The Web of the Golden Spider

“Never,” he answered fiercely.

“Ah! hold me tight, David.”

He drew her more firmly to him.

“Tighter! Tighter!” she whispered.

He crushed her against his pounding heart. He ached with the joy of it. But with the relief from the heavy burden of fear which had for so long weighed him down, nature asserted herself and forced down his leaden eyelids. She felt him sinking in her arms and freed herself. With her hands upon his shoulders she drew back and looked hungrily at him. His sandy hair was tangled and frowsy, his eyes shot with tiny threads of red, his cheeks bronzed and covered with a shaggy light beard. His clothes were tattered, and about his waist there dangled a circle of leather bags. He was an odd enough looking figure. By some strange chance she had never seen him in other than some uncouth garb; drenched with rain, draped in an Oriental lounging robe, with a cartridge belt about his waist, and covered with sweat and powder grime, and now in this.

Both were brought back to the world about them by a shot from Stubbs. He had fired at the Priest and missed. It was as though the man led a charmed life. The girl raised her hand as Stubbs was about to fire again.

“Don’t! Don’t! You are making a terrible mistake. This isn’t the Priest–he is my father.”

The phrase awoke even the sleeping sense of these men.

“Your father!” exclaimed Wilson.

But the man was coming towards them–steadily, and yet as if in a sort of daze.

“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded.

The eyes, the high cheek-bones, the thin lips, were those of the Priest, but the voice was different. It had lost something of its harshness–something, too, of its decisiveness. The girl interrupted,

“This is no time for explanations. Come into the hut. We must rest first.”

She led the way, keeping a tight grip upon Wilson’s arm, steadying him. Stubbs and he whom they had known as the Priest followed.

Within the hut Flores and his wife, still bewildered by the sudden conversion of the Priest from an enemy to a friend (understanding nothing of what had happened), crouched far into the rear overcome with genuine awe and reverence for the guardian of their god in his new character. Threats had driven them to rebellion while kindliness now made of them abject slaves. They stood ready to obey his slightest wish–not with cravenness, but with quick reversion to the faith of their ancestors. But he acted as though he did not see them–as though, in fact, he saw nothing of anything about him save the girl. He followed her with his eyes with almost childlike eagerness and greeted a glance from her with almost pathetic joy. He spoke little, apparently finding difficulty in expressing himself–in forming his scattered thoughts into correct sentences. His whole appearance was that of a man freed after a long imprisonment. The only thing of his present surroundings which he now grasped perfectly was his relationship with the girl. He was reviving old-time joys in his daughter.

But Jo herself, even in the freshness of her happiness over the unexpected success of her long journey, had found an even greater interest in this newer passion. She spread a blanket for Wilson in a corner of the hut and forced him to lie down here and give himself up to sleep. Stubbs sank to the ground in the sun where he stood outside and fell into a stupor.

Hour after hour the girl sat at Wilson’s side as though guarding his rest, and in this gentle task she found a new conception of happiness. Near her, during the long vigil, sat her father, while in and out, softly as two shadows, moved Flores and his wife.

Wilson awoke long before Stubbs and insisted upon getting up. There were many things to be learned and many things to be done. He realized that they were still in the heart of a hostile country and that if they were to get out safely, time could not be wasted in sleep. What part this man whom he still thought of as the Priest would play, he had no idea.

The girl told him as much of the odd story as she had gathered, beginning with her own arrival in the hut. Manning’s memory dated from the blow on the raft. Back of this he skipped an interval of fifteen years. Even there his memory was cloudy. He recalled vaguely having joined an expedition which had for its object prospecting in these mountains, but who the others of the party were he did not know. He remembered hazily the trip over the mountains and a battle with a party of natives. He was injured and after this was sick a long while. As far as he was concerned he had been unconscious ever since that time. Of his recovery, of the strange sequence of events which caused him to take up a life among the Chibcas, who elevated him finally into the position of high priest, of the fanatical devotion to his trust which had driven him across the continent and then across an ocean to recover the image, he recalled nothing. He did not know of the existence of an idol or of any superstition in connection with it.

Wilson, listening, marveled, but he quickly associated this with similar cases of dual identity brought about by brain trouble following an accident to the skull. The psychology of the case, however, did not at present so much interest him as the possible consequences to them all which might follow this dénouement. It instantly occurred to him that it was doubtful if Manning in his present condition was anything but an added menace to the party. A half hour’s questioning convinced Wilson that it was literally true that the last fifteen years were a blank to the man and that his mental condition at present was scarcely superior to that of a child. Consequently, in the event of an attack by the aroused natives either Manning would be thought to have been captured by the party, which would bring down swift vengeance, or he would be thought to have deserted them, which was equally sure to bring about the annihilation of them all. The only thing to do seemed to be to keep the man out of sight as much as possible on the journey and in the event of trouble to hide him altogether. It seemed to him wisest not to allow them to rest even that night but to push on. Flores, eager to do anything for the Priest, agreed to guide them. He aroused Stubbs, and after a good meal the party started and without incident made eight miles before they stopped.

