The Bride of the Sun/Book 2/Chapter 4
IV
Men, women and children began to press toward the group of riders. Dick, first to realize the change in the humor of the mob, spurred alongside Maria-Teresa.
"We must get out of this! Steady, and forward all!"
The Marquis, superbly cool, followed as if reluctant to show his back to any horde of Indians. The menace in the voices grew clearer. He looked round him, and drove his spurs home, till his mount reared and plunged into the crowd, clearing a space around it.
The mob was howling now, and knives were being drawn on all sides, when a giant Indian pushed his way toward the Spaniards. Maria-Teresa, Don Christobal and Diçk recognized Huascar, before whom his countrymen made way with evident respect and dread.
"Back!" he shouted, taking the young girl's mule by the bridle. "Who touches the Virgin of the Sun is a dead man!"
At these words, the crowd parted. Silence succeeded the tumult of a moment before.
"Let the strangers pass," ordered Huascar, and himself escorted them to the ancient palace gates.
Outside, on the plaza, they met a police patrol. The sergeant, in undertaking to escort them to the inn, was eloquent on their imprudence in coming into a quarter peopled by fanatical Indians on the eve of the Interaymi.
The Marquis wished to thank Huascar, but the Indian had vanished. Maria-Teresa and Dick, both very white, had not a word to say. Uncle Francis was also dumb, and did not take a single note.
At the inn they found only one vacant room, in which they all gathered. Dick was the first to utter the thought which was worrying them all.
"Suppose it was true!"
"Yes, suppose it was true!" repeated Maria-Teresa.
"What? Suppose what was true?" demanded the Marquis, refusing to understand.
"The Virgin of the Sun!"
They were all silent for a moment, bent under the weight of one amazing, absurd, monstrous thought. And they exchanged anxious, frightened looks, like children who are being told some terrifying fairy-tale. Dick broke the spell:
"You heard what Huascar said. 'Who touches the Virgin of the Sun is a dead man!' Those were his own words!"
"Just a manner of speech," hesitated Uncle Francis. "It cannot be anything else."
"Anything else? What do you mean?" demanded the Marquis violently.
"Well, it could not be ... the other thing. If Maria-Teresa was ... was the Virgin of the Sun, they would not have let her pass out."
"Are we all going mad! After all, we are masters here!" burst out Don Christobal. "There are the police, and the troops. All those rascals out there are our slaves. 'Pon my soul, we are all raving!"
"Of course!" exclaimed Maria-Teresa.
"All the same, I think we ought to get out of Cajamarca as soon as we can," said Dick, going to the window and looking out Night had fallen, and with it silence. The square outside was deserted.
Suddenly there was a knock at the door, and a servant brought in a letter addressed to Maria-Teresa. She tore it open and read aloud:—"Return to Lima at once. Leave Cajamarca to-night"
"It is not signed," she said, "but this warning comes from Huascar."
"And we should follow his advice," said Dick.
There was another knock at the door. This time, it announced the arrival of the Chief of Police, who was anxious to know what had happened. He had heard of the incident at Atahualpa's palace, and had moreover been warned by an Indian, an employee at the Franco-Belgian bank at Lima, that it might be dangerous for the Marquis and his companions to show themselves in the streets on the following day.
It was obvious that the man feared trouble, and would have given anything to see the party a hundred miles away. When he learned that they were ready to leave at once, he busied himself about finding them fresh mules and a guide, and furthermore detailed four troopers to escort the party as far as the railway.
Cajamarca was left at eleven o'clock that night, and the return journey was made at double the speed at which they had come. Dick would let nobody rest, and forced the pace throughout. It was not until the following night, safe in the train for Pascamayo, that they realized the ridicule that attached to their hasty flight. "Just like a pack of children frightened out of their lives by Agnes' stories," said the Marquis.
Back in civilized life again, they were all surprised at their panic. After all, the whole thing could be so naturally explained—fanatics resenting the presence of strangers at a religious festival, and nothing more. The best thing they could do was to forget it as soon as possible. Uncle Francis restored the party's gaiety by going through the same performance which he had rehearsed on landing.
Forty-eight hours in Lima completely dispelled the cobwebs. Maria-Teresa found a great deal of work awaiting her, and forgot her fears in a maze of figures which took her to Callao early, and kept her busy at the offices until late in the afternoon, when Dick came to fetch her.
One afternoon, about eight days after the adventure at Cajamarca, the tap at her window which announced Dick's arrival came earlier than usual. Maria-Teresa got up, and threw open the shutters. Dick was not there.... Then she retreated with a half-strangled scream. Was it possible? In the rapidly gathering darkness, she could not be sure, and leaned out of the window to see better.... That thing, swaying in the darkness, looked just like the sugar-loaf skull.... She retreated into the room, trembling in every limb, and turned round. From the dark corners of the chamber two other shadows, the valise and cap skulls, were advancing slowly, swaying as they came.
For a moment, Maria-Teresa thought she had lost her reason. Then she made a violent effort to regain control of herself. Dead skulls could not come to life like this. And yet, they were coming toward her, swaying horribly, above shadowy bodies! A desperate scream for help was choked in her throat. "Dick!..." and nothing more. The three living skulls had hurled themselves upon her, gagged her, and now, throwing the inanimate girl over their shoulders, hurried through the black hole of the open window. Maria-Teresa's own motor was waiting there, her negro boy at the wheel, smiling strangely.
Their mummy hands, horribly living, lifted the girl into the tonneau, and the three monsters, like three larvae, climbed in after her. Then the car shot down the street.