The bridge of light

THERE is little more to tell, for our adventures really ended when we crossed the Bridge of Light. I had come through the Cave of the Bats in the dark, blindly, wandering, lost. By merest luck I had found the exit where Itza and I now stood. But this time I had enough excellent torches to burn for hours, and lighting one of these, I held it up and peered about in its ruddy glare. I had no idea of the direction whence I had come, whether I had turned, doubled, run in circles or had followed a reasonably straight course on my former trip. I was not by any means sure how far I had come nor how much time I had spent in the cavern. Hence I had decided that the safest and surest—even if not the shortest—way of finding the entrance by which I had come would be to follow the wall of the cave. I felt confident there were no other exits, for had such existed the people would not have devoted so much care and labor to concealing the entrance by means of the great tilting idol. But we had not proceeded fifty feet—with Itza clinging to me and trembling with vague fears of the dismal place—when I found that my scheme was wholly impracticable.

There was no wall. Huge stalactites and stalagmites joined to form innumerable columns in the labyrinth of grottoes, narrow passages, galleries and corridors leading for unknown distances. The mountain was literally honeycombed with a maze of tunnels and caves. Any one of the countless openings might lead to the entrance, and to explore them all would take months—perhaps years. More than ever I realized how fortune or fate or Providence had guided my footsteps before. And more than ever I realized how difficult we would find it to cross the cave and reach the entrance we sought.

I halted, tried to collect my thoughts, to reason calmly, to concentrate upon the matter. The opening through which we had come was still visible, the morning sun streaming into it. As nearly as I could calculate, it faced southeast. I revisualized the surroundings of the tilting idol at the other entrance, and felt sure it faced the north. I have a rather remarkable sense of direction and I felt certain that I was not mistaken in this. In that case, one entrance would be almost directly opposite the other. Of course it might be far to one side or the other, far to the east or west, but if we followed a straight course towards the north, we must eventually reach the limits of the cavern, and even if we did not see the light that indicated the opening, we could move east or west until we located it. And it would not be difficult to follow a straight line. By noting some peculiarity of a stone column ahead of us, and sighting back to the still visible entrance, we could move forward. Then we could select another column ahead, smudge the one beside which we stood with smoke, and move to the next. There were so many columns that it would be easy to align our course even after we lost sight of the entrance behind us.

Chatting to Itza to encourage her, and explaining my scheme to her, we started on. It was slow work. We had to use care, but all seemed to be going well. We had proceeded for at least an hour. I felt that at any time we might catch a glimpse of the light in the entrance ahead, when Itza uttered a surprized exclamation: “The symbol!” she cried. “See, Itzimin, there on the stone!”

I peered at the spot she indicated. She was right. Clearly outlined on the surface of an upjutting mass of rock was the deeply-cut symbol of Kukulcan with the reed and foot. But it pointed at right angles to the course we were following!

I was puzzled. Had we lost our way, had we become confused and was the symbol right, or did the symbol point the way to another entrance? Should we follow it—perhaps to find that in the ages that had passed since it had been cut, the entrance it led to had been blocked by débris? Or should we ignore it and continue on our course? Then I remembered that, in the vision I had seen, the same symbol was cut there in the valley near the giant tilting idol. That then must be the only exit; the symbol must lead to it. But how, where could we find the next mark? If we left the spot, if we wandered about hunting here, there and everywhere for the next symbol and failed to locate it, could we ever find our way back to the place where we stood, and could we again proceed in the straight line we were following? My torch illuminated only a small area of the cavern, we would have to search very carefully, very slowly for the mark, and there was the chance—the certainty almost—that many, if not most of the symbols, had been covered with the stalactitic material during the countless centuries. Suddenly memory of Nohul Voh’s enigmatical words flashed across my mind, the words he had uttered when he had given me the bamboo tube that had served me so well and so mysteriously in the temple: “It may serve you well within that Cavern of the Bats.” Strange that I should have forgotten it. What had the old sorcerer meant? Had he merely uttered generalities, meaning it might answer as a torch to light our way, or was there a deeper, hidden meaning?

Personally I couldn’t see how the thing would help us any in our present quandary, but Itza—who was ever in awe of Nohul Voh and his strange knowledge and seemingly mystic powers—insisted that it would. Curious to see what the result would be, I dug it out of my pack, unstoppered the end, and flashed its rays upon the rock with the carved symbol. As the strange red glare suffused the stone, I jumped as if I had sat on a lively hornet, and stood gaping in amazement. The symbol stood out in brilliant green light, and leading from it down the side of the rock, across the cavern floor, and disappearing between the stone columns in the blackness, was a row of shining green arrows!

