Show HEART OF THE WORLD II I I I f BY H RIDER HAGGARD I Copyright 1891 by H Rider Haggard Written for The Salt Lake Herald SUMMARY 7 CHAPTER IbIs I-bIs autobiographic where he was born when about 9 years old troubles arose in the country Ignatios father taken by the Spaniards see him in prison the priest Iprnatios receives from him an armlet Is given injunction to see that the boy has it wh n of ag < The father Is hot The boy remains with the jirlest and wants to become one himself Is toll lie cannot till of age On his twentieth birthday the priest tells him all The boy is thf hereditary ruler of the Aztecs s Miatea into the mysteries of the rder of the Heart and installed as Teditary chief Forms a plot to free Aexico of the Spaniards and travels for amber a-mber of years all over the country faturing his plans On one of his turneys finds two stexican bandits as RUlting two Indian women one is a i she is killed the other her sister Iatlo kills both bandits He marries le young Indian girl Just before the time fixed for the execution of the plot agnatlo s wife was placed as a servant In he house of the man who ruled Mexico that she might spv upon him She falls in love with the Spaniard and betray the plan of uprising Ignatio and others are arrested The Spanish leader tells him If he will hand over his gold his ife will be spared He does Others who had been betrayed wreacked their vengeance on the wife Jgnatio becomes a wanderer for twenty years or more finally returns to his village In the mountains and turns his attention to the Btudy and management of mines It was while thus employed that he made the ncqualntance of James Strickland who vas de tined to accompany him to the City Heart of the World PART II PTER IIIIgnatio visits the vil 1Ce t Cumarvo State of Tamaulipas to Bee an Indian said to have an Aztec scroll that had descended to him through many geiK rations and told of a rich gold mine in the mountains the sight of which had been lost Leams the Indian had died suddenly and the scroll could not be found hears of an Inglese in the neigh boihood When he leaves his friends house going along the street sees two dead men and a handsome Indian girl Binding a serape or blanket around the body of one The girl has been the cause of the fatal quarrel As Lord of the Heart Ignatio warns her < o leave the country on pain of death to which she consents A man accosts him and asks him the secret of his power over the woman Tells him lIe cannot explain it Still lingers In Cumarvo discovers a plot to kill the Englishman and thwarts it many of ths wouldbe murderers being 1dll Ie The man so saved is James Strl land He thanks Ignatlo for saving ifi e and Ignatio goes Into the em pU c r Stricklands company Then Is ed the story of Stricklands career iH had ranched in Texas then drifts J Nicaragua became mixed up in mining S min-ing ventures in Honduras leaves Honduras Hon-duras and goes to Mexico There he becomes be-comes the manager of a very rich mine but as it gets deeper the water rushes in so fast that the mine cannot be Worked work-ed The facts are reported to the owners and Strickland is summarily dismissed und they refuse to pay him his salary due He tells Ignatlo to whom SOO are due He has SlOM but Ignatio begs him io bt silent and say no more or he will never forgive him Ignatio leaves the house to calm himself by walking among the mountains little knowing what he fchould hear before entering It again Chapter IYHe walks down the street Is hailed and told the scroll is found Proceeds on his way a man suddenly steps out from tl1e bushes it Is Molas iis foster brother asks to see the symbol fiSo gwo him Molas says the halt 1 I i Jgnatio has is called Day the half that is lost Night Tells of an old India I In-dia doctor whom he visited for his wife nsks if he is sick at heart Tries the Indian I In-dian with the twelve signs he responds The doctor tells him his wife is dad determines it by burning a lock oCher hair The doctor Zibalby has the other half of the Heart sends a message to Ignatio Molas is robbed by bandits after af-ter leaving Zibalbys place it is Don Pedros band tells Don Pedro who gave him the gold Relates the story of his journey to find Ignatio to him Ignatio goes to Strickland and tells him ha must quit his strvice Tells him of the lost mine they go to discover it After a wears ride according to the directions of the scroll they find the mine Igna and a tio takes a hammer and candles leather bag for samples and they enterS I > enter-S CHAPTER V lHE LEGEND OF THE HEART When I had gone a few paces down khele it widened suddenly so that and light icce were able to stand upright our candles Now there was no doubt tthait we were in the tunnel of an old mine a rudely dug shaft that turned this way and that as it followed the windings of the ore body Along this tunnel we went for thirty or forty paces