Page:Gaston Leroux--The bride of the sun.djvu/305

Rh of what had happened, could not even try to give him hope.

Eight more days passed by, and the elements still held them prisoners at Mollendo. His uncle and Natividad watched Dick closely, but his outward calm finally dispelled their fears, and once aboard a ship for Callao, they even questioned him. He told them what he had seen in the Temple of Death, while they listened in horror to the simply-worded narrative, made in a singularly quiet voice. Afterwards, Uncle Francis locked himself in his cabin and sat for a long time with his head between his hands, staring at an unopened note-book.

Dick, leaning over the ship's side, was now gazing idly at the rapidly approaching coast on which he had landed with so much hope and joy. The Peru of Pizarro and the Incas, the fabulous land of gold and legends, the Eldorado of his young ambition and of his love! Dead were his love and his ambition. There lived only the legends, at which they had laughed, which had killed all their dreams and which was to kill him after sending Maria-Teresa to a living tomb! And they had laughed, laughed at the warning of those two stately old ladies, Velasquez canvases brought to life and striving to retain all their pictorial dignity!

As on that first day, he was the first man off