Itza cried out with delight and clapped her hands at my surprise and her own triumph. Hadn’t she said so? Hadn’t she known Nohul Voh had spoken the truth? We hurried on, following the arrows. Suddenly I burst into a peal of laughter. It all seemed so ridiculously familiar—“Follow the green arrows”—I could almost imagine myself in the subway at Times Square, in New York, glancing at the green line as I hurried towards the Lexington Avenue trains! But of course I couldn’t explain this to Itza, and she glanced apprehensively at me wondering if I had suddenly lost my senses.

AS we followed the arrows and the symbols that appeared from time to time, I realized how little chance we would have had, had we tried to find the entrance by moving in a direct line across the cavern. The marks turned, twisted, zig-zagged; swung to left, to right; doubled. I lost all sense of direction, but at last, far ahead, a patch of light showed in the blackness, and a moment later we stood at the entrance. Nothing had changed. The stones and the log I had placed there months before were still in position, and, passing through the opening beneath the idol, we stood once more in the blessed sunshine in the fair, green valley.

I looked up at the great image leaning far forward as if about to fall upon its knees. A question was in my mind. Should I leave the entrance open, so that any man who passed that way might enter and find Mictolan, so those within the valley might have free egress in case they ever deserted Mictolan? Or should I remove the props, swing the idol back in place and close the entrance?

Visions of Mictolan, of the peaceful happy life of its people rose before me. I saw Azcopil ruling the people wisely and well, I saw the lofty temples, heard the pealing of the great bell. Then I visualized the valley overrun with strangers, exploited by rough, unprincipled miners, the Mayas degraded, oppressed, debauched with the rum and vices of the white man. Better by far that they should always remain in their hidden valley, that Mictolan should remain forever unknown, inaccessible to the rest of the world.

Cautiously I removed the wedges and the logs. Carefully I clamored up the mighty image, studying it, examining it, testing it, until at last I found the secret of its mechanism and slowly, smoothly, with a slight jar it swung into place, sealing the entrance to the Cavern of the Bats.

There was little difficulty in finding the symbol on the rock beside the stream. My memory of that mysterious vision in the house of Nohul Voh was very vivid. I recognized every landmark I had seen in that mystic smoke. The rushing brook was exactly as I had seen it. There was the placid shaded pool, and even before we saw the sculptured symbol, I felt sure it would be there, cut deeply into the water-worn surface of the ledge. Beside the pool we decided to rest for the afternoon and night. My nerves were still a bit shaky, and I knew that Itza, unaccustomed to long walks with a pack upon her shoulders, was tired, although she would not admit it. She was so delighted with everything, that I doubt if she knew whether she was tired or not.

Even this first glimpse of the outside world was fascinatingly strange to her. The verdure, the rolling green hills, the distant hazy-blue mountains, the dense jungle, all were different from anything in her native valley. She insisted on bathing in the clear calm pool. It was an inviting-looking spot with its crystal water, its bottom of white and red pebbles, its little crescent of sandy beach. I longed for a swim myself and, having assured myself that there were no alligators or other dangerous inhabitants in the pool, we plunged in, and for an hour or more dove, swam, frolicked, splashed and had a glorious time. Refreshed, and with keen appetites, we emerged at last. I was anxious to conserve our slender stock of food for emergencies that might arise, and I felt certain that there were fish in the stream. So, while Itza dried herself—like the golden statue of a Dryad—in the sunshine, I tried my luck with my hand-made hooks and line. No skill was needed to capture the denizens of that brook, they seemed anxious to be caught, and in almost as many minutes I had half a dozen beauties flapping on the grass. We dined royally and, having rested and smoked, I busied myself rigging up a palm-leaf shelter for the night.

As we were doing this—for Itza was more expert at such matters than I was—she touched my arm and pointed silently to where an unsuspicious deer had stepped from the jungle and stood looking at us curiously. That night we dined on broiled venison, and spent the evening “haricotting” the rest of the meat over a smoky fire. We now had plenty of food to last us for several days, even if no other game was obtainable and I had no further fear of going hungry for some time to come. The sun was just topping the mountains when we set off the next morning, following the course of the stream, happy and light-hearted. By noonday, when we stopped again to rest and eat, the brook had widened to a fair-sized river and, remembering the vision or whatever it was, that I had seen in the sorcerer’s smoke, I looked about for material with which to construct a raft or boat of some sort.