creeping over fallen boulders and twisting ourselves be tweii the brown stalactites that in the counU of ages had formed upon the roOt and iloor till presently we reached UTfrrr I taile that barred our further KTDgrtss a huge mass of rock which had fallen from at some time or other the roof of the tunnel and blocked it I looked at it and said Now senor I think that we shall foave to go back You remember the writing trlls us that this mine although al-though so rich was unsafe because of the rottenness of the rock Doubtless they propped it in the old days but the timbers hay decayed long ago Yes he answered we can do nothing here without help and Igna tio I dont like the look of the roof its it-s full of cracks As these last words left his lips apiece a-piece of stone the size of a childs head lell from above almost at his feet Speak softly I nvJilspered the g of your voice is bringing down the en I stooped to pick up the fallen 5 thinking it might show ore and sid so ny hand struck something n which I lifted and held to the 1 e It was the jawbone of a man w with age and decayed by damp stitscd it to the senor and kneeling down we examined the bed of the tunnel together and not uselessly for there xe found the remainder of the skull and s me fragments of an arm bone but the rest of the skeleton launder la-under the great boulder in front of us He was coming out of the mine when the rock fell on him poor fellow fel-low whispered the senor Look Here and he pointed to a little heap of something that gleamed in the can delight It was free gold almost pure and for the most part in small nuggets nug-gets six or seven ounces of it that once I was contained in a bag which had Jcng sIne rotted away 4 i btless after the mine was closed BOint AJ tec who knew Its secret had I maae a practice of working there for his own benefit till one day as he was coming out the rock fell upon him and i crushed him leaving his spirit to haunt i the place forever Thue Is no doubt about the mine I I I being iSeh whimpered the senor but 1 all the same I think we had better get I out of it I hear odd noises and rumblings I rum-blings which frighten me Come Ig natio and tos turned to lead the way I toward the opening Two paces further I saw him strike Oils shin against a piece of rock that stood up some six or eight inches from II the floorbed of the tunnel and the pain of the blow w t so harp that for tttng where he zras he called out k y Next Instant there was a curi t 4 Bpund > above me as OL something a 5 torn and lo I lay upon any iti > J Q f j face e on the rock and upon me rested a I huge mass of stone I say that it rested upon me but this is not altogether true for had it been 1 so that stone would have killed me at once as a beetle is killed beneath the foot of a man instead of taking more than twoandtwenty years to do it Th < greater part of its weight was borne by the piece of stone agair3t which the senor had struck his leg n point of the icck only pressing into my I i I back and grinding me against the j I ground Now we were in darkness for the senor had been knocked down also and Ms candle extinguished and in the midst of my tortures it came into my j mind that he must be dead J Presently however I heard his voice I saying Ignatio do you live Igna tio I Now I thought for a moment and i even 1n my pain I remembered that I I Ito 1 Outside the mine he sat himself down Ito I-to consider what could be done but no thought came for it was impossible to use the strength of the horses in that narrow place Then he sprang up and looked round him in despair Close to him was a little ravine hollowed by water and on Its very edge grew a small mimosa thorn of which the lopg rootshad been washed almost bare by a flood He saw it and an inspiration entered into him With the help of a lever he might be able to do a feat to which his own strength was unequal un-equal Springing at the little tree that being be-ing of so tough a wood was the best possible for his purpose he tore it from such roothold as remained Cto it A few strokes with his heavy hunting knife trimmed off the branches and fibres and soon he was creepln carefully care-fully up the tunnel dragging the trunk after him When he had gone some twenty paces he heard another I fragment of the root fall and so he said in his story he was minded to flv flvHe He had but just escaped from a horrible hor-rible end the end that generations ago had overtaken the poor Aze and it was awful to brave it again He knew that the chances of being able to rescue me were few indeed whereas those that he would perish miserably in the E TIT L1J = = = = = = l = = = = = = IT 1I I 1 I I 1 t IGXATIO TELLS STIUCKLAXD STORY OP TJIE TALISMAN more of the roof would surely fall erelong i i ere-long and that if my friend stayed here he must die with me Nothing could save me I was doomed to a slow death