The Bride of the Sun

BOOK V—THE HOUSE OF THE SERPENT

I

Maria-Teresa opened her eyes. What was this dream from which she had awakened, or into which she had fallen? Little Christobal’s plaintive voice brought her keen realization of the brutal truth. She held out her arms to the child, but felt neither his kisses nor his tears on her face. Her eyes were still heavy with magic sleep, and she opened them with difficulty.

When, gradually, she came out of the abyss of darkness and dreams into which she could be plunged almost instantly by the sacred sachets always ready in the hideous fists of the three living mummies; the mammaconas, too, had terrible perfumes which they burned round her in precious vases, sandia more pungent than incense, more hallucinating than opium, which transformed the Bride of the Sun into a beautiful living statue. Then they could sing their songs uninterruptedly, for Maria-Teresa had gone to another world, and heard nothing of what happened about her.

Curiously enough, her spirit then carried her back to the hour when the knock had come at her window in Callao and when, dropping the big green register to the floor, she had run to meet Dick. She was worried, too, by the ever present memory of an unfinished letter to their agent in Antwerp, which she had been writing when that other knock at the window had sent her running to Dick again. She remembered with horrible distinctness the appearance of the three living mummies, swaying in the darkness, and the feel on her mouth and face of the hands made parchment-like by the eternal night of the catacombs. Waking from this lethargic slumber, she thought she had shaken off a dream, but when her eyes opened, she no longer knew whether she had not just entered into a terrible dreamland.

When Maria-Teresa opened her eyes this time, she was in the House of the Serpent. She knew, for the mammaconas had told her, that when she awoke there she would be near unto death. There it was that Huayna Capac, father of the last King of the Incas, would come to fetch the bride offered to Atahualpa, and take her with him to the Enchanted Realms of the Sun. In the lucid moments left to her during the voyage, when she was given the nectar that kept her alive, the mammaconas had taught her the duties of the Bride, and the first principles of the faith to which she was to be sacrificed.

At first, Maria-Teresa had hoped that she would be happy enough to lose her reason, or that the terrible fever which took her would free the troubled soul before the body was taken to martyrdom. But the mammaconas knew the secrets which cure such fevers, and had given her to drink a reddish liquid, chanting the while: “Fever has spread over you its poisoned robe. The hated race shall never know our secrets, but our love for Atahualpa’s bride is greater than our hatred. Drink and be well, in the name of Atahualpa, who awaits thee!”

So she had returned to life, only to die again, and so, a nerveless statue, she had traveled right across Peru, to the little adobe house at Arequipa, the last stopping-place before the House of the Serpent. There she had seen Huascar for the first time, bearing in his arms something covered with a veil. Careless of all the listening ears about her, she had risen, and called to him as to a savior. He had answered: “Thou belongest to the Sun, but before he takes you, thou shalt have a great joy. Thou shalt see thy little brother again.” Then he lifted the veil and showed her Christobal, sleeping. She had run forward, while he had retreated in terror. None but the appointed may touch the Bride of the Sun, and the three guardians of the Temple were there, armed, and swaying gently. One of them signed to a mammacona, who carried the sleeping boy to his sister; she burst into tears, for the first time since her captivity. The child opened his eyes and clung to her, sobbing, “Maria-Teresa! Maria-Teresa!”

“How did he come here? You would not hurt him!”

“We shall do as he wishes. He came to us, not we to him. He himself shall decide his fate. Let him beware of his words. That is all I can say to you, all I can do for you. Is that not so, ye Guardians of the Temple?”

Maria-Teresa, clutching the child to her, looked at them with fresh terror painted on her features; at Huascar, calm and motionless; at the three living mummies, gently swaying.

“What do you mean? How can a child beware of his words?”

Huascar, without moving, then spoke to little Christobal.

“Child, will you come with me? I will take you to your father.”

“No! I will stop with Maria-Teresa!”

“The child has spoken,” said Huascar. “So it is ordered. Is it not so, Guardians of the Temple?”

The three horrible skulls swayed gently.

Then Huascar, before leaving, had chanted the words of an Almara psalm: “Blessed are those who shall come pure to the Kingdom of the Sun, pure as the hearts of little children, at the dawn of the world.”

“Huascar, have pity! Remember my mother! Have pity!”

Huascar bowed to the Guardians of the Temple and went out silently.

Maria-Teresa, crooning over little Christobal, covered him with kisses. “Why did you come, little one? Why did you come?”

“To tell you not to be afraid, Maria-Teresa. Papa and Dick are coming. They are following, and will save us both. But if you must die, little sister, I will die with you.”

The mammaconas, moving silently, had lit the sandia in their precious vases; brother and sister slept together, in each other’s arms.

Now she had awakened in the House of the Serpent, and Christobal was not with her. She struggled to regain consciousness, heard his cries near by, and rose from the cushioned couch on which she had been reclining. There was Christobal, naked, struggling in the hands of the mammaconas. Terrified, she made as if to rush to his assistance, but six of the women surrounded her, calmed her with fluttering hands. No harm would come to the child; he was being dressed, as she would be dressed, in a robe made of bat skins. They spoke with infinite respect, giving her a title she had not heard before; they called her Coya, which, in Inca, means queen.

