The Thing That Walked In The Rain (2 page)

“So much for the legend. Now for the facts.”

We descended the path which led down to the margin of the lake. It wound through a thick growth of trees and shrubs, the size of which attested their great age and the tremendous length of time which had elapsed since the volcano had last erupted. At the rim of the lake, the path turned to the right, following the water's edge.

The professor, who was in the lead, suddenly uttered an exclamation of surprise and increased his pace. Hurrying after him, I too gasped in amazement at what I saw. For there in that setting of jungle growth was a weather-worn stone structure so skillfully wrought that it might have been the product of an advanced civilization. Rising to a height of about twenty-five feet above the surface of the lake, and with half of its base jutting out into the water, was a stone structure which supported on its top, a huge rock slab, one end of which projected out over the lake like a diving board. A flight of steps led up to the top from the rear.

Just behind this, sunk into the stone paving in the shape of a crescent moon was a stone reservoir filled with water. Each point of the crescent brought up almost at the margin of the lake, where a slab of pumice permitted the lake water to filter through, thus keeping it perpetually filled. Back of this reservoir rose, tier upon tier of semicircular steps, to a height of about fifty feet, like the seats of an amphitheatre. A stone bridge spanned the center of the crescent, and at the top and center of the amphitheatre a great, elaborately carved slab of rock was set into the mountainside. Surrounded by hieroglyphics, the main figure on this slab was a huge multi-headed serpent. The sides of the altar were also decorated with this figure in bold relief, surrounded by pictographs and hieroglyphics,

“Without a doubt,’’ said the professor, “this is the place of sacrifice mentioned in the legends. And that figure, the many-headed serpent, is no doubt an idealized conception of the monster—probably a huge anaconda— to which the victims were fed.”

We circled the reservoir, crossed the little bridge, and mounted to the top of the altar. Walking out on the stone slab, I looked straight down into the clear depths below. The reason for the Indian belief that the lake was bottomless was instantly apparent, for although I could see downward for a great distance—could even detect fish swimming far below—I could not see the bottom.

We descended the steps once more, and the professor, with notebook and pencil began jotting down the writing on the side of the altar, for future comparison with the various Central American codices he had brought with him.

Anita, in the meantime, bent over and examined the water in the reservoir.

“What a pretty green water plant,” she said. Then she reached beneath the water, but withdrew her hand with a jerk and a little exclamation of fear. “Why. it moved! It’s crawling away!”

The professor and I both reached her side at the same time, A small, green, hushy-looking thing about an inch in diameter was creeping toward the center of the pool, using its branches as legs. The bottom of the pool was dotted with many others, growing with their branches extended upward like shrubs.

“What is it?” I asked.

“A hydropolyp,” said the professor, “but of a kind I have never seen or heard of before. Although there are many varieties of salt water hydropolyps only three fresh water varieties are known in the Americas, the hydra, the cordylophora and the microhydra. There is a green variety called
hydra viridise,
but it is purely a salt water animal. This is interesting! We must take a specimen back to the doctor’s laboratory for examination.”

He reached into the water and grasped one of the bush-like forms, but instantly let go and jerked his hand up out of the water, while the creature turned over and crawled away.

“My word!” he said. “My word! I'd forgotten that some of these creatures have nematocysts—stinging nettle cells! Anyway, we’ll have to bring a specimen jar with us. The things would shrivel up if exposed to the air for a short time.”

So engrossed had we been in our amazing discoveries that we had failed to notice the approach of a very black rain cloud. My first intimation of its presence was the splash of a huge raindrop on my shoulder. This was followed by a swift patter, and then a veritable deluge.

“Come,” said the professor, “we must get back to the cottage. This may last for hours.”

I was about to turn away with the others when I noticed through the sheets of rain, a disturbance in the water just in front of the stone diving platform that evidently was not caused by the torrential downpour. Then I distinctly saw a green serpentine thing reach up out of the water. It was followed by several more, groping and lashing about blindly, like earthworms, exploring the ground around their lairs.

“Look!” I cried excitedly.

THE professor looked with a gasping: “Good God !” and Anita with a scream of fear. One of the lashing arms reached toward us, and we scrambled, slipping and stumbling, up the winding path with a speed of which I had not thought any of us capable.

