Harry Urquhart, in breathless haste, snatched the torch from the hands of his friend, and dashed like a madman to the entrance.
He pulled up in the nick of time, noticing that he stood at the top of an exceedingly steep and narrow flight of stairs. Had he gone on as impetuously as he had started, he would have pitched head foremost down the steps.
He began to descend more cautiously. The steps were slippery from the moisture that invaded the rock in which they had been cut.
He had not descended more than three steps before he was brought to an abrupt standstill. It was as if his heart ceased to beat. From far below—so far away as to be quite faint, though unmistakable—there came to his ears the report of a single shot.
[CHAPTER XXXVII—Too Late!]
The boy hastened down the narrow steps with all the speed he could, Jim Braid following close upon his heels. The two guides had remained above. Even yet, both regarded the place with superstitious awe.
The steps led downward—as it seemed an interminable distance. At first they were straight; then they were spiral; then they were straight again and broader. At the bottom was the vault where, as rumour had it, the great sage himself lay buried, where was gathered together the treasure that had been given in offerings during his lifetime, thousands of years before.
At the foot of the steps, the two boys, side by side, stood spellbound. The sight that they beheld was at once tragic and marvellous.
The vault was a rectangular room about thirty feet long and twenty feet wide. Against the wall facing the steps was a huge stone that resembled a coffin, supported upon a pedestal, cylindrical in shape, and about six feet in height. The coffin and the pedestal on which it stood resembled in shape the letter T. At the foot of the pedestal was a large marble basin, in the centre of which a small jet of water played like a miniature fountain, uttering a never-ceasing bubbling noise that sounded strange in the silence of the vault.
The walls were of bare rock. On the ceiling was carved a number of fantastic figures, similar to those that stood on either side of the great stairway that led to the entrance of the caves. But the wonder of the vault was on the floor, the whole of which was covered inches deep in glittering, sparkling gems. There were sapphires, rubies, diamonds, opals, and pearls. The former worshippers of Zoroaster had called upon the treasure-houses of the ancient world to pay their tribute to the genius of the teacher. They had visited the pearl-fisheries of the East and the ruby-mines of Burma; they had brought gold from Ophir and emeralds from the land of Punt.