The mammaconas took her in their powerful arms, lifting her like a child, and took off the sulphur-hued robes with which she had been adorned in the deserted hacienda. Again they anointed her with sweet oils and perfumed creams, chanting the while a slow and restful lullaby, stilling to the senses. They were tall women from the province of Puno, born on the shores of Titicaca, strong and beautiful; their walk was almost rhythmic, supple and harmonious, while their rounded arms showed golden against the black of their veils. They had splendid eyes, all that could be seen of their faces.

Maria-Teresa and little Christobal were afraid of them, but they were not cruel. Two of their number were to die with Maria-Teresa, to prepare the nuptial chamber in the Palace of the Sun, and they were the most lively, the happiest, the most consoling and understanding. They were wholly happy, and were sad that the Bride did not share that happiness, doing all they could to make her understand the joy of being chosen among all as the Goya. On their ankles they wore great golden bracelets, and in their ears heavy circlets.

The child was no longer crying. They had promised him that if he was good he would return to Maria-Teresa’s arms. She also obeyed the mammaconas docilely. The chant with which they filled her ears lulled her spirit, still heavy with the magic sleep.

There was a thought, too, which gave her courage. Those who were dearest to her knew where she was, what had happened to her, who had carried her off, and why. If little Christobal had been able to find her, surely her father and Dick could do so. They would both be saved. If Dick had not appeared before, it was because he delayed until he was sure of success. At any moment they might appear with the police and soldiers, all these savages would vanish in the mountains, and the horrible dream would be ended. She felt as weak as a child face to face with Destiny.

II

In the Home of the Sun,” sang the mammaconas for the hundredth time, “the trees are heavy with fruits, and when they are ripe the branches bend down to the earth, that the Indian need not even raise his hand to pick them. Do not weep! Thou shalt live eternally, eternally! Death knocks at the doors of the earthly palace, and the Spirit of Evil stretches his accursed wings over our forests. Weep not! On high in the heavens, near the Sun and the Moon, who is his sister and his first bride, near Charca, who is his faithful page, thou shalt live eternally, eternally!”

On Maria-Teresa’s perfumed tresses they placed the royal borla, its golden fringe overshadowing her eyes and giving her a strange hieratic beauty. She shivered when the bat-skin robe slipped over her limbs; it was as if she had donned something viscous and icy, which from that instant made her part and parcel of the eternal night of which the bat is Coya.

Then they placed on her wrist a circlet which she recognized as the Golden Sun bracelet. She realized that her last hours had begun, and thought sadly of the happy yet terrible day when this bracelet first appeared in her existence; she remembered the horror-stricken face of Aunt Agnes, the old duenna crossing herself, her father’s skepticism and Dick’s loving laugh. Where were they all now? Why—why did they not come to her rescue?

Maria-Teresa stretched out her arms to the Providence that seemed to have deserted her, and closed them again on little Christobal, placed in her lap by one of the attendants. When she saw him, clad like herself in the robes of night, she was seized with revolt. This could not be! She turned to the Guardians of the Temple, who came forward in answer to her look, gently swaying. There was no doubt of it! There were the same horrible skulls which Dick and she had seen taken out of the earth, come from their tombs to take her back with them. But she would speak, and test their mercy. She turned away her eyes, mortally afraid that the steady swaying would overpower her will, and told them she was ready to die quietly, as befitted a Bride of the Sun, if only they would spare the little boy and send him safely back to Lima.

“I will not leave you, Maria-Teresa! I will not leave you!”

“The child has spoken. So it is ordained.”

The Guardians of the Temple exchanged glances and moved away again, gently swaying.

Maria-Teresa burst into tears, the ring of madness in her high sobs, while the little boy clung desperately, striving to console her.

“Do not cry, Maria-Teresa! They will come to save us. Papa and Dick will come.... Oh! What was that?”

From behind the walls come the strains of music. A curtain is raised, and the players enter—tall, sad-faced men who take their places in a ring around them. They are the sacred players of the quenia, the flute which is made of human bones. Their song is sadder than a De Profundis, and Maria-Teresa shivers, her beseeching eye exploring in vain every corner of the great bare room which is the antechamber of her tomb.

Monstrous, Cyclopean masses of stone, hexagonal in shape and placed one upon the other without mortar, held in place by their mighty weight alone, form the walls of the House of the Serpent. She knows where she is, for the mammaconas have told her. There are two Houses of the Serpent, one at Cajamarca, the other at Cuzco. They are called thus because of the stone serpent carved over the main entrances. The serpent is there to guard the sacred precincts, and never allows the victims of the Sun to escape. Aunt Agnes and old Irene have often told her this, and until now she has always laughed.

