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Web of the Golden Spider, The

<h2>CHAPTER XXI</h2> <h3>The Hidden Cave</h3> In the face of this new emergency Wilson, as a real man will, quickly regained control of himself. Some power within forced his aching body to its needs. The first shock had been similar to that which a diver feels when receiving no response to a tug upon the life line. He felt like a unit suddenly hurled against the universe. Every possible human help was removed, bringing him face to face with basic forces. His brain cleared, his swollen and inflamed eyes came to their own, and his aching arms recovered their strength. The fresh shock had thrown these manifestations so far into the background of his consciousness that they were unable to assert themselves. Stubbs was gone. It was possible, of course, that he lay dead up there within six feet of where Wilson stood,––dead, perhaps, with a knife in his back. But this did not suggest itself so strongly as did the probability that he had been seized and carried off. The Priest, who was undoubtably back of this, would not kill him at once. There was little need of that and he would find him more useful alive than dead. 254 If there had been a fight––if Stubbs had been given a chance––then, of course, the Priest would have struck hard and decisively. If he had been carried away uninjured, Stubbs would find his way back here. Of that he was sure. The man was strong, resourceful, and would use his last ounce of strength to relieve his partner. Wilson was in a veritable rat trap. One wall of the cliff projected over his head and the other slanted at such an angle that it was impossible to cling to its smooth surface. And so, although within such a short distance of the top, he was as effectively imprisoned as though he were at the bottom of the chasm. There were just two things possible for him to do; wait where he was on the chance that Stubbs might return, or attempt to trace his way further and reach the cave. If he waited, the dark might catch him there and so he would be forced to remain standing until morning. He hadn’t the strength left for that. The other course would also be a bitter struggle to the last remaining spark of energy and might leave him face to face with another blank wall. However, that seemed to offer the bigger chance and would bring death, if death must be, more quickly. He loosened the map from about his throat and, unrolling it, examined it through his smarting eyes. The directions took him almost step by step to the big rock which had barred further progress. He scanned the words which followed. “The path is locked,” it read, “but it opens to the 255 faithful––to children of the Gilded One. Twelve hands’ breadth from the bottom and close to the wall lies the sign. A strong man pressing steadily and with faith against this spot will find the path opened to him.” Twelve hands’ breadth from the bottom and close to the wall. But supposing that referred to some real door which had since been blotted out by falling rock––by a later avalanche of which this barrier was a relic? There was but one way to find out and he must decide quickly. Also, he must memorize the other directions, for he would be unable to consult his map in the darkness of the lower chasm. “Thirty strides on. If the foot stumbles here, the fall is long. To the left ten paces, and then the faithful come to the warmth of the living sun again. The door stands before. Enter ye who are of the Sun; pause if ye be bearded man or unclean.” Twelve handbreadths up and close to the wall; thirty paces on, then ten; so an opening of some sort appeared and near it, the cave. The cave––it lost its meaning as a treasure house. It was a place to relieve the ache which was creeping back to his arms; which would soothe his straining legs. It was a place to lie down in––this hole, hiding pretty jewels and gold plate. He raised his voice in a final call to Stubbs. It was like calling against a wall; his muffled voice was thrown back in his face. With a start he saw that the light about him was fading. He studied his map for the last time to make sure he had made no mistake, and, folding it, adjusted it once more about his neck. <div>256</div> It was the same laboriously slow process all over again. He shuffled one foot ahead, moved his body squat against the wall, and followed with the other foot. Each time he moved the bitter dust sifted down until it checked his breathing and burned his throat. He had learned to keep his eyes fast closed, but it was a constant effort, for this increased the feeling of dizziness. Always there was a power at his back which drew him out as though he were responding to some powerful magnet. This and the temptation to loosen the tight cords back of his knees––to just let go and sink into relaxation––kept him at a more severe strain than did the actual physical effort. But more than gold was at stake now,––more than jewels, though they sparkled like stars. The prize for steady legs and unflinching nerves was a respite from Death. If he reached the cave, he would have several days at least before him. Neither thirst nor hunger, fierce masters though they are, can work their will except by slow process. Against them Stubbs would be racing and he had faith in this man. He did not fear Death itself. In thinking of the end, the bitter thing it meant to him was the taking off of her. And every day meant one day more of her––another chance of finding her and getting her back to God’s country and the life which awaited them