After he was seated, still beating his drum, the young girls with their baskets gathered near, and the others drew up in a wider circle, until all were up the mountain. Then the priests made obeisance to the sitting man and delivered a sort of address, pointing so often directly at the place where the boys were that Diego, who had strained his ears to hear, caught Juan and dragged him back.
“Juan, Juan!” he whispered, convulsively, “they are coming in here. It must be a sort of cave. Let us run back into it.”
Chapter XXIV.
As swiftly as they dared, the two boys ran back in the cave, which proved to be about fifty yards deep; and when they reached the other end they discovered, to their dismay, that it was not as gloomy as they had at first supposed on looking into it after gazing out into the bright sunlight.
Besides the light which came in at the entrance, more was admitted through an opening in the roof, so that, when they stood at the back and looked fearfully around them, they could see everything quite distinctly. The cave was far more like a hall cut in the rock than like a natural cave. It was fully fifty yards in height, but was comparatively narrow, and the walls were covered with figures carved in the stone, and images, like idols, were set in niches.
Part of this the boys saw at the time, and part afterwards. At that moment they only noted such things as seemed to have some bearing on their situation, and were too anxious to look about them with any idle curiosity.
“It must be a temple,” said Diego, “and the savages have come to worship. If we could only hide somewhere.”
But look as they would they could see no place where they could conceal themselves, and there was nothing for them to do but to stand quite still, flattened against the wall, as much in the shadow as possible. It was so hopeless, however, that both drew their sheath knives, and waited with such terror as neither had ever known before.