will lose ourselves, and we will never be able to find our way backhere to get the food," he cried.
"But we will never get out by remaining here," said Holman. "If he hasmade the acceptance of those proposals the only grounds upon which hewill grant you your liberty, I don't see that it will serve any good toremain here taking the food he throws down."
"That's true," murmured Edith, and I blessed her mentally for the calmway in which she had uttered the words. The surrounding darkness had noterrors for her in comparison to the fate that awaited her above. Themanner in which she spoke of the sallow-faced rogue convinced me thatthe proposals that had been made since the time that Leith had shone outin his true colours had produced a terror which she endeavoured to hidefrom her father and sister.
But the dark terrified the Professor. Although he viewed Leith'sproposals with the greatest abhorrence, the hole above his head appearedto him to be the only path back to the outer world, and he was afraid tostray.
"There might be another way out of the place," said Holman. "Can Verslunand I make the attempt and leave you three here?"
"No, no!" cried Barbara. "Please stay here with us!"
"I think it will be better if we remain together," said Edith. "If youand Mr. Verslun did discover an opening it would be exceedinglydifficult to find your way back here, and if you got out of this placeyou might not be able to reach the opening through which we werelowered. Perhaps the way to it is known only to Leith."
Edith's argument was sound. Our finding them in that black cavern waspurely an accident, and it was hardly probable that Holman and myselfwould be able to find our way back to the spot if we went off on a tourof investigation. Personally I had no desire to leave the girls. Leith'sdeviltry had so impressed me that I considered him capable of anything,and if he thought we were out of the way, I had no doubt that he wouldtake immediate steps to break down the courage of the Professor and hisdaughters by means that were familiar to him. I could well understandthat Edith Herndon's love for her father would compel her to sacrificeherself if she saw the aged Professor in front of the great stonecentipede, and that might happen at any moment now that Leith consideredthat he had disposed of all active opposition.
For hours we debated the matter, and finally the Professor was won over.He agreed to move forward on an inspection tour of the vast subterraneanplace the moment the next supply of food came from above, and we waitedanxiously. During the wait Holman and I made short trips into thedarkness, but we were careful that we did not get out of the hearing ofthe two girls, who called at intervals so that we would be able to findour way back. The place was awe-inspiring. Its size could only beguessed at. Stones that were flung in a certain direction where thefloor sloped gradually downward could be heard rolling for many minutesafter they left our hands.
We guessed that it was early morning when we heard from Leith. A blazingtorch illuminated a round hole about seventy feet above our heads, andHolman and I immediately remained quiet so that the big scoundrel wouldbe in ignorance of the reunion. There was no possibility of thetorchlight making our presence known. It would take a score of torchesto enable him to see us.
Leith thrust his head over the edge of the hole while Soma held thetorch, and, with a coarse laugh, the ruffian inquired if his victims hadchanged their minds.
"No, we have not," replied the Professor, his thin, quavering voicesounding strangely weak after the deep-throated bellow of the bully ontop.
"Well, you'll change it soon," cried Leith. "I'll leave you down therefor another day or two, and then I'll get you up to do some stunts. Mindyou, I mean a proper marriage with Miss Edith, Professor! _The Waif_will run us up to the German missionary station while you take chargehere for your affectionate son-in-law."
I opened my mouth to fling an answer at the taunting scoundrel, butHolman surmised my intention and begged me to hold my tongue.
"They'll get no food if you cry out!" he whispered. "Don't speak to him,man!"
The Professor made no answer to the offensive remark, and after a fewminutes' silence Leith drew back, and Soma started to lower a bundle offood into the dark prison.
"That rope might prove useful," whispered Holman. "Feel around and seeif you can get hold of it before he pulls it up."
The light of the torch which Leith held only illuminated about six feetof the rope as the native passed it into the prison, so Holman and I,standing directly under the opening, felt around in the darkness as thebundle of food came toward the ground.
"I have it!" murmured Holman. "Wait till he unhooks the bundle."
We let the rope run through our hands till the package of food touchedthe rock floor. The line had a small hook upon the end, and the momentSoma felt that the parcel had reached the bottom of the place, hedexterously unhooked it with a slight jerk and started to haul in.
"Now!" whispered the youngster. "A big pull! We might bring the niggerthrough the hole!"
We went very close to performing the feat. The jolt took the nativeunawares; he fell forward on his knees and barely saved himself fromdropping into the opening. The rope came toward us with a run, but as wepulled furiously it stopped with a sudden jerk, and we knew that theother end was tied to some projection on the surface.
Leith laughed derisively, and the laugh maddened Holman. He clutched therope and started to climb rapidly upward. I couldn't see him, but I felthis shoes as he wriggled away into the darkness above me, and I held mybreath, I gripped the rope and kept it taut so that Leith and Soma mightnot discover the ruse.
But Leith had more cunning than we credited him with. After a futilepull at the rope he thrust the pine torch through the hole, and as itdropped into the cavern it illuminated the figure of Holman, who wast
hen about fifteen feet from the floor. "Cut the rope!" roared theruffian. "Quick, Soma! Cut the rope and break the ---- fool's neck!"
Holman, realizing that it was impossible to reach the top, saved himselfa nasty fall by sliding down the rope while the native slashed at it,but he had not touched the floor when the ninety feet of strong manillacame whirling down through the darkness. And the rope was not the onlygift we received. Angry at discovering that we had escaped death in ourplunge into the place, Leith poured forth a stream of blasphemy thatoutdid the effort he had made when kicking Holman and me on theafternoon the youngster had wounded him. He cursed us till the shockedProfessor dragged his two daughters away out of hearing, and there wefound the three when we had gathered up the rope and the food.
"We might as well make a try to explore the place," said Holman. "Thescoundrel says that he will not send down any more food till you accepthis proposals."
"Then we'll never get any," said Edith Herndon quietly. "I pray that Godwill show us the way out of this place."
CHAPTER XXII
THE WHITE WATERFALL
We found the rope exceedingly useful now that we had decided to explorethe place in search of a way out. It was reasonable to think that thefloor of the cavern would contain innumerable fissures into which wemight fall, and to guard against this we decided to make a life line outof the thirty yards