“We shall get lost in this mountain if we are not careful,” said Captain Arnold, stopping and looking round. “I wonder if we are getting anywhere near where this river rushed out of the mountainside, Jack.”
Jack asked Mafumu, and the boy shook his head. “Long, long, long way,” he said mournfully. “Mafumu not know way.”
The party of four went across the cave and left the swirling river behind. They were not sure that it was the same one that made the waterfall. Captain Arnold felt certain that the mountain held two or three rivers, that all joined to make one. It was no use to follow the one they had just left.
Soon they came to a curious door, quite round and studded with a strange pattern of suns. Behind it they heard voices! “What are they saying, Mafumu?” whispered Jack.
Mafumu pressed himself as close to the door as he dared. His sharp ears picked up the voices — and as he listened Mafumu grew pale under his dark skin! He crept back to the others.
“They say that the sun-god is angry,” whispered Mafumu. “They say that he is burning up the mountains because he has no servant. He needs a servant before he will hide his head in the great clouds and bring rain. And it is from one of us that he asks for a servant!”
Mafumu spoke partly in his own language and partly in Jack’s. The other boy understood him and told Captain and Mrs. Arnold what he had said. The Captain was silent for a long time.
“It is what I feared,” he said. “One of us will be thrown down the mountain-side to lessen the anger of their sun-god! We must try to reach Mike, Peggy, Nora and the others at all costs, as soon as we can. We must warn them!”
A Strange Journey — And A Surprise
As Captain Arnold was speaking the round door was flung open, and a tall, red-bearded man came out. It was dark in the passage, and he did not see the little company pressed against the wall. He was about to step out into the passage when there came the sound of running feet — and someone with flowing robes rushed up from the opposite direction.