CHAPTER XXXI. STORY OF THE CITY OF FIRE (CONTINUED)
"How I managed to think of any defense against such an attack, andespecially in the circumstances, is a matter I have often wonderedabout since. How, having thought of it, I succeeded in putting it intoexecution, is probably more wonderful still. But I will just state whathappened.
"You may observe that I have large hands. Their size and strength servedme well on this occasion. At the moment that the rope tightened aboutmy throat I reached up and grasped the Brahmin's left thumb. Desperationgave me additional strength, and I snapped it like a stick of candy.
"Just in the nick of time I felt the cord relax, and, although the veinsin my head seemed to be bursting, I managed to get my fingers under thatdamnable rope. To this very hour I can hear Vadi's shriek of pain as Ibroke his thumb, and it brings the whole scene back to me.
"Clutching the rope with my left hand, I groaned and lay still. TheBrahmin slightly shifted his position, which was what I wanted him todo. The brief respite had been sufficient. As he moved, I managedto draw my knees up, very slightly, for he was a big, heavy man, butsufficiently to enable me to throw him off and roll over.
"Then, gentlemen, I dealt with him as he had meant to deal with me; onlyI used my bare hands and made a job of it.
"I stood up, breathing heavily, and looked down at him where he lay inthe shadows at my feet. Dusk had come with a million stars, and almostabove my head were flowering creepers festooned from bough to bough. Thetwo campfires danced up and cast their red light upon the jagged rocksof the hillock, which started up from the very heart of the thicket, tostand out like some giant pyramid against the newly risen moon.
"There were night things on the wing, and strange whispering sounds camefrom the forests clothing the hills. Then came a distant, hollow boominglike the sound of artillery, which echoed down the mountain gorges andseemed to roll away over the lowland swamps and die, inaudible, by theremote river. Yet I stood still, looking down at the dead man at myfeet. For this strange, mysterious artillery was a phenomenon I hadalready met with on this fateful march--weird enough and inexplicable,but no novelty to me, for I had previously met with it in the Shan Hillsof Burma.
"I was thinking rapidly. It was clear enough now why I had hithertobeen unmolested. To Vadi the task had been allotted by the mysteriousorganization of which he was a member, of removing me quietly anddecently, under circumstances which would lead to no official inquiry.Although only animals, insects, and reptiles seemed to be awake aboutme, yet I could not get rid of the idea that I was watched.
"I remembered the phantom light, and that memory was an unpleasantone. For ten minutes or more I stood there watching and listening, butnothing molested me, nothing human approached. With a rifle restingacross my knees, I sat down in the entrance to my tent to await thedawn.
"Later in the night, those phantom guns boomed out again, and againtheir booming died away in the far valleys. The fires burned lower andlower, but I made no attempt to replenish them; and because I sat thereso silent, all kinds of jungle creatures crept furtively out of theshadows and watched me with their glittering eyes. Once a snake crossedalmost at my feet, and once some large creature of the cat species,possibly a puma, showed like a silhouette upon the rocky slopes above.
"So the night passed, and dawn found me still sitting there, the deadman huddled on the ground not three paces from me. I am a man who as arule thinks slowly, but when the light came my mind was fully made up.
"From the man who had died in Nagpur I had learned more about thelocation of the City of Fire than I had confided to Vadi. In fact, Ithought I could undertake to find the way. Upon the most important pointof all, however, I had no information: that is to say, I had no idea howto obtain entrance to the place; for I had been given to understand thatthe way in was a secret known only to the initiated.
"Nevertheless, I had no intention of turning back; and, although Irealized that from this point onward I must largely trust to luck, Ihad no intention of taking unnecessary chances. Accordingly, I dressedmyself in Vadi's clothes, and, being very tanned at this time, I think Imade a fairly creditable native.
"Faintly throughout the night, above the other sounds of the jungle, Ihad heard that of distant falling water. Now, my informant at Nagpur, inspeaking of the secret temple, had used the words:
"'Whoever would see the fire must quit air and pass through water.'
"This mysterious formula he had firmly declined to translate intocomprehensible English; but during my journey I had been consideringit from every angle, and I had recently come to the conclusion that theentrance to this mysterious place was in some way concealed by water.Recollecting the gallery under Niagara Falls, I wondered if some similarnatural formation was to be looked for here.
"Now, in the light of the morning sun, looking around me from the littleplateau upon which I stood, and remembering a vague description of thecountry which had been given to me, I decided that I was indeed in theneighbourhood of the Temple of Fire.
