Chapter 40 | A Grand Discovery | Yussuf the Guide

It was the very next day that the professor took his paper, rule, and pencils down to a building that seemed to have been a temple. It was at the very edge of the tremendous precipice, and must once have been of noble aspect, for it was adorned with a grand entrance, with handsomely carved columns supporting the nearly perfect roof, and the wonder was that the brigands had not utilised it for a dwelling or store. But there it was, empty, and the professor gazed around it with rapture.

The guards stood at the entrance leaning against the wall watching him and Lawrence carelessly, and then, going out into the sunshine, they picked out a sheltered spot, and sat down to smoke.

The professor began to draw. Soon afterwards Mr Burne sat down on a broken column taking snuff at intervals, and Yussuf seated himself with his back to the doorway, drew some worsted from his breast, and began to plait it rapidly, while Lawrence went on investigating the inmost recesses of the place.

“Come and look here, Yussuf,” he cried at the end of a few minutes, and the Turk followed him to a part of the building behind where an altar must have stood and pointed down.

“Look here,” he said; “this stone is loose, and goes down when I stand upon that corner. It’s hollow, too, underneath.”

He stamped as he spoke, and there was a strange echoing sound came up.

“Hush!” said Yussuf quickly, and he glanced round to see if they were observed; but they were hidden from the other occupants of the place; and, stooping down, Yussuf brushed away some rubbish, placed his hands under one side of the stone where it was loose, and lifted the slab partly up.

The air came up cool and sweet, so that it did not seem to be a vault; but it was evidently something of the kind, and not a well, for there was a flight of stone steps leading down into the darkness.

It was but a moment’s glance before Yussuf lowered the stone again, and hastily kicked some rubbish over it, and lowered a piece of an old figure across it so as to hide it more.

“What is it?” said Lawrence quickly.

“I do not know,” replied Yussuf. “It is our discovery. It may be treasure; it may be anything. Say no word to a soul, and you and I will get a lamp, escape from the prison to-night, and come and examine it, and see what it is. It may be a way out.”

Lawrence would gladly have gone on at once, but Yussuf signed to him to be silent; and it was as well, for he had hardly time to throw himself down on a block of stone, and sham sleep, when the guards came sauntering in and looked suspiciously round. Then, not seeing two of their prisoners, they came on cautiously, and peered over the stones that hid them from where the professor was drawing, to find Yussuf apparently asleep, and Lawrence sharpening his pocket-knife upon a stone.

One of the men came forward and snatched the knife away, saying in his own tongue that boys had no business with knives, after which he stalked off and returned to his old place outside.

“You see,” said Yussuf quietly, “it was no time now for examining the place; wait till night.”

For the first time since he had been a prisoner the hours passed slowly to Lawrence. It seemed as if it would never be night, and every time he met the professor’s or Mr Burne’s eye, they seemed to be taking him to task for keeping a secret from them.

Then, too, Mrs Chumley appeared to be suspecting him, and Chumley drew him aside as if to cross-examine him; but it was only to confide a long story about how severely he had been snubbed that day for wanting to follow the professor to the ruins where he was making his drawings.

At last, though, the guards had thrust in their villainous faces for the last time, according to their custom, and all had lain down as if to sleep.

An hour must have passed, and Lawrence lay with his heart beating, waiting for a summons from Yussuf; but it seemed as if one would never come, and the lad was about to give up and conclude that their guide had decided not to go that night, when a hand came out of the darkness and touched his face, while a pair of lips almost swept his ear, and a voice whispered:

“Rise softly, and follow me.”

Lawrence needed no second invitation, and, rising quickly, he followed Yussuf to where the rug hung over the door.

“Bend down low, and follow me,” whispered the Turk. “The guards are nearly asleep.”

He drew the rug a little on one side, and Lawrence saw where the two men were huddled up in their sheepskin cloaks.

“Do as I do,” whispered Yussuf.

The moon was shining, and the part where the guards sat was well in the light; but a black shadow was cast beneath the walls of the great building, and by stooping down and keeping in this, the evading pair were able to get beyond the ken of the guards, and though lights shone out from one ruined building, whether from fire or lamp could not be told, not a soul was about, and they were able to keep on till the inhabited part was left behind and the old temple reached.

“It was a dangerous thing to do, Lawrence effendi,” said the guide. “I repented promising to bring you, for the men might have fired.”

“Never mind that,” whispered Lawrence. “We are safe now. Have you brought a light?”

“Yes,” was the reply; and, by the moonlight which shone through a gap, Yussuf led the way among the broken stones to the back of the old altar, where, after feeling about, he found the side of the stone, lifted it right up, and leaned it against a broken column.

Then, after a word of warning, he stooped down and struck a match, but the draught that blew up the opening extinguished it on the instant.

Another and another shared the same fate, after giving them a glimpse of a ragged set of stone steps; and as it was evident that no light could be obtained that way, Yussuf took the little lamp he had brought into a corner of the building, lit it, and sheltering it inside his loose garment, he came back to where Lawrence waited listening.

“I’ll go first,” said Yussuf. “Mind how you come.”

He lowered himself into the hole, and descended a few steps.

