Treasure of Kings by Burt L. Standish
CHAPTER XXI--I AM MADE A GHOST, AND THEN A FOOL
I sprang at him with my sword, the rusty blade that I had filched fromthose grim and whitened bones.
The man was at my mercy. He was unarmed, having laid aside his riflebefore he approached the Tomb. He trembled in every limb as he fledbefore my onslaught, and cried out aloud for pity, as I jabbed at him ina kind of vicious frenzy.
In the twilight his face looked pale-green in colouring, and his littlepig-like eyes seemed in danger of springing from his head. It would bedifficult to conceive an expression upon which abject terror was morestrongly marked.
Amos Baverstock was an evil man in many ways, and a brave man in others;else he had never risked his life so often amid the dangers of thetropic wilderness. Courage of a sort he had in plenty, but, because hewas evil in his nature, he feared death and all connected with thegrave, though I had never thought to find him as superstitious as hewas. He had always struck me as a hard, calculating man, who lookedupon the practical side of all things. And yet, without a doubt, he nowtook me for a ghost.
And after all--when the full facts are considered--his mistake wasexcusable; even to-day, when I call to mind that scene which was enactedin the half-light of the woods, I am inclined to laugh at it all, forthere was something ludicrous about it.
I wore the helmet of the dead man, and had sprung at Amos out of theTomb, without giving him time to think. Assuredly, in his eyes, whatelse could I have been but an infuriated ghost, dangerous and activebecause my peace and solitude had been disturbed.
I thrust at him savagely in the darkness, whilst he hurried here andthere, in and out among the trees, yelling like a fiend. How hideous hewas! I can see him now, with his hunchback, his green face, his staringeyes, his mouth contorted in terror. For all that he was quick andagile, and once or twice eluded a sword-thrust that would have piercedhim to the heart.
And then, at last, I had him. I carried my sword in my right hand, and,as I lunged, he jumped aside, towards the left. As quick as thought Icaught him by the throat. Whereat he fell down before me on his quakingknees, and clasped his hands in the attitude of one who pleads formercy.
He was in my power. I said not a word, but clenched my teeth, andlooked into those eyes that even then I feared. I drew back my sword,and then paused a moment; for I had no liking for the work, which wasthe hangman's job.
"Mercy!" he groaned.
I took in a deep breath, like a man about to dive. I felt that I mustbrace myself for this red task of common justice. I looked at his body,clothed in tatters, to select a spot most vulnerable where I mightplunge my rusted sword.
"Mercy!" he cried again.
I clenched my teeth. I was on the point of speaking, but fortunatelydid not.
I could hear him breathing heavily.
And thereupon, on a sudden, I was felled by some one who had crept uponme from behind. I was felled like an ox. A single blow upon the backof the head sent me over like a ninepin, and I lay stretched at my fulllength upon the ground, but half-conscious, with a singing sensation inmy head.
Presently I sat up and looked about me. There was Amos, still upon hisknees, as green as ever. And immediately above me stood one whom I didwell to recognise as Mr. Gilbert Forsyth.
That place was dimly illumined by the white light of the newly-risenmoon, turning the leaves upon the trees above us to a glistening silver.
Forsyth was wearing the remnants of a pair of trousers, the legs ofwhich ended in a tattered fringe a little below his knees. He was nakedto the waist, around which was a belt, crammed with knives and pistols.
I remembered his curled whiskers and his pomaded moustache on themorning when I had first set eyes upon him, when I lay hidden in thegorse-bush. His fair hair now had grown so long that it reached to hisshoulders; and his whiskers had spread into a short, shaggy beard, whichwas divided somewhat in the middle like that of a Frenchman or a Sikh.I had thought of him always as a very immaculate gentleman; but here wasa desperate, piratical blade who, one might easily believe, chewed glassand compelled his unhappy victims to walk the plank.
He looked at me and folded his arms; and then spoke in a voice quitecalm.
"And who the blazes are you?" he asked.
I was wise enough not to answer. Ghosts--so far as I knew--could neverspeak. And was I not a ghost?
If I had been a fool to go down into the Tomb, I showed at least alittle wisdom in now holding my tongue. For this, however, I take nocredit. I could not foresee the course that events would take. I hadbeen surprised and mastered, and cursed myself because I had not killedAmos out of hand, when the man was in my power. Disappointed, disgustedwith myself, I was stubborn as a mule. They might do what they would,they might torture me, but still I would not speak.