"We had followed a fairly well-defined path right to this plateau,and that it was nothing less than the high road to the citadel ofFire-Tongue, I no longer doubted. Beneath me stretched a panorama limnedin feverish greens and unhealthy yellows. Scar-like rocks striated thejungle clothing the foothills, and through the dancing air, viewed fromthe arid heights, they had the appearance of running water.
"Swamps to the southeast showed like unhealing wounds upon the face ofthe landscape. Beyond them spread the lower river waters, the bankof the stream proper being discernible only by reason of a greatergreenness in the palm-tops. Venomous green slopes beyond them again, afringe of dwarf forest, and the brazen skyline.
"On the right, and above me yet, the path entered a district of volcanicrocks, gnarled, twisted, and contorted as with the agonies of somemighty plague which in a forgotten past had seized on the very bowels ofthe world and had contorted whole mountains and laid waste vast forestsand endless plains. Above, the sun, growing hourly more cruel; ahead,more plague-twisted rocks and the scars dancing like running water; andall around the swooning stillness of the tropics.
"The night sounds of the jungle had ceased, giving place to theceaseless humming of insects. North, south, east, and west lay that hazeof heat, like a moving mantle clothing hills and valleys. The sound offalling water remained perceptible.
"And now, gentlemen, I must relate a discovery which I had made in theact of removing Vadi's clothing. Upon his right forearm was brandeda mark resembling the apparition which I had witnessed in the night,namely, a little torch, or flambeau, surmounted by a tongue of fire.Even in the light of the morning, amid that oppressive stillness, Icould scarcely believe in my own safety, for that to Vadi the dutyof assassinating me had been assigned by this ever-watchful, secretorganization, whose stronghold I had dared to approach, was a factbeyond dispute.
"Since I seemed to be quite alone on the plateau, I could only supposethat the issue had been regarded as definitely settled, that no doubthad been entertained by Vadi's instructors respecting his success. Theplateau upon which I stood was one of a series of giant steps, and onthe west was a sheer descent to a dense jungle, where banks of rottenvegetation, sun-dried upon the top, lay heaped about the tree stems.
"Dragging the heavy body of Vadi to the brink of this precipice, Itoppled it over, swaying dizzily as I watched it crash down into thepoisonous undergrowth two hundred feet below.
"I made a rough cache, where I stored the bulk of my provisions; and,selecting only such articles as I thought necessary for my purpose,I set out again northward, guided by the sound of falling water, andhaving my face turned toward the silver pencillings in the blue sky,which marked the giant peaks of the distant mountains.
"At midday the heat grew so great that a halt became imperative. Thepath was still clearly discernible; and in a little cave beside it,which afforded grateful shelter from the merciless rays of the sun, Iunfastened my bundle and prepared to take a frugal lunch.
> "I was so employed, gentlemen, when I heard the sound of approachingfootsteps on the path behind me--the path which I had recentlytraversed.
"Hastily concealing my bundle, I slipped into some dense undergrowth bythe entrance to the cave, and crouched there, waiting and watching.I had not waited very long before a yellow-robed mendicant passed by,carrying a bundle not unlike my own, whereby I concluded that he hadcome some distance. There was nothing remarkable in his appearanceexcept the fact of his travelling during the hottest part of the day.Therefore I did not doubt that he was one of the members of the secretorganization and was bound for headquarters.
"I gave him half an hour's start and then resumed my march. If he couldtravel beneath a noonday sun, so could I.
"In this fashion I presently came out upon a larger and higher plateau,carpeted with a uniform, stunted undergrowth, and extending, as flat asa table, to the very edge of a sheer precipice, which rose from it toa height of three or four hundred feet--gnarled, naked rock, showing novestige of vegetation.
"By this time the sound of falling water had become very loud, and as Iemerged from the gorge through which the path ran on to this plateauI saw, on the further side of this tableland, the yellow robe of themendicant. He was walking straight for the face of the precipice, andstraight for the spot at which, from a fissure in the rock, a littlestream leapt out, to fall sheerly ten or fifteen feet into a windingchannel, along which it bubbled away westward, doubtless to form agreater waterfall beyond.
"The mendicant was fully half a mile away from me, but in that cleartropical air was plainly visible; and, fearing that he might lookaround, I stepped back into the comparative shadow of the gorge andwatched.
"Gentlemen, I saw a strange thing. Placing his bundle upon his head, hewalked squarely into the face of the waterfall and disappeared!"