They found a good camping place–a sort of crude cave near a brook and just off the trail. They built a fire and cooked a portion of the leg of mutton which Flores had brought for them before returning. So far they had not caught a glimpse of a native. This fact and the excitement of actually being upon the home path banished them completely from their minds. But that night both men agreed that each had better take his turn at watching.

“I’ll take the first watch,” insisted Wilson to Stubbs. “I wouldn’t trust you to wake me up.”

With a good-natured grin Stubbs submitted and threw his tired body on the turf, making a pillow of the bags of jewels. He slept as heartily as though snug in the bunk of a safe ship. But both the girl and her father refused to take Wilson’s advice and do likewise. Both insisted upon sharing his watch with him. The father sat on the other side of his daughter staring, as though still wondering, into the shadows of the silent wood kingdom about him. He spoke but little and seemed to be still trying to clear his thoughts.

At their backs rose the towering summits which still stood between them and the ocean; above those the stars which from the first had seemed to watch their lives; before them the heavy, silent shadows which bade them be ever alert.

Wilson sat upright with his rifle over his knees. The girl nestled against his shoulder. All was well with the world.

CHAPTER XXVII

Dangerous Shadows

In the narration of what had befallen her while in the care of Sorez, Wilson came to have a new conception of the man. With the exception of the fact that Sorez had considered his own interest alone in bringing the girl down here, and that he had lured her on by what he knew to be a deliberate lie, Sorez had been as kind and as thoughtful of her as her own father could have been. After their imprisonment in Bogova and while in hiding from Wilson he had supplied the girl with the best of nurses and physicians. Furthermore, in order to make what recompense he could to her in case of an accident to him or in the event of the failure of their mission, he had, before leaving Bogova, made his will, bequeathing to her every cent of his real and personal property. The chief item of this was the house in Boston which he had purchased as a home for himself and niece, a few months before the latter’s death. In addition to this he had in the end made the supreme sacrifice–he had given his life.

Sitting there in the starlight she told Wilson these things, with a sob in her voice.

“And so he kept his word after all–didn’t he? He brought me to him.”

The older man by her side looked up at her.

“My daughter,” he murmured. “My daughter.”

She placed her arm over his shoulder scarcely able to believe the good fortune which had at once placed her here between her father and her lover.

“The golden idol did some good after all,” she whispered.

“The idol?” asked her father. “What idol?”

“You remember nothing of an image?” broke in Wilson.

“An image? An idol? I have seen them. I have seen them, but–but I can’t remember where.”

He spoke with a sort of childlike, apologetic whine. Wilson hesitated a moment. He had brought the idol with him after finding it in the hut where Manning had carried it from the raft–apparently unconsciously–and had taken it, fearing to leave it with Flores. He had intended to throw it away in the mountains in some inaccessible place where it could never again curse human lives. This image ought to be final proof as to whether or not Manning could recall anything of his life as a priest of the Sun God or not. If the sight of this failed to arouse his dead memory, then nothing ever could. Of all the things in this life among these mountains no one thing had ever figured so prominently or so vitally in his life as this. About this had centered all his fanatical worship–all his power.

As Wilson rose to get the image from where he had hidden it near Stubbs, the girl seized his arm and, bending far forward, gasped:

“The shadow–did you see it?”

Wilson turned with his weapon cocked.

“Where?” he demanded.

But underneath the trees where she had thought she saw a movement all was quiet again–all was silent. With a laugh at her fears, Wilson secured the image and brought it back. He thrust it towards Manning. It was clearly visible in the moonlight. The girl shrank a little away from it.

“Ugh!” she shuddered. “I don’t like to look at it to-night.”

In the dull silver light it appeared heavier and more somber than in the firelight. It still sat cross-legged with the same cynical smile about its cruel mouth, the same bestial expression about the brow, the same low-burning fires in the spider-like eyes. As Wilson and her father bent over it she turned away her head. Once again she seized Wilson’s arm and bade him look beyond the thicket in front of them.

“I saw something move. I am sure of it.”

“You are a bit nervous, I’m afraid,” he said tenderly. “If only you would lie down for the rest of the night.”

“No, no, David. I am sure this time.”

“Only a shadow. There is a light breeze.”

“I couldn’t see anything but–it didn’t feel like a shadow, David.”