Queen Sheba's Ring Part 20

"If you can, save my son also," I whispered.

"I'll do my best if I can get hold of him," he answered. "Sergeant, if anything happens to me you know your duty."

"I'll try and follow your example, Captain, under all circ.u.mstances, though that will be hard," replied Quick in a rather shaky voice.

Oliver stepped out on the ladder. I reckoned that twelve or fourteen short paces would take him across, and the first half of these he accomplished with quiet certainty. When he was in the exact middle of the pa.s.sage, however, the end of one of the uprights of the ladder at the farther side slipped a little, notwithstanding the efforts of j.a.phet to keep it straight, with the result that the plank bound on the rungs lost its level, sinking an inch or so to the right, and nearly causing Oliver to fall from it into the gulf. He wavered like a wind-shaken reed, attempted to step forward, hesitated, stopped, and slowly sank on to his hands and knees.

"_Ah_!" panted Maqueda.

"The Gentile has lost his head," began Joshua in a voice full of the triumph that he could not hide. "He--will----"

Joshua got no further, for Quick, turning, threatened him savagely with his fist, saying in English:

"Stow your jaw if you don't want to follow him, you swine," whereon Joshua, who understood the gesture, if not the words, relapsed into silence.

Now the Mountaineer on the farther side spoke, saying:

"Have no fear, the ladder is safe."

For a moment Oliver remained in his crouching posture on the board, which was all that separated him from an awful death in the gulf beneath. Next, while we watched, agonized, he rose to his feet again, and with perfect calmness walked across to its other end.

"Well done our side!" said Quick, addressing Joshua, "why don't your Royal Highness cheer? No, you leave that knife alone, or presently there'll be a hog the less in this world," and stooping down he relieved the Prince of the weapon which he was fingering with his round eyes fixed upon the Sergeant.

Maqueda, who had noted all, now interfered.

"My uncle," she said, "brave men are risking their lives yonder while we sit in safety. Be silent and cease from quarrelling, I pray you."

Next moment we had forgotten all about Joshua, being utterly absorbed in watching the drama in progress upon the farther side of the gulf. After a slight pause to recover his nerve or breath, Orme rose, and preceded by j.a.phet, climbed up the bush-like rock till he reached the shaft of the sphinx's tail. Here he turned and waved his hand to us, then following the Mountaineer, walked, apparently with the utmost confidence, along the curves of the tail to where it sprang from the body of the idol. At this spot there was a little difficulty in climbing over the smooth slope of rock on to the broad terrace-like back. Soon, however, they surmounted it, and vanishing for a few seconds into the hollow of the loins, which, of course, was a good many feet deep, re-appeared moving toward the shoulders. Between these we could see Higgs standing with his back toward us, utterly unconscious of all that was pa.s.sing behind him.

Pa.s.sing j.a.phet, Oliver walked up to the Professor and touched him on the arm. Higgs turned, stared at the pair for a moment, and then, in his astonishment, or so we guessed, sat down plump upon the rock. They pulled him to his feet, Orme pointing to the cliff behind, and evidently explaining the situation and what must be done. Then followed a short and animated talk. Through the gla.s.ses we could even see Higgs shaking his head. He told them something, they came to a determination, for now he turned, stepped forward a pace or two, and vanished, as I learnt afterwards, to fetch my son, without whom he would not try to escape.

A while went by; it seemed an age, but really was under a minute. We heard the sound of shouts. Higgs's white helmet reappeared, and then his body, with two Fung guards clinging on to him. He yelled out in English and the words reached us faintly:

"Save yourself! I'll hold these devils. Run, you infernal fool, run!"

Oliver hesitated, although the Mountaineer was pulling at him, till the heads of more Fung appeared. Then, with a gesture of despair, he turned and fled. First ran Oliver, then j.a.phet, whom he had outpaced, and after them came a number of priests or guards, waving knives, while in the background Higgs rolled on the rock with his captors.

The rest was very short. Orme slid down the rump of the idol on to the tail, followed by the Mountaineer, and after them in single file came three Fung, who apparently thought no more of the perilous nature of their foothold than do the sheiks of the Egyptian pyramids when they swarm about those monuments like lizards. Nor, for the matter of that, did Oliver or j.a.phet, who doubled down the tail as though it were a race track. Oliver swung himself on to the ladder, and in a second was half across it, we holding its other end, when suddenly he heard his companion cry out. A Fung had got hold of j.a.phet by the leg and he lay face downward on the board.

Oliver halted and slowly turned round, drawing his revolver as he did so. Then he aimed and fired, and the Fung, leaving go of j.a.phet's leg, threw up his arms and plunged headlong into the gulf beneath. The next thing I remember is that they were both among us, and somebody shouted, "Pull in the ladder."

"No," said Quick, "wait a bit."

Vaguely I wondered why, till I perceived that three of those courageous Fung were following across it, resting their hands upon each other's shoulders, while their companions cheered them.

