n ever, now that I
could see freedom so close and shining, her very robe rustling within a
few feet of me, her very voice calling to me, singing the morning song
of the sea. But in the caverns behind me, I heard another mocking song,
and I felt a cold breath on my cheek, for Death stood by my side a-grin.

"The treasure!" he whispered, "I need you to guard that. The treasure
you have risked all to win--the treasure for which you have lost--your
treasure! You cannot escape. Go back and count your gold. 'It is all
good money'! Ha! ha! 'it is all good money'!"

The illusion seemed so real to me that I cried aloud: "I will not die! I
will not die!"--cried it so loud, that any one in a passing boat might
have heard me, and shuddered, wondering what poor ghost it was wailing
among the rocks.

But the fright had done me good, and I nerved myself for another effort.
I examined the long crevice through which the sea was glittering so
near. It was not so narrow as at first it had seemed, and I reckoned
that it was some twenty feet through. On my side, it was a little over a
foot across. Wouldn't it be possible to wedge myself through? I tried it
at the opening, and found, that, with my arms extended sidewise, it was
comparatively easy to enter it, though it was something of a tight fit.
If it only kept the same width all through, I ought to be able to manage
it, inch by inch, if it took all day. But, did it? On the contrary, it
seemed to me that it narrowed slightly toward the middle, and--judging
by the way the light fell on the other side--that it widened out again
farther on.

If only I could wriggle past that contraction in the middle, I should be
safe. And if I stuck fast midway! But the more I measured the width with
my eye, the less the narrowing seemed to be. To be so slightly
perceptible, it could hardly be enough to make much difference. Caution
whispered that it might be enough to make the difference between life
and death. But already my choice of those two august alternatives was
so limited as hardly to be called a choice. On the one hand, I could
worm my way back through the caves and tunnels through which I had
passed, and try my luck again at the other end.

"With half-a-dozen matches!" sneered a voice that sounded like
Tobias's--"Precisely" ... and the horror of it was more than I dared
face again any way. So there was nothing for it but this aperture,
hardly wider than one of those deep stone slits that sto