But Nordhu appeared to have obtained too good a start. The pursuers were beginning to think that, after all, they should lose him, when, rounding a curve swiftly, they pulled up in sheer astonishment.
Scarce twenty feet away, his gleaming jewel flashing a challenge to Seymour’s, stood the man they sought. Beside him was a great lever, upon which his hand rested, and at his feet in the floor of the tunnel yawned a hole some six feet in width. Close to the near edge of this crouched the hounds, their ferocity overcome by the hypnotic power of the priest.
At once the pursuers became watchful. What card was Nordhu about to play? they wondered. What devilish trick was he about to perform? The priest’s face puckered up into a savage grin as he noted the hesitation of his enemies.
“Why do ye not come on?” he cried ironically; “art afraid? I have waited to bid ye farewell, thinking perchance ye might grieve did I leave you without.”
Seymour’s face was distorted with fury as he gazed upon the priest. Scarcely could he control the mad passion which bade him rush forward and grip the grinning fiend. But what was that hole in the floor? What was the lever? That Nordhu was about to spring some diabolical trick upon them was certain, and the thought checked the baronet’s murderous desire. So for a space they remained, pursuers and fugitive glaring at each other with a world of hatred in their eyes, yet neither making a move.
Then once more the priest spoke:
“Since ye will not join me, I will go. Fare ye well until I return with my warriors to destroy ye.”
He laughed mockingly, and at that Seymour, losing control of his temper, leapt forward. Quick as thought Nordhu flung over the lever beside him, and at once, from the roof of the tunnel, a cataract of liquid light began to fall, plunging into the hole in the floor.
“Wilt follow now?” snarled the voice of the priest above the boom and splash of the falling light.
“Jupiter!” gasped the Yankee. “Checkmate!”