by Lew Wallace
CHAPTER III
THE HIDDEN TREASURE
The slaves looked dubiously at the dusty aperture, which held out noinvitation to them; the master, however, drew his robe closer abouthim, and stooping went in, lamp in hand. They then followed.
An ascending passage, low but of ample width, received them. It too hadbeen chiselled from the solid rock. The wheel marks of the cars used inthe work were still on the floor. The walls were bare but smoothlydressed. Altogether the interest here lay in expectation of what was tocome; and possibly it was that which made the countenance of the masterlook so grave and absorbed. He certainly was not listening to thediscordant echoes roused as he advanced.
The ascent was easy. Twenty-five or thirty steps brought them to theend of the passage.
They then entered a spacious chamber circular and domed. The light ofthe lamps was not enough to redeem the ceiling from obscurity; yet themaster led without pause to a sarcophagus standing under the centre ofthe dome, and when he was come there everything else was forgotten byhim.
The receptacle of the dead thus discovered had been hewn from the rock,and was of unusual proportions. Standing broadside to the entrance, itwas the height of an ordinary man, and twice as long as high. Theexterior had been polished smoothly as the material would allow;otherwise it was of absolute plainness, looking not unlike a dark brownbox. The lid was a slab of the finest white marble carven into aperfect model of Solomon's Temple. While the master surveyed the lid hewas visibly affected. He passed the lamp over it slowly, letting thelight fall into the courts of the famous building; in like manner heilluminated the corridors, and the tabernacle; and, as he did so, hisfeatures trembled and his eyes were suffused. He walked around theexquisite representation several times, pausing now and then to blowaway the dust that had in places accumulated upon it. He noticed theeffect of the transparent whiteness in the chamber; so in its day theoriginal had lit up the surrounding world. Undoubtedly the model hadpeculiar hold upon his feelings.
But shaking the weakness off he after a while addressed himself towork. He had the negro thrust the edge of the bar under the lid, andraise it gently. Having thoughtfully provided himself in theantechamber with pieces of stone for the purpose, he placed one of themso as to hold the vantage gained. Slowly, then, by working at the endsalternately, the immense slab was turned upon its centre; slowly thehollow of the coffin was flooded with light; slowly, and with seemingreluctance, it gave up its secrets.
In strong contrast to the plainness of the exterior, the interior ofthe sarcophagus was lined with plates and panels of gold, on whichthere were cartoons chased and beaten in, representing ships, and talltrees, doubtless cedars of Lebanon, and masons at work, and two menarmed and in royal robes greeting each other with clasped hands; and sobeautiful were the cartoons that the eccentric medalleur, Cellini,would have studied them long, if not enviously. Yet he who now peeredinto the receptacle scarcely glanced at them.
On a stone chair seated was the mummy of a man with a crown upon itshead, and over its body, for the most part covering--the linenwrappings, was a robe of threads of gold in ample arrangement. Thehands rested on the lap; in one was a sceptre; the other held aninscribed silver tablet. There were rings plain, and rings with jewelsin setting, circling the fingers and thumbs; the ears, ankles, even thegreat toes, were ornamented in like manner. At the feet a sword of thefashion of a cimeter had been laid. The blade was in its scabbard, butthe scabbard was a mass of jewels, and the handle a flaming ruby. Thebelt was webbed with pearls and glistening brilliants. Under the swordwere the instruments sacred then and ever since to Master Masons--asquare, a gavel, a plummet, and an inscribing compass.
The man had been a king--so much the first glance proclaimed. With him,as with his royal brethren from the tombs along the Nile, death hadasserted itself triumphantly over the embalmer. The cheeks wereshrivelled and mouldy; across the forehead the skin was drawn tight;the temples were hollows rimmed abruptly with the frontal bones; theeyes, pits partially filled with dried ointments of a bituminous color.The monarch had yielded his life in its full ripeness, for the whitehair and beard still adhered in stiffened plaits to the skull, cheeks,and chin. The nose alone was natural; it stood up thin and hooked, likethe beak of an eagle.
At sight of the figure thus caparisoned and maintaining its seat in anattitude of calm composure the slaves drew back startled. The negrodropped his iron bar, making the chamber ring with a dissonant clangor.
Around the mummy in careful arrangement were vessels heaped with coinsand pearls and precious stones, cut and ready for the goldsmith.Indeed, the whole inner space of the sarcophagus was set with basinsand urns, each in itself a work of high art; and if their contents wereto be judged by what appeared overflowing them, they all held preciousstones of every variety. The corners had been draped with cloths ofgold and cloths embroidered with pearls, some of which were now fallingto pieces of their own weight.
