And now the young Englishman began to find his time very fully occupied, so much so, indeed, that the days seemed not nearly long enough to enable him to accomplish the half of what he wished to do. There was, for instance, the learning of the Quichua language. Harry had not been domiciled in his palace twenty-four hours before it had become patent to him that this was the first task which he must undertake; for very few of the nobles had any knowledge whatever of Spanish, and the inconvenience and loss of time involved in conversing through an interpreter were far too great to be passively endured. And, since he could do very little else as satisfactorily as he would wish until he had mastered this rich and expressive language, he devoted four hours of every day—two in the morning and two in the evening—to its study. Then he soon learned that, exclusive of the inhabitants of the Valley of the Sun, there were some three hundred and fifty thousand Indians scattered up and down the country, at least one in every ten of whom might be counted as a fighting man. These people had to be brought into the valley, housed, fed, disciplined, in preparation for the time when arms should be put into their hands; also—what was more difficult still—matters had to be so arranged that the families of these men, and all dependent upon them, should suffer neither loss nor inconvenience from the drafting of the able-bodied into the valley. Then the arrangements and preparations for the importation of arms and ammunition into the country—everything connected with which had, of course, to be done entirely without the knowledge of the authorities—involved a tremendous amount of hard and intricate work. It is therefore not to be wondered at that during the first six months of his reign the young Inca was unable to spare a single hour for amusement.

But the moment was at hand when Harry was to enjoy some sport of a quite unique character; and the way in which it came about was thus. As he stood one morning in the palace garden, gazing out over the lake, with his faithful henchman Arima close at hand, an idea suddenly occurred to him, and, turning, he remarked:

"The lake looks particularly enticing this morning, Arima. Are there any balsas near at hand? Because, if so, you shall fetch me one, and we will go out together to deep water and indulge in a glorious swim."

"A swim, Lord, in the deep water of the lake?" ejaculated Arima in horror-stricken accents. "Nay, that is impossible."

"Impossible!" repeated Harry. "And why, pray?"

"Because of the monsters, Lord," answered Arima. "Were we to venture to plunge into the lake we should almost certainly be devoured."

"Indeed!" answered Harry. "So there are monsters in the lake, are there? I was not aware of that. And what are those 'monsters'? Are they alligators, or voracious fish, or what are they? I should hardly have supposed that the water of the lake was warm enough for alligators to flourish in it."

"Nay, Lord," answered Arima, "they are not alligators. I have seen alligators in some of the northern rivers, and know them well enough to be able to distinguish between them and the monsters which haunt our lake. Nor are they fish; or if they be, they are quite unlike any other fish that these eyes of mine have ever beheld. We call them 'monsters' because our forefathers did so, and because we have no other name for them; also because of their exceeding size and malevolence."

"Ah!" commented Harry. "Well, what are these creatures—these monsters—like, and how big are they? Have you ever seen them?"

"Yes, Lord," was the answer. "I have seen them no less than three times at close quarters, and always with the same disastrous results. The first time was when, during my passage of the lake on a balsa, one of my companions had the misfortune to fall into the water. Ere the balsa could be stopped and paddled back to where the man was struggling, two of the monsters appeared and tore him limb from limb. The resemblance to an alligator lies chiefly in the shape of the head, which, however, is longer in proportion and more pointed than that of the alligator. Also, our monsters have smooth skins, nearly black in colour, and instead of feet and legs they have fins. The tail also is differently shaped from that of an alligator, being wide and flat at the end."

"By Jove!" exclaimed Harry in astonishment, "they must be queer and formidable-looking creatures indeed; and fins in place of legs and feet! I'll be shot if I can place them at all. Are there many of them?"

"We do not generally see more than two, or three at most, although it is on record that on one occasion, many years ago, four were seen, two of them being obviously young ones," answered Arima.

"Upon my word, this all sounds exceedingly interesting," commented Harry. "I should dearly like to see the creatures myself. Do they often show themselves?"

"Very rarely, Lord, save in the case of such accidents as those of which I have told you," answered Arima. "Yet," he continued, "if my Lord desires to see the monsters it could doubtless be managed. If the carcass of an animal were deposited upon yonder rock,"—the Indian pointed to a rock showing slightly above the water's surface about a mile from the shore—"and another were cast into the water quite near it, the monsters would doubtless be attracted to the place; and if my Lord were close at hand at the time, upon a large and safe balsa, he would see them when they crawl up on the rock to reach the carcass exposed there."

"Ah!" ejaculated Harry; "you think so? Then let the matter be arranged for to-morrow, Arima. I confess that your description of the creatures has powerfully excited my curiosity, and made me very anxious to see them."

And on the morrow the young Inca's curiosity was fully gratified, and with something to spare.

Oh, those monsters! Harry believed he possessed a passably fair general knowledge of natural history, but these creatures—monsters truly—were entirely new to him. In no natural history had he ever seen a representation of anything like them. And yet, when he came to think of it again, singular and terrifying as was their appearance, it was not altogether unfamiliar. He believed he had seen them portrayed somewhere, although he could not for the moment remember where. Fully forty feet long from the snout to the tip of the tail, with a head shaped midway between that of a pike and a crocodile, with enormous protruding eyes, with a smooth somewhat fish-shaped body almost black above and shading off to a dirty whitish-grey beneath, with a long tail broad and flat at its extremity, and with four seal-like flippers instead of legs and feet, the monsters looked more like nightmare creatures, evolved by reading a book on antediluvian animals after a—. Of course, that was it, Escombe decided, as his thoughts took some such turn as above. He now distinctly remembered having read some years ago a most interesting illustrated magazine article upon extinct animals, and one of the pictures portrayed these identical monsters, labelling them "Plesiosaurus"! Yes, the more Harry thought about it the less room did he find for doubt that these so-called monsters haunting the lake in the Valley of the Sun were actually survivors—most probably the only ones—of the antediluvian plesiosaurus. How they got there was a most interesting problem, yet it seemed by no means a difficult one to solve. The conclusion at which Escombe speedily arrived—rightly or wrongly— was that upon the subsidence of the waters of the Deluge a pair of plesiosauri had found themselves imprisoned in the great basin of the valley, where, the conditions presumably being exceptionally favourable, they had not only survived but had actually contrived to perpetuate their species to a very limited extent. And the reason why the lake was not swarming with them, instead of containing probably only three or four specimens at the utmost, was doubtless that the waters were too circumscribed in extent, and too unproductive in the matter of fish, to support more than that number.

The problem of how they came to be where they were was, however, not one of very great importance; the thing that really mattered was, in Escombe's opinion, that their presence in the lake constituted a horrible danger to those who were obliged to traffic upon its waters, and they must be destroyed. They must not be permitted to exist another day longer than was absolutely necessary. Why, when one came to think of it, how many hundreds of lives might not already have fallen victims to the savage voracity of those creatures? What hope for his life would a man have if he chanced to fall off his balsa at a moment when one of those monsters happened to be close at hand? Positively none. Escombe shuddered as he reflected that, ignorant as he had hitherto been of the presence of the plesiosauri in the lake, it had only been by a series of fortuitous circumstances—or was it the intervention of a merciful Providence?—that he had been from time to time prevented from bathing in the lake, ay, and actually swimming out to the distant rock, as he had several times been strongly tempted to do.

Yes, those implacably ferocious monsters must be destroyed forthwith; and the only point remaining to be settled was, how was the work of destruction to be accomplished?

The plan which first suggested itself to the young Inca was the very obvious one of fishing for them with a baited hook and line, even as sharks were fished for. True, it would need a very big hook and a very strong line to capture a creature of the size and strength of a plesiosaurus; but to manufacture them was surely not beyond the resources of the inhabitants of the valley. Yes; but there was another matter to be considered. What about a craft from which to do the fishing? The largest balsa that Harry had ever seen upon the lake was not nearly big enough for the purpose; a hooked plesiosaurus would drag it under water without an effort, and then what would become of its occupants? The probabilities were too awful for contemplation, and the idea was not to be entertained for a moment. Besides, a balsa was not at all the kind of craft on which to engage in so dangerous a form of sport, even though it were possible to build one big enough; what was needed was a good stanch sturdy boat of, say, twenty tons or so. And, having arrived at this point in his meditations, Escombe was naturally reminded that he had often wished that he possessed a small yacht wherein to disport himself on the lake. Why should he not have one? His will was law; he had but to speak the word and the best and most skilled workers in the valley would be at his disposal for the construction of the vessel. And as to her design, why, he had always been an enthusiastic yacht sailor, and knew, as well as most amateurs, what the shape of such a craft should be, and was quite capable of putting that shape on paper in a form that could be worked from.

