It is true, I never beheld with my own eyes the actual civilisation of ancient Peru as it had existed in Cahazaxa's time, because, many years before, it had died a natural death. The Peruvians, born and bred upon the western sea-board or the great tablelands beyond the Andes, were not able to survive in the humid atmosphere of the tropic forest. In course of time, a colony of several thousands, whom Cahazaxa had led across the mountains, had dwindled to a community of a few families of the old inca stock, the majority of whom served as priests of the Sun in the great ruined temple, constructed by their forefathers, which they were not able to keep in repair.
It was these men, descended in a direct line from the incas whom the Spanish conquerors had driven forth from Cuzco and Quito, who guarded the secret of the Greater Treasure. It was they who were treacherously attacked and foully done to death by Amos Baverstock. And I will now relate the full story of that brutal enterprise as I got it from the lips of the man whom I befriended.
Baverstock, with his three companions, had come to the temple some weeks before, on the day they had tied me to the tree and left me to starve to death.
The priests had been greatly alarmed at the sight of the intruder, whom they recognised at once. They remembered the time when Baverstock and Trust had attacked the temple, and they had been obliged to fight for their lives, and would then and there have been slaughtered, had it not been for John Bannister, who placed himself at their head and drove Amos forth.
But Bannister was no longer with them to fortify them with his courage, to preside at their councils, and to deal death to their enemies with his swift, unerring aim. And they were terrified at the very sight of Amos, as I myself had been when I first set eyes on the man upon the Sussex shore.
He demanded to know where the Greater Treasure was hidden. He reminded them that they had lied to him once, and held forth threats that made their blood run cold. If they lied to him again, he would return, and no man of them would live to fool Amos Baverstock a third time.
Now, they dared not speak the truth, for they were sworn to secrecy before the Sun, which they believed to be the Creator of the Universe; and yet, they dared not lie, for they knew Amos would be as good, or as evil, as his word.
So, swearing upon all things they looked upon as holy, they set Amos and his friends upon the right road to the "Big Fish." They told him to follow a certain track across the grassland, until he came to a range of down-like, grass-clad hills. Thence, to the west, lay a wood in mid-valley, and in a glade in this wood the Treasure was buried, the place being marked by a great red stone, standing forth in the form of a monster fish in the act of leaping from the water. Here, clearly, was the origin of the legend, current among the natives even to this day, of the Big and Little Fishes. And when I heard the story as it was told me by the inca priest, I confess I was conscious that my heart beat more rapidly and the warm blood of my youth was stirred within me.
But Amos Baverstock cared nothing for legend. He lived only to lay hands upon a horde of untold gold; and that same day he left the Temple of Cahazaxa and set forth to the west upon his treasure hunt.
And when he was gone, the priests held conference, demanding of Atupo why he had told their enemy so much of their cherished secret--for Atupo was the name of the surviving priest with whom I talked among the temple ruins. For he it was who devised the scheme whereby he hoped both to save the lives of his friends and to preserve the Greater Treasure; and now that all had failed so dreadfully, to the great pain he suffered from his wound was added anguish and remorse, inasmuch as the blame was his.