Maria-Teresa, then, is in Cuzco, in a palace well known to travelers, historians, and archaeologists; a place which all may enter, which all may leave in freedom; a place to which guides bring the curious stranger. Then what does it all mean? Why should she fear? They are sure to come to her rescue. But why are they still not here?

Which way will they come? Listen! Yes, above the sad piping of the quenias rise other sounds: murmurs, footsteps, and the dull rumble of a gathering throng. It comes from over there, from behind that vast curtain, that vast golden-yellow curtain which stretches right across the room and prevents her from seeing. What does it hide, and what is that crowd awaiting?

Maria-Teresa questions the two mammaconas who are to die with her. They are stretched at her feet in their long black veils, and rise with respect to answer. The faithful are waiting to adore King Huayna Capac, who will come to lead her back to Atahualpa. Maria-Teresa, uncomprehending, asks more questions. He will come from the bowels of the earth to claim them, and they will pass through the realms of night in their robes of mourning, till they reach the Enchanted Realms of the Sun. Then they will be clad all in gold, with golden dresses and jewels of gold, for all time.

“And the little boy?” asked Maria-Teresa.

To her horror, they turned their heads away and did not answer. She caught Christobal more closely to her, covering his face with kisses, as if she wished to smother him with caresses to save him from a more terrible fate. The child strove to console her. “Do not be afraid,” he whispered. “Papa and Dick will come, not the wicked King. They will soon be here.”

On one of the giant stones are mysterious signs to which the whispering mammaconas draw each other’s attention—strange sculptured figures with the head of man and the body of the coraquenque. In all time and on all the earth, so say the Incas, there has been only one couple of coraquenques, two of the mystic birds which appeared in the mountains at the coronation of each new king and gave him two of their feathers to adorn his head-dress.

Behind the curtain, the noise has ceased, and the song of the quenias suddenly grows so piercing that Maria-Teresa cries out in terror. Christobal, clutching at her bosom, nestles closer. Then the curtains are parted, and the whole hall is revealed.

Below, a long way below her, is a prostrate and silent crowd. On the porphyry steps which stretch down to this crowd stand the three Guardians of the Temple. A step below them, Huascar, his arms crossed under his red poncho. Lower still, four prostrate Red Ponchos, who are the Guards of the Sacrifice. Their heads, completely hidden by the sacred bonnet and ear-caps, are bent so low that none can see their faces.

Surely there is somebody in that huge crowd who will free her! Maria-Teresa, filled with a wild hope, rises with the child in her arms, and cries for mercy. But the booming answer takes away all hope. “Muera la Coya! Muera la Coya! To death with the Queen!” They give her the title in Aïmara, but clamor for her death in Spanish, that she may understand.

The four mammaconas on her right, the four others on her left and the two who were to die with her surrounded the young girl, forced her back to her seat. But she still struggled, holding up the boy, and begging that he at least might be spared.

“He is the sacrifice of Pacahuamac,” came the answer. And the mammaconas, taking up the echo, chanted: “The sacrifice of Pacahuamac! Before all things began, before the Sun and before the Moon, his sister, was the Great Spirit, Pacahuamac. Pacahuamac, the Great Spirit!”

Down below there, the surging crowd took up the cry. Huascar, turning, commanded silence with a gesture.

They were all standing now, except the four Red Ponchos on the last step; still prostrate and silent. The cry of the quenias rose again, strident and shrill; soon they alone were to be heard. Maria-Teresa, crushed, conquered, had ceased struggling. Not a voice, not a sign, had answered the appeal. In a groan, she begged the mammaconas for their perfumes. “Have mercy. Bring your perfumes. Then we shall not suffer.” The two who were to die with her shook their heads. “We must go to Atahualpa waking, with all our hearts and all our senses, that heart and senses may live hereafter.”

The quenia players ceased their music, and a terrible, gripping silence descended on the hall. The faithful fell to their knees, and Huascar’s sonorous voice commanded silence.

“Silence! Silence in the House of the Serpent! The dead King is coming! Listen!”

It was as if an earthquake had shaken the walls. The place was filled with thunder. But instead of coming from the heavens, it rose from the very bowels of the earth.

Little Christobal trembled in his sister’s arms, clung closer, and whispered, “Look, Maria-Teresa! Look at the Red Ponchos.” She lifted her eyes, looked, trembled, and forced herself to silence. While every other head was bent in worship, the Guards of the Sacrifice had raised theirs, and under the sacred bonnets, despite the stain that disguised them, Maria-Teresa recognized the faces of Dick, her father, Natividad and Uncle Francis.

When she looked a second time, the four bonnets were prostrate again, and a cry from Huascar, herald of Huayna Capac, brought the multitude to its feet.

Another tremor shook the very foundations of the temple, and one wall seemed to vanish.

“Huayna Capac!”

