ame it was Marakinoff. I take him to Ponape an' the natives there
they will not take him to the Nan-Matal where he wish to go--no! So I
take him. We leave in a boat, wit' much instrument carefully tied up.
I leave him there wit' the boat an' the food. He tell me to tell no
one an' pay me not to. But you are a friend an' Olaf he depend much
upon you an' so I tell you, sair."

"You know nothing more than this, Da Costa?" I asked. "Nothing of
another expedition?"

"No," he shook his head vehemently. "Nothing more."

"Hear the name Throckmartin while you were there?" I persisted.

"No," his eyes were steady as he answered but the pallor had crept
again into his face.

I was not so sure. But if he knew more than he had told me why was he
afraid to speak? My anxiety deepened and later I sought relief from it
by repeating the conversation to O'Keefe.

"A Russian, eh," he said. "Well, they can be damned nice, or
damned--otherwise. Considering what you did for me, I hope I can look
him over before the Dolphin shows up."

Next morning we raised Ponape, without further incident, and before
noon the Suwarna and the Brunhilda had dropped anchor in the harbour.
Upon the excitement and manifest dread of the natives, when we sought
among them for carriers and workmen to accompany us, I will not dwell.
It is enough to say that no payment we offered could induce a single
one of them to go to the Nan-Matal. Nor would they say why.

Finally it was agreed that the Brunhilda should be left in charge of a
half-breed Chinaman, whom both Da Costa and Huldricksson knew and
trusted. We piled her long-boat up with my instruments and food and
camping equipment. The Suwarna took us around to Metalanim Harbour,
and there, with the tops of ancient sea walls deep in the blue water
beneath us, and the ruins looming up out of the mangroves, a scant
mile from us, left us.

Then with Huldricksson manipulating our small sail, and Larry at the
rudder, we rounded the titanic wall that swept down into the depths,
and turned at last into the canal that Throckmartin, on his map, had
marked as that which, running between frowning Nan-Tauach and its
satellite islet, Tau, led straight to the gate of the place of ancient
mysteries.

And as we entered that channel we were enveloped by a silence; a
silence so intense, so--weighted that it seemed to have substance; an
alien silence that clung and stifled and still stood aloof from
us--the living. It was