Something that happened during our stay in this new place I almost dread to tell you, and yet it is a more than solemn fact, and will show to you a tithe, perhaps, of the anxiety that our stay there caused me. One morning the Smith and I had volunteered to secure some mangoes. I had heard Cynthia express a wish for some, and she so seldom asked for anything but the simple food that we had to divide among us, that I decided to skirt down the hill to a tree of which I knew and bring some to the plateau. We listened at the door of our passage, and, hearing no sound, we removed the slab of stone and ran down the underground way, feeling the wall with our hands to guide us. When we reached the outer air we struck into the woods toward the west, and were soon at the mango tree. The Smith was an expert climber, and so I allowed him to climb up among the great branches, while I stood below to catch the fruit. I caught all that I could as he dropped them, that they might not be bruised, and when I had collected what I thought a sufficient quantity I called to him to come down.
"There are some fine ones out on that lower limb," said he. "I should like to get those for the lady, if you don't mind."
I saw him crawling out on the long, strong limb. He laid along it like a serpent, and, as it was a lower limb, he was not far from the ground. All at once I heard an exclamation of horror, and the Smith dropped from the branch. I ran to him, and found that he was bending over a figure lying among the grass and weeds. It was that of a young man of perhaps twenty years of age. He was lying on his back, his eyes staring upward. He was cold in death. How can I write the rest! From the region of the heart a tube or hollow sort of reed stood up perpendicularly in the air. No! I can not write it. The "loup garou" had been there before us, and without the excuse of the vaudoux rites! They had, indeed, been wolves to their own kind. Vampires, I might say! I turned my head while the Smith withdrew the tube and the sharp instrument at its end, which had made the incision.
"First the trance," said the Smith, "and then death! Fortunately, the victims know nothing usually of the manner of their end."
We had no way to dig a grave for the poor young fellow, so we carried him to a cleft in the rock of which I knew and dropped the body down. This terrible incident impressed me as nothing else (not even the sacrifice of the children) had. There was something so horrible in the fact of the young man meeting his fate alone in that deep, dark wood! I was ready to slay the first creature that I came across, but we met no one in returning, and got safely into the passageway and replaced the rock. Then the horror of it all overcame me, and I dropped in the tunnel like a stone.
CHAPTER XIX.
WE MEET FOR THE SECOND TIME WITH "LE BRUIT DU GOUFFRE," AND I TAKE ANOTHER JOURNEY.
I awoke at the touch which, I believe, would bring me back from death.