III

That part of the wall on which were sculptured the strange signs and the two human-headed birds had opened, as if on a pivot. Maria-Teresa cowered and covered her face with her hands, for the dead king was emerging from the gulf of shadow beyond. The wall swung back into position, and the young girl, opening her eyes again, saw before her a two-seated throne of massive gold. The seat on the right of the dead majesty was unoccupied. The great crowd of Indians was bent to the dust in adoration, while the dirge of the quenia-players rose to the roof in ever-increasing volume.

The two mammaconas who were to accompany Maria-Teresa to the Enchanted Realms of the Sun stood on each side of her, while the ten other priestesses, formed in two lines, passed and re-passed before her, in the intricate steps of a sacred dance. When they came before the Dead One’s throne, they fell to their knees, then rose again, chanting: “This is Huayna Capac, King of kings, son of the great Tapac Inca Yupanqui. He has come by the Corridors of Night to claim the new Coya offered by the Inca people to his son Atahualpa.” Then they moved backwards, crossing and re-crossing, swaying their black veils. Twelve times they repeated this movement, and each time the chant grew louder, while the purl of the quenias swelled and broadened.

Maria-Teresa, holding Christobal closely to her, stared fixedly at Huayna Capac, and the Dead One seemed to stare back at her. He also wore the bat-skin robe made for the Corridors of Night, but beneath it could be seen the royal mantle and the golden sandals. His face, calm and severe, majestic in its still beauty, nearly had the hues of life; it was framed in masses of coal-black hair, crowned with the royal borla in which quivered the plumes of the coraquenque. Under the half-closed lids the eyes seemed living. The dead king was seated naturally, his hands resting on his knees, and so life-like was his whole attitude that to Maria-Teresa’s horrified eyes he seemed to be breathing. Only little Christobal heard her half-strangled cry, for the mammaconas were repeating their chant for the twelfth time, and with the piercing note of the quenias, deadened all other sound in the House of the Serpent.

Down below there, the mob of Indians was swaying, swaying gently from right to left, in imitation of the rhythmic movements of the three Guardians of the Temple. Maria-Teresa kept her eyes fixed on the dead king, not only because he was just opposite her and, half fascinated, she could not do otherwise, but also because she did not wish to look at the Red Ponchos. She felt that if her eyes were allowed to wander for an instant, they would fatally betray the four.

Maria-Teresa was now as if half buried in the idea of death; she felt as if the earth had already claimed her, only leaving her head free for a little longer. She was becoming gradually hypnotized by the motionless monarch, while the fanatical crowd about her wondered, awestruck.

Huascar raised his arm, two fingers of his right hand imposing immediate and absolute silence. The Guardians of the Temple drew near, pointing towards the vacant seat on the golden throne. Two mammaconas lifted up Maria-Teresa, carried her to it, and placed her beside Huayna Capac, son of the great Tapac Inca Yupanqui. Then the double throne was turned until it faced the assembly and the Red Ponchos.

Maria-Teresa closed her eyes, shivering at the thought of the corpse beside her. She dared not open them, realizing with horrible distinctness that if she did she must try to run down to Dick, or call out something that would betray them. Though her eyes were closed, and she outwardly seemed as dead as the mummy beside her, Maria-Teresa knew what was happening. Little Christobal, peeping over the curve of his sister’s arms, was watching everything, and a whisper, so low that she hardly felt the breath rising along her bare neck, said: “Dick has lifted his head.... Papa is looking at us... we must not move.” Maria-Teresa pressed her trembling fingers on the child’s lips, and he was silent.

So they were there. Her tired brain, working, working, wondered what they were going to do. It was horrible to know them there, hidden and helpless. For if they had not been helpless, they would not be hidden, they would have come with police and soldiers. Could it be that the Indians were masters of the country now? Then she thought of the revolution, of Garcia, who had once loved her. Why had they not gone to him? At a word, he would have come with his whole army. And they, hidden under their red ponchos, what could they do? What was their plan?

The mammaconas were chanting:—

“Earthquakes shook the world. The moon was girt with rings of many colors. Thunder fell on the royal palace, and reduced it to ashes. An eagle, hard pursued by falcons, circled over the great square of the city, filling the heavens with his cries. Pierced by the talons of his foes, he fell dead at the feet of the noblest among the Incas.”

At these words, recalling the defeat and death of their last ruler, all bent their heads, groaning, and the breath of the quenia players trembled in the dead men’s bones. Huascar had also bent to the ground; then he raised his forehead and his eyes met those of Maria-Teresa. She shivered, and when he moved toward her, she thought her last hour had come. She had been able to appeal to the mercy of the crowd, but she could not call to this man, whose look showed that he loved her. She closed her eyes.

Huascar’s voice reached her, slow, cadenced, and monotonous.

“Coya, thou belongest to Huayna Capac, the great King who will take thee to the House of the Sons of the Sun. We leave thee alone with him. He will lead thee through the Corridors of Night, which no living man must know, and in the temple will seat thee among the Hundred Wives. Thou must obey him, thou must rise only if he rises! Thou must obey. And remember that the serpent watches in the House of the Serpent.”

He withdrew, still facing her, with the three Guardians of the Temple, while the great crowd below flowed silently through the three doors.

