[CHAPTER XXII.]
FACE TO FACE.
“Hark! What was that?” whispered San Lucia to Murado.
The two old brigands paused in their stealthy march upon their sleeping victims, as the sound of the crash Noddy’s auto made came faintly to their ears.
“How should I know?” asked Murado, but he seemed alarmed.
“It sounded in the tunnel,” went on San Lucia. “Some one is coming! Quick! Let us hide! Another night will do for our work.”
Thereupon the two old villains, alarmed by the terror of the noise caused by they knew not what, hesitated and then fled as silently as they had advanced. For the time the lives of the boys and the professor had been saved.
San Lucia and Murado went to their hiding place in the old temple, the building being so large and rambling that it would have hidden a score of men with ease. It may be added here that they did not dare to touch many things in the ancient city, thinking them bewitched.
All unmindful of the danger which had menaced them, our travelers slept on, nothing disturbing them, and they did not hear the noise made by Noddy’s tumble, though they were not far from the mouth of the tunnel.