The girls were horrified when they heard what he had to say. The cave was full of his own people. Among them he had seen, by the light of their torches of cocoa-nut husks, the new chief, a young man who was high in favour with the mystery men and had led the revolt against himself. But what had distressed him was the sight of a prisoner lying bound against the wall of the cave. It was a white man, and Maku was almost sure it was the "mikinaly." The mystery men could only have one object in bringing a white missionary to the scene of their dreadful orgies: he was to be offered up as a sacrifice to their heathen deities.
At this terrible news the girls' blood ran cold. Dreadful as the horrors of cannibalism had been to their imagination, the knowledge that the reality would soon be enacted so near at hand was overpowering. The thought of any human creature being tortured and killed in cold blood was agony to them; and that the victim should be a white man, a fellow-countryman, within reach of them, and yet beyond their help, caused them to shrink and quiver as with actual physical pain.
For some time they sat in silence, clasping their arms about each other.
Every now and again the old man uttered a groan. They could not see one another in the darkness, and Tommy's match-lighter was exhausted, so that they could not obtain a light; but the girls were conscious by a sort of electric sympathy that Maku and even gay-hearted little Fangati were scarcely less affected than themselves.
"Will it be to-night?" asked Elizabeth presently, in a whisper.
"No, no," replied Maku; "two days, flee days, den all gone."
This answer only increased the horror of the situation. The victim was to linger through three days anticipating his cruel death. The savages knew not so much mercy as to send him early to his doom.
"He no 'flaid; he all-same good man," murmured Maku.
"I can't stand it," cried Elizabeth, springing up; "I must see for myself. Perhaps something can be done for him."
"Don't, Bess!" exclaimed Tommy, clinging to her. "What can you do? They may see you."