Escombe's mind was made up: he would destroy those plesiosauri, and to destroy them a suitable boat was necessary. That boat might be so designed and built as to also afford him a great deal of pleasure, and he would have her. And thereupon he set to work and devoted every minute he could spare to the preparation of her design, which, a week later, was in the hands of a small army of carpenters, eager to show what they could do in a line of work that was entirely new to them.



CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

THE SLAYING OF THE MONSTERS.

"Many hands make light work"; and in just two months from the day of starting work upon the cutter she was complete, rigged, and ready for launching. She was of the most up-to-date type with which Escombe was acquainted; that is to say, beamy, rather shallow of body, with spoon bow, and a fin keel, and her designer felt particularly proud of her as he walked round her and critically surveyed her lines and general shape the last thing before giving the word to put her into the water. Needless to say she was also the object of great and ever-increasing curiosity to the inhabitants of the valley generally, not more than perhaps a dozen of whom had ever seen anything more handy and shipshape than the unwieldy balsa, or raft constructed of reeds, a not very manageable craft at the best of times, and of course quite incapable of being navigated under sail except before the wind. The cutter was got into the water without accident, and after some slight readjustment of her inside ballast, to bring her accurately to her correct water line, her young owner got on board and, a nice sailing breeze happening to be blowing right down the lake, took her for a trial spin from one end of the lake to the other, running down and beating back. The result was eminently satisfactory in every respect, the little vessel developing a fine turn of speed, not only before the wind but also close-hauled, while she was of course, like all craft of similar form, remarkably weatherly; indeed the smartness with which she worked back against the wind, from the lower end of the lake, was regarded by the unsophisticated inhabitants of the valley as nothing short of miraculous.

Meanwhile, Escombe having given instructions for the manufacture of a hardened copper hook, with two fathoms of chain attached, and a stout rope of plaited raw hide, at the same time that he had put the yacht in hand, these articles were now ready. Therefore, after exercising his crew for a week, to get them thoroughly accustomed to the working of the new craft, he made arrangements for a grand plesiosaurus hunt, to which he invited his stanch friend Umu, and three or four other nobles who had manifested a capacity for development into kindred spirits.

On a certain glorious morning this novel fishing party embarked on board the yacht, taking with them, of course, their fishing line and the carcasses of two llamas, cut in half, for bait, together with a formidable battery of bows and arrows, spears, heavy maces, and other weapons for the killing of their quarry when captured; to which armament Escombe added his magazine rifle and two packets of cartridges, which the faithful Arima had been careful to bring away from the survey camp, together with everything else belonging to his young master, on the memorable occasion of that individual's abduction. Starting under easy sail, and heading for the bottom of the lake, the great fishing line— made fast by its inner end to the windlass bitts, and the remainder of it led aft outside and clear of all rigging—was baited and paid out astern as soon as the cutter had run into deep water.

It was not very long before the party, intently on the watch for the approach of the plesiosauri, detected a strong, swirling ripple mingling with that of the yacht's wake, which indicated that at least one of the monsters was at hand, and presently the ripple broke, revealing some six feet of smooth, black, glistening back keeping pace with the little vessel, while occasionally, when the light favoured, an indistinct and momentary glimpse might be caught, through the swirling water, of two enormous, glaring eyes. But the beast, in its eagerness to reach its supposed prey, had apparently passed the baited hook as unworthy of its notice, for the bait was a long way astern of the creature, which seemed intent only on overtaking the yacht, for it now made frequent rushes forward until it was within a few fathoms of the little vessel's counter, and then sank out of sight and dropped astern again, as though it knew not what to make of the moving object ahead of it. But, provokingly enough, from the sportsmen's point of view, it never dropped far enough astern to bring it level with the bait, while, on the other hand, when it approached the yacht it was careful to keep far enough below the surface to render anything like an accurate aim impossible; indeed it behaved as though it instinctively knew that danger threatened it. Although Escombe's companions were eager enough to waste their arrows in obviously futile attempts to hit it, the young leader of the expedition rigorously forbade everything of the nature of chance shooting, lest the creature should happen to receive a more or less slight wound, and thus be driven to flight. And, for the same reason, Escombe himself declined to attempt a shot with his rifle.

But while they were all intently watching the movements of the creature, and standing with weapons in hand, ready to discharge an effective shot at the first favourable opportunity, a sudden, startled yell from Arima, who was tending the fishing line, caused the whole party to wheel round to see what was the matter, and Harry had only bare time to drop his rifle and grip his faithful henchman by the belt, to thus prevent him from being dragged overboard, as the line suddenly tautened out like a bar, flinging up a great shower of spray as it did so, while a terrific plunge in the water far astern revealed the fact that a second monster, whose presence had hitherto been undetected, had taken the bait and become hooked.

"Let go the line, you idiot, let go!" hissed Escombe through his clenched teeth, as he braced his feet against a stanchion and flung himself back, clinging with both hands to Arima's belt, while that individual vainly strove to hold the now frantically struggling reptile—"let go, man, if you don't want to be dragged overboard and eaten alive! Haul down the foresail, there, for'ard!"

The stout raw-hide line twanged like a harp-string as the terrified Arima relaxed his convulsive grip on it and was hauled back inboard to safety by his master, and the yacht's forward progress was checked with an abruptness that threatened to drag the bitts out of her as the strain of the line, with the plunging, struggling monster at the end of it, was suddenly thrown upon them, while the shock sent every individual, fore and aft, sprawling upon the deck, to the uproarious and most undignified amusement of the young Inca, and the mortal terror of his faithful subjects. Then, as all hands scrambled to their feet again and instinctively regained possession of their weapons, the hooked saurian started to "run", in the vain hope, possibly, of breaking away from the restraining influence which had so suddenly and unaccountably seized upon it. The yacht was whirled violently round—almost capsizing in the process—and dragged, with her bows nearly buried in the hissing and curling water, back toward the head of the lake, at a steadily increasing pace, as the now thoroughly terrified plesiosaurus surged forward at headlong speed in its frenzied endeavour to escape, with its companion keeping pace by its side.

The yacht had only travelled a distance of some three miles down the lake when the monster had taken the bait, and on the backward journey this distance was covered in about a quarter of an hour—a fact which bore eloquent testimony to the tremendous strength of the creature. Harry was beginning to feel exceedingly uneasy lest his vessel should be towed into such shallow water that he would be compelled to cut the line in order to save her from being dragged ashore, when the quarry, which probably also objected to shallow water, wheeled suddenly right round and, rushing close past the cutter, in a perfect maelstrom of foam and spray, headed back for the lower end of the lake, with its companion still bearing it company. To thrust the helm hard over, and to shout to everybody to lie down and hang on for their lives, was, with Harry, the work of but a moment; yet the yacht, handy as she was on her helm, had scarcely swept halfway round when the stout line again jerked itself taut, the terrific strain again came upon the bitts, causing them to ominously creak and groan, and once more the little vessel heeled gunwale under as she was whirled violently round, until she righted again and ploughed up a glassy sheet of foam-laced water on either bow as she tore along in the wake of the monster reptiles.

"This cannot possibly last very much longer," remarked Escombe reassuringly to his companions, who had by this time turned a sickly, greenish-yellow with terror at so unaccustomed an adventure—and that, too, on an element to which they were practically strangers—"the brute will soon become exhausted at this rate, and when he does we will haul him alongside and finish him off with our spears and arrows. I don't care how far he runs, so long as he heads as he is now going; it is those sudden twists and turns that are dangerous. If he were to break away we should probably never have a chance to hook him again."

Nevertheless, despite Harry's confident prognostication, they had traversed quite half the length of the lake ere there was the slightest perceptible sign of the creature weakening; and they accomplished another quarter of the distance ere the reptile slackened speed sufficiently to admit of their attempting to haul the yacht up alongside it. Then, when they at length proceeded to make the attempt, the additional strain thrown on the rope, as it was hauled in and coiled down, seemed to exhaust the last remnant of the brute's strength, and, stopping suddenly, it rose to the surface and, throwing its head out of the water, shook it savagely from side to side in a futile endeavour to shake itself free of the hook, emitting a curious grunting kind of roar as it did so.

Yet, even now, the creature was not conquered; for when it found itself being hauled alongside the yacht it suddenly sank, and nearly the whole of the length of rope that had been hauled in was allowed to run out again ere Harry, by taking a quick turn round the bitts, was able to stay its downward progress. And then it became a matter of sheer, downright drag by all hands ere the huge bulk could be brought near enough to the surface to permit of the use of their weapons on it, when it was found that its companion still clung faithfully to its side.

