For the next five minutes we were searching in the open space around the tree. At length I found an inequality beneath the moss, and with our sheath knives we removed the superficial growth of fifteen years.
“There has evidently been something buried here,” said Kahikatea, as we looked at the grave-like ridge, about two feet in length; “if we find bones, or all that is left of them, old Te Makawawa’s a fraud, and you and I together will bore and blast a passage through by the ‘way of the spider;’ but, if on the other hand we find a stone, the old chief is to be trusted, in which case you must set out to look for Crystal Grey, and I will bore and blast alone.”
“Unless you will come with me,” I said.
He did not speak for a little while, and I saw he was hesitating. Then the dreamy look came into his eyes—the look which I knew meant his strange, mad desire to look into the face of Hinauri, who, lifeless, but full of meaning, stood praying up there in the forehead of the mountain.
“No,” he made answer presently. “Crystal Grey is your quest. You must go alone.”
We were digging into the soft ground with our sheath knives and scraping out the dirt with our hands. When we were nearly two feet down my sheath knife grazed upon something hard, and another minute disclosed the surface of a stone embedded there.
“We’d better get it right out to make sure,” said Kahikatea, and so we worked away until we had cleared its whole surface. Then, with the aid of a log for a lever, we hoisted it and placed it upon the moss.
“Without a doubt the old chief is to be trusted,” said Kahikatea.
“Without a doubt,” I rejoined. “There were points that I had made up my mind to disbelieve. This was one of them. But now I have verified so much of his story that I am inclined to accept the whole of it as true. I shall act on the assumption that Crystal Grey is still living, and I shall search for her.”
We replaced the stone in its grave and covered it up to look as much as possible the same as before, then found our way back along the bank of the stream to the camp beneath the mountain wall, where we spent the remainder of the day and part of the night in discussing our different undertakings.