The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [6140]
"How far is it to the cavern?" Harry panted.
"Somewhere between one and ten miles," was my answer. "How the deuce should I know? But we'll make it now, I think. Can you hold out, Desiree?"
"Easily," she answered. "If only I could get some air! Just one good, long breath."
There was the danger, and on that account no time was to be lost. Again we struck out into the blackness ahead. I felt myself no longer fresh, and began to doubt seriously if we should reach our goal.
But we reached it. No need to recount our struggles, which toward the end were inspired by suffering amounting to agony as we choked and gasped for sufficient air to keep us up.
Another hundred yards would have been too much for us; but it is enough that finally we staggered onto the bank at the entrance to the cavern in which we had previously rested, panting, dizzy, and completely exhausted.
But an hour in the cavern, with its supply of air, revived us; and then we sat up and asked ourselves: "What for?"
"And all that brings us--to this," said Harry, with a sweeping gesture round the cavern.
"At least, it is a better tomb," I retorted. "And it was a good fight. We still have something in us. Desiree, a good man was lost in you."
Harry rose to his feet.
"I'm going to look round," he announced. "We've got to do something. Gad, and it took us a month to build that raft!"
"The vanity of human endeavor," said I, loosening the strap round my shoulders and dropping my bundle to the ground. "Wait a minute; I'm going with you. Are you coming, Desiree?"
But she was too tired to rise to her feet, and we left her behind, arranging what few skins we had as well as possible to protect her from the hard rock.
"Rest your weary bones," said Harry, stooping to kiss her. "There's meat here if you want it. We'll be back soon."
So we left her, with her white body stretched out at its full length on the rude mat.
Bearing off to the left, we soon discovered that we would have no difficulty to leave the cavern; we had only to choose our way. There was scarcely any wall at all, so broken was it by lanes and passages leading in all directions.
We followed some of them for a distance, but found none that gave any particular promise. Most of them were choked with rocks and boulders through which it was difficult to force a passage. We spent an hour or more in these futile explorations, then followed the wall some distance to the right.
Gradually the exits became less numerous. High on a boulder near the entrance of one we saw the head of some animal peering down at us. We hurled our spears at it, but missed; then were forced to climb up the steep side of the boulder to recover our weapons.
"We'd better go back to Desiree," said Harry when we reached the ground again. "She'll wonder what's become of us. We've been gone nearly two hours."
After fifteen minutes' search we found the stream, and followed it to the left. We had gone farther than we thought, and we were looking for the end, where we had left Desiree, long before we reached it. Several times we called her name, but there was no answer.
"She's probably asleep," said Harry. And a minute later: "There's the wall at last! But where is she?"
My foot struck something on the ground, and I stooped over to examine it.
It was the pile of skins on which Desiree had lain!
I called to Harry, and at the same instant heard his shout of consternation as he came running toward me, holding something in his hand.
"They've got her! Look! Look at this! I found it on the ground over there."
He held the thing in his hand out before me.
It was an Inca spear.
Chapter XXI.
THE MIDST OF THE ENEMY.
Harry and I stood gazing at each other blankly in the semidarkness of the cavern.
"But it isn't possible," I objected finally to my own thoughts. "She would have cried out and we would have heard her. The spear may have