The Man from Brodney's Part 41

"You are talking nonsense," she said lightly.

"Perhaps. But would you?" he insisted.

"I think I shall go in, Mr. Chase," she said with a warning shake of her head.

"Don't, please! I'm not asking you to marry me if we _should_ leave the island. You must give me credit for that," he argued whimsically.

"Ah, I see," she said, apparently very much relieved. "You want me only with the understanding that death should be quite close at hand to relieve you. And if I were to become your wife, here and now, and we should be taken from this dreadful place--what then?"

"You probably would have to go through a long and miserable career as plain Goodwife Chase," he explained.

"If it will make you any happier," she said, with a smile in which there lurked a touch of mischievous triumph, "I can say that I might consent to marry you if I were not so positive that I will leave the island soon. You seem to forget that my uncle's yacht is to call here, even though your cruisers will not."

"I'll risk even that," he maintained stoutly.

She stopped suddenly, her hand upon his arm.

"Do you really love me?" she demanded earnestly.

"With all my soul, I swear to you," he replied, staggered by the abrupt change in her manner.

"Then don't make it any harder for me," she said. "You know that I could not do what you ask. Please, please be fair with me. I--I can't even jest about it. It is too much to ask of me," she went on with a strange firmness in her voice. "It would require centuries to make me forget that I am a princess, just as centuries were taken up in creating me what I am. I am no better than you, dear, but--but--you understand?" She said it so pleadingly, so hopelessly that he understood what it was that she could not say to him. "We seldom if ever marry the men whom G.o.d has made for us to love."

He lifted her hands to his breast and held them there. "If you will just go on loving me, I'll some day make you forget you're a princess." She smiled and shook her head. Her hair gleamed red and bronze in the kindly light; a soft perfume came up to his nostrils.

The next day three of the native servants became violently ill, seized by the most appalling convulsions. At first, a thrill of horror ran through the chateau. The plague! The plague in reality! Faces blanched white with dread, hearts turned cold and sank like lead; a hundred eyes looked out to sea with the last gleam of hope in their depths.

But these fears were quickly dissipated. Baillo and the other natives unhesitatingly announced that the men were not afflicted with the "fatal sickness." As if to bear out these positive a.s.sertions, the sufferers soon began to mend. By nightfall they were fairly well recovered. The mysterious seizure, however, was unexplained. Chase alone divined the cause. He brooded darkly over the prospect that suddenly had presented itself to his comprehension. Poison! He was sure of it! But who the poisoner?

All previous perils and all that the future seemed to promise were forgotten in the startling discovery that came with the fall of night.

The first disclosures were succeeded by a frantic but ineffectual search throughout the grounds; the chateau was ransacked from top to bottom.

Lady Deppingham and Robert Browne were missing! They had disappeared as if swallowed by the earth itself!

Neenah, the wife of Selim, was the last of those in the chateau to see the heirs. When the sun was low in the west, she observed them strolling leisurely along the outer edge of the moat. They crossed the swift torrent by the narrow bridge at the base of the cliff and stopped below the mouth of the cavern which blew its cool breath out upon the hanging garden. Later on, she saw them climb the staunch ladder and stand in the black opening, apparently enjoying the cooling wind that came from the damp bowels of the mountain. Her attention was called elsewhere, and that was the last glimpse she had of the two people about whom centred the struggle for untold riches.

It was not an unusual thing for the inhabitants of the chateau to climb to the mouth of the cavern. The men had penetrated its depths for several hundred yards, lighting their way by means of electric torches, but no one among them had undertaken the needless task of exploring it to the end. This much they knew: the cavern stretched to endless distances, wide in spots, narrow in others, treacherous yet attractive in its ugly, grave-like solitudes.

"G.o.d, Chase, they are lost in there!" groaned Deppingham, numb with apprehension. He was trembling like a leaf.

"There's just one thing to do," said Chase, "we've got to explore that cavern to the end. They may have lost their bearings and strayed off into one of the lateral pa.s.sages."

"I--I can't bear the thought of her wandering about in that horrible place," Deppingham cried as he started resolutely toward the ladders.

