He made no further comment and I breathed a sigh of relief.  Unless Newmarch sent a second messenger to make sure that the news of my desertion would reach Leith, I felt that I was safe.

[Illustration]

CHAPTER VII

THE PIT

We were under way early on the morning after I joined the party.  Leith had the camp astir by daybreak, and after a hasty breakfast we trailed off behind Soma and the carriers, heading directly toward the basalt towers that rose up in the middle of the island.

I for one was not sorry that we were making an early start.  All through the night I lay awake expecting another member of the crew to rush into camp with a message from Newmarch to Leith, and when we started on the trail, I took particular care to lag behind the procession for the first few hours so that I would be in a position to intercept any diligent runner from The Waif.  I took the first opportunity of telling Holman of the manner in which the bilious Englishman had hastened my departure with the Winchester, and the youngster’s face wore a perplexed expression.

“That precious captain is Leith’s partner in villainy,” he cried, “but our hands are tied.  The Professor is simply crazy with delight over the things that the brute is going to guide him to, and all our suspicions don’t amount to much when you put them together.  You see we’ve got nothing definite to go on at present.  All we can do is to watch and wait, and be ready to act when the moment comes.  Soma and his five mates are Leith’s pets, you can bet your life on that, but we have one ally in your friend Kaipi.”

The path of the preceding day was smooth compared to the ground we climbed over that morning.  There was no trail as far as we could see.  Soma, who was in the lead, found his way by occasional marks that could only be visible to the eye of a native.  Barbara Herndon remarked on one occasion that there was danger of our getting lost, but Leith grinned at the remark.

“Soma has been here more than once,” he replied.  “What he doesn’t know about this place isn’t worth knowing.”

The path continued to ascend, but the thick tropical growth did not lessen during the tramp of the morning.  Leith walked with the Professor, who appeared to be in a state of joy bordering upon hysteria, while Holman and I in the rear tried to assist the two girls over the roughest sections of the road.  I thought as we scrambled through impenetrable scrub and crawled over rocky piles that it was the strangest expedition that had ever set forth.  If Leith was the wicked devil that we suspected him to be, four persons were risking their lives to gratify the whim of a half-crazy scientist who was dying for notoriety.  He would not be turned aside from his pursuit of the specimens which Leith had told him of; his daughters would not desert him, and their resolve had brought Holman and myself.  We were blind automatons that the fame-seeking archaeologist was dragging at his heels.  He did not consider the sufferings of the two girls; least of all did he think that Holman or myself was doing anything to safeguard his life or property.  He was blind to everything but the natural curiosities around him, and he made frequent entries in the notebook that was to be his crutch to Olympus.