At length, after some fifteen minutes of exhausting labour on the one hand, opposed to stolid dogged resistance on the other, the monster reptile was dragged so close to the surface that the point of its snout was actually raised above the level or the water, and the whole of the gigantic body, right down to the extremity of the broad-ended tail, could be clearly seen hanging suspended vertically in the pellucid depths beneath the yacht, while swimming agitatedly round and round the suspended body could occasionally be seen the creature's mate, now plunging deep, as though, thoroughly terrified, it had at length determined to abandon so dangerous a neighbourhood, and anon returning with a swift rush to the surface, and furious dartings to and fro, as though meditating an attempt at the rescue of its companion.

And now, for the first time, the hunters were able to obtain a thoroughly clear and satisfactory view, at close quarters, of the gruesome-looking brutes, and a truly hideous and nightmare-inspiring sight it was; a sight which, as Escombe gazed at the ponderous, powerful, thick-skinned bodies, the enormous, protruding, balefully glaring eyes, and the long, cavernous, gaping jaws, armed with great serrated teeth—those of the upper jaw fitting in between those of the lower—caused him to feel, more strongly than ever, the conviction that in destroying the creatures he was a public benefactor.

The captured brute now hung so nearly motionless, with the point of the great barbed hook protruding through its upper jaw, that it was evident its strength must be practically exhausted; and Escombe, standing by to open fire with his magazine rifle in case of an emergency, gave the word to his companions to deal the death stroke, advising some to endeavour to reach the creature's brain by means of a spear-thrust through the eye, while others were to attempt to pierce the heart. But, with the arrival of the crucial moment, the nerves of the natives seemed to suddenly fail them; they became flurried and frightened in the very act of raising their weapons to strike, and every man of them missed his mark, inflicting many serious and doubtless painful wounds, but not one that seemed in the least degree likely to prove mortal. The result was the immediate resumption of a struggle so violent that for a breathless minute or two it really seemed as though the cutter, stout little craft as she was, would be dragged under water and sunk. And in the very height of the confusion one of the hunters must needs fall overboard into the midst of the boiling flurry of bloodstained foam raised by the struggles of the frantic brute, and was only dragged aboard again by Harry in the very nick of time to save him from the terrific rush of the second plesiosaurus. Then the young leader of the party, seeing that his companions were too completely unnerved to be of any use, and that the violent struggles of the wounded brute threatened to seriously injure, if they did not actually destroy, the cutter, stepped forward, and, raising his rifle, seized the opportunity afforded by a pause of a fraction of a second in the violent movements of the creature, and sent a bullet crashing through its right eye into its brain. That settled the matter. The struggles ceased for a moment or two with startling suddenness; a convulsive, writhing movement followed; then came a terrible shudder, and with a final gasping groan the monster yielded up its life and hung motionless, its body supported, still in an upright position, by the great hook through its jaw. With the crack of Escombe's rifle the second monster had suddenly vanished.

The question now was, what was to be done with the carcass of the dead plesiosaurus. As Harry stood there, contemplatively regarding it, it was perfectly obvious to him that if the great fish hook were cut out of the creature's jaw with an axe, the body would at once sink to the bottom of the lake, and there would be an end of it, so far as he was concerned, and the party would at once be free to resume their fishing, although he had his doubts as to whether, after what had already happened, another of the monsters could be tempted to take the baited hook. But it suddenly occurred to him that, the plesiosaurus being to all intents and purposes an extinct and antediluvian animal, the only remains of it in existence must necessarily consist of such fossilised fragments as had been accidentally discovered in the course of excavation, and that the complete skeleton of such a gigantic specimen as that before him would be regarded as a priceless acquisition by the curator of the Natural History Museum at South Kensington; so he at once resolved to take the necessary steps for its preservation. He gave orders for the line to which the hook was bent to be led aft, for convenience of towage, and then commanded his crew to set the cutter's sails, his purpose being to tow the carcass to a lonely part of the shore, and there have the body hauled up out of water, the flesh carefully removed from the bones, and the skeleton as carefully disarticulated, prior to packing it for dispatch to England.

But the cutter was scarcely under way, and heading for the spot that had been selected as suitable for the above operations, when a disturbance of the water near at hand indicated the presence of some bulky moving body, most probably the companion of the dead creature, which had been terrified into temporary flight by the report of Harry's rifle. The animal, however, or whatever it might be, remained invisible, the little swirling eddies and ripples on the surface of the water alone betraying its whereabouts. But while Harry and his friends were discussing this appearance, and wondering what it might portend, one of them happened to glance around him in another direction, and his startled exclamation caused the rest of the party to look in the direction toward which he pointed. And there, somewhat to their consternation, the party saw, not half a dozen yards away, on the cutter's weather beam, the indications that two more of the monsters were present, keeping way with the cutter, and, as was presently pretty evident, edging in toward her; indeed, so close were they to her that an occasional momentary flicker of the black back of the nearer of the two could already be caught through the gleaming water. Two or three of the nobles who had by this time succeeded in pulling themselves together and getting a grip upon their courage, proposed an instant attack upon the monsters; but Escombe felt that, for the moment, he had as much upon his hands as he could manage. For with that huge dead bulk in tow the cutter was scarcely under command, and he had no desire to scare the creatures away by commencing an attack upon them which he could not follow up.

The choice, however, was not left to him for long; for within five minutes of the discovery of the last arrivals all three of the plesiosauri, as with one consent and at a signal, closed in upon the carcass of their comrade, and, flinging themselves upon it with the utmost fury, gave themselves up to the task of tearing it to pieces, the work being accomplished in the midst of a foaming, splashing turmoil of water that was absolutely terrifying to witness, which caused the little cutter to pitch and roll to such an extent that it was almost impossible to retain a footing upon her heaving deck. Whether the creatures made any attempt to devour the great lumps of flesh that they tore from the violently swaying carcass it was quite impossible to determine, but in any case the process of disintegration was a speedy one, for in less than ten minutes from the moment of attack all that was left attached to the hook was the head of the defunct saurian.

Justly vexed at this malicious interference with his plans, and determined to save at least this last relic as a trophy of his prowess, the young Inca gave orders for the head to be hauled inboard; but upon the first attempt to do this, one of the monsters made a savage rush and seized the head in its great jaws, worrying it as a dog worries a rat, giving utterance as it did so to a succession of horrid grunting kind of growls that caused most of the hearers to break into a cold perspiration. So tenaciously did the brute retain its grip that for a few minutes the onlookers were almost persuaded that it was hooked; but ultimately it released the mangled fragment—which its powerful jaws had by this time crushed and splintered almost out of recognition—and, retreating some thirty yards, suddenly wheeled and came foaming back to the yacht, at which it made a furious dash, with the apparent determination to climb on board and sweep her deck clear of its human freight. So resolute, indeed, was it in driving home its attack that it actually succeeded in getting its two fore flippers in on the boat's deck, scattering its occupants right and left, and almost driving two or three over the side, while so heavily was the boat listed by the weight of the monster, that Harry, sliding upon the steeply inclined deck, had the narrowest possible escape of being precipitated headlong into the creature's gaping jaws, and indeed only saved himself by stretching out his hand and thrusting the snout violently aside, the violence of the thrust luckily enabling him to recover his equilibrium. Then Umu—who appeared to be the only native of the party blessed with any real courage or presence of mind—seeing his beloved master in imminent danger, as he believed, of being seized and devoured before their eyes, raised his bow, and hastily fitting an arrow to the string, drew the shaft to its very head and let it fly into the reptile's throat, where it stuck fast, inflicting so much pain that the beast at once flung itself back into the water, roaring and choking, coughing up blood, and throwing itself into the most indescribable contortions.

