"Not many hours," said Forsyth; "but it seems like days and nights. We have had time enough in which to consider the misery of our end--without water, food, or light, in the midst of all this gold."
Bannister was silent a moment. He had not descended the stairs into the chamber, but stood upon a step about midway down with myself close behind him.
"I"ll have no treachery," said he. "It is very needful that you understand the situation as it is. I am a man of my word, as you may or may not know, and I set you free on certain conditions only."
"Fire ahead," said Forsyth. "State your terms. Anything for daylight and for freedom--for the certain knowledge that we have been granted a new lease of life."
"Good!" said Bannister. "I go before you up the staircase, and wait for you above. Whatever arms you have you leave behind you. If any one of you comes forth with a rifle in his possession, I shoot him dead upon the spot."
"We share the gold with you?" asked Joshua Trust.
"Not an ounce of it, you fool!" cried Bannister. "Years ago I might have had it for myself, had I wished to play the robber. All this treasure is not yours or mine or anyone"s; it belongs by right to the Government of the country. I am neither a smuggler nor a thief. Were it worth less, I might not be so honest; but here are millions, such as to release would be to let loose a great force of evil that would profit no one, and ourselves least of all. Here this gold has lain for ages, and here let it lie. That is one of my conditions."
"Let us out!" cried Trust. "All night I have dreamed that I must eat bars of gold to live. I have sucked golden ingots with parched, dry lips. I have slept upon gold, and never before had I a couch so uninviting. Let us out, I say! I agree to anything."
At that, Bannister bade me ascend the stairs, and followed close upon my heels. When we reached the top, we waited both with our rifles at the ready, prepared to fire upon the first sign of trouble. But the three of them, one behind the other, came forth out of the vault as meek as shorn lambs--first Trust; then Vasco; and finally, Mr. Gilbert Forsyth, who, swaggering into the daylight in no particular haste, had the audacity to hold out a hand to Bannister, as if he greeted an old acquaintance.
John Bannister, however, did no more than shrug his shoulders, and then went to the stone slab and threw it back into its place.
"When did Amos leave here?" he asked, turning again to Forsyth.
"Last night."
"Did he say anything before he went?"
"Yes, he was so gracious as to tell us we could die where he had left us. As for himself, he was going back into the forest to find native porters to carry the gold away."
"Just as we thought!" said Bannister. "Rushby was in the right."
And, thereupon, our attention was immediately attracted by the strange conduct of Joshua Trust, who looked up at the little patch of blue sky just visible between the overhanging branches of the trees, clenched both his fists in an amazing burst of pa.s.sion, and shook them above his head.
"He shall pay for this!" he cried, with an oath that can never be repeated. "And I have served him faithfully for years! He has gone back upon me, when he saw that he had gained everything he wanted! By thunder, he shall pay for it!"
Bannister looked at him, and smiled.
"Have more sense, man," said he. "What use is all this anger? Amos Baverstock is mad."
"Mad or sane," cried Trust, "he shall answer for what he has done. Come, tell me, what"s the time?"
"I should think no more than ten," said Bannister. "We started at daybreak, and we were not two hours upon the march before we found the brook."
When I looked at Joshua, I was reminded of the man whom I had known on board the _Mary Greenfield_, who was wont to sit drinking at his cards.
He was red of eye and flushed of countenance, and I saw that his lips trembled with a pa.s.sion he was quite unable to contain. He was a rough man, in any case; and now that he had lived for months in the wilderness, and had been saved from death as it were at the eleventh hour, he was the greatest savage of the five of us.
"Ten o"clock," he repeated. "Four bells, by Christopher! Then, he can"t be far away. He can never have travelled far by night, for he took with him a hundredweight of gold. I"ll go after him," he cried.
"He shall answer yet for what he tried to do."
Bannister stretched out an arm to detain the man; but Trust sprang aside and, with another oath, dived into the thickets.
CHAPTER XXVI--A NIGHT OF TERROR
I was about to follow in pursuit of Trust, and had even taken a few steps towards the undergrowth upon the right bank of the brook, when Bannister called me back.
"What"s the use?" said he. "Let dogs delight. We have our own friends to think of."
"Our own friends?" said I.
"Have you forgotten Rushby? We have left him alone too long as it is.
His life is more to us than the fate of either Trust or Baverstock; and he is in danger just as great."
At those words, I felt something of shame that I had indeed forgotten one who had proved himself so loyal and true a comrade.
"Then, what"s to be done?" I asked.
"That"s not so easy to decide," said Bannister. "I take it," he added, turning again to Forsyth, "that you are now willing to cast in your lot with us, to give up all thought of plunder?"
Forsyth actually yawned.
"Have it your own way," said he. "I have made a promise which I will faithfully keep. I have always believed that there was honour among thieves; but, even here, I find I was mistaken. To speak the truth, I am heartily sick of the whole business, which has cost me a pretty penny with nothing to show for it, save a scratched skin and a score of bruises, and the loss of an ear. You may count me as one of yourselves.
I have little enough, perhaps, upon which to flatter myself, but if there is skill in gaining, there is at least an art in losing. It can be done gracefully. Do you not agree?"
"Moralise as much as you like," laughed Bannister. "It amounts to no more than this: you have failed dismally, and are glad enough to find yourself alive. You are wise to accept the situation as it is. That"s all the same to me. Henceforward, you are under my orders, and I expect prompt obedience."
"I shall be charmed," said Forsyth, with a mock bow. "And what of Rushby?"
"He lies some way to the north," said Bannister. "I am alarmed at his condition. The wound in his leg is septic, and it is very doubtful whether he will recover."
"I am distressed to hear it," answered the other, to whose effrontery there seemed no end; for he added, "If the truth be told, it was I myself who shot him--with the best intentions in the world."
"No doubt," said Bannister grimly. "There has been give and take on both sides; and I am the more glad to have saved your life, since I know for a fact that you stood between d.i.c.k, here, and certain death, when Amos would have killed him. But we waste time in useless talk. Before we leave this place, I propose to cover the slab with earth, to hide all traces of an intrusion so utterly worthless, doomed to failure from the start."
And thereupon the four of us set to work, sc.r.a.ping the soft earth back upon the stone slab; for Bannister, who had enough of Spanish to express his meaning, soon found another ally in Vasco, who, after all, was a weak, shiftless kind of fellow, with few opinions of his own. Though the man had been bewildered by the sight of so much gold, the Treasure had had much the same effect on him as on myself when I first went down into that vast, amazing chamber. He was frightened of it all; and as well as that, he now realised for the first time that he had served for all these months one who was both treacherous and mad; and had it not been for Bannister and me, he would not have escaped with life.
We were all hard at work upon our hands and knees, when we were surprised by the sound of a rifle-shot, fired at no great distance in the Wood, in a northerly direction.
Bannister got slowly to his feet, and stood listening; and then, although he turned in my direction, it was as if he spoke quietly to himself.
"One shot," said he. "And one shot only."
That was all he said.
"Trust was never armed," said I.
"That signifies nothing," answered Bannister. "Amos is loaded down by gold. If he carried a rifle, Trust may have wrenched it from his hands."