All the mammaconas followed, drawing their black veils over their faces, like widows leaving a cemetery. Even the two who were also to die left her, first bending to kiss her feet, peeping shoeless from under the bat-skin robe.

Darkness was rapidly gaining the hall. Why were they leaving her alone there? What was this horror which even they dared not see? She must not rise unless he rose. Would this dead thing come to life, then, take her by the hand, and lead her into the eternal night? What of the Red Ponchos? She looked. They were still there, prostrate at the foot of the steps. The Guards of the Sacrifice, she had heard them called. They were stopping! A surge of joy filled her heart She felt less afraid now.

The Guardians of the Temple had left. Huascar had left.

Would the Red Ponchos follow? No, they did not move. She was watching them now, with her whole soul. They were still there, motionless, ready to spring to her rescue when the hall was empty, ready to carry her to the horses that must be waiting. The Dead One at all events could do nothing to prevent it.

There were only twenty Indians left in the hall now... only five... four... three.... They turned slowly at the doorway to look at her again... She sat motionless, rigid.... She must not move unless the Dead One moved.... Only the four Red Ponchos remained....

She half screamed.... They also had risen, pacing slowly toward the doors.

It could not be! They could not be deserting her! But they were going away like the others, without looking in her direction. No, she must not scream... she must wait patiently... wait for a sign. Still walking slowly, three of them had gone to the three doors, but the fourth, Dick, turned suddenly, his finger on his lips.

Forgetting Huascar’s words, Maria-Teresa half rose in her seat. There was a revolver in Dick’s fist now, and her father had vanished through one of the doors, looking to make sure that the courtyard was deserted. Then his voice gave the signal:—“Recuerda!” (Remember!) Dick dashed up the porphyry steps, Don Christobal following, while the two others remained at the doors.

“Come, Maria-Teresa! Quick!”

Dick stretched out his hands to take little Christobal, and Maria-Teresa had risen, when a terrible whistling sound filled the hall, and the two prisoners, shrieking, were hurled back into the seat by the monstrous folds of a huge serpent which seemed to spring into life about them, binding them down to the throne of Death. The serpent of the House of the Serpent had come to claim his prey.

Raising his revolver, Dick thundered at the hideous head towering above them, whistling with wide-open jaws, and tore at the coils which imprisoned his fiancée. His hands fell, not on living flesh, but on hard, cold metal; copper rings which ground one against the other, overlapped, and drew tighter. It was in vain that he and Don Christobal tore at them with furious hands.

“Look out! They are coming!” shouted Natividad from the doorway, and the hall was invaded by Indians, while the Serpent shrieked stridently, and a thousand rattles seemed to sound the alarm. The Marquis still tore at the coils that were choking his children, but Dick, hesitating a moment, dashed down the stairs. In a twinkling, the hall was full of Indians, priests, caciques, mammaconas, scores of Quichua soldiers from the train of Oviedo Runtu, who alone remained invisible.

Huascar appeared, still calm and immovable, as if this scene did not surprise him, as if nothing could surprise him. Had he known beforehand what was to have happened, he could not have given his orders more deliberately. Don Christobal, Natividad, and Uncle Francis were tied up in a trice, the latter at last alarmed by the brutality of his captors. Dick had disappeared.

“Take them away,” ordered Huascar.

Don Christobal struggled, turned and looked once again. “Maria-Teresa! Christobal!” Then he too was hurried away.

Meanwhile Huascar, more and more somber, directed the search for Dick. They hunted in vain; he had disappeared like a drop of water in the sea. Finally, Huascar gave the order to clear the hall again.

Left alone with the Guardians of the Temple, who stood caressing the serpent’s folds with their hideous little hands, the high-priest went behind the throne. In a moment, the brazen monster was silent, loosened its grip, and shrank link by link, until it vanished whence it had come.

Going to the wall, Huascar placed his hand on the coraquenque, and the massive stones rolled back; the throne shook, slipped backwards, and vanished down the Corridors of Night, taking with it the dead King, Maria-Teresa and little Christobal, both unconscious. The wall closed upon them, hiding again the secrets which only those who are ready to die may know.

The Guardians of the Temple bent their monstrous heads in obeisance before Huascar, and in their turn went out Huascar, last High-Priest of the Incas, was alone in the House of the Serpent Slowly going to the top of the porphyry steps, he sat down. His head dropped between his hands, and there he remained till dawn.

IV

Dick, clear of the House of the Serpent by what was little short of a miracle, crouched down in a niche of the palace wall, hewn out by some dead Inca hand, and there waited for Huascar throughout the night, watching the door at which he must appear. He was careless of the danger he ran, and his very boldness saved him. Not one of the passing Quichuas, dignitaries of the Interaymi, dreamed for an instant that the poor Indian wrapped in his poncho, and apparently asleep, was the sacrilegious stranger who had slipped from their clutches. The darkness, too, favored him, as it had favored his daring escape; he had merely turned his red poncho inside out, so that it looked like any other poncho, and had joined the howling crowd, stopping in it until Huascar’s order had cleared the hall.