Then a very extraordinary thing happened. No sooner did the wounded plesiosaurus begin to vomit blood than the other two, which had meanwhile been swimming excitedly to and fro, hurled themselves upon it in what seemed to be a perfect frenzy of fury, and a most ferocious and sanguinary battle ensued, the swirling, flying, foam-flecked water being almost instantly deeply dyed with blood, while the air fairly vibrated with the terrifying sounds emitted by the combatants. The cutter, meanwhile, relieved of the heavy drag upon her of the carcass of the dead plesiosaurus, began to slide rapidly away from the vicinity of the fighting monsters, and would soon have left them far behind. But this did not at all suit Harry, who, having undertaken to destroy the ferocious reptiles, was by no means inclined to leave his task less than half done. He therefore put the cutter about and, to the mingled astonishment and dismay of his companions, headed her back toward the scene of the combat, steering in such a manner as to pass just to leeward of the spot where the violent commotion in the water showed that the battle was still raging with unabated fury. Then, as the boat ranged up alongside, with her foresheet hauled to windward, the great bodies of the monsters could be seen rushing and plunging and leaping hither and thither, whereupon the whole party of sportsmen opened a vigorous and well-directed fire of arrows and javelins upon them, Harry chiming in with his deadly rifle whenever a good chance for a shot offered itself. The result of this determined attack was that the young leader was lucky enough to get in a splendid shot close behind the left shoulder of one of the struggling brutes, which must have reached its heart, for upon receiving the bullet the great reptile flung itself more than half out of the water, uttering a dreadful cry as it did so, and then, falling back, turned slowly over, and with one last writhing, convulsive shudder, sank slowly to the bottom of the lake. Meanwhile the remaining two, both severely wounded, flung themselves upon each other with such a maniacal intensity of fury as was truly awful to see. Finally, one of the monsters succeeded in getting a firm grip upon the throat of the other, and hung on, despite the frantic struggles of the other to get clear. For perhaps two full minutes the commotion in the water was positively terrific; then it rapidly decreased until, probably quite exhausted by the intensity of their prolonged efforts, they lay practically still upon the surface of the water, their only signs of life being an occasional slight twist of the body on the part of one or the other of them. Such an opportunity was much too good to be missed, and, raising his rifle, Escombe was lucky enough to shoot both the monsters dead by a couple of rapid, well-directed shots through the head. The two carcasses immediately began to sink; but before they vanished completely out of sight, one of the cutter's crew, by means of a lucky cast, succeeded in hooking one of the defunct saurians with the great fish hook; and by this means the monster was eventually landed, with some difficulty, at the spot originally chosen for the purpose. Thus terminated the great plesiosaurus hunt, after nearly three hours of the most exciting work that Escombe had ever enjoyed.



CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

HUANACOCHA THE PLOTTER.

About a fortnight after Escombe's destruction of the plesiosauri, it pleased Huanacocha, the late chief of the Council of Seven, to entertain a small but select party of his especial friends at a banquet, which he gave in his house, situate on the borders of the lake, the grounds of which adjoined those of the Virgins of the Sun, which, in turn, were contiguous to those of the royal palace.

Huanacocha was probably the most wealthy man in the City of the Sun, next to the Inca himself; for he had held the position of chief of the Council of Seven for nearly a quarter of a century, and previous to the appearance of Escombe upon the scene the portion of the national revenue that would otherwise have gone into the coffers of the sovereign had always been awarded to the Council of Seven; while, Huanacocha being not only an astute but also an utterly unscrupulous man, of exceptionally strong and overbearing character, the larger portion of this award had regularly found its way, by various devious channels, into his own private treasure chest. He was consequently well able to offer his guests an entertainment of almost regal magnificence. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that when the Lord Huanacocha issued invitations to a banquet—which was not very often—the full number of the invited generally made a point of accepting, and being present at the function.

Upon the occasion in question the guests consisted of our old friends Tiahuana, the Villac Vmu, and Motahuana, together with the Lords Licuchima and Chalihuama, late of the Council of Seven, and the Lords Chinchacocheta and Lehuava—six in all.

It is not necessary to describe the banquet in detail; let it suffice to say that, for reasons of his own, the host had given special instructions that neither trouble nor expense was to be spared to make the function a complete success; and that therefore, so well had his instructions been carried out, the entertainment as a whole fell not very far short of that which had marked the occasion of Escombe's accession to the throne of the Incas.

There is no need to record in detail the conversation that followed upon the dismissal of the servants. It is sufficient to say that Huanacocha had arranged this banquet with the express object of eliciting the views of his guests upon a certain project that had been gradually taking shape in his mind, which he believed was now ripe for execution. But, to his astonishment and consternation, he now discovered that he had to a very important extent entirely misapprehended the situation; and after a long and somewhat heated discussion the meeting had broken up without result, save that the guests had departed from his house in a mutually distrustful and uneasy frame of mind.

When Huanacocha at length retired to rest that night not only did he feel somewhat uneasy, but he was also distinctly angry with himself; for although he had achieved the purpose with which the banquet had been given—which was to elicit a frank expression of opinion from certain individuals relative to the Inca and his schemes of reformation—he felt that he had blundered badly. He had used neither tact nor discretion in his manner of conducting the conversation; he had been reckless even to the point of suggesting opposition to the decrees of the sovereign; and when it was too late, when he had fatally committed himself, he had seen, to his discomfiture, that two of his companions—and those two the most powerful persons in the community, next to the Inca himself, namely the Villac Vmu and his deputy, Motahuana—were distinctly out of sympathy with him. True, the Villac Vmu had expressed himself as puzzled, disturbed, anxious at the attitude of the Inca towards the religious question; but it was perfectly clear that the frame of mind of the High Priest was not nearly acute enough to induce him to regard with favour, or even with patience, any suggestion at all savouring of sedition. And he, Huanacocha, in his heat and impatience, had been foolish enough to throw out such a suggestion. The question that now disturbed him was: what would be Tiahuana's attitude toward him henceforward in view of what he had said; nay more, what would be the attitude of the High Priest toward his friends in view of what they had said? Would the Villac Vmu and his deputy accept a suggestion which he had thrown out, that this momentous and imprudent conversation should be regarded as private and confidential, and treat it as such, or would they consider it their duty to report the affair to the Inca? If they did, then Huanacocha knew that he and his friends would have good cause to regret their imprudence; for, despite all his cavilling, the late Chief of the Council of Seven had already seen enough of Escombe's methods to feel certain that the young monarch would stand no nonsense, particularly of the seditious kind, and that, at the first hint of anything of that sort, if the culprits did not lose their heads, they would at least find themselves bestowed where their seditious views could work no mischief.

As these reflections passed through the mind of Huanacocha, that somewhat impulsive and overbearing individual grew increasingly uneasy, and he now began to fear that he had been altogether too outspoken.

For, be it known, this man Huanacocha had conceived nothing less than the audacious idea of overthrowing the Inca, and securing his own election in his stead. In his capacity of Chief of the Council of Seven he had for a long term of years enjoyed a measure of power scarcely less than that invested in the Inca himself; for, being by nature of an unusually arrogant and domineering disposition, while the other members of the Council had been exceedingly pliant and easy-going, he had never experienced any difficulty in browbeating them into tolerably quick compliance with his wishes, however extravagant they might happen to have been. As for the people, they had rendered the same implicit, unquestioning obedience to the Council that they would have rendered to the Inca, had there been one on the throne. Having enjoyed this power, together with all the privileges and emoluments attaching thereto, for so long a time, Huanacocha had found it particularly hard and unpleasant to be called upon to resign them all, practically at a moment's notice, when young Escombe made his appearance upon the scene. Possibly, had Harry chanced to conform to this man's preconceived opinion of what the Inca would be like whenever it should please him to revisit the earth, he might have accepted the situation with a reasonably good grace; but to be ousted by "a mere boy"—for as such he always thought of the young Inca—was altogether too much to be submitted to tamely.

At the first his mental revolt had been vague, indefinite, and formless; perhaps he had thought that in course of time it would pass away and he would grow reconciled to the new order of things, particularly if the young Inca should show himself properly willing to submit to the guiding hand of the Council of Seven, as represented by its late chief. But Escombe lost no time in making it perfectly clear to everybody that he had his own ideas upon the subject of government, and meant to act upon them. Upon more than one occasion—upon several, in fact—the young Inca had turned a deaf ear to the counsels of Huanacocha, and had carried out his own ideas because he had honestly believed them to be better and more advantageous to the community. He had put his foot down heavily upon many abuses of power on the part of certain of the highest nobles, and in this way Huanacocha had suffered perhaps more severely than anyone else. For this reason his condition of mental revolt, instead of passing away, gathered new force and gradually began to assume a definite form which ultimately resolved itself into the determination to cause Harry's "removal" by some means—he did not particularly care what they were—and procure his own election to the vacant throne, if that might be; or, if not that, at least the re- instatement of the Council of Seven, with himself, of course, as its chief.

With this object in view he had commenced operations by proceeding to manufacture sedulously a number of imaginary grievances from which he asserted that the people were suffering, and these he industriously spread abroad among his own friends, hoping that in course of time they would filter through to the people themselves, and be eagerly adopted by them; which delectable plan certainly met with some measure of success.

