But I made no halt here, nor did I let my companions even see the treasure that was to be divided between Djama and the professor according to my promise, for I had greater marvels in store for them. So, lantern in hand, I led the way through a winding gallery behind the pyramid of gold of which I told you before. At the end of this was a door, formed by a revolving stone similar to that at the entrance to the hall. This Tupac and another opened under my directions, and we entered a long, straight passage behind it. At the end was a broad flight of stone steps, and at the top were two low bronze doors bolted into pillars on either side. The doors had no hinges, but they turned with the pillars, and no one who did not know this, or how the pillars turned, could open them. But this secret was one of many others that I had brought with me from the past, and in a few moments the doors were standing open before us.

We passed in, and I closed them behind us. Two of my men had come laden with great candles and torches, and these I had lighted and placed in golden sconces which stood out from the walls in the great hall into which we had passed through the bronze doors. When this had been done, I beckoned to Tupac, and went silently with him to the other end of the hall, where, on a throne of gold under a canopy of silver, sat a silent figure clad in the imperial robes, and with a mask of beaten gold over its face, according to the ancient custom. It was the effigy of the great Yupanqui, father of Huayna-Capac, which had been seated here since his death, as an emblem of the unbroken sovereignty of his race, giving place in turn to his son and grandson on the days that they were crowned, and being replaced when the ceremony was over.

Now, with Tupac's help I carried the effigy into a little chamber behind the throne, and there quickly removed my upper clothing and dressed myself as I had done before in the Hall of Gold, and took my place on the throne. Then I bade Tupac lead Joyful Star, with her eyes still bandaged, to me. When he had placed her before me, I made a sign to him, and the bandage fell from her eyes. She turned white as death, and staggered back a pace, with her hands clasped to her temples, and there she stood, staring wide-eyed at me and all the splendours about her.

Wherever her gaze wandered it saw nothing but gold and silver and gems and rich-dyed hangings of silk and wool, whose brilliant hues no time could dim. The roof and the upper halves of the walls were covered with plates of burnished silver. Around the walls, half-way between the floor and the ceiling, ran a great cornice or ledge of gold, on which stood the golden chairs in which were seated the mummies of the twenty Incas which I had last seen in the Sanctuary of the Sun, looking down through the eye-holes in their golden masks.

From the cornice to the floor hung the bright-hued hangings, and against these were ranged along the floor on either side threescore seats of silver, and the floor was paved with diamond-shaped blocks of gold and silver set alternately. Behind the throne on which I sat rose from the floor to roof a sloping wall of golden ingots, and on either hand stood a great golden vase, heaped high with unset gems, emeralds and diamonds, pearls and sapphires and rubies, precious almost beyond price; and on the roof above my throne a great, golden image of the Sun, encircled by spreading rays of gems, glowed and sparkled in the light of the candles and torches.

At last Ruth's wandering gaze became steady and rested upon my face, and I looked back into her eyes, making no sign until she should speak, and sitting motionless as the effigy whose place I had taken.

'Where am I?' she said at last in a low, faint voice, like one awakening from a dream. 'And who are you? Surely you cannot be—and yet, yes, you are Vilcaroya! What has happened?'

'Nothing more than the granting of Joyful Star's request, save that through the treasure-house which she asked to see I have brought her to a better one. Does it please her?'

'Is it real, Vilcaroya?' she whispered. 'Is all this really gold and silver, and are these real diamonds and rubies and emeralds, or am I only dreaming? Does it please me? What a question! I have never even dreamed of anything like it. Where are we, Vilcaroya?'

'In the throne-room of the Incas, beneath what was once their palace and fortress on the hill of Sacsahuaman,' I answered, 'and this is the throne of the great Yupanqui, the greatest earthly king and conqueror of my race. I sat here and crowned myself Inca in the presence of Anda-Huillac and the priests and nobles of the Land of the Four Regions on the day before the night when I drank the death-draught with Golden Star.'