beneath the stone and yet if I told him tibia I knew that he would not go Therefore I answered as strongly as I could Fly senor I am safe and do but stay to light a candle I will follow youYou You are lying to me he answered your voice comes from the level of the floor And as he spoke I heard the scratching sound of a match So soon as he had found his candle and lit it he knelt down and looked at me Then he looked at the roof above and following his glance with difficulty difficul-ty I saw that next to the hole whence the boulder had fallen hung a huge block of stone surrounded by great cracks from which water dropped that trembled like a leaf whenever he moved mov-ed or spoke For the love of God fly I whispered whis-pered In a few hours it will be over with me and you cannot help me I am a dead man do not stop here to share my fate For a moment he seemed to hesitate then his courage came back to him and he answered hoarsely We entered this place together friend and we will go out together or not at all You must be fixed by the rock and not crushed or you would not speak of living for hours Let me look and he lay upon his breast and examined the fallen rock by the light of the candle Thank God there is hope he said at last The boulder rests on the ground and upon the stone against which I struck my leg for only one point of it is fired in your back Do you think that anything is broken Ignatio I I cannot say senor my pain is great and I am being slowly crushed to death but I believe that as yet my hones are whole Fly senor > I beg of you I will not he answered sullenly I am going to roll this rock off you j Then lifting with all his great I strength he strove to move the stone i from off me but without avail for it was beyond the power of mortal man I to stir it and all the while the black mass trembled above his head I I must go for help he said presently j pres-ently I Yes yes senor go for help I answered an-swered for I knew well that before I he could return with any more of the roof would have fallen shutting me 1 in to perish by inches or perhaps f crushing the life out of me in mercy Then I remembered and added I Stay a moment before you go you are noble I will give you something I Feel here round my neck there is a little lit-tle chainnow draw it over my head so You see a token hangs to it if I ever you are in trouble with the Indians I In-dians take their head man apart and show him this and he will die for you If need be I Englishman by this gift I have made you heir to the Aztecs in the heart of every Indian and the master of the great brotherhood of Mexico I Molas the messenger will tell you all and bring you to those who can initiate I 5ou Bid him lead you whither he i I would have led me Farewell and God I gO with you Tell the Indians how I died that they may not think you 4 murdered me i I I To these words of mine the senor I made no answer but thrust the token i into his pocket without looking at it i like one who dreams Then taking the I candle with him he crept forward down the tunnel and vanished and mv heart sank as I saw him go leaving I leav-ing me to mv dreadful fate without a i j word of farewell j 1 Doubtless he Is too frightened to I speak I thought and it is right that j j he should fly as quickly as possible to save his life I Now as I was soon to learn I was doing the senor a bitter wrong In my mind seeing that he never dreamed of deserting me but went to find a means of rescue As he told me afterward i when he reached the mouth of the tunnel tun-nel he could think of no way by which j I might be saved since these moun1 tame were uninhabited and it would take several hours to bring men from Cumarvo I 0 attempt were many Then he remembered remem-bered what my sufferings must bs if I still lived and how his own conscience would reproach him in the after years should he leave me to my fate and went on Now the could see the half detached mass of the roof still hung it was a smaller fragment that had fallen one nearer to the ntrance He could see also that I lay in the same position beneath be-neath the rock and he thought that I was dead because I neither moved nor I I spoke though in fact I had but I swooned under the agony of my suffering suffer-ing Are you dead he whispered and I heard his voice through my sleep and lifting my head looked up at him astonished for I had never thought to see him again Do I behold a spirit I said pr is it you come back It is I Ignatio and I have brought a lever Now when I lift struggle forward for-ward if you can I Then he placed the trunk of the thorn tree in what seemed to him the best position and put all his strength upon it It was in vain even so he could not stir the rock Try a little more to the right I said faintly there is a better hold He shifted the lever and dragged at itt I till his muscles cracked and I felt the stone tremble as