But as he lay tossing sleeplessly upon his bed he realised that he had that evening been both foolish and precipitate: he had seriously mistaken the nature of the views held by the two priests, and had betrayed himself and his friends in their presence. How would the Villac Vmu and his deputy act, or would they act at all, was the question which he now repeatedly asked himself? Could he by any means ascertain their intentions? He must, by fair means or foul: it would never do for him to remain in ignorance upon such a vital point after the reckless manner in which he and his friends had spoken. Ay, and more than that, he must make quite sure that they maintained silence upon the subject of that most imprudent conversation, otherwise—!

He flung himself over restlessly upon his bed: the longer he thought upon the matter the more glaring did his folly appear. He must guard himself and his friends from the consequences of that folly at all costs. But how? Who was there to advise him? Suddenly he bethought himself of Xaxaguana, the priest who ranked next below Motahuana. Of course, he was the very man of all others; for, first of all, he was Huanacocha's very particular friend, and a man, moreover, who was deeply indebted to him for many past favours of a somewhat exceptional kind; also he was young, comparatively speaking, very ambitious, and not over scrupulous. Yes, Xaxaguana was undoubtedly the man for his purpose, and Huanacocha told himself, with a smile of relief, that he had been a fool for not thinking of the priest before.

But although Huanacocha believed that he saw in Xaxaguana the "friend in need" for whom he had been so anxiously casting about, he was still much too uneasy to sleep, and he was up and about with the appearance of the first faint suggestion of dawn, too anxious to remain inactive any longer, yet fully conscious of the fact that the hour was altogether too early for him to seek his friend without running a very grave risk of attracting unwelcome attention by so unusual a proceeding. He therefore decided to take a long walk, and think the whole affair over again while his brain and his pulses were being steadied by the cool, fresh air of the morning.

Was it fate or was it mere chance that caused him to select a route which led him past that part of the temple which constituted the quarters of the priests? Huanacocha told himself that it was his lucky star that was in the ascendant; for as he was passing the building the door gently opened and the very man that he was so anxious to see stepped into the roadway and quietly closed the door behind him. Then he looked round and beheld Huanacocha, and a little ejaculation of astonishment escaped him.

"This is a fortunate meeting indeed," he exclaimed as he stepped forward to greet his friend; "most fortunate; for perhaps you will be astonished to hear that I am thus early astir with the express object of seeking you."

"Ah!" thought Huanacocha; "unless I am greatly mistaken that means that I must prepare for the worst." But, having by this time shaken off his panic to a considerable extent, and once more pulled himself together, he decided to allow his friend to speak first, as by so doing he would probably be better able to judge what he should himself say. He therefore responded to Xaxaguana's greeting by remarking:

"Then it is lucky that I chose this direction for my morning ramble, otherwise we should have missed each other. You look somewhat astonished at seeing me astir so early; but the fact is, my friend, that I was sleepless; I have therefore left my bed early, to take a walk in the early morning air. But I understood you to say that you wished to see me. Which way shall we go?"

"Let us go up the road toward the hills," answered Xaxaguana. "There will be the less chance of our being seen; and it may be well for me to mention, at the outset, that there may be several good reasons why you and I should not be seen together at this juncture, my Lord Huanacocha."

"Ah! and wherefore so, my good friend?" demanded Huanacocha.

"Because," answered Xaxaguana, "last night you betrayed yourself into the committal of a serious imprudence, namely that of presuming to criticise unfavourably certain acts of our Lord the Inca, which, as you are surely aware, is a crime punishable with death. Do you ask how I happen to know this? I will tell you. It chanced that I was kept late from my bed last night by certain business connected with the approaching Feast of Raymi, and I was therefore astir when the Villac Vmu and Motahuana returned from your banquet. You may possibly be aware that it is a rule among us that nothing which transpires within the precincts of the temple is ever to be referred to, or even so much as hinted at, outside the temple walls. It is therefore our habit, when within those walls, to speak before each other with the most perfect freedom; and, friend Huanacocha, I am breaking one of our most stringent vows in telling you even this much. I hope, therefore, that should the time ever arrive when you can do me a service, you will remember this fact, and allow it to weigh in my favour."

"Rest assured that I will do so, my good friend," answered Huanacocha; "although methinks that there are one or two services rendered to you for which I have as yet received no adequate return. But let that pass; I am interrupting you; pray proceed with your story."

"I will," returned Xaxaguana. "As I have already mentioned, I was astir when Tiahuana and Motahuana returned from your house last night. They entered the common room, in which I was at work—possibly because it was the only room in which any lights were burning—and, flinging themselves upon a couch quite near to me, began to talk. It was easy to see that they were much agitated and excited; but, being busy, I paid little heed to their conversation at the outset, and only pricked up my ears when I heard your name mentioned. Then I confess that I listened, and soon heard sufficient to convince me that you, Huanacocha, and your friends Lehuava, Chinchacocheta, Licuchima, and Chilihuama were, last night, guilty of such imprudence as may well cost you all your lives, unless you have the wit and readiness of action to prevent it!"

"But," ejaculated Huanacocha, all his former alarms returning to him with tenfold force, "how mean you, friend? Surely, neither the Villac Vmu nor Motahuana will dream of reporting what was said within the privacy of my house, will they?"

"What was said in the privacy of your house, last night, amounted to blasphemy," remarked Xaxaguana dryly; "and it is the bounden duty of every loyal subject of the Inca to report blasphemy, wherever it may be spoken. From what was said last night I gathered the impression that neither of the persons mentioned are likely to shrink from the performance of their duty, however unpleasant it may be; so for this reason I set out to warn you this morning. And it was for reasons connected with this that I ventured to indicate the exceeding undesirability of our being seen together just now."

"But—but—" stammered Huanacocha, completely thrown off his balance by what he had just learned—"if I understand you aright, my good Xaxaguana, all this means that the lives of my friends and myself have been put into the utmost jeopardy by my crass folly of last night, I knew—yes, I knew, when it was too late, that I had been a fool," he concluded bitterly.

"To be absolutely candid with you, friend Huanacocha, I think you were," rejoined Xaxaguana somewhat cynically. "Why did you do it?"

Huanacocha stopped short in the middle of the road and looked his friend square in the eye.

"Xaxaguana," said he, "when I was Chief of the Council of Seven it was in my power to do you several good turns—and I did them. Under certain conceivable circumstances it might be in my power to do you several others; and if you can indicate to me a way by which I can extricate myself from my present peril, rest assured that I will not prove ungrateful. I believe you are my friend; and I believe also that you are astute enough to recognise that I can serve you better living than dead. I will therefore be perfectly frank with you and will tell you all that has been in my mind of late. But see, there is the sun, and the good folk of the town will soon be astir, and we may be seen together; let us go over yonder and sit in the shadow of that pile of rocks; we can talk freely there without risk of being seen, or interrupted."

Without another word Xaxaguana turned and led the way across the upland meadow to a somewhat remarkable pile of rocks that cropped out of the soil about a hundred yards from the road, and, passing round to the shady side, which was also the side hidden from the road, seated himself on a bed of soft moss, signing to his companion to do the same. For nearly an hour the pair conversed most earnestly together; then Xaxaguana rose to his feet and, reconnoitring the road carefully to see that there was no likelihood of his being observed, stepped forth from his place of concealment. Then he hurried across the intervening stretch of grass, and on reaching the road, once more glanced keenly about him, and briskly turned his steps homeward. Half an hour later Huanacocha did pretty much the same thing; and it was noticeable—or would have been, had there been anyone there to see—that his countenance had lost much of the expression of anxiety that it had worn when he set out for his walk early that morning. He had scarcely bathed and finished his morning meal after his unwonted exertions when his favourite servant rushed into his presence and in agitated accents informed him that one of the underlings of the temple, on his passage into the town, had given forth the startling intelligence that the Villac Vmu and Motahuana, both of whom had been his lord's honoured guests at the banquet of the previous night, had just been found dead upon their beds!



CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

TRAPPED!

The emotion of Huanacocha at this surprising piece of news was almost painful to see. As he listened to the hurriedly told story, poured forth by his man, his features took on a sickly yellow tinge, his eyes seemed to be on the point of starting out of his head, and his breath came in labouring gasps from his wide-open mouth; finally, when at length he seemed to have fully grasped the purport of the story, he hid his face in his hands, rested his elbows upon his knees, and sat there quivering like an aspen leaf. In the course of a few minutes, however, he regained his self-control, and with a sigh of such depth that anyone unaware of its melancholy cause might have almost mistaken it for one of relief, he rose to his feet and, muttering to himself something about the difficulty of believing so incredible a story, and the necessity for personally ascertaining the truth, he gave orders for his litter to be brought to the door, and presently sallied forth on his way to the temple, with this intention.

