He preceded them round the three great Buddhas who sat in repose on lotus flowers, stopping first to point out to them the wizened embalmed figure of the holy man of the temple, an old abbot whose sanctified flesh had resisted the process of decay. The children looked with awe at the shriveled body over which a cloak of faded red satin had been thrown. Its clawlike finger nails, the sparse hairs protruding from the gilt which did not hide the wrinkles of the face, the puny withered legs on which the dead man sat, reminded them of a monkey profanely set up beneath a canopy of gold and scarlet. The sight filled them with horror. Nancy gladly hurried into the courtyard beyond and followed the direction the monk pointed while he waited for Edward, who wanted one more look at the hideous corpse.
She passed through a door, took a step or two, then paused in alarm. This was a room, not a passage. She must have taken the wrong turning. Before she had sufficient presence of mind to go back, she heard a grating noise and wheeled round just in time to see the grinning lips of the monk as he slammed the door in her face. There followed a creaking of wooden bolts. She dashed frantically to the door, but, as she anticipated all too correctly, it would not yield.
For the moment she was too much frightened over what might be happening to Edward to consider her own peril. She heard his voice crying shrilly, "What have you done with my sister?" then the voice of the monk grunting, "Catch the little rat." After this came noise of a scuffle and an exclamation of pain, then some cursing which seemed to show that Edward had outwitted the man who was trying to capture him. The noise went with a rush into the hall beyond so that Nancy, whose heart was beating tumultuously, could not follow the further fortunes of her brother. She was in an agony of fear for his safety and looked wildly round the room to see what she could do. There was the first and obvious precaution of drawing the inner bolts of the door so that she was secure for the present from any but a violent attempt to break into the chamber.
As a matter of fact, Edward had done well. The instant he realized the evil purpose of the monk he had drawn his bow tight, suddenly glad and proud of the weapon Nancy had derided. When the monk rushed forward to seize him, Edward had let his arrow fly, catching his adversary a blow in the pit of the stomach which effectually checked the attack. The man took some seconds to regain his breath. They were enough for Edward to run swiftly across the courtyards to the outer hall of the temple where the other monk was still fumbling with the gates. He was too slow. Edward eluded him and dashed down the path till after a flight of several hundred yards he realized no one was pursuing. Then he paused. The exhilaration of his doughty resistance forsook him. He wanted to boast to Nancy about his prowess as a marksman; he had vanquished a real enemy. But there came the stupefying memory that Nancy herself was in great danger and that he must save her.
Nancy was not only in great danger but sadly depressed by the quiet which ensued upon Edward's escape. She did not have even the comfort of knowing that the boy was free. The sound of excited voices came from a distant part of the monastery but no clue to what had happened.
The girl looked anxiously about her prison. It was a bare, whitewashed room, fortunately with only the one door, but also without a vestige of furniture which could help her in climbing to the high square windows. She tried jumping in hope of grasping the wooden frame, but the effort was too great. Her hands slipped uselessly down the rough tiles. After wearing herself out in frantic leaps, she sat down exhausted on the floor, sobbing convulsively as she realized that her only chance of escape depended upon Edward—the possibility that he had been more successful and got away to call help.
This passive ordeal was heart-rending, for Nancy had ample time to remember all the tales of monks and their evil doings, which the women of the household were wont to relate with much gloating zest. She was under no illusions about their lust, their greed, their cruelty, their perverted ways. She had heard too many stories about young girls kidnapped and held in lewd bondage while their families searched for years, unable to secure any hint of where they had been taken; she knew too that these lonely monasteries often were the haunt of bandits who recruited their wives from the guileless women who came to worship; they were places where rascals hid children while they extorted ransom from wealthy parents. Only the other day Nancy had been told of a boy whose ears had been cut off and sent by post to his parents to hurry payment of the money the robbers had demanded. Would they treat Edward this way?—or herself?
She tried to avoid pondering the details of her own fate, but she could not blot them out of mind. She would not yield, she vowed, but she guessed the ruthless torturing ways of these men when they wished to bend a handsome girl to their will. In a spurt of energy she jumped up to examine the fastenings of the door. They were strong. She took off the garters of brilliant orange elastic which she used, like modern Chinese girls, now that the fad of silk stockings had ousted the old foot wrappings. If the worst came to the worst she might be able to hang herself from the bolts on the door; alas, her experiments in the performance of suicide were not very convincing: the garters were too short and if she used the string which held her trousers in place she might practise too successfully and give finality to a rehearsal which was meant to be tentative. Yet the interest of examining the articles of her clothing for their possible use in suicide had the paradoxical result of cheering the girl and diverting her from the extreme depths of morbid terror. It was like planning a game to think how self-destruction could be effected by the limited means at her command. Nancy became more light-hearted over the problem of this danger which had swooped down so unexpectedly from the gayety of a summer stroll. The temple, at all events, had relapsed into quiet. The girl's courage was not put too quickly to the crisis of defending her door.