"She'll come out of it all right," said Chase, a sudden compa.s.sion in his eyes.

Drusilla Browne was standing near by, cold and silent with dread, a set expression in her eyes. Her lips moved slowly and Deppingham heard the bitter words:

"You will find them, Lord Deppingham. You will find them!"

He stopped and pa.s.sed his hand over his eyes. Then, without a word, he s.n.a.t.c.hed a rifle from the hands of one of the patrol, and led the way up the ladder. As he paused at the top to await the approach of his companions, Chase turned to the white-faced Princess and said, between his teeth:

"If Skaggs and Wyckholme had been in the employ of the devil himself they could not have foreseen the result of their infernal plotting. I am afraid--mortally afraid!"

"Take care of him, Hollingsworth," she whispered shuddering.

The last glow of sunset, reflected in the western sky, fell upon the tall figure of the Englishman in the mouth of the cavern. Tragedy seemed to be waiting to cast its mantel about him from behind.

"Good-bye, Genevra, my Princess," said Chase softly, and then was off with Britt and Selim. As he pa.s.sed Drusilla, he seized her hand and paused long enough to say:

"It's all right, little woman, take my word for it. If I were you, I'd cry. You'll see things differently through your tears."

The four men, with their lights, vanished from sight a few moments later. Chase grasped Deppingham's arm and held him back, gravely suggesting that Selim should lead the way.

They were to learn the truth almost before they had fairly begun their investigations.

The heirs already were in the hands of their enemies, the islanders!

The appalling truth burst upon them with a suddenness that stunned their sensibilities for many minutes. All doubt was swept away by the revelation.

The eager searchers, shouting as they went, had picked their way down the steps in the sloping floor of the cavern, down through the winding galleries and clammy grottoes, their voices booming ever and anon against the silent walls with the roar of foghorns. Now they had come to what was known as "the Cathedral." This was a wide, lofty chamber, hung with dripping stalact.i.tes, far below the level at which they began the descent. The floor was almost as flat and even as that of a modern dwelling. Here the cavern branched off in three or four directions, like the tentacles of a monster devilfish, the narrow pa.s.sages leading no one knew whither in that tomb-like mountain.

Selim uttered the first shout of surprise and consternation. Then the four of them rushed forward, their eyes almost starting from their sockets. An instant later they were standing at the edge of a vast hole in the floor--newly made and pregnant with disaster.

A current of air swept up into their faces. The soft, loose earth about the rent in the floor was covered with the prints of naked feet; the bottom of the hole was packed down in places by a mult.i.tude of tracks.

Chase's bewildered eyes were the first to discover the presence of loose, scattered masonry in the pile below and the truth dawned upon him sharply. He gave a loud exclamation and then dropped lightly into the shallow hole.

"I've got it!" he shouted, stooping to peer intently ahead. "Von Blitz's powder kegs did all this. The secret pa.s.sage runs along here. One of the discharges blew this hole through the roof of the pa.s.sage. Here are the walls of the pa.s.sage. By heaven, the way is open to the sea!"

"My G.o.d, Chase!" cried Deppingham, staggering toward the opening. "These footprints are--G.o.d! They've murdered her! They've come in here and surprised----"

"Go easy, old man! We need to be cool now. It's all as plain as day to me. Rasula and his men were exploring the pa.s.sage after the discovery of the treasure chests. They came upon this new-made hole and then crawled into the cavern. They surprised Browne and--Yes, here are the prints of a woman's shoe--and a man's, too. They're gone, G.o.d help 'em!"

He climbed out of the hole and rushed about "the Cathedral" in search of further evidence. Deppingham dropped suddenly to his knees and buried his face in his hands, sobbing like a child.

It was all made plain to the searchers. Signs of a fierce struggle were found near the entrance to the Cathedral. Bobby Browne had made a gallant fight. Blood stains marked the smooth floor and walls, and there was evidence that a body had been dragged across the chamber.

Britt put his hand over his eyes and shuddered. "They've settled this contest, Chase, forever!" he groaned.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE PURSUIT