Then for the first time, I realized that I was unconsciously assuming that I actually had looked into the future, or at least had, by some mysterious means, been enabled to view the route we were following. Nonsense! I said to myself. How could I have seen a place I had never visited? By some form of hypnosis or auto-suggestion Nohul Voh might have caused me to think I saw the valley near the cliff with the great idol. I had seen that before. But I had surely never been here by this broad stream. Yet there was the symbol on the rock by the pool. There was the stream. Try as I might to argue against it, I felt in my heart and innermost mind that everything would eventuate precisely as I had seemed to see it back in Mictolan. And at any rate, it would be far easier and quicker to travel down river by boat or raft than to follow the winding course of the stream afoot.

In the tropics, it is usually a simple matter to make some sort of a craft that is buoyant, easily handled and capable of supporting considerable weight in fairly calm water. There are always bamboos or the cork-like Balsa trees within easy reach when in jungle country, and where there are lakes or back-waters, there are the hollow reeds that, tied into bundles and lashed together, may be used to construct those light, seaworthy but strange crafts known as “balsas” by the Indians, who use them exclusively to navigate the waters of Lake Titicaca. And here, close to the stream, were bamboos, cork-like balsa[4] trees and plenty of reeds. Itza fell to with a will and worked like a beaver. Her endurance and strength always surprised me. She did not give the impression of being a particularly strong woman, but the soft curves and contours of her body and limbs covered muscles that were almost equal to my own, and she possessed the remarkable endurance of her race. And when it came to performing any task that called for primitive methods or native skill, she was immeasurably superior to me, despite the fact that I always prided myself upon my knowledge and experience of woodcraft.

[4] A tropical wood of extreme lightness.

With her help we soon had several good-sized balsa logs ready, and by sundown we had practically finished a sort of combination raft and catamaran that would, I felt sure, serve us on the stream as long as we did not meet rapids or falls. The next morning we embarked, and thereafter, for days, we drifted swiftly, easily, down river without adventure, without effort.

TWICE, as we swept past cliffs, we saw the symbols pointing ever onward, and despite myself I, was forced to admit that, regardless of how it had been done, old Nohul Voh had revealed the truth to me when he had showed me the “Way of the Symbols.” So, being now convinced that it was so, I kept a sharp lookout for the precipice in whose base was the black tunnel through which the river flowed in the vision. Each day, as we drifted on, the mountains receded and became lower. Each day the river broadened, and I was constantly expecting to see Indian huts or villages and was as constantly surprised to find the country apparently uninhabited. Game was abundant, the stream was filled with fish, and though Itza missed the vegetable food to which she had always been accustomed, still she made no complaint and remained well and strong.

Often she laughingly twitted me on having pictured such bugbears of dangers and hardships. Since leaving the Cave of the Bats it had all been easy, safe, glorious fun to her. But we were not at the end of our journey yet, I told her.

Then, at last, one day we saw the expected mountain side stretching across the valley ahead, and presently, as we drew near, the black archway at its base was visible, exactly as I had seen it in my vision. By now I had become so thoroughly convinced of the accuracy of that glimpse into the unknown, that I felt perfectly sure that we would pass through the tunnel and emerge on the farther side in safety. But unfortunately the smoke-screen had not shown me the craft in which I was voyaging. Still, our balsa wood raft had proved most efficient, there was no sign of rapids or falls ahead—although the current increased and ran swiftly into the tunnel. But I was not taking any unnecessary chances. Running the raft ashore, I made it fast, and, with no little difficulty, made my way down stream until within a few feet of the opening in the cliff. But though we both listened intently, we could hear nothing that sounded like rapids or a fall—just a low, rushing, steady roar. Only one peril, I felt, remained. Could I feel sure that there was space enough between the surface of the stream and the roof of the tunnel for our craft and ourselves to pass? Fully ten feet of space showed at the entrance, but could I be certain it did not decrease within?

Then I noticed that the high water-mark—the highest point reached by the river in the rainy season—was not within four feet of the top of the opening. That settled it. The tunnel must be large enough to permit the whole volume of the river in the wet season to pass without backing up, and it was now the height of the dry season. Moreover, hadn’t I seen myself floating safely on the lake at the farther end of the tunnel? I cast all doubts and fears aside, overhauled the raft, added lashings, strengthened it, and having lit two torches, we embarked, cast the raft free and were swept into the black hole. It was a strange weird scene with our torches casting a ruddy glare upon the swirling waters and the damp rocky walls. But within five minutes the walls vanished. No sign of rock could be seen to right, left or overhead, and I laughed aloud at my misgivings. Instead of becoming lower, the tunnel had opened into a vast cavern—vast indeed as I knew from the echo of my laughter. And it was not long. We seemed hardly to have entered the place—the arch was still outlined against the sunshine behind—when ahead we saw the glimmer of light. It increased rapidly in size, and more quickly than it takes to tell it, we swept out from the cavern and rocked gently upon the surface of a good-sized lake. As if I had known the place all my life, I turned instinctively and peered at a rocky islet a few hundred feet distant. Though I had expected it, yet, when I saw the familiar symbol cut into the rock, I uttered a surprised ejaculation, and a peculiar sensation—as I imagine one might feel who sees or thinks he see a ghost—caused a tingling of my spine. But Itza’s eyes were sharper, quicker than mine.