“It is quite safe,” he said. “Come down;” and Lawrence descended to stand by his side.

“Shelter this lamp a minute,” whispered Yussuf. “I must close the stone, or the light will be out.”

Lawrence took the lamp, the perspiration standing on his forehead the while, as he felt that this was something like being Aladdin, and descending into the cave in search of the wonderful lamp.

“Suppose,” he thought, “that Yussuf should step out and leave him in this horrible place to starve and die. Nobody would ever guess that he was there, and no one would hear his cries. What was the place—a tomb? And had Yussuf gone and left him?”

There was a low dull hollow sound as the stone descended into its place, and a cry rose to the lad’s lips, but it had no utterance, for Yussuf said softly from above:

“Now you may show the light, and we can see where we are.”

Lawrence drew a breath of relief as he took the light from his breast, and saw that he was standing upon a very rough flight of stone steps, with the rugged wall of rock on either side.

Yussuf took the lamp and held it up, showing a rough arch of great stones over their heads, and the square opening over a rough landing where they had descended, while on either side the rock looked as if at some time it had been split, and left a space varying from four to six feet wide, the two sides being such that, if by some convulsion of nature they were closed, they would have fitted one into the other.

“Follow close behind me,” said Yussuf. “This must lead into some vault or perhaps burial-place. You are not frightened?”

“Yes, I am,” said Lawrence in a low tone.

“Shall we go back?”

“No, but I cannot help being a little alarmed.”

Yussuf laughed softly.

“No wonder,” he said. “I feel a little strange myself. But listen, Lawrence; what we have to fear is a hole or crack in the rock into which we might fall, so keep your eyes on the ground.”

But their path proved very easy, always a steep descent, sometimes cut into stairs, sometimes merely a rugged slope, and always arched over by big uncemented stones.

No vault came in sight, no passage broke off to right or left; it was always the same steep descent—a way to some particular pine made by the ancients, who had utilised the crevice or split in the rock, and arched it over to make this rugged passage.

“I think I understand,” said Yussuf, when they had gone on descending for quite three hundred yards.

“What is it?” said Lawrence; “a tomb?”

“No.”

“A treasure chamber?”

“No.”

“What, then?”

“There must be a spring of good water somewhere down at the bottom, and this was of great value to the people who built this place on the rock. Shall we go any farther?”

“Yes, I want to see the spring,” said Lawrence. “I am not so frightened now.”

“There is quite a current of air here,” said Yussuf, when they had descended another hundred yards or so. “The spring must be in the open air, and out by the mountain side.”

Lawrence was too intent upon his feet to answer, and they descended another fifty yards, when Yussuf stopped, for the way was impeded by a piled-up mass of fallen stones, and on looking up to see if they were from the roof they found that the arching had ceased, and that the roof was the natural rock of wedged-in masses fallen from above.

“We can get no farther,” said Yussuf, holding the lamp above his head.

“Look, look!” said Lawrence softly; “there is a light out there.”

Yussuf looked straight before him; and placing the lamp upon the ground, and shading it with his coat, there, sure enough, not more than a dozen yards away, was a patch of light—blight moonlight.

“I was wrong,” said Yussuf calmly; “this is not the way to a spring, but a road from that temple down to some pathway along by the side of the mountain, and closed up by these fallen stones. Lawrence effendi, we shall not want my ropes to descend from the walls. You have found a way out of the old place that has lain hidden for hundreds of years.”

“Do you think so?”

“Yes; and that we have only to set to work and clear away these stones sufficiently to reach the entrance, and then we can escape.”

“Let us begin, then, at once,” cried Lawrence joyously.

“No; we will go back now, and examine the way, so as to make sure that our course up and down is safe. Then we will get back, and be satisfied with our night’s work.”

“Yes,” said Yussuf, when he reached the stone again; “it is all quite plain. I could come up and down here in the dark, and there will be light enough at the bottom in the daytime to see what to do.”

He raised the stone after extinguishing his lamp, and they both stepped out; the stone was lowered into its place, a little earth and dust thrown over it and a few fragments of rubbish, and then the midnight wanderers stole back to the prison, but only to stop short in the shadow with Lawrence chilled by horror. For, as they were about to step up to the portal, one of the guards yawned loudly, rose, and walked to the rug, drew it aside, and looked in.

He stood there gazing in so long, that it seemed as if he must have discovered that there were absentees; but, just as Lawrence was in despair, he dropped the curtain, walked back to his companion, and sat down with his back to the portal.

Yussuf wasted no time, but glided along in the shadow, and Lawrence followed; but as he reached the portal he kicked against a piece of loose stone and the guards sprang up.

Lawrence would have stood there petrified, but Yussuf dragged him in, hurried him across the interior, threw him down, and took his place behind him.

“Pretend to be asleep,” he whispered; and he turned his face away, as the steps of the guards were heard, and they lifted the rug curtain and came in with a primitive kind of lantern, to look round and see if all were there, being satisfied on finding them apparently asleep, and going back evidently believing it was a false alarm.

“Safe this time, Yussuf,” whispered Lawrence.

“Yes,” said the guide. “Now sleep in peace, for you have discovered a way to escape.”