Argue the matter as he would, the young man saw no hope. Garcia’s victory over the Federal troops at Cuzco had given the district into the hands of the Indians. The Spanish population, only an eighth of the 50,000 souls in the ancient city, had fled. Never since the Spanish Con quest had the Quichuas so completely been the masters. Garcia himself had prudently left the town, waiting for the end of the Interaymi; and the few troops he had left behind him were heart and soul with the native population, from which they had been levied, and with which they shared customs, faith and fetichism. In a word, the Cuzco was as much the home of the Incas as it had been in the heyday of their despotic rulers.

When Dick and his companions had reached the outskirts of the city they had hidden their motor in a half-deserted country inn, bribing the landlord. They had at once realized that force was out of the question. Happily, there remained Garcia’s money. The landlord, a poor half-breed who asked no better than to become rich, had listened readily, and the offer of a small fortune had set him off looking for Red Ponchos willing to betray Huascar.

He found four, the very men who were to be the Guards of the Sacrifice, in the House of the Serpent. When these men had explained their functions, the four Europeans could hardly believe their good fortune. Dick and Don Christobal were so absorbed by the idea of getting through to the prisoners somehow, that they did not stop to think how suspiciously easy their task had been. Uncle Francis, a witness of the bargain, was for once not altogether wrong when he shrugged his shoulders at their childish scheme to “take him in.”

The Red Ponchos agreed to everything, and the price was fixed, and they received half-payment. The remainder was to be handed over when the Marquis’ children were free. The traitors promised to help them escape from the sacred precincts, and moreover brought them their disguises.

Uncle Francis, chuckling covertly, accepted the part assigned to him with such readiness, showed such quiet courage in his attitude, that he reconquered at one stroke the lost esteem of both the Marquis and his nephew. Natividad, ever ready to believe anything to the discredit of an Indian, and knowing from experience how easily they were to be bought, was quite confident in the success of the expedition.

Thoroughly fooled by Huascar, they had walked into the trap, and only amazing luck had saved one of them. Where were the others now? Where was the dungeon that held them, and what was to be their fate?

Dick was waiting in the dark street before the palace, determined to shoot Huascar when he saw him. All night through, nobody came out of the House of the Serpent. At dawn, the young engineer suddenly felt a hand on his arm, and, looking up, recognized the old man to whom he had spoken at Arequipa, the father of Maria Cristina de Orellana.

“Why do you stop here?” asked the stranger. “You won’t see the procession if you do. Follow me, and I’ll show you my daughter coming out of the Corridor of Night.”

Dick stared at him. Groups of Indians were passing, all heading in the same direction. The old man spoke again.

“You may as well go with them. They are all off to see the procession of the Bride of the Sun.”

Dick followed him mechanically. Why not, after all? He was nearly mad himself. Why should a madman not be his guide? As they walked, Orellana babbled on tonelessly.

“I know you well. You want to see the Bride of the Sun. I see you have even disguised yourself as an Indian to do so. Not in the least necessary, I assure you. You’ll see her, right enough, if you come with me. I know Cusco, below ground and above ground, better than any living man. I have lived in their secret passages for ten years. When I am not under ground, I guide strangers through the city, and show them where the Bride of the Sun used to pass on her way to the Temple of Death. You know that, of course? It’s the same as the Temple of the Sun, only underneath. I’ll show it you, for it’s worth seeing.

“Fine fêtes this year, señor. Last time, they had to hide themselves in the Corridors of Night, but to-day they are masters both above and below, and that dead king of theirs, Huayna Capac, will see daylight again. They’ll take him all through the city, as they used to do. If you don’t know that, you haven’t been keeping your ears open.

“Where are your friends? I could have shown it to them as well. And I don’t charge much; a few centavos keep me going for weeks. All the innkeepers know me, and send for Orellana when they have visitors. I know you all quite well. I saw you at Mollendo, then at Arequipa, and now here you are again outside the House of the Serpent. That’s where they always go first. Yes, that’s the way they brought Maria Cristina ten years ago. She was the prettiest girl in Lima, so they chose her for their god. I didn’t know then, but this time they won’t have their way quite so easily. When I saw the Interaymi come round again, I said to myself: ‘Orellana, you must get ready for them.’ And I’m ready for them, never fear!”

Thus they crossed the whole city. Dick, walking like a man in a dream, following to the next station in the martyrdom of his sweetheart, paid no heed to the wonderful ruins on all sides of him, the mighty buildings piled rock on rock by demi-gods, and which have not moved, nor will move until the earth dies, long after the winds of heaven and the quivering of the mountains have stamped flat the miserable huts left by the Conquistadors.