The distance to be covered was not great, and by the time that Huanacocha reached the temple he had almost completely recovered his composure. Alighting from his litter, and bidding his bearers to wait, he climbed the long flight of steps leading up to the building and, accosting the first person he met, demanded, in an authoritative tone of voice to see Xaxaguana. It was perfectly evident, even to one less experienced than Huanacocha in matters pertaining to the temple routine and its discipline, that some very unusual occurrence had happened, for everybody about the place seemed excited, agitated, distraught; but Huanacocha was, of course, well known to every inhabitant of the City of the Sun, and presently someone was found possessing enough authority to deal with the great man's request, or command, rather, and in the course of a few minutes he was conducted along a passage and shown into an empty room, there to await the arrival of the man he sought.

Apparently Xaxaguana was busy at the moment, for it was nearly a quarter of an hour ere he appeared, and when he did so his countenance was heavy with concern.

"Pardon me for having kept you so long waiting, my Lord," he said in a loud voice, "but this terrible occurrence, of which I presume you have heard, has thrown us all into a shocking state of confusion, and when your message reached me I was, in my capacity of senior priest, with the physicians whom we summoned, and who have been endeavouring to discover the cause of the death of our lamented friends the Villac Vmu and Motahuana." And, as he spoke, he closed the door carefully behind him.

"And have they succeeded?" demanded Huanacocha.

"Oh yes!" answered Xaxaguana. "They are in complete agreement that the cause of death in each case was senile decay. They were both very old men, you know."

"Senile decay!" exclaimed Huanacocha, in astonishment. "Surely you are not serious, Xaxaguana. Why, they were at my house last night, as you know, and nobody who then saw them will ever believe that they died of old age. They were almost as active and vigorous as the youngest of us, and neither of them exhibited the slightest symptoms of senile decay."

"Possibly not," assented Xaxaguana; "nevertheless that is the verdict of the physicians. And, after all, you know, these exceedingly old men often pass away with the suddenness of a burnt-out lamp; a single flicker and they are gone. I must confess that, personally, I am not altogether surprised; for when they returned from your house last night it occurred to me that they seemed to have suddenly grown very old and feeble; indeed I said as much when the news of their death was brought to me."

"You did, did you?" retorted Huanacocha. "By our Lord the Sun, you are a wonder, Xaxaguana; nothing less! How did you manage it, man, and so promptly too? Why it must all have happened within half an hour of your return home this morning."

"It did," said Xaxaguana. "I was still in my bath—for you must know that, being somewhat fatigued with my protracted labours of yesterday, I overslept myself this morning—when the intelligence was brought to me that our two friends had been discovered lying dead in their beds. And they could only have died very recently, for they were neither stiff nor cold."

"And—I suppose there were no signs—no marks of violence on the bodies; nothing to suggest the possibility of—of—foul play?" stammered Huanacocha.

"No," answered Xaxaguana; "the physicians found nothing whatever of that kind. How should they? It is certain that both men died in their beds, within the precincts of the temple. And who is there within these precincts who would dare to commit an act of sacrilege, to say nothing of the fact that, so far as is known, there is no one who would be in the slightest degree benefited by their death, or could possibly desire it."

Huanacocha looked at his friend admiringly.

"As I said just now, you are a wonder, Xaxaguana," he remarked. "But you have not yet told me how you managed it, and I am anxious to know. So set aside all further pretence, my friend; be frank with me, and satisfy my curiosity."

"No," said Xaxaguana firmly. "The man who has a secret and fails to keep it to himself is a fool, friend Huanacocha, and I am not a fool; therefore if I happen to have a secret I prefer to retain it within my own breast. But the matter stands thus. You told me certain things this morning, and among them was this. You said that if perchance anything were to happen to Tiahuana and Motahuana, that they died before it was possible for them to take certain action which you had reason to fear, you would use your powerful influence with our Lord the Inca to see that I obtained promotion to the position of Villac Vmu, as is, indeed, my right, together with certain other advantages. Is not that so? Very well. Singularly enough, that which you desired has happened—most fortunately for you; and now it seems to me that all that remains is for you to fulfil your promise. Do not you agree with me?"

"Yes," answered Huanacocha frankly, "I do; and I will proceed hence to the palace and officially inform the Inca of the sudden and lamented death of the Villac Vmu and his deputy, and will urge the immediate appointment of yourself to the vacant post of High Priest. There is no doubt that you will get the appointment, for in the first place you are entitled to it as senior priest; in the next, you will get the full advantage of my recommendation; and, in the third, the Inca has no personal friend to whom he would wish to give the appointment in preference to yourself. That matter may therefore be regarded as settled.

"But there is another, and an equally important, matter which I now wish to discuss with you, Xaxaguana, and in which I desire your advice and help. Tiahuana and Motahuana being dead, there is nobody, so far as I know, who has any particular interest in retaining the present Inca upon the throne. To that remark you may of course object that he is the re- incarnated Manco whose coming, as the regenerator of the ancient Peruvian nation, was prophesied by Titucocha, and that, in the event of anything happening to him, the regenerating process would be deferred indefinitely. But, I ask you, my dear friend, what if it were? In what way should we suffer? It is true that we have accustomed ourselves to look forward to our regeneration as the one thing to be desired above and before all others; but is it? We are perfectly happy here in this valley as we are. Do we in very truth desire to exchange our present happy and peaceful existence for an indefinite and doubtless long period of toil, and warfare, and suffering? And in what respects should we be the better at the end, even if we should be successful—of which, permit me to say, I have my doubts? And do we really desire that change in the character of our religion, and the so-called amendment of our morals upon which this young man insists? I doubt it, my friend, not only as regards you and myself, but also as regards the people generally. Now, I have spoken to you quite frankly; be equally frank with me, and give your view of the matter."

"I will, my friend, and in a very few words," answered Xaxaguana. "My view of the matter is identical with your own. And it is possibly identical also with that of many others. But how is that going to help us? Also, with all your frankness you have not yet given utterance to the idea that I see you have in your mind. You are far too cautious, friend Huanacocha, ever to become a successful conspirator."

"One must needs be cautious in broaching such a conspiracy as I have in my mind," answered Huanacocha. "Nevertheless," he continued, "boldness and caution are sometimes the same thing, therefore will I be bold with you, Xaxaguana, since I think it will not be difficult for me to prove to you that not only our views, but also our interests, are identical. In a word, then, I believe that it would be advantageous to you and to me—and possibly also to the rest of the inhabitants of this valley—if the present Inca were deposed, and I were made Inca in his place. The question is, how is the matter to be accomplished? If he were to die now, even as the Villac—"

"It would be the most unfortunate thing that could possibly happen," cut in Xaxaguana. "The Villac Vmu and Motahuana were both old men, and therefore that they should die is not at all remarkable. But that they should both die at the same moment is, to say the least of it, somewhat singular, and, despite all our precautions, is not unlikely to arouse more or less suspicion in many minds. Now, if the Inca also were to die, that suspicion would undoubtedly be converted into certainty and an investigation would assuredly be set on foot which could not fail to end disastrously for those found responsible for the three deaths, and especially for that of the Inca; for, as of course you are fully aware, practically the whole of the inhabitants of the valley are still old- fashioned enough to cling to the superstition that to murder the Inca is the blackest of black sacrilege.

"But on the day when the Inca was presented to us in the temple, you spoke certain words which, if they were now repeated, might find an echo in the mind of many an inhabitant of this city. You boldly expressed your doubts as to the identity of the youth with him whose appearance was foretold by the prophet Titucocha, and whom we of the ancient Peruvian nation have been expecting for the last three hundred years and more. Now, we know that many of the Inca's ordinances are regarded with disfavour by the people generally; and I believe that, as a consequence of this, it would not be very difficult to implant in the minds of the discontented a suggestion that the late Villac Vmu made a very serious mistake—if, indeed, he did not commit an unpardonable crime—in introducing this young man to us as the re-incarnated Manco Capac. That suspicion once instilled into them, it should be a comparatively easy matter to incite them to demand that the Inca shall establish his identity by submitting to the ordeal by fire, after which your election to the vacant throne should be a foregone conclusion; for, of course, neither you nor I believe for a moment that the young Englishman can possibly survive the fire ordeal."

Huanacocha gazed at his companion for several moments in silent admiration; then he exclaimed enthusiastically:

"I have already told you twice this morning that you are a wonder, and I now say it for the third time—you are a wonder, Xaxaguana, the possessor of the most astute and clever brain in the valley; and I foresee that, working together, you and I may achieve such dazzling results as we have scarcely yet dared to dream of. But how do you propose to bring about the result of which you have just spoken? It will be a slow and tedious process at best, and while it is being achieved many things may happen."