there. It did wait for them; in coming here they had left the true course of their life, but it remained for them to take it up when once they should make the beaten tracks again. Now he was trembling along the 257 ragged edge of losing it all––all that lay behind and all that lay before. But if this was to be so, why had he ever seen that face in the misty dark? why had he come upon her the second and the third time? why had Chance brought him to her across ten thousand miles of sea? why had it brought him here? Why at the beginning could he not have forgotten her as one forgets those who flit into one’s life and out again? He did not believe in a jesting God. One foot forward, the body flat against the wall, a little choke from the dust, then the other foot after. A pause to catch the breath, then––one foot forward, the body flat against the wall, a little choke from the dust, then the other foot after. Also he must pause to remember that it was twelve hands up, close to the wall, thirty paces on, then ten. Odd things flash through a mind long at a tension. In the midst of his suffering he found time to smile at the thought that life had reduced itself to such a formula. A single error in this sing-song, such as ten hands up instead of twelve,––was it ten or twelve? Ten hands up and close to the wall––twelve hands up and close to the wall––they sounded alike. Each fell equally well into the rhythm of his song. He stopped in the grip of a new fear. He had forgotten, and, trying to recall the rest, he found he had forgotten that too. His mind was a jumble so that now he did not dare to put out his right foot at all without first feeling with his toe a little beyond. <div>258</div> But this passed soon, and his thoughts returned to her, which steadied him instantly. So he came safely to the single step down and accomplished this. Then the other and accomplished that. At the end of a few paces farther he faced the great rock. It had become dark down here now,––so dark that he could not see six inches ahead. His foot had come against the rock, and then he had felt up with his hands. He found it impossible to stoop sufficiently accurately to measure from the bottom. There was nothing for it but to guess––to try again and again until either it gave or he proved that it would not give. He placed his hand upon the rock at about the height of his chest and threw his weight forward. It was as though he were trying to push the mountain itself to one side. He tried above, below, to the right, to the left without result. Nothing discouraged, he began again, starting from as low as he could reach and pressing with all his strength at intervals of a few inches. Suddenly, like a door opened from within, the rock toppled to the right where it hung balanced over the precipice, leaving an opening two feet wide. It would have been a tight squeeze for Stubbs, but Wilson easily jammed through. He saw that the path continued at a slightly downward slope. “Thirty paces on and ten to the left.” He repeated the words parrot fashion and his feet obeyed the instructions automatically. The thirty paces ended so near the edge of crumbling rock that it fell away beneath his toe leaving some two inches 259 over nothing. Had a man walked here without directions, he certainly would have taken this last step and been hurled into the space below. It was pitch dark where he stood. He felt along the wall for the opening which should take him to the left ten paces. The wall, the path, the depth below the path were all one save to touch alone. It was as though he himself had been deadened to every sense but this. During the last few minutes his brain, too, had dulled so that all he now grasped of the great happy world outside was a vague memory of blue sky before which a shadowy figure danced like a will-o’-the-wisp. But still propelled by the last instinct to leave man before the soul, he put one foot ahead of him, pressed his body flat to the wall, and drew the other after. As he proceeded thus, counting the steps he took, he became aware that the air was fresher. Ahead, he saw an opening which was a little less dark than this which stifled him. It was light, though he saw it only faintly through blurred eyes. It was a gray slit coming together at the top. He groped his way almost to the edge and then to the left he saw a second opening––an opening into another dark. It was the cave. He staggered the few remaining feet and fell prone upon its granite floor. How long he remained so he could not tell. He was not wholly unconscious, but in a state so bordering upon it that he realized nothing but the ecstatic relief which came to his aching body. Still he was able to realize that. Also he knew that he had reached his 260 journey’s end, so far as anything more he could do was concerned. He would wait––wait as long as possible––cling to the very last second of life. He must do that for her. That was all that was left. His slowly fading senses flickered back. He roused himself and sat up. In the gloom back of him he made out nothing: the opening was becoming obliterated by the dark without, so that he felt as though in a sealed box––a coffin almost. He felt an impulse to shout, but his dry lips choked this back. He could not sit still. He must act in some way. He rose to his hands and knees and began to grope about without any definite object. There was something uncanny in the thought that this silence had not been broken for centuries. He thought of it as his toes scraped along the granite behind him. Once when he put out his