They left the city behind them and Orellana, taking Dick by the hand, like a little child, made him climb the mount which the Quichuas call the Hill of the Dancing Monkey. Its gigantic summit, hewn into terraces, galleries and giant stairways by long-dead craftsmen, was already crowned with Indians. All eyes were turned toward that other miracle of Inca work which is Sacsay-Huaynam, a hill of stone fashioned into a Cyclopean fortress, with three lines of defenses rising one above the other, each wall dotted with niches from which on this day, as of yore, armed sentries looked out over the country. On the summit of Sacsay-Huaynam towered the Intihuatana, or “the pillar on which the sun is bound.”

Orellana’s broken voice explained it all to Dick, guide-like.

“This pillar, señor, was used by the Incas to measure time. A religious stone, erected to mark the exact period of the equinoxes. That is why they call it Intihuatana; it means where the sun is bound.’ Look over there! You can see the procession starting.... Don’t you understand? The Corridors of Night run right under the city, from the House of the Serpent to Sacsay-Huaynam. When my daughter comes out, they will take her round the hill, and round the Intihuatana. Then, when the Sun has been freed by the High-Priest, the procession will come down to the gates of the city.”

Dick could now clearly see the procession forming up on the walls, and even distinguished Huascar at its head, giving orders. Leaving Orellana, he hurried toward Sacsay-Huaynam, getting as near as the press of Indians would allow. He could now see that the solstice pillar, placed in the center of a circle, was loaded with festoons of flowers and fruit, while on its summit stood a golden throne. The throne of the Sun, vanished centuries before, had been brought out from the Corridors of Night and replaced there before the dawn.

There was silence on Sacsay-Huaynam; a few priests were grouped round the Pillar, waiting for the hour of noon. Then Huascar appeared, clad in golden vestments. Facing the throne of the Sun, the High-Priest waited a few seconds, turned and cried aloud in Aïmara a phrase which was taken up on all sides in Quichua and Spanish:—“The god is seated on the Column in all his light!” Then he struck his hands together, giving the signal for all to march; the god, having visited his people, had been freed, and continued his voyage through the heavens. The faithful followed him on earth, from east to west.

The sacred procession sprang into life, led by Huascar. First came a hundred servitors of the god, simply dressed, whose task it was to clear the way, chanting paeans of triumph. After them, a group of men in chequer-board tunics of red-and-white, whom the populace greeted with shouts of “The amautas! The amautas!” (the sages). Then others all in white, bearing hammers and maces of silver and copper, who were the apparitors of the royal palace; the guards and the Inca’s body attendants, their azure robes blazing with precious metals; finally, the nobles, with heavy ear-rings marking their rank. The procession wound slowly down from Sacsay-Huaynam to the plain, and then the double throne, borne on the shoulders of the noblest among the Indians, appeared to the multitude. Thousands of throats greeted the dead king and his living companion; a roar of mingled enthusiasm for the descendant of Manco Capac, and hatred for the conquering race, translated by deafening shouts of “Muera la Coya! Muera la Coya!”

Maria-Teresa seemed to hear nothing; pale as marble and beautiful as a statue, she passed unheeding, little Christobal still in her arms. Instead of the bat-skin robes, they now wore vicuna tunics, sheer as silk. Behind them walked the two mammaconas who were to die, their faces veiled with black; the other women and the three Guardians of the Temple had disappeared. The cortège was brought up by a company of Quichua soldiers in modern uniform, rifle on shoulder, tramping to the lilt of the quenia-players, who closed the march.

The contrast between this antique procession and that fragment of a modern army was more than curious. Uncle Francis, the only one who could have really appreciated it under the circumstances, was not there. As to Dick, he was watching Maria-Teresa with the fixed gaze of a madman. Strive as he would, he could get no nearer, and so backed out of the press to run toward the gates of the city, where he hoped to fight his way to the front ranks.

On the last steps of the Hill of the Dancing Monkey he was immobilized by the press of people and forced to look with them to the summit of Sacsay-Huaynam, where, on the top of the highest tower, had appeared the scarlet figure of a priest, sharp-cut against the azure of the sky.

Dick at once recognized the Preacher of Cajamarca, and voices around him further explained that this was the chief officer of the quipucamyas, or Keepers of the Historical Word. His voice, sweeping down from Sacsay-Huaynam, checked the advance of the procession, chanted the glory of by-gone days.

Ringing clear and impassioned, it recalled the day when the Stranger and his diabolical train had first entered those plains after the death of Atahualpa. As to-day, the Sun blazed over the Imperial City, then full of altars sacred to his cult. Then, innumerable buildings, which the conqueror was to leave in ruins, traced white streets in the heart of the valley, and clustered on the lower slopes of the hills. In the conqueror’s train was Manco, descendant of kings, in whose name he gave orders and was obeyed. On that day, when the sun went down behind the Cordilleras, it might well have been thought that the Empire of the Incas had ceased to exist.

“But it still lives!” thundered the voice. “The Sun still shines on his children; the Andes, cradle of our race, still tower to the skies; Cuzco, navel of the earth, still quivers at the voice of his priests; Sacsay-Huaynam and the Intihuatana are still standing; the procession of the Interaymi still starts from these sacred walls!”

