“Steady, steady! They’re not going to burn her. She’s the Bride of the Sun, and they wall her up. Burn her, indeed! It’s not done, I tell you. Every Aïmara child knows that. Little children don’t see the Temple of Death unless they are to die in it, but they know that much. Burn my daughter, indeed! As if I would allow it! What do you think I brought this pick for? You do just as well not to answer. Much better remain silent than talk nonsense like that. If you look at the walls out there you’ll see a big porphyry slab between each gold panel. There are just a hundred of them, and behind each one is one of the Sun’s brides. If I only knew which tomb my daughter was in, I would have had her out a long time ago. But the slabs are all just alike, and there is nothing to help a poor father in his search. This time, though, I’m watching, and as soon as they’ve gone, I shall save her.”
“She may be dead, smothered alive, when you get her out.” Dick, thinking hard while the old man babbled on in whispers, was hoping against hope.
“That just shows how little you know about it. They are deep tombs, like cupboards, and you can sit in them. Don’t you know the Indians always bury people sitting? There’s air enough in there to keep her alive for an hour, or even two. And I shall have her out in ten minutes!”
Dick stared blindly at the porphyry slabs before him.
“But if there are a hundred of them in there already, there isn’t room for another. Are you sure?”
“Of course I am. You needn’t worry, boy. The pyres are for the two mammaconas who go before the Bride to prepare her chamber in the Enchanted Realms of the Sun.”
“There are three pyres, though.”
“Naturally. They have to take out the oldest bride to make room for my daughter. Then they burn her. What else should they do?”
“Burn her? Then they do burn her!”
Dick had almost lost control of his mind.