He approached the rock, called out as loudly as he could and hammered on the rock with the butt of his rifle. But no response came, and, at last, sorely puzzled, he abandoned the attempt.
“Well,” Professor Bruce said grimly, “the old Pharaoh has sprung the trap. His dead hand has reached out through forty centuries and tricked us.”
“What do you mean?” asked the captain.
“What I say,” was the reply. “You don’t suppose that it was mere accident that caused that stone to fall just at this minute, do you?”
“The long arm of coincidence—”
“Nothing of the kind,” interrupted the professor. “That rock was balanced so perfectly that it would fall when a hidden spring was pressed. And we pressed that spring when we stepped on one of the blocks in this paved passage. Those old fellows were marvels when it came to bits of infernal ingenuity like that.”
“It is probable,” observed Phalos.
“The very fact that there was an opening there should have warned us,” admitted the captain. “Why should entrance have been so easy? Simply to lure us in, so that we could be punished for our presumption. ‘Will you walk into my parlor, said the spider to the fly.’ Well, we’ve walked in all right, and if the spider knows anything where he is, I’ll bet he is grinning at us this moment.”
He communed with himself a moment in bitter self-reproach, while Phalos and Professor Bruce, both silently, tried to work out some plan of procedure.
“Well,” the captain resumed at last, with a return of his old nonchalant manner, “there’s no use crying over spilt milk. We’re here, and that’s all there is about it. We’re all grown men, and we’re all of us able to face the truth. I believe I’m betraying no confidence,” he added with grim humor, “when I say that we’re in a very serious situation. But we’ve all been in others quite as serious and emerged with a whole skin, and perhaps history will repeat itself.”