We know that kings and queens are but men and women subject to the samepassions of common people; that they are generous or sordid accordingto their natures; that there have been misers amongst them; but thisone--did he imagine he could carry his amassments with him out of theworld? Had he so loved the gems in his life as to dream he couldillumine his tomb with them? If so, O royal idiot!
The master, when an opening had been made sufficiently wide by turningthe lid upon the edge of the sarcophagus, took off his sandals, gave afoot to one of his slaves, and swung himself into the interior. Thelamp was then given him, and he surveyed the wealth and splendor as theking might never again. And as the king in his day had said withexultation, Lo! it is all mine, the intruder now asserted title.
Unable, had he so wished, to carry the whole collection off, he lookedaround upon this and upon that, determining where to begin. Conscioushe had nothing to fear, and least of all from the owner in the chair,he was slow and deliberate. From his robe he drew a number of bags ofcoarse hempen cloth, and a broad white napkin. The latter he spreadupon the floor, first removing several of the urns to obtain space;then he emptied one of the vessels upon it, and from the sparkling andvaricolored heap before him proceeded to make selection.
His judgment was excellent, sure and swift. Not seldom he put the largestones aside, giving preference to color and lustre. Those chosen hedropped into a bag. When the lot was gone through, he returned therejected to the vessel, placing it back exactly in its place. Then hebetook himself to another of the vessels, and then another, until, incourse of a couple of hours, he had made choice from the collection,and filled nine bags, and tied them securely.
Greatly relieved, he arose, rubbed the benumbed joints of his limbsawhile, then passed the packages out to the slaves. The occupation hadbeen wearisome and tensive; but it was finished, and he would nowretire. He lingered to give a last look at the interior, muttering thesentence again, and leaving it unfinished as before:
"No one has been here since"--
From the face of the king, his eyes fell to the silver tablet in thenerveless hand. Moving close, and holding the lamp in convenientposition, he knelt and read the inscription.
I.
"There is but one God, and He was from the beginning, and will bewithout end.
II.
"In my lifetime, I prepared this vault and tomb to receive my body, andkeep it safely; yet it may be visited, for the earth and sea are alwaysgiving up their secrets.
III.
"Therefore, O Stranger, first to find me, know thou!
"That in all my days I kept intercourse with Solomon, King of the Jews,wisest of men, and the richest and greatest. As is known, he set aboutbuilding a house to his Lord God, resolved that there should be nothinglike it in the world, nothing so spacious, so enriched, so perfect inproportions, so in all things becoming the glory of his God. Insympathy with him I gave him of the skill of my people, workers inbrass, and silver, and gold, and products of the quarries: and in theirships my sailors brought him the yield of mines from the ends of th
eearth. At last the house was finished; then he sent me the model of thehouse, and the coins, and cloths of gold and pearl, and the preciousstones, and the vessels holding them, and the other things of valuehere. Ad if, O Stranger, thou dost wonder at the greatness of the gift,know thou that it was but a small part of what remained unto him oflike kind, for he was master of the earth, and of everything belongingto it which might be of service to him, even the elements and theirsubtleties.
IV.
"Nor think, O Stranger, that I have taken the wealth into the tomb withme, imagining it can serve me in the next life. I store it here becauseI love him who gave it to me, and am jealous of his love; and that isall.
V.
"So thou wilt use the wealth in ways pleasing in the sight of the LordGod of Solomon, my royal friend, take thou of it in welcome. There isno God but his God!
"Thus say I--HIRAM, KING OF TYRE."
"Rest thou thy soul, O wisest of pagan kings," said the master, rising."Being the first to find thee here, and basing my title to thy wealthon that circumstance, I will use it in a way pleasing in the sight ofthe Lord God of Solomon. Verily, verily, there is no God but his God!"
This, then, was the business that brought the man to the tomb of theking whose glory was to have been the friend of Solomon. Pondering theidea, we begin to realize how vast the latter's fame was; and it ceasesto be matter of wonder that his contemporaries, even the most royal,could have been jealous of his love.
Not only have we the man's business, but it is finished; and judgingfrom the satisfaction discernible on his face as he raised the lamp andturned to depart, the result must have been according to his best hope.He took off his robe, and tossed it to his slaves; then he laid a handupon the edge of the sarcophagus preparatory to climbing out. At themoment, while giving a last look about him, an emerald, smoothly cut,and of great size, larger indeed than a full-grown pomegranate, caughthis eyes in its place loose upon the floor. He turned back, and takingit up, examined it carefully; while thus engaged his glance dropped tothe sword almost at his feet. The sparkle of the brilliants, and thefire-flame of the great ruby in the grip, drew him irresistibly, and hestood considering.
Directly he spoke in a low voice:
"No one has been here since"--
He hesitated--glanced hurriedly around to again assure himself it wasnot possible to be overheard--then finished the sentence:
"No one has been here _since I came a thousand years ago_."
