Roy Norton

“ He and Benny were so smeared with their slaughterhouse work as they painstakingly picked and scraped and tore away minute pieces of fat from the inside of that unfortunate beast’s hide, that one might have thought the fate of generations of sportsmen to come hinged upon their doing this job thoroughly. Wardrop rhapsodized like a poet.
The doctor and Ixtual and Juan all clawed moss and lichen. I knew we couldn’t advance until the work was done, so, being the only practical man in the party, borrowed Wardrop’s shotgun and started out to get a few wild birds for the pot. ”

“ In silence all of us followed the archæologist and his Maya companion, peering over their shoulders as they advanced. The doctor paused just inside the door, bent forward, and then in a hushed voice said: “Peace to the sentinel! He died at his post.”
We saw the crumbling remnants of a man’s skeleton, persisting with that singular obstinacy of human relics in mute attestation to the fact that once here had lived and died a man. ”

“ Not a mere path, but a road cut through living rock like those old Roman roads built by the Mediterranean conquerors when they moved northward. A road with gutters for freshet waters at its sides, and as well engineered as could be done by any man of this day. Here and there the sparse vegetation of the high altitude had found lodgement in a crevice; occasionally rubble stones from the sides had slipped across, and a few huge bowlders that had rolled from higher points had found lodgment. ”

“ To my considerable satisfaction I discovered that the air remained as pure as above, and there was no sign of the ropes yielding or parting; but the light from my electric torch showed nothing in the wall in the way of steps or break. It was as nature had left it, smooth and unbroken. ”

“ Wardrop with equal insistence said he believed he should be the one to go, at which we all laughed derisively, for his weight would have required the use of much stronger ropes than the make-shift lot on which whoever descended must trust his life. I finally had my way and we rigged a bosun’s chair into which I seated myself and was swung out over that somewhat terrifying blackness, and lowered away. The edge proved to be a projecting shelf, so that I swung clear of the wall. ”

“ One of them was evidently the dining room, or mess, for on a stone table there stood plates of copper, ancient jugs betokening the development of Maya ceramics, and tiny heaps of dust which I think must have been some time food. Beds were there, with their garnishings mere heaps of dust and dry mold. In one room on a stone table we found round pieces of carefully cut bronze that I think must have been coins from an ancient purse. ”

“ Here, too, were guard houses on either side of men who dwelt in artificial light during their time of duty. These houses had other ceramics, and signs of habitation in those long-past days, but we found no skeleton remains of the post. There were racks of spears, javelins, and arrow heads, as if this had been an armory. There were glyphs on the walls that the doctor deciphered and then walked out to investigate.
“Above us,” he said, pointing his electric torch, “are tons and tons of balanced bowlders that could be released by following the directions embossed in those stone tablets. ”

“ Wardy called to the doctor. “That mass of metal has been sometime suspended by ropes or cables, and they had rotted away and if we hadn’t taken the precaution to stuff up those slots with rock, some of us would have been shut off behind there for the Lord knows how long.” ”