The rain pelted us unmercifully until we reached the cottage, but with the usual perversity of rainstorms, ceased almost as soon as we had attained shelter.

“What was it?” I asked, as we stood there, making little pools on the floor of the screened porch.

Mabrey mopped his wet face with his handkerchief. “God only knows!” he replied. “I’m willing to concede, however, that it
wasn’t
an anaconda. Let’s get into some dry things.”

Anita retired to her father’s bedroom to change, while the professor and I went into the kitchen to discard our wringing wet garments, rub down, and put on dry ones.

When we emerged into the living room once more we found Anita seated at her father’s desk. She had rumpled her dark-brown shingle-bobbed hair to dry it. and I thought she looked more beautiful than ever.

“I’ve found something interesting,” she announced, "perhaps a key to the mystery. It’s father’s diary.”

“A diary,” said the professor, “is a personal and sacred thing.”

“But it says: ‘For my daughter, Anita, when I am gone,’ ” replied the girl, “and instructs me to communicate the contents to you, Uncle Charley.”

“That’s different,” said the professor, settling himself comfortably and loading his pipe. “Suppose you read it to me.”

“I’ll go out on the porch,” I said.

“No, stay, Jimmie,” begged Anita. “There’s nothing secret about it. After all, even if there were, you are in this adventure with us—one of us. Sit down and smoke your pipe. I’ll read it to both of you.

“The first part,” continued Anita, “tells Dad’s reason for coming here—to investigate the persistent legend of a terrible monster living in the crater lake. We all know that. He soon found the place of sacrifice and brought away some of the hydropolyps for examination in a temporary laboratory he had set up in a hut, while native workmen, under his direction, were building this house for him. Then he---”

She was interrupted by the slam of the screen door and the sound of footsteps on the porch. Pedro stood, bowing in the doorway.

“Pardon
senorita y senores,”
he said, “but three
Indios
come in strange dress. Almost they are ’ere. I await instructions.”

“Find out who they are and what they want,” said Mabrey.

Pedro bowed and departed, and we all went to the window to watch him meet the newcomers. Our two Misskitos, we noticed, arose at their approach and bowed very low. The strangers were attired in garments unlike anything worn today, except perhaps on feast days or at masquerades or pageants. One Indian, much taller than the other two, was more richly and gaudily attired. And into his feather-crown were woven the red plumes of the
quetzal,
the sacred bird whose plumage might be worn only by an emperor under the old
regime.

The tall red man spoke a few words to Pedro in an authoritative manner, and the latter, after making obeisance, turned and hurried back to us.

“He ees the great Bahna, the holy one!” said Pedro. "He would ’ave speech weeth the
senores.”

“All right. We’ll see him,” replied Mabrey. “Send him in.”

A few moments later Pedro bowed the tall Indian and his two companions into the room. The two shorter men stood with arms folded, one at each side of the doorway, but the tall man advanced to meet us.

“I have come,” he said in English as good as our own, "to warn you to leave. You are in great danger.”

“From whom do you bring the warning, and what is the danger?” asked the professor.

The Indian’s face remained expressionless—immobile. “The great god, Nayana Idra, speaks through me. I am his prophet. Not so long ago I warned the man whom you came to seek. He would not heed my warning, and he is gone. So you seek fruitlessly. You dare the wrath of the Divine One in vain. Go now, before it is too late, or on your own heads let the blame rest for that which will follow.”

“Am I to understand that you are theatening us with the vengeance of this fabulous monster living in your alleged bottomless lake?” asked the professor, a trace of anger in his voice. “You seem well educated, and I confess that I am puzzled by a man of your apparent learning professing such superstitions.”

“I have studied the learning of your people,” replied Bahna, evenly, “but I have studied many things besides. You overreach yourself in calling them superstitions. They are the religion of my race, of which I am the hereditary leader. They are truths which you would neither appreciate nor understand. I have come to warn you, neither as a friend nor as an enemy, but solely as the mouthpiece of Nayana Idra, whom I serve.”

“And who, pray tell, is Nayana Ira?”

