Prisoners of Chance

It was a grewsome sight to approach in such a place, especially as the peculiar eyes appeared to follow my slightest movement. Yet only for a breathless moment did I experience doubt as to its nature, then laughed grimly at myself for a superstitious fool. The remaining portion of this dimly revealed underground apartment appeared bare, except for a gayly decorated skin or two, and the figure of a man, garbed in the gloomy attire of a priest, lying fast asleep at the very feet of the statue. Beyond showed a dark opening where the tunnel continued onward into the earth.

It required brief observation to note these outlines, nor did they greatly serve to delay my advance. I paused merely long enough to become thoroughly convinced of the reality of the priest's slumber, and then crept silently past, keeping close as possible within the shadow of the eastern wall, until once again safely swallowed within the blackness of the passage. Oddly enough the mere sight of that fellow lying there unconscious served to yield me new courage, robbing the cave of its loneliness, and I plunged directly ahead.

The passage I now followed rose with a sharp pitch, evidently inclining toward the surface, the opening not far distant. It was like mounting a hill, so marked was the incline, yet I covered a distance fully equalling that of my previous descent before becoming aware of a steadily increasing gray tingeing the side walls. Halting in this faint illumination I was suddenly startled by the sound of vigorous English speech. I advanced cautiously. The words were so confused by the echoes that little could be made of them until I reached a coarsely matted curtain, through which dimly sifted the welcome daylight. Here I paused, listening intently, striving to discover what mystery lay hidden beyond.

For some moments nothing reached me, excepting a low, dull murmur, as if voices chanted in muffled monotone, the sound commingling with a sharp crackling of flames, and an occasional doleful beating upon some surface resembling the taut parchment of a drum. Suddenly a deep voice close at hand roared out hoarsely, and my heart leaped in excitement, although I at once recognized it.

"You black-faced son of Belial," came a savage snort, "do you give all that food unto a dumb idol, when a Christian man, a ministering servant of the Most High, lies groaning with a stomach which has n't tasted food for four and twenty hours? Possess you no bowels of compassion for the long sufferings of a fellow-man? Come now, give me just a bite of the white meat, and yonder grinning wooden image will never miss it. You won't, you spawn of Baal, yet I marked plain enough how you filled your own lean belly with the best there was."