its bulk began to riseIf If you can help ever so little it will come he gasped Then in my despair though the anguish of it nearly killed me I set my j palms upon the ground and contracting contract-ing myself like a snake that is held with a forked stick thrust upward with my back till the point of the stone was I raised eight of ten inches from the ground For a moment and one only it hung I there next instant the lever slipped and down It came again But I had I taken my chance for clinging to the ground with my fingers so soon as my I back was free with a quick movement 11 I dragged myself a foot or more forward for-ward Then the point of rock that had i been lifted from my back fell again I but this time it struck the ground between be-tween my thighs Now he seized me by the arms and tore me free though I left one of my long boots beneath the stone I strove to rise but could not because of the hurt to my back I You must carry me senor I said He glanced at the mass that trembled above us then giving me the candle lifted me from the ground like an infant in-fant and staggered forward down the tunnel Perhaps We had gone some seven or eight paces not more when there was a dreadful crash behjnd us The roof had fallen in and the spot which we had occupied some thirty seconds before was now piled high with rocks On I said cracks are showing in the stone above us and he rushed I I forward till we found ourselves cx I i hausted and bleeding among the I j grasses outside the mine I I Now I bowed my head and returned I i thanks for my escape then lifting It I looked my preserver in the face and saidI I swear by the name of God senor that He never made a man nobler than I t yourself i I The next instant I fell forward and I fainted there among the ferns Ten days had passed since I was carried from the mouth of that accursed ac-cursed mine back to Cumarvo in a litter and during all this time I had suffered much pain in my back and been very ill so ill indeed that I was scarcely allowed to speak with stay one Now however I was much better and one afternoon the Senor Strickland assisted by my roster brother Molas lifted me from my bed Into a hammock ham-mock By the way Ignatio said the > senor sen-or when Moms had gone I never gave you back this charm of yours What a queerlooking trinket It is he added add-ed taking it from his neck and what did you mean by your talk in the tunnel tun-nel about its making me heir to the empire of the Aztecs in the heart of every Indian and the rest of it I suppose sup-pose that you were delirious with pain anddld grt know what you were say lingIs Is the door shut senor I asked and are you sure that there is no one on the veranda Good Then draw your chair nearer and I will tell you something I am not certain that 3 should take this talisman back again still I will do so for reasons that yoi shall learn presently Know senor that this broken gem is at once the fouhdStion stone and the secret symbol of a great order oi which although you have not been initiated ini-tiated info it you are now one of the lords seeing that the crowning anc vital ceremony of the creation of a Lord of the Heart consists in the hanging hang-ing of the symbol about his neck for the space of a minute only by myself who ain the chief lord and Keeper of the Heart for life and you have worn it for ten whole days Before we part I will call a chapter I of the order for even among these mountains we have brethren and you ohall be initiated into its ritual and raised to the rank of a chief lord as IF I your right meanwhile I will instruct you briefly in its mysteries as it is my bounden duty to do Understanfl senor that the first duty of the servant of the Heart is silence si-lence and that silence I demand of you Men have died ere now senores senor-es they have died on the rack in the dungeons of the inquisition and shriv clod as wizards in the fires of the stake sooner than reveal those things that have been told them upon the faith of the Heart against which the confessional confes-sional itself cannot prevail no not with the best of Catholics But suppose that a man Should not keep silence Ignatio what then he asked There is a land senor I answered where the most talkative grow dumb and its borders can be crossed by all even by the Lords of the Heart for fearful is the doom of a false brother You mean that if repeat anything I may hear I shall bemurdered Indeed no senor but you may happen I hap-pen to die I speak on the Heart do you hear with the Ears I hear with the Ears he answered catching my meaning Very well senor since you have now sworn secrecy to me by the most solemn oath that can Jass the lips of man I will speak to you openly This is the tale of the Broken Heart so far as I know it thoughjhow much of it is ruth and how much is legend I can i Hot say I You have heard the story of that j I white man