"Don't go too fast!" she pleaded, "I'm—I'm—afraid of being left behind...."
Hand-in-hand, like the Babes in the Wood, we set off again through the forest, pelting headlong down the track. Unmolested we reached the lip of the clearing and dropped down into the hollow where the grave lay bathed in the lemon-coloured light of the new day. In front of us towered the rugged mass of rock for which we were making and my eye sought on the topmost terrace that pillar of dressed stone which held, as I firmly hoped, the secret of the treasure.
Panting we scrambled up the shelving slabs of stone which led to the foot of the crag. In order to reach the first shelf I had given Garth a back; but I guessed that the track I had seen winding aloft from the first terrace must, somehow, find its way to the ground.
We followed the base of the rock round till, presently, we came upon a tiny, zigzag foot-path, crumbling and precipitate, leading upwards. By this we were out of sight of the clearing, but the sounds of pursuit drifted across to us more plainly every minute.... the noisy passage of men through the undergrowth, raucous shouts. They seemed to be beating the jungle, keeping in touch with each other by calling.
The attack, when it came, would come from the rear. Therefore, I made Marjorie go first up the path. I looked at her anxiously. She was game all through, this girl; but her eyes were wistful and her mouth drooped pathetically. The path, winding its way across the face of the rock, brought us on to the first shelf and thence, from the far end, pursued its course aloft. As we stepped out on the terrace a shout rang out from below and at the same moment a bullet hit the rock with a rebounding thwack right next to my ear while another whined shrilly over our heads.
"Go on, go on!" I cried to Marjorie. Together we dashed across the terrace and then the winding of the path brought us under cover again. We toiled on, the path growing steeper and steeper. I kept looking round to see if we were followed; but the grey path below us remained deserted.
As we mounted higher I noticed that the shelves cut out of the rock face grew narrower. The second terrace was scarcely more than twelve feet wide. Since we had left the first terrace we had looked out over a stern landscape of barren rock and lonely crag without a vestige of green. But, when we were within measurable distance of the third and topmost terrace, the path suddenly bent to the left and a magnificent panorama of land and sea burst upon our gaze.
Far below us the belt of green jungle was spread out at our feet; the waving green trees sloped down to the cliff-sheltered anchorage where the white wings of sea-birds flashed in the sun; a broad belt of deep blue sea ran out to the horizon all round. In the foreground our narrow path zigzagged to and fro, like a fluffy grey ribbon gummed to the rock. Just beyond we looked into the cup-shaped hollow with the grave. Tiny figures, every detail clear-cut and distinct in that limpid air, were dotted about the clearing. One leant heavily upon a stick which, as we stood and gazed upon the view, he raised and with it pointed aloft.
"Hurry, hurry!" I cried to Marjorie, but almost before I spoke a rifle again rang out in the hollow below and the dust spurted at my feet. It was some thirty yards to where the path, turning once more, would bring us out of sight and we scrambled forward with the bullets "zipping" angrily in the dust or noisily flattening themselves out on the rock. Several of the men in the clearing seemed to be firing, for the bullets came pretty fast.
It was a harrowing experience to be shot at at that height, perched on a precipitate path like flies on a ceiling. I plunged forward, my heart in my mouth. Now Marjorie had reached the bend and having rounded it into cover, had halted, waiting for me to draw level. A bullet struck the ground between us splashing the grey volcanic dust knee-high and the next moment I had scrambled into safety. Then I saw that the topmost terrace was only a few yards from us.