“Nayana,” said Bahna, with the air of a teacher lecturing a class, “is the Divine One, Creator of All Things. When he chooses to assume physical form he is Nayana Idra, the Terrible One, wreaking vengeance on those who have ignored or defied him.”

“In his physical form,” said the professor, “what does he look like?”

Bahna pointed to one of two great golden discs suspended in the pierced and stretched lobes of his cars. On it was graven a multi-headed serpent like that cut in the rock at the place of sacrifice.

“This,” he said, “is man’s crude conception of his appearance.”

“May I ask,” said Mabrey, “in what manner you received the message which you have conveyed to us from this alleged deity?”

His features as inscrutable as ever, the Indian drew a roll of hand-woven cloth from beneath his garments. Then, glancing about him, as if looking for a place to spread it, he walked to the desk, behind which Anita was sitting, unrolled it, and laid it down before us.

“There,” he said, “is the message. Heed it and you will live. Disregard it, and you will meet with a fate more terrible than you can imagine.”

We looked at the cloth curiously. It was embroidered with hieroglyphic symbols resembling those cut in the face of the sacrificial altar.

“When I awoke this morning,” said Bahna, “this magic cloth was spread over me. The message says: ‘Today there will come to the mountain three white strangers with their servants, to seek him on whom our vengeance had fallen. They are not of our people, and cannot understand our truths. Neither can they become our servants. You will warn them to leave, lest our wrath fall upon them.’ ”

“You seem,” said the professor, “to have cooked up a most interesting, if unconvincing cock-and-bull story. If you are able to make yourself understood to Nayana, you may tell him for us that we will come and go as we please. And now, Bahna, I bid you good afternoon.” By not so much as the flicker of an eyelash did Bahna betray the slightest emotion. Folding his cloth, he replaced it under his clothing and marched majestically through the doorway, followed by the two men who had accompanied him. We watched the three until they disappeared in the jungle. Then the professor reloaded his pipe, lighted it, and sat down in his chair.

“Now,” he said, “we can go on with the diary.” Anita sat down at the desk, reached for the diary, looked surprised, then alarmed, and searched fearfully, frantically through the books and papers on the desk. Then she sank back with a look of despair.

“I'm afraid we can’t,” she said, weakly. “The diary is gone!”

AFTER our evening meal, Professor Mabrey and I sat on the porch smoking our pipes and listening to the patter of the rain and to the almost incessant rumbling of thunder that had commenced with the advent of darkness. Anita was inside, looking through her father’s papers. The cook-fire of Pedro and the two Misskitos had sputtered and gone out, and I guessed that they were, by now, comfortably installed in the mosquito-bar draped hammocks they had swung in the hut.

“This chap Bahna sure slipped one over on us,” I remarked, thinking of the episode of the afternoon, “Seems to me there must have been something important in that diary—something he was afraid to have us see.”

“Undoubtedly,” replied the professor. “It was careless of me not to watch. These natives are deucedly tricky.”

“Speaking of natives,” I said, “I’ve been wondering if Bahna really is a native. He certainly doesn’t look like the other Indians here. And he’s educated.”

“I’ve been wondering the same thing, myself,” replied Mabrey. “Bahna is not a native name. I doubt if it is a proper name at all. Sounds more like a title. And his features were more Aryan than Mongoloid. With a turban instead of a feather crown he’d pass for a Hindu.”

"Hasn’t it been determined that there is some connection between the religions and traditions of the Far East and those of the early American civilizations?” 1 asked. “Seems to me I’ve heard or read something of the sort.”

“It is a subject,” he replied, “on which ethnologists have never agreed. It’s pretty generally conceded, I believe, that all American Indians are members of the Mongolian race—blood brothers of the Chinese, Japanese, Tibetians, Tartars, and other related peoples of the Old World. Students of symbology have found evidence which seems to link all the great civilizations of antiquity. And Colonel James Churchward has correlated them all as evidence that the first civilization developed in a huge continent called Mu, situated in the Pacific Ocean, and, like the fabulous continent of Atlantis, sinking beneath the waves after its mystic teachings, had prevailed in the Americas, the then still flourishing Atlantis, Greece, Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, India and other coexistent civilizations.