At the words so strange, so inexplicable upon any theory of nature andcommon experience, the lamp shook in his hand. Involuntarily he shrankfrom the admission, though to himself. But recovering, he repeated:
"Since I came a thousand years ago."
Then he added more firmly:
"But the earth and the sea are always giving up their secrets. So saiththe good King Hiram; and since I am a witness proving the wisdom of thespeech, I at least must believe him. Wherefore it is for me to governmyself as if another will shortly follow me. The saying of the king isan injunction."
With that, he turned the glittering sword over and over admiringly.Loath to let it go, he drew the blade partly from the scabbard, and itsclearness had the depth peculiar to the sky between stars at night.
"Is there anything it will not buy," he continued, reflectively. "Whatking could refuse a sword once Solomon's? I will take it."
Thereupon he passed both the emerald and the sword out to the slaves,whom he presently joined.
The conviction, but a moment before expressed, that another wouldfollow him to the tomb of the venerated Tyrian, was not strong enoughto hinder the master from attempting to hide every sign which might aidin the discovery. The negro, under his direction, returned the lidexactly to its former fitting place on the sarcophagus; the emerald andthe sword he wrapped in his gown; the bags and the tools were countedand distributed among the slaves for easy carriage. Lamp in hand, hethen walked around to see that nothing was left behind. Incidentally heeven surveyed the brown walls and the dim dome overhead. Having reachedthe certainty that everything was in its former state, he waved hishand, and with one long look backward at the model, ghostly beautifulin its shining white transparency, he led the way to the passage ofentrance, leaving the king to his solitude and stately sleep, unmindfulof the visitation and the despoilment.
Out in the large reception room, he paused again to restore the wall.Beginning with the insignificant key, one by one the stones, each ofwhich, as we have seen, had been numbered by him, were raised andreset. Then handfuls of dust were collected and blown into the slightcrevices till they were invisible. The final step was the restorationof the sarcophagus; this done, the gallery leading to the real vault ofthe king was once more effectually concealed.
"He who follows, come he soon or late, must have more than sharp eyesif he would have audience with Hiram, my royal friend of Tyre," theadventurer said, in his meditative way, feeling at the same time in thefolds of his gown for the chart so the object of solicitude on theship. The roll, the emerald, and the sword were also safe. Signing theslaves to remain where they were, he moved slowly across the chamber,and by aid of his lamp surveyed an aperture there so broad and lofty itwas suggestive of a gate rather than a door.
"It is well," he said, smiling. "The hunter of spoils, hereafter asheretofore, will pass this way instead of the other."
The remark was shrewd. Probably nothing had so contributed to the longconcealment of the gallery just reclosed the second time in a thousandyears as the high doorway, with its invitation to rooms beyond it, allnow in iconoclastic confusion.
Rejoining his workmen, he took a knife from the girdle of one of them,and cut a slit in the gurglet large enough to admit the bags ofprecious stones. The skin was roomy, and received them, though with theloss of much of the water. Having thus disposed of that portion of theplunder to the best advantage both for portage and concealment, hehelped swing it securely upon the negro's shoulder, and without otherdelay led from the chamber to the great outdoors, where the lamps wereextinguished.
The pure sweet air, as may be imagined, was welcome to every one. Whilethe slaves stood breathing it in wholesome volumes, the master studiedthe stars, and saw the night was not so far gone but that, withindustry, the sea-shore could be made in time for the ship.
Still pursuing the policy of hiding the road to the tomb much aspossible, he waited while the men covered the entrance as before withstones brought up from the bank. A last survey of the face of the rock,minute as the starlight allowed, reassured him that, as to the rest ofthe world, the treasure might remain with its ancient owner undisturbedfor yet another thousand years, if not forever; after which, in acongratulatory mood, he descended the mountain side to the place ofbivouac, and thence in good time, and without adventure, arrived at thelanding by the sea. There the negro, wading far out, flung the toolsinto the water.
In the appointed time the galley came down from the city, and, underimpulsion of the oars, disappeared with the party up the coastnorthward.
The negro unrolled the pallet upon the deck, and brought some bread,Smyrna figs, and wine of Prinkipo, and the four ate and drank heartily.
The skipper was then summoned.
"You have done well, my friend," said the master. "Spare not sail oroar now, but make Byzantium without looking into any wayside port. Iwill increase your pay in proportion as you shorten the time we areout. Look to it--go--and speed you."
Afterward the slaves in turn kept watch while he slept. And though thecoming and going of sailors was frequent, not one of them noticed theoil-stained water-skin cast carelessly near the master's pillow, or thenegro's shaggy half-cloak, serving as a wrap for the roll, the emerald,and the sword once Solomon's.