Forsyth repeated his question; and for answer, I rushed again at Amos,and even then would have killed him, had not the other caught me in hisarms and held me fast.
The man was stronger than I thought; for, though I kicked and struggled,I could not free myself. Amos, as he watched us, regained a little ofhis commonsense, and got slowly upon his feet.
"No ghost," said he. "No ghost." And he went on repeating the words asif he were a parrot.
"Ghost!" laughed Forsyth. "If this is a ghost, he is a warm-bloodedone, and as vicious as they make 'em."
"Then, who is he?" asked Baverstock. "I swear to you, he came out ofthe Tomb, as I'm a living man."
"And he's another," added Forsyth. "Who he is, or what business he hasin such a place as this, I can no more say than you can. None the less,the circumstantial evidence is all against mortality. I am reminded, myfriend, of the Carthaginian Queen: '_Exoriare aliquis nostris ex ossibusultor_'--(May some avenger arise from my bones). I call this individual'Hannibal,' on that account."
"Who wants your Latin gibberish!" cried Amos. "Look plain facts in theface; call a spade a spade."
"Also," said Forsyth, in his usual sing-song voice, "call a man a man,and not a ghost."
"If he's alive," said Amos, coming even nearer, "then, who is he? Itell you, when I lifted the tombstone, he sprang forth like aJack-in-a-box, and, had it not been for you, I would never have escapedwith life."
"I have told you already," said the other, "I know no more of him thanyou do."
It was then that they were joined by the Spaniard, Vasco, and JoshuaTrust, who came together from the darkness of the thickets into the fulllight of the moon. And when they saw me, they also were afraid; for Istill wore the helmet on my head and stood at no great distance from theopen grave.
Forsyth explained the situation in a few words, with many a wave of thehand, as if he introduced us. Baverstock, in the meantime, was rapidlybecoming his normal self. He seemed to have forgotten, for the timebeing, the very object of his journey.
"There's some mischief here!" on a sudden he exclaimed. "Rushby told uswe would find the map beneath the helmet of the Spaniard."
At this, Forsyth laughed, and pointed straight at me.
"And since our Hannibal," he observed, "wears such a headgear somewhatout of fashion, we may safely presume that he could tell us where themap is, if he had the power to make us understand--which, for myself, Idoubt."
The truth then dawned upon me on the instant. Mr. Gilbert Forsyth, forall his cleverness and calmness, was as fully in the wrong as AmosBaverstock had been; for he believed me to be a savage, whereas theother had taken me for a ghost, the awful apparition of a bygone Spanishsoldier. If I had refused to speak before from sheer pigheadedness, Iwas now resolved to play the part that I was cast for, putting my trustin Providence and fortified by resolution. Though they burnt my fleshwith red-hot irons, I was determined I would never speak.
They questioned me in every barbarous language that they knew. Vascoand Amos himself were my inquisitors, for Trust was no scholar, andForsyth's learning went no further than the dead classic tongues, and, Ibelieve, a little French. But I just gaped at them li
They looked in the Tomb; they searched everywhere for the map. Theymade a great fire of brushwood that they might see the better, andneglected no possible hiding-place where that little strip of parchmentmight be hidden. They looked inside my quiver, and even in the hollowof my blow-pipe. And then, at length, quite late at night, they gave itup. And in an ill mood they were, especially Trust and Amos.
They must have thought, however, that I was likely to be of some use tothem, for they bound me hand and foot before I was permitted to lie downto rest. They were evidently not disposed to set me free, until theyhad solved the riddle I presented. They were altogether at a loss toexplain who I was or why--apparently of my own free will--I had gonedown into that grim and ancient vault. I think, even then, theyconnected me in some way or other with Bannister himself.
Left alone, I was given time to think, and I lay awake that night formany hours, wondering what would happen.
There were exactly three reasons why they should not have recognised me:firstly, I was so altered in appearance, so brown and wrinkled by thesun, with my hair all long and shaggy, that I do not think my own motherherself would have known me; secondly, my face had been half-hidden bythe helmet I had worn; and, thirdly--the most potent fact of all--theynever dreamed for a moment that I was yet alive. Months before, they hadtied me to a tree, and left me to starve to death in the great forestmany miles away across the plain beyond Cahazaxa's Temple. And, as Iremembered this, it occurred to me that, even if they were to recogniseme, they might again believe me to be a ghost, since for so long theyhad been certain I was dead.
