"How does he pretend to know these things?"
"I cannot say," said the guide. "These men have the wisdom of the ancients, who could read the stars and knew of many things long since forgotten. It is supposed by the Maziris themselves that by means of fasting and penance and self-inflicted torture he has gained such holiness that he can see into the future, that he can read from the Book of Fate."
They could not move their eyes from the Guardian of the Cave. He now stood erect and motionless before the altar like one transfigured into a kind of deity. There was little about him that suggested what we know as human.
He was straight of back, his bare arms folded upon his chest, his head a little lowered. And the shafts of daylight from either side of the cave converged upon the whiteness of his head, so that he was like a saint, solemn and magnificent, surrounded by the all-pervading gloom.
Suddenly he let out a shout that was half a shriek—louder than before; and then they saw that his madness was not feigned. Like a wild beast he hurled himself upon the wheels and set them all in motion, some revolving one way, some the other. And even as the wheels were turning he shook his fist at the entrance to the vault—the red granite rock at the extremity of the cave.
"Open!" he cried, in the strange Maziri language. "Open in the name of Zoroaster!"
Again and again, he cried to the vault to open, as though that which was inanimate would heed his infuriated words. The spokes of the great bronze wheels reflected the light from the lamp, but there came no answer to the man's cries but the echoes of his own voice in the dimness of the cavern.
Once again he flung himself upon the ground, and prayed in a loud voice that the spirit of Zoroaster might descend and show him how to open the vault. According to Fernando, he asked the gods to grant him one of two favours—either that the secret of the Sunstone might be conveyed to him then and there, or that the Sunstone itself might be returned to the cave.
And suddenly he stopped in the midst of his prayer, springing sharply to his feet. For some seconds he stood quite motionless, in the attitude of one who listens.
Then he spoke slowly and distinctly and less loudly than before.