Jack took a half-burned torch, whose flare had been quenched upon their regaining the room from the raid in which they had secured the buck, and relighted it. He held it as far into the darkness as he could, and the red light showed that a ladder, built of heavy beams of teak, ran downwards from the edge of the hole. Mr. Haydon sniffed cautiously. "The air doesn't smell bad," he remarked; "close and musty, but no mephitic vapours. I think we'll go down."
Jack swung himself over the lip of the hole, dropped his feet on the stout ladder, and went down first, holding the torch before him, and his father followed. They found themselves in a low room of fair size, but not one-half as large as that above and below.
"What's that?" said Jack, and pointed to the far corner, where something gleamed white. They crossed to it, and stood before a knot of skeletons. Nine they counted, each lying as the dead man had fallen long, long ago. In the houses of the city, where roofs had fallen in, where wild beasts had devoured the flesh, and where sun and rain and wind had worked their will upon the bones, all trace of the citizens of that long bygone day had utterly disappeared, but here, where the secret chamber had protected their remains, the skeletons were perfect.
"These are some of the men who fell in the sack of the city," said Jack.
His father bent and carefully examined them by the light of the torch.
"I scarcely think so, Jack," he said. "The bones are perfect and bear no sign of injury. It is more likely that they were priests of the pagoda who took refuge here, and perhaps died of famine, not daring to leave their hiding-place."
Jack moved a little, and started. In his new position a ray of red fire darted at him from one of the heaps of white bones. He stepped forward, bent, and picked up the glittering object.
"Look here," he said to his father, "this is something in your line, if I'm not very much mistaken."
His father turned it over, rubbed the dirt off it, and held it up to the light. It lay in his palm and winked in the light of the torch with dancing gleams of deep scarlet fire.
"Whew!" whistled Mr. Haydon, "a magnificent ruby, large, and of the purest water. Where did you get it, my boy?"