Page:Weird Tales Volume 6 Number 4 (1925-10).djvu/47

Dan and I looked at each other. The bands of suspense grew tighter. I could almost sense that Thing in the pyramid; and if I could do so, how much more could Dan who had not the bulwark of a strong will? It was late afternoon, almost dusk, or I think I might have left the city then. But I didn't; and I liked Dan as much as I have liked any man in the past ten years.

We talked quite a bit at supper, about other things. Very early Dan said he was sleepy and lay down. I was determined to sit up all night. I turned on our last electric battery. It showed Monty's present to me, a brass cylinder full of papers. I settled myself on one side of the entrance and began to read.

The papers were written by one John Culver, Gent., who had sailed from Biddeford April 17,1531, on the Golden Girl to seek for the Golden City of the Incas, or Aztecs, it mattered little. I skipped the first part. I wanted to know how it had reached this place. It seems (I'll tell it very briefly) that the adventurers had landed, wandered around the cape finding nothing but fever and hostile natives, until finally five survivors reached this city. Their food was almost gone, there was no prospect of more. They explored the city, the pyramid; and there one, crazed by privation and fever, had thrown himself into the hole before their eyes. Shaken, the others had descended. They wanted to leave; but they had no place to go; and something held them here. Each night one disappeared. The last entry was at night. Culver was alone, the food was gone. His last words were, roughly, these: "And I would rather die of starvation by myself than join the others in that fearsome hole; but my will is weakened, I fear I cannot hold out against the Thing. I fear that I am going. May the Lord have mercy on my soul!"

I looked up. The battery was flickering wanly, struggling feebly with the encroaching darkness. For the first time I noticed the stillness—the heavy, menacing stillness. I felt very much alone. I looked over to Dan; at least I had one companion left. For one moment I sat numbed. Dan was gone! Then I rushed to the door. The moonlight was even brighter than it was the night before, bright with a hard, laughing brightness as it shone on the west face of the pyramid. There, on the steps, almost at the top, was a figure mounting slowly. What could I do? Before I could cross the square and climb the four hundred odd steps Dan would be inside, gone forever, gone into that abominable hole. There was only one thing to do. I still think it was the only thing. I went for my rifle. I was back in a moment; but the figure was almost to the platform. I took very careful aim and fired, and fired again. He was killed instantly. The figure swayed and rolled with dull thuds down the side of the pyramid to the square below.

It must have been fully an hour that I sat with my face in my hands. I knew I had been right in what I had done. I know so still. I couldn't let Dan, my friend, pitch headlong into that black hole, headlong into—what? And I think when the Last Reckoning comes I shall be told that I was right.

I brought one of the canvas tents and rolled Dan in it. I dragged him into one of the inner rooms and left him. There was nothing else I could do. I reloaded my gun and started to mount the pyramid, filled with rage that was all the greater because it was impotent. I had some crazy notion of emptying my gun into those depths, though it could have no effect. I had ascended some hundred steps when a wandering breeze brought that sweet, numbing odor down to me. It must have gained in strength from