At the next corner he halted, inspecting the dimly lighted street for signs of soldiery, but no living being moved. The spectre-like stranger had vanished. While the cavalier stood, he heard distant cavalry. It was wholesome and earthly at least; and although it called for caution, yet it was in some sort reassuring, and he went on in greater ease of mind. A few minutes later he entered another square flanked on the left by a large edifice recognizable by the glow on its gilded roof as the Temple of the Sun. He had his bearings, and knew that the Huatenay was not far beyond. The plaza was the ancient Coricancha, or Place of Gold.
Half-way across he heard horses once more, approaching, and not distant. The great door of the temple stood open. He hurried to its shelter as a patrol of cavalry trotted into the square. They were coming in his direction, and he entered the building. The darkness was absolute, but opposite was another door, faintly lighted by the reflection from the heavens. He stole toward it with reluctance, awed by the vastness of the hall, whose walls sent back sepulchral echoes of his furtive tread. High up indistinctly outlined windows revealed the loftiness of the interior, which seemed to be unceiled. The place was lugubrious, as if tenanted by ghosts of votaries of the ancient faith, mourning its desecration. So thought Cristoval, and hastened his steps—then stopped. There had been a movement in the doorway in front of him: a mere blur, and gone, noiseless as a shadow. There was a trickling chilliness under his back-plate, and again he made a sign of the cross. The place was unholy—accursed by pagan rites. He must out of it! Should it be to face the patrol, or—the other? The open air of the court was nearer, and he quickened his pace to gain it, assailed by a multitude of whispered reverberations; chased, as he knew, by devils, spooks, goblins, and lemures.
In the court, he was sweating, but cold. It was bare, ghostly, and surrounded by buildings with broad, open doors into which he did not look as he sped across toward a gate that stood ajar. Outside, he breathed more freely. He was in a garden with trees and shrubbery, and these, even in the dark, are always friendly. There were avenues, but the ground had been upturned by his countrymen for buried treasure, and he could follow none. He turned across what had been a lawn, descending from terrace to terrace, burdened by the sense of being watched by the lurking stranger; nor paused until he had placed distance between himself and the unhallowed temple. Now he could hear the ripple of a stream, and knew that he was at the Huatenay; but kept on, looking for a stout bush he could have at his back, and with a vigilant outlook for the other tenant of the garden. He was now fully aware of his burns, but dared not remove a jambe to ease them. He seated himself presently, but after a minute's rest the sensation of being under espionage became unendurable. It chafed him, and with the irritation of his burning feet and legs, roused a bloodthirsty desire to hunt the lurker and determine whether he was substance or shadow. He thought better of it.
A few minutes, now, would bring him to the Amarucancha, and impatience pushed him on. He had gained the lowest terrace when the mysterious form appeared again, directly in his path, a hundred feet away. It rose as if out of the earth, retreated a few paces, and vanished into the shadow of the gully, leaving Cristoval in dismay.
"Santa Madre!" he gasped, and stood irresolute, wishing with ardor for a crucifix. The figure was so wholly spectral that the thought of following it into the darkness started his courage oozing as quickly as it did the perspiration. Yet there was no help for it unless to return through the temple. The stout cavalier was in a wavering frame of mind. Then it stole over him that this shadowy creature was interposing between him and Rava. He sprang down the bank with an oath. Were it Satan himself he would dispute such hindrance.
He stumbled among the bowlders, straining his eyes for a sight of the figure, furious to test its reality. But he plunged forward resolutely. Above the temple he came to a stairway leading to the quay, and mounted it, intending, if the streets were quiet, to leave the stream. As he raised head and shoulders above the parapet, an arrow, coming with terrific force, struck the bars of his lifted visor and splintered with a crash that made his ears ring within his helmet. At the same instant the figure rose a few yards ahead and sped away through the darkness. Notwithstanding the shock, Cristoval's dread vanished in a flash. "Aha! thou flitting, gliding, misty son of an imp of perdition, then thou 'rt real!" He dropped his visor. "By the saints! 't is a burden off my mind. I thought thee a ghost, but that was no ghostly arrow, my word for it! And 't was good archery. Bien! I'll keep thee in mind until I can teach thee thou 'rt shooting at a friend." Convinced now that the stranger was a native bent on vengeance on his own account, Cristoval descended again and pushed on up the stream, infinitely relieved in spirit. But thereafter he kept his visor closed.
At length the black buildings on either bank came to an end at the great square, and with beating heart the cavalier recognized the pile on the right as the Amarucancha. He crept cautiously up the steps by which the Inca and Mayta had descended on the night of their attempted escape. Here he could look out upon the plaza, so near that he heard the Spaniards' voices. The fire had eaten from the direction of the Sachsahuaman to its margin, and like the Rimac Pampa, it was partly illuminated by burning ruins. In the middle were awnings and tents occupied by his beleaguered countrymen. Near the camp was the picket line with the steeds saddled, and in front of it, a detachment standing to horse, ready for instant action. Cristoval took it in at a glance, then his eyes sought the palace before him. Immediately opposite was a door. Would it be locked? Locked, no doubt!—and would he dare to knock? First he would try its fastenings. Cristoval was shaking at the knees, and so intent that he had forgotten prudence. He was about to steal across the quay when he was arrested by the tread of an approaching sentinel. The cavalier retreated down the steps with a flash of sudden heat over his body. Ten thousand devils! Here was a condition unforeseen. Standing in the water and leaning against the shadowed wall, he thought with diligence and many whispered interjections. With the square so near he could not overcome the sentinel without an alarm. The attempt might serve as a last resort; but he put it aside to debate a hundred impracticabilities. After a time he crept up the steps again and stole a look at the soldier. The latter was keeping close to the palace wall, and for a pikeman his vigilance seemed preternatural. Had he divined his surveillance by a pair of watchful eyes in a head simmering with plans for his quick extinction!—but he had not. He paced so many paces to the south, turned with a glance at the sky; paced so many more to the north, turned with a glance at the sky; and so for an hour, when he challenged the relief.
Meanwhile, Cristoval descended and stood meditating furiously. Assuredly the chance for entrance here was slight. He picked his way carefully down the stream, ascended by the first flight of steps to the opposite bank, and started toward the square in the shadow of the buildings. At its edge he descried another sentinel, and turned back. At a bridge passed going up, he crossed the rivulet. At the farther side he glanced back up the street toward the western line of fire, now sweeping rapidly forward, and once more caught sight of the flitting figure crossing the light, slinking toward the plaza, but lost at once in the darkness. "Aha! my friend," muttered Cristoval, "thou 'rt off the scent. Keep off it, thou heathen, or I may warm thy legs with the flat of my blade."
He moved up the quay with a slight hope of finding an unguarded door into the palace. Twenty paces more and he was startled by a long-drawn yell of agony from the direction of the square. The stranger had attacked a sentinel. "Holy Mother!" he exclaimed, "the skulking archer hath scored."
The whispered words had not been said before a second cry arose, fiercely exultant, "Allah il Allah!" Cristoval started at the words, and crossed himself.