“Sunset tour of inspection.  Seen the same kind of thing as at Gib.,” said the Sergeant.  “Oh! by Jingo!  Pussy isn’t lying after all—­there he is,” and he pointed to a figure that rose suddenly out of the black stone of the idol’s back just as the guards had done.

It was Higgs, Higgs without a doubt; Higgs wearing his battered sun-helmet and his dark spectacles; Higgs smoking his big meerschaum pipe, and engaged in making notes in a pocket-book as calmly as though he sat before a new object in the British Museum.

I gasped with astonishment, for somehow I had never expected that we should really see him, but Orme, rising very quietly from his seat beside Maqueda, only said: 

“Yes, that’s the old fellow right enough.  Well, now for it.  You, Shadrach, run out your ladder and cross first that I may be sure you play no trick.”

“Nay,” broke in Maqueda, “this dog shall not go, for never would he return from his friends the Fung.  Man,” she said, addressing Japhet, the Mountaineer to whom she had promised land, “go you over first and hold the end of the ladder while this lord crosses.  If he returns safe your reward is doubled.”

Japhet saluted, the ladder was run out and its end set upon the roughnesses in the rock that represented the hair of the sphinx’s tail.  The Mountaineer paused a moment with hands and face uplifted; evidently he was praying.  Then bidding his companions hold the hither end of the ladder, and having first tested it with his foot and found that it hung firm, calmly he walked across, being a brave fellow, and presently was seen seated on the opposing mass of rock.

Now came Oliver’s turn.  He nodded to Maqueda, who went white as a sheet, muttering some words to her that did not reach me.  Then he turned and shook my hand.

“If you can, save my son also,” I whispered.

“I’ll do my best if I can get hold of him,” he answered.  “Sergeant, if anything happens to me you know your duty.”

“I’ll try and follow your example, Captain, under all circumstances, though that will be hard,” replied Quick in a rather shaky voice.

Oliver stepped out on the ladder.  I reckoned that twelve or fourteen short paces would take him across, and the first half of these he accomplished with quiet certainty.  When he was in the exact middle of the passage, however, the end of one of the uprights of the ladder at the farther side slipped a little, notwithstanding the efforts of Japhet to keep it straight, with the result that the plank bound on the rungs lost its level, sinking an inch or so to the right, and nearly causing Oliver to fall from it into the gulf.  He wavered like a wind-shaken reed, attempted to step forward, hesitated, stopped, and slowly sank on to his hands and knees.

“Ah!” panted Maqueda.

“The Gentile has lost his head,” began Joshua in a voice full of the triumph that he could not hide.  “He—­will——­”