or god sometimes called I Quetzal by the Indians and sometimes Cucumatz who cam to these lands in I the far past and civilized their peoples Afterward he vanished away in a ship promising that when many generations had passed he would return again When he had gone the empire which lie created fell into the hands of two brothers whose chief city was either at Palenque or in its neighborhood and the citizens of this empire like Christians Christ-ians worshipped one good god the true God under the name of the Heart of Heaven and to Him they offered few sacrifices save those of fruit and flowers flow-ers Now of these brothers one married mar-ried a wife from another country u daughter of devils very beautiful and witch a great N Soon this woman as in the story of the wives of Solomon and their lord drew away the king her husband from the true faith to the worship of the gods of her own land and brought It about that he offered human sacrifice to them Then there arose a great confusion con-fusion In that country and the end of It was that the people divided themselves them-selves into two partiftp the worshipers of the Heart of Heaveziiand the worshipers wor-shipers of devils They made war upon each other till many of their chief men were killed then they came to an agreement whereby where-by the nation was sundered Half of it under that king who had married the woman marched northward and became the fathers of the Aztecs and other tribes and half the faithful worshipers wor-shipers of the Heart remained in the Tabasco country I Now from tlat day forward evil overtook both these peoples for though the Aztecs flourished for awhile in the I end the Spaniards despoiled them The worshipers of the Heart also were driven from their cities by hordes of barbarians who rolled clown upon them and their faith perished or seemed to perish But what has this history to do with the charm around your neck Ignatio he asked I will tell you When Quetzal sailed away from his people so says the legend le-gend he left the stone of which this is the half that once he had worn upon his brow to be a treasure to the kings vifo came after him Also he set this fate upon it that while the Heart remained re-mained unbroken for so long should the people be one and whole but if it came about that it was cut or shattered shat-tered they should be divided with it to be no moreone people until again the fragments were one stone I Now when these king brethren I quarreled and parted they sawed the token asunder as you see each of them keeping a half this half being that of him who married the woman For generations it was worn by his descendants and on their deathbeds I passed on by them to another or at times taken from their bodies after they were dead There are many stories told about the stone in the old days and it is certain cer-tain that he who had it was the real king of the country for the time being At length it came into the hands of the great Guatemoc last of the Aztec emi em-i perors who before the Spaniards hung him found means to send it to his son from whom it has come down to me To you What have you to do with Guatemoc r I I am his lineal descendant senor I I the eleventh in the male line Then you ought to be emperor of I the Indians if every man had his rights Ignatio I I That is so senor but of my own story I will tell you presently Now of I this stone Through all the ages it has never been lost and it is knovin I throughout the land he who wears it i for his life being called Keeper of the I Heart and also Hope of those who wait since it may happen in his day I that the two halves will come together again I And what if they do Then so says the legend the In I dians will once more be a mighty na tion and drive those who oppress them Into the sea as the wind drives dust Now he rose from his chair and walked up and down the room Do you believe ail this he asked suddenly Yes I answered or the geater part of it Indeed if what I hear is true the lost half of the talisman that has been missing for so many generations genera-tions is in Mexico at this moment and so soon as I am well enough I go tt seek him who bears it and who Ins come from far to find me That fs why we must part senor f Where has this man come from I he asked eagerly I do not know for certain I answered but I think he has come I from the sacred city of the Indians the hidden Golden City which the Spaniards Span-iards sought for but could not find but that still exists among the mountains acd deserts of the far interior whither hope to journey with him That still exists Ignatio you must be mad It has never existed except in the imagination You say so senor but I think differently dif-ferently At least I knew a man whose grandfather had seen it He the grandfather grand-father was a native of San Juan Ba tista in Tabasco and when he was young Jie committed some