"Now, pull, brothers, pull!" shouted the Sergeant, and pull we did. Poor Fung! they deserved a better fate.

"Always inflict loss upon the enemy when you get a chance," remarked the Sergeant, as he opened fire with his repeating rifle upon other Fung who by now were cl.u.s.tering upon the back of the idol. This position, however, they soon abandoned as untenable, except one or two of them who remained there, dead or wounded.

A silence followed, in the midst of which I heard Quick saying to Joshua in his very worst Arabic:

"Now does your Royal Highness think that we Gentiles are cowards, although it is true those Fung are as good men as we any day?"

Joshua declined argument, and I turned to watch Oliver, who had covered his face with his hands, and seemed to be weeping.

"What is it, O friend, what is it?" I heard Maqueda say in her gentle voice--a voice full of tears, tears of grat.i.tude I think. "You have done a great deed; you have returned safe; all is well."

"Nay," he answered, forgetting her t.i.tles in his distress, "all is ill.

I have failed, and to-night they throw my brother to the lions. He told me so."

Maqueda, finding no answer, stretched out her hand to the Mountaineer, his companion in adventure, who kissed it.

"j.a.phet," she said, "I am proud of you; your reward is fourfold, and henceforth you are a captain of my Mountaineers."

"Tell us what happened," I said to Oliver.

"This," he answered: "I remembered about your son, and so did Higgs. In fact, he spoke of him first--they seem to have become friends. He said he would not escape without him, and could fetch him in a moment, as he was only just below. Well, he went to do so, and must have found the guard instead, who, I suppose, had heard us talking. You know as much about the rest as I do. To-night, when the full moon is two hours high, there is to be a ceremony of sacrifice, and poor Higgs will be let down into the den of lions. He was writing his will in a note-book when we saw him, as Barung had promised to send it to us."

"Doctor," said the Sergeant, in a confidential voice, when he had digested this information, "would you translate for me a bit, as I want to have a talk with Cat there, and my Arabic don't run to it?"

I nodded, and we went to that corner of the plateau where Shadrach stood apart, watching and listening.

"Now, Cat," said the Sergeant (I give his remarks in his own language, leaving out my rendering) "just listen to me, and understand that if you tell lies or play games either you or I don't reach the top of this cliff again alive. Do you catch on?"

Shadrach replied that he caught on.

"Very well. You've told us that once you were a prisoner among the Fung and thrown to these holy lions, but got out. Now just explain what happened."

"This, O Quick. After ceremonies that do not matter, I was let down in the food-basket into the feeding-den, and thrown out of the basket like any other meat. Then the gates were lifted up by the chains, and the lions came in to devour me according to their custom."

"And what happened next, Shadrach?"

"What happened? Why, of course I hid myself in the shadow as much as possible, right against the walls of the precipice, until a satan of a she-lion snuffled me out and gave a stroke at me. Look, here are the marks of her claws," and he pointed to the scars upon his face. "Those claws stung like scorpions; they made me mad. The terror which I had lost when I saw their yellow eyes came back to me. I rushed at the precipice as a cat that is hunted by a dog rushes at a wall. I clung to its smooth side with my nails, with my toes, with my teeth. A lion leaped up and tore the flesh of my leg, here, here," and he showed the marks, which we could scarcely see in that dim light. "He ran back for another spring. Above me I saw a tiny ledge, big enough for a hawk to sit on--no more. I jumped, I caught it, drawing up my legs so that the lion missed me. I made the effort a man makes once in his life. Somehow I dragged myself to that ledge; I rested one thigh upon it and pressed against the rock to steady myself. Then the rock gave, and I tumbled backward into the bottom of a tunnel. Afterwards I escaped to the top of the cliff in the dark, O G.o.d of Israel! in the dark, smelling my way, climbing like a baboon, risking death a thousand times. It took me two whole days and nights, and the last of those nights I knew not what I did. Yet I found my way, and that is why my people name me Cat."

"I understand," said Quick in a new and more respectful voice, "and however big a rascal you may be, you've got pluck. Now, say, remembering what I told you," and he tapped the handle of his revolver, "is that feeding-den where it used to be?"

"I believe so, O Quick; why should it be changed? The victims are let down from the belly of the G.o.d, just there between his thighs where are doors. The feeding-place lies in a hollow of the cliff; this platform on which we stand is over it. None saw my escape, therefore none searched for the means of it, since they thought that the lions had devoured me, as they have devoured thousands. No one enters there, only when the beasts have fed full they draw back to their sleeping-dens, and those who watch above let down the bars. Listen," and as he spoke we heard a crash and a rattle far below. "They fall now, the lions having eaten.

When Black Windows and perhaps others are thrown to them, by and by, they will be drawn up again."

"Is that hole in the rock still there, Shadrach?"

"Without doubt, though I have not been down to look."

"Then, my boy, you are going now," remarked Quick grimly.

CHAPTER XII