ly should have
ventured to place Pablo in a position of such grave responsibility had
there been any likelihood of his being called upon to perform the duty
with which we charged him; but we were well satisfied that to the Priest
Captain alone had been known the secret of the sliding door, and that,
consequently, the need for closing the passage leading upward into the
treasure-chamber would not arise. Without any fear for Rayburn's safety;
therefore, we left him lying in the little room at the foot of the
stair-way, and thence went forth through a cleft in the rock--that
seemed to be a natural crevice, where the mountain was split apart--and
so came into a natural cave of such great size that the light of the
lantern was not sufficient to enable us to see its roof nor its farther
wall. Save that the well-defined path that we followed was continuously
steep, we did not find walking difficult, for the fragments of rock with
which the floor of the cave everywhere was strewn had been lifted aside
carefully, so as to make a smooth and easy way. And only in one
place--where for a short distance the path skirted the edge of a black
gulf, in the depths of which we could hear the rush of water--was any
part of it dangerous.

For near an hour we went onward, all the while steadily ascending; and
then, as we turned a corner, we saw a long way before us a faintly
luminous haze. It was so very faint that only by holding the lantern
behind us, and then closing our eyes for a moment, could we assure
ourselves that what we saw really was light at all; but when we turned
another corner, presently, the light, though still faint, was
unmistakable; whereat Young gave a whoop of joy, and we quickened our
steps in our eager longing to behold the sunshine that we knew could not
be far away. Suddenly the path dipped downward, and then another turn
brought us into light so strong that the lantern no longer was needed to
show us where to tread; and by a common impulse we gave a great glad
shout together and went onward at a run; and so, running and shouting
like the crazy creatures that truly for the time being we were, we made
one turn more, and then beheld before us, reaching away broadly and
openly in a fashion to give one a sense of most glorious freedom, a
vastly wide plain, over which everywhere the blessed sunshine blazed
full and strong. As we stood together in the mouth of the cave for a
moment in silence--for no words seemed strong en