Forty-eight hours in Lima completely dispelled the cobwebs. Maria-Teresa found a great deal of work awaiting her, and forgot her fears in a maze of figures which took her to Callao early, and kept her busy at the offices until late in the afternoon, when Dick came to fetch her.
One afternoon, about eight days after the adventure at Cajamarca, the tap at her window which announced Dick’s arrival came earlier than usual. Maria-Teresa got up, and threw open the shutters. Dick was not there.... Then she retreated with a half-strangled scream. Was it possible? In the rapidly gathering darkness, she could not be sure, and leaned out of the window to see better.... That thing, swaying in the darkness, looked just like the sugar-loaf skull.... She retreated into the room, trembling in every limb, and turned round. From the dark corners of the chamber two other shadows, the valise and cap skulls, were advancing slowly, swaying as they came.
For a moment, Maria-Teresa thought she had lost her reason. Then she made a violent effort to regain control of herself. Dead skulls could not come to life like this. And yet, they were coming toward her, swaying horribly, above shadowy bodies! A desperate scream for help was choked in her throat. “Dick!...” and nothing more. The three living skulls had hurled themselves upon her, gagged her, and now, throwing the inanimate girl over their shoulders, hurried through the black hole of the open window. Maria-Teresa’s own motor was waiting there, her negro boy at the wheel, smiling strangely.
Their mummy hands, horribly living, lifted the girl into the tonneau, and the three monsters, like three larvae, climbed in after her. Then the car shot down the street.