These were my thoughts as I lay awake, too near the fire for comfort;and as I was thinking, I observed a singular phenomenon, which at firstgave me cause for new alarm.
Amos, Forsyth, and Vasco were sound asleep, and Joshua Trust was onwatch, seated on the ground a little way from me. He was notparticularly alert. Indeed, he was occupied in the kind of pastime thatamused him. With a red-hot firebrand in his hand, he was killing, oneby one, the little insects that crawled upon the ground.
I looked past him into the thickets, and at once I could have sworn thatI observed a pair of eyes in which the firelight was reflected--eyesthat steadily regarded me. Now, I might have believed these eyes to bethose of a jaguar, were it not that they resembled the eyes of a man,and I knew for a fact that John Bannister was on the trail.
I made neither sound nor movement, but at once set out upon this newtrain of thought. Were a jaguar prowling around the camp, and I hadseen in his eyes the reflection of the firelight, it had been of acertainty but a few inches from the ground; for I knew well the habitsand the nature of this most beautiful of beasts. But these eyes werefour feet at least above the ground, and, being too large for those of amonkey, must belong to a human being--who could be none other than JohnBannister himself.
Sure of my facts, I was resolved to take no action, though my lifeitself were in the greatest danger. I knew that I might safely leavethe matter in the hands of an older, wiser, and a stronger man than I.
I saw those eyes for no longer than a few seconds, and then theydisappeared. I heard no sound, not so much as the stirring of a leaf,for the night was strangely still. There was not a breath of wind.
How can I describe the emotions that then swayed me! I knew that I mustpossess my soul in patience, leaving what was best to do to Bannisterhimself. And yet I longed with all my heart to grasp the hand of myfriend. I knew now, for certain, that he was near to me, watching overme, ready to strike a strong blow in my defence when the opportunityshould offer. And for that reason--so great was my faith in him--I wasconscious of a sense of security that I had not known for months.
I remembered that I had not seen him since that day when I beheld himrunning across the Sussex fields, with his brown paper parcel under hisarm, when Forsyth had struck me down with his whip and carried me away,to begin my series of adventures. I remembered him, too, as I had seenhim, standing in the white road looking after us. And he was now quitenear to me, thousands of miles away from where I had caught my lastglimpse of him; for it is a long march, in very truth, from the SouthDowns of England to the shadow of the Andes; and much lies between thatis strange and wonderful and savage--the great ocean, the mystery ofthose broad and endless rivers, and the forest with its eternal twilightand dark, silent places where death lies in wait. John Bannister hadgone forth to find me; and he had found me, at last, after all thesedreadful days.
How was it possible for me to sleep? I lay awake for hours with quicklybeating heart, and thought of all that had been and all that might beyet to come. I saw Vasco take the watch from Trust, and then Mr.Forsyth post himself as sentry towards the early hours of morning. Andwhen at length the daylight came, Forsyth looked at me and saw that Iwas awake. We sat for a while, looking straight into one another'seyes.
"Friend Hannibal," said he.
But I made no answer. At which he thought--for he was a strange man inmany ways--to test me with the classics.
"'_Tutum silentii praemium_,'" said he; "or, as we have it, 'Silence isever golden.' However, I believe that you could tell us much, were youso disposed."
Still I never answered. He could think what he liked; I was determinedto hold my peace. For all that, I was considerably disconcerted; for hecontinued to look at me for a long time in a very searching manner, thewhile the daylight grew and the woods became flooded with that faint,evanescent twilight that fades and seems to drift, even when the sun isat its height.
At last he gave a start, and sat bolt upright, rubbing both his eyes.
"A strange thing!" said he, and continued to look at me, but this timewith a frown.
"A strange thing, indeed!" he repeated.
There was another pause, during which I had not the courage to look himin the face. I had some presentiment of what was now to come; in spiteof which the suddenness with which he had made it manifest that mysecret was out, quite took away my breath.
"Allow me," said he, "to offer you my most hearty congratulations. Wehave every reason to presume that Master Richard Treadgold is unloved bythe gods."
And at that, he held out a hand, and I was obliged to shake with him,though I felt at once frightened and a fool.