A shot rang out. Then another and another!
“Peter!” cried Judy. “Are you all right?”
“All right,” he called back in a voice of confidence. “You can trust the forest rangers to get us out of here if we can’t find a way out by ourselves.”
“If the children’s mother had come with us she might have been able to help us,” Judy told the magician. “She says she used to play here with the Riker twins, Philip and Paul. Their uncle chased them out and took possession of the cave. I should have asked her if there’s more than one entrance.”
“There were two,” was the startling reply. “One was the cave of Ravana. Rama would stand at the other entrance calling, ‘O my Sita! Do not give up hope. I will send my faithful Hanumen, king of the monkeys, with a ring for thy finger.’ The ring,” the magician explained in his ordinary voice, “stands for the magic circle of love that never ends, like the love of Rama and Sita.”
“You know the story as well as Helen does,” Judy said quietly, smiling. “You called Mr. Riker Uncle Paul and you knew about the cave. You must be—”
“For the time being, call me Rama,” he interrupted before she could say what she felt sure now must be his name. “I hope I may be the true Rama and that Sita will accept my ring.”
For a moment Judy really felt like Cupid, but she still hadn’t brought the two lovers together. Their predicament took her quickly back to reality. The other entrance to the cave proved to be effectively blocked by an iron door evidently bolted on the outside. After several useless attempts to open it, Peter fired a few more signal shots and then announced that there was nothing to do but wait.
“It’s a good thing we found the jade collection before the thieves did,” he said to the magician. “I doubt if your uncle could have stopped them.”
“He couldn’t have. I’d like to see the whole collection placed in a museum where it would be safe and other people could enjoy it and learn the legends about the different gods and goddesses.”