"Nay," answered Xaxaguana, "it will not be nearly so lengthy a process as you seem to think. This is my plan."

And, placing his mouth to his companion's ear, Xaxaguana proceeded to whisper a few sentences which appeared to fill Huanacocha with wonder and admiration.

"Do you think it will succeed?" Xaxaguana demanded, as he concluded his communication.

"It cannot possibly fail, if carried out with promptitude and discretion," answered Huanacocha in tones of conviction. "And its perfect simplicity is its greatest recommendation. When do you propose to commence operations?"

"At once," answered Xaxaguana, "now, this very day. Nothing will be talked of during the next few days save the sudden death of the Villac Vmu and Motahuana, and such a topic of conversation will afford me the precise opportunity which I require. And now, friend Huanacocha, you and I have been together quite as long as is either prudent or desirable. Go, therefore, hence to the palace, acquaint the Inca with the sad news of which you are the official bearer; inform him, if you will, that in the zealous discharge of your duty you have visited me for the purpose of obtaining the fullest information relative to the deplored event, and direct his attention to the extreme desirability of creating me Villac Vmu at once."

"Fear not, friend," answered Huanacocha, as he rose to take his leave, "you shall receive the notification of your appointment in the course of the day." And, followed by Xaxaguana, who accompanied him as far as the outer door, he left the apartment and proceeded on his way to the palace.

Huanacocha was as good as his word; for he not only secured from Harry the appointment of Xaxaguana to the dignity of Villac Vmu, but actually took the trouble to hurry back from the palace to the temple with the information of his success, and the royal warrant duly signed.

As Xaxaguana had anticipated, almost the sole topic of conversation during the ensuing fortnight was the death of the late Villac Vmu, and that of his deputy, at practically the same instant of time, as was determined by the physicians. For the first few days this circumstance was spoken of simply as a somewhat remarkable coincidence, but not very long after the obsequies—which were celebrated with unprecedented pomp in the temple—were over, it began to be noticed that, when the subject happened to be referred to, people were acquiring a trick of putting their heads together and whispering mysteriously to each other. The trick rapidly developed into something nearly approaching a habit; and as it did so, the whispers as rapidly changed into plain, open speech, and the words which were interchanged lost their original air of confidential mysteriousness, until, finally, people told each other without very much circumlocution that there was, in their opinion, more in the strange deaths of Tiahuana and Motahuana than met the eye. And if they were asked to express themselves more plainly they reminded each other that the two priests, who had died under such really remarkable circumstances, were the men who were responsible for the finding of the white Inca, and the introduction of him into the community, and this reminder was quite frequently followed by a somewhat pointed question as to whether, after all, they—the priests—could by any chance have made a mistake in their method of identifying the Inca, some people even going to the length of expressing the opinion that it was no question of mistake, but rather a case of deliberate deception of the people, with some mysterious purpose which would probably now be never brought to light, inasmuch as that our Lord the Sun, angry at the change in the form of the national religion, has cut off the offenders in the midst of their sins, as a sign of His displeasure. The transition from such talk as this to openly expressed doubts concerning the genuineness of the Inca's claim to be the re-incarnation of the divine Manco Capac was an easy one, made all the more easy by the unpopular character of many—one might indeed almost say all—of Escombe's decrees. Yet so consummate was the cunning and subtlety with which the campaign was conducted that scarcely a whisper of it was allowed to reach the ears of those who were suspected of being favourably inclined toward the Inca, and not the faintest inkling of it ever penetrated to Escombe himself. Such extreme care indeed was exercised by those who were pulling the strings that no sign whatever of the Inca's fast-waning popularity was for a moment permitted to manifest itself. The process of corrupting the palace officials and staff generally was found to be exceptionally tedious and difficult, for Escombe's genial disposition and straightforward character enabled him to endear himself without effort to everybody with whom he was brought into intimate contact. But it was accomplished at length by the exercise of almost superhuman ingenuity, with a solitary exception in the case of Arima, who, it was at once recognised, was so faithfully and devotedly attached to his royal master that it would be worse than folly to attempt to corrupt him; he was therefore left severely alone; the most stringent precautions being taken to keep the whole thing secret from him.

Matters had reached the stage above indicated when Escombe, having grappled with an exceptionally arduous day's work, retired to rest close upon midnight, and soon afterward sank into a heavy sleep, only to be, as it seemed, almost instantly awakened by the light of torches flashing upon his closed eyelids, and the scuffle of sandalled feet about his couch. Springing up into a sitting posture in his bed, he opened his eyes, still heavy with sleep, to find his chamber full of men—many of whom were armed—conspicuous among whom were Huanacocha and Xaxaguana, the new Villac Vmu.

"Why, my Lord Huanacocha," he exclaimed, rubbing his eyes to assure himself that he was awake, "what does this mean? How did you get in here? And what is the matter?"

"The matter, Lord," answered Huanacocha, "is one of the utmost gravity and importance, as the Villac Vmu, here, will inform you. It is nothing less than a revolt among the priests generally, most of whom have declared against the modifications in the form of the worship and service in the temple, instituted by my Lord, and have risen against the Villac Vmu and those others who have pronounced themselves in favour of my Lord's modifications. Some of those who were in favour of the modifications have been slain; but the larger number, amounting to between twenty and thirty, are even now being subjected to the fire ordeal, as would have been the Villac Vmu, had he not happily escaped and made his way to my house for shelter and help. That, in brief, is how the matter stands; is it not, Villac Vmu?"

"'Tis even so, Lord," answered Xaxaguana. "And when I had stated the facts to my Lord Huanacocha, he regarded them as of import serious enough to justify us even to the extent of disturbing the rest of my Lord the Inca, and—"

"By Jove, yes, I should think so," exclaimed Harry, interrupting the High Priest unceremoniously, and springing from his couch to the floor. "Where is Arima? Pass the word for Arima, somebody, please—or, stay, hand me my clothes; I'll get into them myself without waiting for Arima. How many of these revolting priests are there, do you say?"

"They number about a thousand, Lord," answered Xaxaguana. "We have already taken it upon ourselves to send to Umu, asking him to come to our assistance; but it will be some time ere our messenger can reach him, and he in turn can reach and order out the guard. We therefore thought it well to come to my Lord and ask him to hasten with us to the temple, there to use his authority to save the lives of those who must otherwise undergo the fire ordeal."

"Of course," assented Harry, as he scrambled into his clothes. "But what will happen if those mutinous beggars refuse to obey me, eh?"

"Refuse to obey you, Lord?" repeated the Villac Vmu in shocked tones. "Nay, they will certainly not do that. They have revolted now merely because they cannot be brought to believe that the innovations against which they rebel are in accordance with the orders of our Lord the Inca. You have but to personally assure them that such is the case, and they will instantly return to their allegiance."

"Very well," answered Harry, as he threw a heavy cloak over his shoulders to protect himself from the keen night air. "Now I am ready. Lead the way, somebody, and let us be going."

Emerging from the palace, and hurrying along the almost pitch—dark garden paths, the party swept through the palace gates into the main road, and made a dash for the temple by the nearest possible route, which happened to be through several dark, narrow, deserted side streets, in which not a soul was stirring; the little crowd of hurrying figures consequently passed on its way and soon reached the temple without having been observed by so much as a single person.

Somewhat to Escombe's surprise the temple proved to be in absolute darkness, when the party arrived before the walls; but Xaxaguana explained this by informing the young monarch that the revolted priests were all assembled in the opposite wing of the building, and that he had deemed it a wise precaution not to attempt to enter on that side, lest they should meet with resistance before the Inca could find an opportunity to make his presence known. As they drew in under the temple walls Xaxaguana called a halt, expressing some anxiety as to the possibility of the door being closed by means of which he proposed to effect an entrance, and he sent forward a scout to reconnoitre. His anxiety, however, proved to be unfounded, for the scout presently returned with the information that the door was unfastened and everything quiet on that side of the building. The party therefore moved forward once more, and presently Escombe found himself being conducted along a corridor, unlighted save by the smoky flare of the torches carried by his escort. Contrary to the young ruler's expectations, the building, even now that he was inside it, remained dark and silent as the grave; but this was explained by the statement of Xaxaguana that the revolting priests were all gathered together in the rock-hewn basement of the building, where they were at that moment engaged in putting their more faithful brethren to the dreadful "ordeal by fire". Accordingly, when Xaxaguana unlocked a massive bronze gate let into a wall, and invited Harry to descend with him to the chamber where the horrid rite was in progress, the young man followed unhesitatingly, as he also did through a door which the priest unlocked when they had reached the foot of the flight of stone steps and traversed some yards of corridor apparently hewn out of the living rock. The room was comfortably enough furnished, and looked almost as though it might have been prepared for his reception, for it was lighted by a handsome lamp suspended from the roof.

