They had reached a hall-like opening in the cliff, that looked as if it had been split out by highly clever stone workers, and here the General turned his flash, but he no longer held it close to the ground. It was likely that he did not fear its being seen so he was more liberal with the illumination. They had to go single file partly because of the narrowness of the way, and partly because of their manacled hands. They were all woefully tired and stumbling along with dragging feet. Jim began to wish that whatever the Boss had in store for them could be got over with immediately. He felt as if he simply couldn’t go much further.
The hallway wound around, opened into a great cave-like tunnel, and just beyond that they came to a large square basin, like a great roofless room. Above one side the stones formed an arch which hid the occupants from sight of airmen and here Austin saw a fire, built well against the rocks; about it several men were stationed as if waiting. The arrival of the men with their captives did not create much excitement and Jim guessed that something of importance was about to happen, or someone was expected to arrive at any moment. The men were half lounging, their collars turned up and their caps pulled down, so at first he could distinguish none of them very clearly.
“Come over here,” the Admiral ordered, and escorted his party some distance from the group.
“I’m going to sit down,” Jim announced, and promptly dropped to the ground, or rather the stones. “Whew, that feels better.” He noticed some of the men glance indifferently in his direction, but the four of them made themselves as comfortable as possible while the Admiral and his companion stood over them, guns in hand.
Several minutes passed during which time no one spoke and as Austin leaned back to rest he looked up toward the sky, which was a clear cold blue with stars that seemed to have retreated to their greatest distance from the globe as if they rather disapproved of the actions of men. “Queer how different they look when we are flying near to them,” he thought. “As if they are interested and want to be encouraging.” He reasoned that the place they were in was probably near the coast and considerably north of Cuzco where the range of the mountains was broader, with wide stretches of uninhabited territory. The Flying Buddy felt sure that only in such a place would the great Boss have a stronghold such as this, and it was evident that the men were familiar with the section; enough so that they had a landing site as well as the corner with its overhanging ledge.
“Suppose it’s the Boss they are waiting for,” the lad whispered to Arto who was seated beside him.
“Si,” Arto answered.
“Perhaps he’s got some kind of cave or something. Do you know anything about where we are?”
“No. It might be east, far from Cuzco.”
“I was thinking north—”