CHAPTER XII.
IN THE CAVE OF DEATH.
With the smoking torch gripped in one shaking hand and the knife that had done the terrible work in the other, Porfias del Norte hurried from the scene of that frightful underground tragedy.
"I'm the only one left," he muttered thickly. "I can't last long in this infernal hole."
He stopped in the central chamber.
"Where does all the smoke go to?" he exclaimed. "By this time the torch should have filled the place to suffocation."
There was smoke enough in the chamber, but, as he stood there, he could see it creeping across the roof above his head, striking the lower arch of the passage, and passing on in a slow, gentle current.
"It finds an outlet somewhere!" he whispered, feeling his heart giving a sudden leap in his breast. "What sort of an outlet?"
The faintest ray of hope had shot into his soul. Still he realized that smoke might go where a human being could not pass. Nevertheless, with a burning sensation of eagerness creeping over his hitherto chilled body, he bent low and hastened onward into that low passage.