hands near the cave opening, they fell upon what felt like cloth. Something gave before his touch with a dry rattle as of bones. He drew back with the morbid thought that they really were bones. Perhaps some other poor devil had made his way here and died. He felt a craving, greater at first even than his thirst, for light. If only the moon came in here somewhere; if only he could find wood to make a fire. He had a few matches, but these he must keep for something more important than catering to a fear. He turned back to the cave mouth, pressing forward this time to the very edge. He saw opposite him another sheer face of rock which came in parallel to this in which he was imprisoned. His eyes fell below to a 261 measureless drop. But the moon was shining and found its way down into these depths. With his eyes still down he bathed in this. Then, with returning strength, he turned to the left and his heart came into his throat. There was still more light; but, greater joy than this, he caught sight far below him of a pool of liquid purple. The cold, unshimmering rays of the moon played upon it in silver paths. It was the lake––the lake upon whose borders it was possible she stood at that very moment, perhaps looking up at these cliffs. It looked such a gentle thing––this lake. Within its calm waters another moon shone and about its edges a fringe of dark where the trees threw their shadows. He thrust his body out as far as possible to see more of it. The light and the color were as balm to his eyes. But it brought back another fever; how he would like to thrust his hot head into its depths and drink, drink, drink! The idea pressed in upon him so strongly, with such insane persistence, that he felt as though if he got very near the edge and took a firm grip with his toes, he could reach the water in a jump. It was worth trying. If he took a long breath, and got just the right balance––he found himself actually crouching. He fell back from this danger, but he couldn’t escape his thirst. He must find water. The dry dust had sifted into his throat––his lungs. His thoughts now centered on nothing else but this. Water stood for everything in the world––for the world itself, because it meant life. Water––water––nothing 262 else could quench the fever which tore at his throat like a thing with a million sharp claws––nothing else could clear his brain––nothing else put the strength back into his legs. Back into the cave he pressed––back into the unknown dark. The flinty sides were cool. He stopped to press his cheeks against them, then licked them with his dry tongue. Back––back away from the temptation to jump, he staggered. Another step, for all he knew, might plunge him into some dark well; but even so, it wouldn’t matter much. There might be water at the bottom. Now and then he paused to listen, for it seemed to him he caught the musical tinkling of dripping water. He pictured a crystal stream such as that in which when a boy he used to fish for trout, tinkling over the clean rock surface,––a sparkling, fairy waterfall where at the bottom he might scoop up icy handfuls. He tried to pierce the dark to where this sound seemed to be. He struck one of his precious matches. The flame which he held before him was repeated a thousand times, in a shining pool to the left. With a throaty, animal-like cry, he threw himself forward and plunged his hands into the pool. They met a cutting surface of a hundred little stones. He groped all around; nothing but these little stones. He grabbed a handful of them and struck another match. This was no pool of water––this was not a crystal spring––it was nothing but a little pile of diamonds. In a rage he flung them from him. 263 Jewels––jewels when he wanted water! Baubles of stone when he thirsted! Surely the gods here who guarded these vanities must be laughing. If each of these crystals had only been a drop of that crystal which gives life and surcease to burning throats,––if only these bits could resolve themselves into that precious thing which they mocked with their clearness! Maddened by the visions these things had summoned, he staggered back to the opening. At least he must have air––big, cooling draughts of air. It was the one thing which was left to him. He would bathe in it and drink it into his hot lungs. He moved on his hands and knees with his head dropped low between them like a wounded animal. It was almost as though he had become a child once more––life had become now so elemental. Of all the things this big world furnished, he wanted now but that one thing which it furnishes in such abundance. Just water––nothing else. Water of which there were lakes full and rivers full; water which thundered by the ton over crags; water which flooded down over all the earth. And this, the freest of all things, was taken from him while that for which men cut one another’s throats was flung in his face. Yes, he had become just a child once more,––a child mouthing for the breast of Nature. When he reached the opening he dropped flat with his head over the chasm. His blurred eyes could still see one thing––the big, cool lake where the moon laughed back at herself,––the big cool lake where the 264 water bathed the shores,––the big cool lake where Jo slept. Jo––love––life––these were just below him. And behind him, within reach of his weak fingers, lay a useless half billion in precious stones. So he fought for life in the center of the web. <hr class='major' /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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