“Look, look, Itzimin mine!” she cried excitedly. “Houses! People!”

I shaded my eyes and stared incredulously. But there was no doubt of it. Less than half a mile distant a village stood at the edge of the lake, and people were moving back and forth upon the beach.

That they would be Indians was certain. But would they prove hostile or friendly? However, there was nothing we could do. The natives had already seen us and several canoes were coming swiftly towards us. As they drew near, I was relieved to see that they wore hats, that they were dressed in coarse native cotton shirts and—yes, there was no doubt about it—one fellow had on a pair of pants!

That settled it. I had no further fears. In fact, as the Indians drew near they were far more afraid of us than we had been of them. I shouted to them in Zutugil, but that appeared only to scare them the more. Then I tried Spanish, and with shouts of delight they replied in the same tongue. They were friendly, half-civilized, simple, harmless people, and ten minutes later we were in the village, objects of the most intense curiosity on the part of the villagers. But when, by chance, they caught a glimpse of the tattooed symbol on my chest, their curiosity changed instantly to wonder and adoration. They might be Spanish-speaking, degenerate, semi-Christianized, half-civilized members of their race, but they still recognized the mark of the ancient Mayan priest-kings and revered those who bore it. At this juncture, Itza bent towards me and whispered a question that brought roars of laughter from my lips.

“Are these people of your race, Itzimin?” she asked.

To me there was something extremely ludicrous in her query, in her mistaking members of her own race for Anglo Saxons. But after all, why not? They were no more like the people of Mictolan than—well, I was about to say than like me, but honestly, of the two, I verily believe that, being a civilized man “gone native” as one might say, I looked far more like their kinsman than any man in Mictolan.

For a moment Itza looked hurt at my merriment over her quite natural and innocent question, but when I had explained, she regarded it as a good joke and laughed gaily herself. And as the Indians felt that there must be something funny, and that it would be discourtesy to their distinguished guest not to show appreciation of it, they, too, burst into peals and roars of laughter.

THEY were good-natured, simple folk, and in reply to my questions, informed me there was a white man in a village three days’ walk to the south. He was, they added, a Padre, though why I, a member of the exalted, almost sacred Titul Zius clan, should want to find a white man or civilization was quite incomprehensible to them. That I was within three days of a village where there was a priest was not so surprising to me as it might seem. It is a remote Indian village indeed that is too far away to have its Padre, and that we had come far and deviously from the valley of Mictolan I knew. The hidden city might be two hundred, three hundred miles distant, and in that wilderness of unexplored mountain ranges such a place as Mictolan might well remain hidden forever, even though within one hundred miles of settlements and even of railways.

“And how is this village called, wherein dwells the Padre?” I asked my informant, who appeared to be the Cacique of the village by the lake.

“It is called the village of Xibaltango, my lord,” he replied.

I gasped, speechless with surprise. Xibaltango within three days’ march of where I sat! Jolly, good-hearted, roly-poly old Padre José barely sixty miles distant! I could scarcely believe my ears. But very possibly there was more than one Xibaltango.

“And know you not how he calls himself, the Padre?” I queried.

“Of a truth, most certainly, my lord,” declared the Indian. “All the world knows that; all know him as the Padre José.”

There was no doubt about it. By some whim of fate, of chance or of Providence the ‘Way of the Symbol’ had led us to—well, relatively speaking, to the front door of Padre José.

Three days later we stood before him, and the amazed, incredulous, utterly flabbergasted expression that came over his ruddy jovial face when he recognized me, is beyond words to describe.

“Santisima Madre!” he cried, devoutly crossing himself at his involuntary exclamation. “It is the Señor Americano! It is the Señor who had the codex and who went to Katchilcan! But, Señor, it is impossible, it is a miracle, it is an apparition! He—the Señor—you, were killed, destroyed, murdered by the Indios Bravos! I had word from Katchilcan—your—his—the Señor’s bearers returned with the tale. I have said masses, prayers; have burned candles for the repose of your—the Señor Americano’s soul. I have done penance for having sent you—him—into the wilderness.

“Dios mio, it cannot be so, Señor, it is not—tell me it is true!”

