With an exclamation Otter struck him heavily across the mouth, knocking him backwards, but the mischief was done, for a voice cried in answer:
“We hear you, father, and will find ropes and follow.”
Then they started. One moment they paused to look at the huge bulk of the dead crocodile.
“This dwarf is a god in truth,” cried one of the captains, “for no man could have wrought such a deed.”
“Forward,” said Leonard, “we have no time to lose.”
Now they were by the crocodile’s bed and among the broken bones of his victims.
“The bag, Otter, where is the bag?” asked Leonard.
“Here, Baas,” answered the dwarf, dragging it from the mouldering skeleton of the unlucky priest who, having offended the new-found god, had been let down through the hole to lay it in its hiding-place and to perish in the jaws of the Water-Dweller.
Leonard took the bag, and opening its mouth, which was drawn tight with a running strip of hide, he peeped into it while Otter held down the candle that he might see. From its depths came a glimmer of red and blue light that glowed like the heart of some dull fire.
“It is the treasure,” he said, in a low tone of exultation. “At last the luck has turned.”