At these words, the procession moved on again, and had it not been for the anachronism of the riflemen bringing up the rear, one could almost have believed that five hundred years had brought no change in the plains of the Cuzco.

Dick, finally free to move on, was despairing of ever getting nearer to Maria-Teresa when he met Orellana again.

“What are you looking for?” asked the old man. “A place to see from? Then come with me, and I’ll show you my daughter. I know Cuzco better than the Incas themselves. Come with me.”

Once again Dick allowed the madman to be his guide. They reentered the city by way of the Huatanay ravine, spanned to this day by the Conquistadors’ bridges, and entered a maze of side-streets free from the crowd. Skirting the prodigious Hatun Rumioc, or wall-which-is-of-one-rock, they passed Calcaurpata, which tradition makes the palace of Manco Capac himself, first King of the Incas and founder of Cuzco; then they turned toward the Plaza Principale, called Huàcaypata by the Quichuas of to-day as by the Incas of yore. To reach it, Orellana took Dick through the ruined palace of the Virgins of the Sun, detailing, as he went, the uses and names of the various rooms. The young man’s impatient interruptions left him quite unmoved.

“We have plenty of time. You shall see my daughter from so near that you could speak to her. Stop a minute, and listen to the quenias. The head of the procession has no more than reached San Domingo. That church, curiously enough, was built on the very foundations of the Temple of the Sun.... I have never met a visitor less curious than you are.... This is the cloister of the Virgins of the Sun.... It has always been the home of virtue and piety, for the Christians turned it into a convent under the auspices of Santa Catarina.”

Dick, unable to stand the guide’s jargon any longer, began to run toward the noise of the advancing procession.

“You might pay me!” shouted Orellana in his wake. “Pay me what you owe me!” and stooped to pick up the centavos which the young engineer threw on the ground.

Nearing the plaza principale, Dick again found his way blocked by the crowd, and forgot his anger in the relief of finding a friend when Orellana tugged at his poncho again.

“You might as well stop with me,” urged the old man. “Hurrying won’t help you. I know a little tiny Corridor of Night that will lead us to the Sun, right to the top stone of one of those temples.... It’s a temple dedicated to Venus.... They call her Chasca, or the young man with the long and curly locks, and he’s supposed to be the page of the Sun. Come with me.” Orellana had taken Dick by the hand, and led him to a cellar, in which they found the foot of a narrow staircase. Once at the top of it, they were, as the old man had promised, on the summit of a ruined temple, dominating the crowded square below and the streets radiating to it like the spokes of a wheel to the huh. Around them were other ruins; temples sacred to the moon, to the “armies of the heavens,” which are the stars, to the rainbow, lightning and thunder... walls which still defied the elements, though the temples were now shops, work-rooms or stables.

The head of the procession had appeared, the hundred servitors of the god pressing back the crowd, and slowly wound its way round the square. Then the golden litter came into sight and Huayna Capac, for the first time in centuries, came to the center of the world, the Umbilicus of which he had been lord and master. All heads were bowed before this sovereign shadow and the memory of ancient glories once again brought to life. The crowd even forgot for the moment its hatred of the stranger woman, the motionless Coya with the stranger child in her arms.

The double throne was brought to the center of the square, and the crowd rose with clamoring voices. Around the litter, the caciques and the chiefs, the nobles and the amautas, who are the sages, joined hands and began to circle, dancing as they danced of yore, when each man held a link of the golden chain and danced the Dance of the Chain. Hands made the links to-day, for when the Strangers slew Atahualpa, the nobles of the Cuzco threw that chain, which otherwise would have gone to the King’s ransom, into the deepest water of Lake Titicaca.

“Recuerda!”

Suddenly, as if from the heavens, this cry checked the rhythm of the Dance of the Chain. Maria-Teresa started on her throne, remembering the signal in the House of the Serpent. The child in her arms also lifted its head, and their eyes questioned the blue vault above from which this word of hope had fallen.

“That was Dick’s voice, Maria-Teresa! I told you he would come to save us!”

The girl’s eyes explored the towering walls about her, black with Indians. How could she recognize him in that crowd? Where was he? Again the voice rang out over their heads, so loud that it could be heard by the most distant unit of the crowd.

“Recuerda!”

Every head was turned upwards, and a threatening murmur rose from that human mass, torn from its dream of renascence and liberty by a single Spanish word. Recuerda! What must they remember? That they were slaves? That these fêtes, striving to recall an abolished past, could only last the space of a day? That the sun of to-morrow, forgetting that of to-day, would only shine anew on their servitude?

Maria-Teresa started up from the golden throne with the child in her arms, brought to life and action again by the beloved voice.

Looking higher, they at last saw, on the highest stone in the azure, a pigmy figure holding out its arms to the Coya, and crying, “Maria-Teresa! Maria-Teresa!”

“Dick!”

Then all understood that on high there was a stranger, one of the hated race, come to rob them of the soul of their Coya.