“It’s half an hour,” someone announced hoarsely.
“They’re not coming—they’re not, blast them!” Joe shrieked. He pounded his fists futilely against the immovable stone, and with that bedlam broke loose as the men screamed and hammered everything they could get their hands on against the unperturbed rock. In the melee the last light flickered, leaving them in a writhing, twisting mass of panic-stricken humans. Once or twice Cardow’s voice rose above the din as he endeavored to restore quiet, but it was promptly drowned by the screams of the gang.
“Get further away,” Arto urged. The captives moved cautiously along the wall until at last they were on the opposite side from where the entrance had been. From somewhere a faint light shone before the Sun-God, and Jim decided that it came from the clusters of brilliants set in the wide band. The men continued to fight and scream, but their voices were growing hoarser. Some were crying like infants, and this noise, Jim thought, was the most awful.
“I’ll feel for a crack,” Arto suggested. “Hang on to me, Senor Jim.” He dropped to his stomach, and Austin caught his trouser leg, then when Gonzalas moved further, the boy too lay flat, while Pedro clung to him, and Mrs. Gonzalas knelt beside her husband. She was praying quietly.
Across the temple the struggle was growing less furious, as if the men were becoming exhausted from their efforts or over-come by the closeness of their prison. For several minutes Arto wriggled close to the wall, his hands running lightly and swiftly over the space until at last he paused, they heard him take a deep breath, then he raised himself.
“Send her,” he whispered. Pedro moved his wife forward and Arto made her lie on the floor, her face pressed against a tiny opening through which came a very thin streak of air from the outside world.
“Stay there, mio,” her husband ordered more firmly than Jim had heard him speak to her before, and she protested no more.
“We will find others,” Arto assured her softly.
“No. I took it off long ago,” Pedro answered. “A man’s cuff on a small woman—it was easy.”
“My husband, permit me to share the hole with Senor Jim,” she begged earnestly. “But for us he would not—”
“Never mind me,” Jim whispered hastily, “I’m doing fine,” but his head was already dropping forward on his breast. He tried to raise his hand to loosen his collar, but the effort was too great, and he closed his burning eyes with a weary sigh.