“Aye, and of vanished gods,� said I, extending my hand.
There was something weird and eerie about the plateau and we felt better for the warm touch of each other’s hand; at least I did. I always felt happier when I touched her little hand, but in this instance the feeling was somewhat different. In a certain sense it seemed like profanation for us to be there, yet we went on steadily, if slowly. We passed by the colonnade of statues, around the inner platform, and deliberately mounted the stairs.
Something, I know not what, made me bid my mistress pause before we reached the top, and I looked to my pistol, and loosened my sword in its sheath as I did so, although why I did so, and what I anticipated, I cannot say. At any rate, I mounted to the top alone. There before me lay a platform which was sunk beneath me for a depth of two feet and which was surrounded by a low wall on the top of which I stood. The three images rose from a smaller platform on a level with the top of this wall in the midst, and the whole place was filled with a horrible and frightful mass of human bones. Skulls, legs, thighs and smaller bones heaped in terrible confusion lay bleaching before me, and the space between them was filled with a fine dust, doubtless the dust of earlier bones which had moldered away through centuries. Those that still preserved their shape were the top layer and were bleached perfectly white. They lay in all directions as if they had been cast aside carelessly and at random, yet there were indications that there had been a path from where I stood to the platform of the three images, which platform I perceived was just about wide enough to lay a human body on it at the base of the first image.
I stared apprehensively, I must confess, at this frightful charnel house of the centuries. The only evidence of humanity we had discovered on that island were these bleached and moldering skeletons. I would have prevented her, but my mistress suddenly came up and stood by my side. Then I thought she would have fainted as the full horror of the scene burst upon her.
“Men have been here,� she faltered, “horrible, cruel men.�
“Yes,� said I, “but centuries ago. Look, the bones are bleached white. You have naught to fear.�
“Let us leave this frightful place,� she whispered.
“Presently,� I answered, “but you will remember the directions of the chart. I must stand upon yonder altar and get my bearings. The treasure cave should be in line with the statues and a niche or depression in the wall on the further side.�
“Yes,� she replied, “I remember.�
“Well then,� I said, “will you go down to the platform out of sight of this horrible place and wait for me there?