At a spot among the trees, situated about a hundred yards from where the captain had been standing, the little party came to the place where a dozen pack mules had been tethered; and a brief search among the heterogeneous articles which comprised the packs furnished the sergeant with a raw-hide rope, from which he cut off a couple of lengths sufficient to securely bind the hands of Phil and Dick firmly behind their backs, and this operation was at once so effectually performed that anything in the nature of escape by simply breaking away and running for one’s life was rendered impossible, quite apart from the sinister and significant order to shoot which had been given to the soldiers. A quarter of an hour later the entire party were on the move, and the two Englishmen had the mortification of finding themselves marched back along the road by which they had come.
Shortly after passing the spot where our friends had struck the road, the path—for it was little more—curved away toward the left, and led along the top of an extensive plateau of rich pasture land, upon which, about midday, they sighted the first herd of cattle that the Englishmen had seen since their escape from the Mayubuna; and during the afternoon they saw other herds in the charge of peons, showing that the party were gradually approaching civilised territory; and about half an hour before sunset they marched into a small village, composed chiefly of adobe huts, where a halt was called for the night, and where our friends were confined in a ramshackle barn of a place in company with the sergeant and ten men. That the sergeant was quite determined not to get into trouble by the neglect of any possible precaution soon became perfectly evident; for when, about half an hour after the arrival of the party at the village, supper was served, the individual in question gave orders that before the hands of the prisoners were released to enable them to convey food to their mouths, their ankles were to be securely bound together; and this was done. Then, after supper was over, without unbinding the ankles of the prisoners their wrists were again bound together behind their backs, after which their ankles and wrists were drawn as closely together as they could be induced to come, and firmly lashed behind them; and in this constrained and exceedingly painful posture they were unceremoniously flung into opposite corners of the hut, where, upon the bare floor, and suffering torments from the vermin with which the place was infested, and from which, in their constrained position, they were helpless to defend themselves, they were left to pass the night as best they might.
A seemingly interminable night of torture for the hapless prisoners came laggingly to an end at last when, about half an hour after daybreak, the lashings which had confined their limbs all through the hours of darkness were loosed, and they were allowed to scramble to their feet and walk to and fro for a few minutes before partaking of breakfast. After breakfast the march was resumed; and—not to dwell at unnecessary length upon this portion of the narrative—about an hour before sundown the entire party marched into a city which one of the soldiers surlily informed Phil was Cuzco; and here the two young Englishmen were at length safely deposited in an underground dungeon of a building which had once been one of the Inca’s palaces; escape being rendered impossible by the simple process of chaining them to the wall by means of a heavy iron chain about six feet in length, one end of which was attached to an iron girdle locked round the prisoner’s waist while the other end was welded to an iron ringbolt, the shank of which was deeply sunk into the solid masonry of the dungeon wall.
On the morning of the following day they were temporarily released from their loathsome prison—where their bed had consisted merely of a thin layer of damp straw cast upon the stone flags with which the dungeon was paved, and where the only ventilation consisted of a small iron grating let into the masonry above the door—and conducted, under a strong guard, into the presence of the Governor of the city, who questioned them closely concerning their names, nationality, where they had come from, where they were bound for, and why they wished to go there. At first the two Englishmen resolutely refused to answer any of the questions put to them; but when at length the Governor, growing exasperated at their obstinacy, threatened them with the torture of the boot, Phil so far satisfied the man’s curiosity as to inform him truthfully of their names and nationality, adding the fictitious information that, having quarrelled with their captain, they had been forcibly put ashore somewhere in the Gulf of Darien, and had since been wandering aimlessly about the country, not knowing where to go or how to escape from it. The story was well enough concocted, considering that it was made up on the spur of the moment; but it was evident that it did not altogether satisfy his Excellency, who finally ordered them to be taken back to their dungeon and kept there pending certain enquiries which he proposed to make. Later in the day, when they once more found themselves alone, and again chained to the dungeon wall, Dick, in his simplicity, ventured to question Phil as to his reasons for resorting to fiction instead of boldly telling the truth, or refusing to say anything at all; to which Phil replied:
“My gentle buzzard, if I had persisted in refusing the Don’s request for information, we should have been put to the torture; for when these fellows threaten a thing like that, they usually mean it; or, if they do not actually mean it at the moment, they would unhesitatingly carry out their threat, rather than give themselves the lie; and we should show ourselves singularly deficient in common sense were we to submit to be tormented for hours, and probably maimed for life, rather than impart a little information—so long as that information is of such a nature as to harm nobody. At all costs we must avoid being tortured, if we can; for how could we hope to escape, or, having escaped, hope to carry out our plans, if our bones were broken, or our limbs twisted out of joint. Therefore, as soon as torture was mentioned, I decided that the time had arrived when speech was to be preferred to silence. But I was careful to avoid saying anything which might connect us with the Adventure; because sooner or later news of the exploits of that ship is certain to penetrate as far south even as this, and I have a suspicion that the participants in those exploits will not be altogether popular with the dons. Also, we must remember that there was a rumour that two of the crew of that ship had found shelter and succour in a certain house in Cartagena; and if two persons belonging to the Adventure should eventually be found at large in this country a certain colour of probability might be imparted to the rumour; in which case our gentle friends Clara and Dolores might get into serious trouble. Therefore I thought it best on all accounts to mingle a little fiction with my facts. And I trust that long before his Excellency’s proposed enquiries have borne fruit we shall be far enough away from Cuzco and its Governor.”
“Do you think, then, that there is the slightest chance of our effecting our escape?” asked Dick, glancing expressly at the chain which bound him to the wall.
The darkness of the dungeon was too profound for Phil to detect that glance; nevertheless he must have guessed at it, for he replied:
“No, my son, I don’t think anything of the sort; I know! Don’t ask me how I know, for I cannot tell you; but the knowledge is nevertheless here,” tapping his forehead. “Keep up your courage, youngster,” he continued. “Those chains are nothing. Neither chains nor stone walls can long hold in restraint the man who is destined to be free; and I tell you that neither you nor I are doomed to die at the hands of the Spaniard. More I cannot tell you; for although I am as certain as I am of my own existence that we shall escape, my foreknowledge is not clear enough to enable me to say how that escape is going to be effected.”
“I wish I felt half as confident as you seem to do about it,” grumbled Dick. “At present it appears to me that nothing short of a miracle can help us. But—well, we shall see.”
The lad’s pessimism seemed to be fully justified when, on the following day, the pair were once more released from the chains that confined them to the wall, and were summoned by their jailer to follow him. They obeyed the summons with alacrity, each of them animated by a secret hope that an opportunity might present itself for them to break away from their custodian and effect their escape from the building, and eventually from the city; but this hope was nipped in the bud when, immediately outside the door of the dungeon, an armed guard, consisting of half a dozen soldiers and a corporal, were seen to be awaiting them. Evidently, the moment for escape was not yet.