I assured him that it was true, that I was very much alive, that I had never been killed.

He heaved an immense sigh of vast relief. Then, with a twinkle in his eye. “And the Señorita, Señor? Is she—the pretty one—also real or is she perhaps an apparition?”

“She, also, is most real mi Padre,” I assured him. “It is a long, long story and greatly, I know, it will interest and amaze you. But first of all, would I ask that you convince yourself that we are both of flesh and blood by making us man and wife.”

He pursed his lips and whistled. Placing the tips of his pudgy fingers together, cocking his head first on one side and then the other, he surveyed us critically. Then he burst out laughing.

“Señor Americano!” he exclaimed. “Many, very many and very strange things have I heard of you Norte-Americanos. Much that I could not believe; but the very strangest, the most incredible of all is what I hear from your own lips. You come to me with a so-strange codex. I send you to learn the Zutugil. From there you journey to see Katchilcan. He tells you some story, you vanish in the wilderness. You are killed, destroyed. I pray for the repose of your soul—though for all I know you are heretic—the months pass. Suddenly, from nowhere, a spirit, a ghost, an apparition, you appear. You have been transformed; no longer are you the Señor Americano. You are, you have become a savage, an Indio, and—Madre de Dios, yes, si, an ancient Maya—a figure from that so-strange codex. By your hand you lead a girl, an India, a most beautiful muchacha. An India such as I, who thought I knew all the tribes, have never seen. Do you tell me where you have been, Señor? Do you relate your tale? Do you explain why you still live? Do you speak of your codex? No, no indeed! Your first words are—‘Marry me to this maiden!’ It is sublime, marvelous! If I had doubts before, I could have none now. Never—not for one moment! No one but an Americano, a Yanqui could be so mad! But I am impatient to hear your story. I am aflame with curiosity. So I will marry you, will baptize you, will make you both Catolicos so I may do so. Only in that way can I get the story, Señor. That I can see. But,” he added as if to himself, “very much do I doubt if in the eyes of God you will be any more man and wife than you are now.”

To Itza that extemporaneous baptism, the short ceremony that made us legally man and wife, was all a most impressive, mysterious and wonderful affair.

Aside from myself, Padre José was the only white man she had ever seen, and having never seen me save bearded, unkempt, tanned, the fat, jolly, smooth-faced priest appeared like a being of a totally different race. To her, too, the little adobe church must have appeared a most poor and tawdry “temple.” And though, for her benefit, Padre José used the Zutugil dialect in the ceremony, she went through it as though in a daze or a dream, and I doubt if she really understood what it all meant or what it was about. In fact, much later, she confided to me that at the time she thought it some mystic rite that all my race went through when they returned from distant places, and that the ring—that the priest produced from the Lord only knows where—was placed upon her finger as a mark to show she was my property. But there was one thing she did understand. She recognized the cross above the little altar, she realized that the figure of the Saviour was an image of my people’s God. Falling upon her knees before it, she murmured the Lord’s prayer I had taught her, and then, switching to her own tongue, gave thanks to Kukulcan.

Greatly touched was the jolly Padre at this, though he placed his hand over his mouth and his merry eyes crinkled at the corners when—like the little heathen she was—she addressed herself to Kukulcan.

SO we came to the end of our wanderings. Pages I might write describing Itza’s wonder at all she saw, at the people, the cities, the railways, the steamships, the motor cars—at everything. But all that is apart from the story.

By the time we were back in New York Itza, ever adaptable and quick to learn—was, outwardly, as much the product of twentieth century civilization and fashions as any of the thousands of women upon the streets and avenues of the metropolis. In a city where all the races of the world mingle, her glowing golden skin and lustrous hair attracted no attention, but many an admiring and envious glance was cast at her unusual features, her wonderful eyes and her superb figure. But the great cities had no more charms for her than for myself. They amazed, astounded and terrified her. She longed for sunshine, verdure, mountains and quiet; the surroundings, the home, I had so often dreamed of. And at last, thanks to the codex that had by merest accident come into my hands in far off Vigo, and that had led me through such strange adventures, I found myself in a position to make those dreams come true. No wonder old Katchilcan had said he would give the half of his life to possess the Book of Kukulcan. How true had proved his words as I recalled them: ‘To him who has the Book, and comes by it by honest means, his way shall be made easy and he shall gain great peace and happiness, and he shall abide forevermore with the gods.’

And as I prepare to lay aside my pen, and Itza rises and with smiling lips and eyes comes towards me, I know that, for me, at least, the promise of the ancient prophecy has been borne out in full—beyond even my wildest expectations.