"If my Lord will condescend to wait here a moment and rest, I, his servant, will go and see exactly what is happening, and return to report," remarked Xaxaguana as he stood aside to allow Harry to pass him.

"But why wait?" demanded Harry, facing round to the High Priest. "Surely we have not a moment of time to waste. Would it not be—"

But, even as he was speaking, the Villac Vmu slid rapidly back into the passage, closing the door behind him with a slam, through the thunderous reverberation of which in the hollow vault Harry thought he caught the sound of a sharp click. With a muttered ejaculation, expressive of annoyance, he sprang to the door and endeavoured to open it; but it was fast, and, as he listened, he heard the sounds of hastily retreating footsteps in the passage outside. And in that same moment the truth flashed upon him that, for some inscrutable reason, he was trapped and a prisoner!



CHAPTER NINETEEN.

UMU TAKES A HAND IN THE GAME.

The first rays of the next morning's sun had scarcely flashed over the ridge of the sierra which hemmed in the eastern side of the valley, when Arima, awaking with a most atrocious headache, and the feeling generally of a man who has just passed through an unusually prolonged bout of dissipation—or, alternatively, has been drugged—arose from his bed and, staggering across the room, plunged his throbbing and buzzing head into a large basin of cold water, preparatory to dressing. Once, twice, thrice did he plunge head, neck, and hands into the cooling liquid, with but little satisfactory result, for the relief which he sought, and confidently expected to derive, from the process, refused to come; and he groaned as he sank upon a seat and tightly gripped his throbbing temples in his hands. Never before in his life had he felt so ill, so utterly cheap and used-up, as he did at that moment. In addition to the violent headache from which he was suffering, his blood felt like fire in his veins, his skin was dry and rough; he was so giddy that he could scarcely stand. The truth was that he had been drugged with such brutal severity on the preceding night, by Xaxaguana's emissaries, to make sure of his being out of the way at the moment of his master's seizure, that it had been due more to chance than anything else that he had ever again awakened. After a few minutes' rest he felt so much better that he was able to dress, and afterwards make his way to his master's room. For, ever since the slaying of the monsters in the lake, it had been Escombe's habit to rise early in the morning, and, making his way to the bottom of the garden, embark on a balsa, from which, after Arima had paddled it a few hundred yards from the shore, master and man had been wont to bathe together. And now, according to custom, the faithful Indian hurried away to awaken his master, as usual, for indulgence in the regular morning dip.

But upon entering the sleeping chamber he of course found it untenanted, and for a moment the thought occurred to him that possibly he was late, and that his master, having awakened at his usual hour, had risen and gone down into the garden alone. A single glance out of the window, however, at the length of the shadows cast by the various objects lighted by the sun outside, sufficed to satisfy him that habit had triumphed over even the influence of the narcotic which had been administered to him, and that he was certainly not more than a few minutes late. Then, with the instinct of the semi-savage, he flung his glances quickly about the room, and instantly detected signs that it had been invaded during the night by a number of people, and that his master had arisen and dressed in haste. Quick to take the alarm where Escombe was concerned, he at once hurried out, and, without waiting to find any of the palace officials to whom to report his discovery, proceeded forthwith to question as many of the servants as he met. But here again he only found matter for further alarm and apprehension; for not only did the whole service of the building appear to be in a state of complete disorganisation, but it at once became evident to him that every man he met was confused, agitated, and more or less anxious of manner; and, although each and all professed themselves unable to throw any light upon the mystery of the Inca's inexplicable disappearance, he felt instinctively that they were all lying to him.

Realising at length that no information was to be obtained from these people, Arima passed from the palace into the grounds, making his way, in the first instance, down to the shore of the lake, for the purpose of satisfying himself beyond all possibility of question whether or not there was any foundation for his first surmise, that Escombe had risen early and left the palace without waiting for him. But no; there was no sign of his young master in that direction; moreover, the balsa was lying moored in its proper place; also the cutter was at her usual moorings. There was therefore no possibility that the Inca had taken it into his head to go for a solitary early morning sail. Satisfied upon this point, the Indian next made his way round to the front of the palace, and here at once the evidences of a visit of a large party of people to the palace, some time during the preceding night, once more presented themselves, the latest—that is to say the topmost—set of footprints showing that quite a crowd of people had hurried from the main entrance of the building down the broad path leading to the entrance gates of the garden and thence into the main road. Moreover, the "spoor" remained undisturbed in the road for a distance sufficient to indicate the general direction in which the party had gone, although it was lost in the ordinary signs of traffic within a few yards of the gates. Having ascertained thus much, Arima returned to the spot where the footprints first showed outside the palace doors, and, going down upon his hands and knees, patiently set himself to the task of endeavouring to discover his young master's among them. But before he had had time to achieve any result in this direction one of the palace officials appeared and, angrily demanding to know what he was doing there, ordered him back into the palace to attend to his duty; explaining, by way of reply to Arima's agitated representations, that the Inca had left the palace during the early hours of the morning, with a party of companions, to hunt the vicuna. The Indian at once knew this to be a falsehood, for the hunting grounds lay many miles down the valley, and hunting parties never dreamed of proceeding thither otherwise than on horseback, and Arima was prepared to swear that none of the party had been mounted. Moreover he was convinced that his master would never have dreamed of leaving his favourite servant behind had he been bound upon a hunting expedition. The official, however, was curt and peremptory in his manner, and Arima soon understood that he must obey his orders or suffer arrest. He therefore returned to the Inca's rooms and proceeded to put them in order, as was his duty. But the very curtness and peremptoriness of the official's manner to him, as well as the improbable story which he had told, only had the effect of strengthening and confirming the suspicions in the faithful fellow's mind; for the attachment of the young Inca to this man was well known, and even the highest officials of the palace had thus far not disdained to be extremely civil to him.

But the question in Arima's mind now was: what precisely was it that had happened to his young master, and whither and why had he gone? For even thus far no glimmering of the hideous truth had reached the Indian's mind. His suspicions and apprehensions were all as yet chaotic and formless, and he was very far from fearing that Escombe's life was in danger. But as he proceeded with his business, seeking from time to time to get some relief from his splitting headache and the other extremely disagreeable symptoms from which he was still suffering acutely, it gradually began to dawn upon him, as his mental faculties slowly shook off their stupor, that every one of those symptoms were synonymous with those following upon the administration of an overdose of a decoction made from a certain poisonous plant growing here and there in the valley, and which was sometimes used as an anaesthetic by the local physicians. He was fully aware of the tremendous potency of the extracted juices of this plant, as also of its tastelessness, and the consequent ease with which it could be administered, and he recognised clearly that if anyone had wished to administer such a draught to him on the previous night it could easily have been done. The question which next arose in his mind naturally was: why should anyone desire to administer such a draught to him? But his mental powers had by this time sufficiently recovered from the effects of the drug to enable him quickly to trace a connection—however obscure as yet—between this act and the extraordinary fact of his master being missing. When once the faithful fellow had reached the length of connecting the two circumstances together he was not long in realising the terrible possibilities that lurked in such a sinister combination of circumstances. And with this realisation he suddenly took fright, for at the same moment the significance of certain apparently trivial remarks and occurrences that had lately come to his knowledge suddenly dawned upon him. Could it be that these matters, scarcely noticed at the moment, really bore the significance which he now attached to them, or was it all the result of some bodily disorder reacting upon his mental processes and causing him to take a distorted and unnatural view of things that were actually of no moment whatever? He could not tell; his brain was still in too muddled a condition for him to feel that he could trust it. But there was one sensible thing that he could do, he told himself. He could go to Umu and lay the whole matter before him. Umu was a shrewd sensible man, who would soon say whether or not there was anything in those mad fantasies that were now beginning to chase each other through his bewildered brain. Besides, Umu was the Inca's most devoted friend—next to himself, perhaps. So, slipping out of the palace by the garden entrance—lest perchance he should be seen and stopped if he attempted to pass out by way of the other—he plunged at once into the most unfrequented paths, and so betook himself, by a circuitous route, to the lake shore, where he at once got aboard the balsa, and, paddling the primitive craft some half a mile beyond the royal demesne, beached her in a secluded spot, and thence made the best of his way to Umu's house.