“It says: In the foot-steps of the God wait till the eyes of Chia flash.”
He indicated the particular knots of a particular string as the source of his information.
“Where are the foot-steps, old priest?” Henry demanded, staring about him at the unbroken sward.
But the old man started his mule, and, with a tattoo of bare heels on the creature’s ribs, hastened it on across the clearing and into the jungle beyond.
“He’s like a hound on the scent, and it looks as if the scent is getting hot,” Francis remarked.
At the end of half a mile, where the jungle turned to grass-land on swift-rising slopes the old man forced his mule into a gallop which he maintained until he reached a natural depression in the ground. Three feet or more in depth, of area sufficient to accommodate a dozen persons in comfort, its form was strikingly like that which some colossal human foot could have made.
“The foot-step of the God,” the old priest proclaimed solemnly, ere he slid off his mule and prostrated himself in prayer. “In the foot-step of the God must we wait till the eyes of Chia flash——so say the sacred knots.”
“Pretty good place for a meal,” Henry vouchsafed, looking down into the depression. “While waiting for the mumbo-jumbo foolery to come off, we might as well stay our stomachs.”
“If Chia doesn’t object,” laughed Francis.
And Chia did not object, at least the old priest could not find any objection written in the knots.