The run of the galley from the nameless bay near Sidon was without stopor so much as a headwind. Always the blue sky above the deck, and theblue sea below. In daytime the master passenger would occasionallypause in his walk along the white planks, and, his hand on the gunwale,give a look at some of
the landmarks studding the ancient CycladeanSea, an island here, or a tall promontory of the continent yonder,possibly an Olympian height faintly gray in the vaster distance. Hismanner at such moments did not indicate a traveller new to the highway.A glance at the points such as business men closely pressed give thehands on the face of a clock to determine the minute of the hour, andhe would resume walking. At night he slept right soundly.
From the Dardanelles into the Hellespont; then the Marmora. The captainwould have coasted, but the passenger bade him keep in the open. "Thereis nothing to fear from the weather," he said, "but there is time to besaved."
In an afternoon they sighted the great stones Oxia and Plati; thefirst, arid and bare as a gray egg, and conical like an irregularpyramid; the other, a plane on top, with verdure and scattering trees.A glance at the map shows them the most westerly group of the Isles ofthe Princes.
Now Nature is sometimes stupid, sometimes whimsical, doingunaccountable things. One gazing at the other isles of the group from asoftly rocking caique out a little way on the sea divines instantlythat she meant them for summer retreats, but these two, Oxia and Plati,off by themselves, bleak in winter, apparently always ready forspontaneous combustion in the heated months, for what were theydesigned? No matter--uses were found for them--fitting uses. Eremitesin search of the hardest, grimmest places, selected Oxia, and peckingholes and caves in its sides, shared the abodes thus laboriously wonwith cormorants, the most gluttonous of birds. In time a rude conventwas built near the summit. On the other hand, Plati was converted intoa Gehenna for criminals, and in the vats and dungeons with which it wasprovided, lives were spent weeping for liberty. On this isle, tears andcurses; on that, tears and prayers.
At sundown the galley was plying its oars between Oxia and the Europeanshore about where St. Stephano is now situated. The dome of Sta. Sophiawas in sight; behind it, in a line to the northwest, arose the tower ofGalata. "Home by lamplighting--Blessed be the Virgin!" the marinerssaid to each other piously. But no! The master passenger sent for thecaptain.
"I do not care to get into harbor before morning. The night isdelicious, and I will try it in the small boat. I was once a rower, andyet have a fancy for the oars. Do thou lay off and on hereabouts. Puttwo lamps at the masthead that I may know thy vessel when I desire toreturn. Now get out the boat."
The captain thought his voyager queer of taste; nevertheless he did astold. In a short time the skiff--if the familiar word can bepardoned--put off with the negro and his master, the latter at the oars.
In preparation for the excursion the gurglet half full of water and thesheepskin mantle of the black man were lowered into the little vessel.The boat moved away in the direction of Prinkipo, the mother isle ofthe group; and as the night deepened, it passed from view.
When out of sight from the galley's deck, the master gave the rowing tothe negro, and taking seat by the rudder, changed direction to thesoutheast; after which he kept on and on, until Plati lay directly inhis course.
The southern extremity of Plati makes quite a bold bluff. In a periodlong gone a stone tower had been constructed there, a lookout andshelter for guardsmen on duty; and there being no earthly chance ofescape for prisoners, so securely were they immured, the duty must havebeen against robbers from the mainland on the east, and from piratesgenerally. Under the tower there was a climb difficult for most personsin daylight, and from the manoeuvring of the boat, the climb wasobviously the object drawing the master. He at length found it, andstepped out on a shelving stone. The gurglet and mantle were passed tohim, and soon he and his follower were feeling their way upward.
On the summit, the chief walked once around the tower, now the merestruin, a tumbledown without form, in places overgrown with sickly vines.Rejoining his attendant, and staying a moment to thoroughly empty thegurglet of water, on his hands and knees he crawled into a passage muchobstructed by debris. The negro waited outside.
The master made two trips; the first one, he took the gurglet in; thesecond, he took the mantle wrapping the sword. At the end, he rubbedhis hands in self-congratulation.
"They are safe--the precious stones of Hiram, and the sword of Solomon!Three other stores have I like this one--in India, in Egypt, inJerusalem--and there is the tomb by Sidon. Oh, I shall not come towant!" and he laughed well pleased.
The descent to the small boat was effected without accident.
Next morning toward sunrise the passengers disembarked at Port St.Peter on the south side of the Golden Horn. A little later the masterwas resting at home in Byzantium.
Within three days the mysterious person whom we, wanting his propername and title, have termed the master, had sold his house andhousehold effects. In the night of the seventh day, with his servants,singular in that all of them were deaf and dumb, he went aboard ship,and vanished down the Marmora, going no one but himself knew whither.
The visit to the tomb of the royal friend of Solomon had evidently beento provide for the journey; and that he took precious stones inpreference to gold and silver signified a journey indefinite as to timeand place.