crime and fled inland tu save his life All that befell him I do not know tout at length he found himself wandering wander-Ing by the shores of a great lake somewhere some-where in or beyond the country that is now know as Guatemala and being exhausted laid himself down to die there and fell asleep When he awoke people were standing stand-ing round him like the Indians to look at but very light in color and beautifully beauti-fully dressed in white robes with necklaces neck-laces of emeralds and feather capes These people put on board a great canoe and took him to a glorious city with a high pyramid in the center of it which was named Heart of the World Of this city he saw little however for its people kept him a prisoner only from time to time he was brought before their Icing and elders who satin sat-in a hall filled with images of dead men fashioned in gold arid questioned as to the country from whence he came the tribes that dwelt in it and more especially es-pecially of the white men who ruled the land In that hall alone so he said there were more gold and precious stones than are to be found in all Mexico When he had nothing more to tell them the people wished to kill him fearing lest he should escape and bring upon them the white men who loved gold The end of it was that he did escape by the help of a woman who guided him back toward the sea though she never came there for she died upon the road Afterward this man went to live in a little village near Palenque where he also died having told nothing of what he had seen since he feared lest the vengeance of the People of the Heart should follow him When he was dying he told his son who told his son who told the tale to me Senor it has been the dream of my life to visit that city and now at last I think that I have found the clue which will lead me to I it I Why do you want to visit it Ig natio natioTo To understand that senor you must know my history And I told him of the failure of the great plot and the part that Ihad played init all of which I have already set out also of the secret hopes and ambitions of my life Senor 01 added though I am beaten I am net yet crushed and I still desire to build up a great Indian empire I see by your face that you think me foolish You may be right or I may be right I may be pursuing truths or dreams I may be sane and a I redeemer or insane and a fool What I does it matter I follow the light that runs before me willothewisp or star It leads to one end and for me it is the light that I am born to follow If you beieve nothing else at least believe this senor that I do not seek my own good or advancement but rather that of my people At the worst I am not a knave I am only a fool But how will you help your cause by visiting this city supposing it to exist Ignatlo Thus senor these people among whom without doubt the old man of whom I have spoken who is named Zibalhay is a chief or king are the true Jitock and head of all the Indian races and when they learn my plans and whom I am they will be glad to furnish me with means whereby I can bring them to their former empire And if they take another view of the matter Ignatio Then I fear that is all and among so many failures one more will scarcely scarce-ly matter I am like a swimmer who sees or thinks that ha sees a single plank that may bear him to safety Maybe he cannot reach that plank or if he reaches It maybe it will sink beneath be-neath his weight At least he has no other hope Senor I have no other hope Therein There-in the Golden City is untold wealth for the man saw it and without money mon-ey great sums of money I am helpless help-less therefore I go thither to get the money The ship has foundered under me and with it the cargo of my ambitions ambi-tions and the work of my life therefore there-fore being desperate I fallback upon a desperate expedient FirstI will seek this man that the two halves of the heart may come together to-gether and the prophecy be funfilled then if may be I will travel with him to the city Heart of the World careless care-less whether I live or die but determined deter-mined if need be to die fighting for the fulfillment of the dream of an Indian In-dian empire Christian regenerated and stretching from sea to seathat I have followed all my days The dream Ignatio Perhaps you name it well but few have such noble I dreams And now who goes with you on this journey Who goes with me Molas as far as the temple where the Indian Is After Af-ter that if I proceed no one Who would accompany a man grown old in failure whom even those that love him deem a visionary on such a desperate des-perate quest Why if I should dare to tell my projects even men would mock me as children mock an Idiot in the street I go alone senor perhaps to die As regards the dying Ignatia of course I can say nothing since all men must die sooner or later and the moment and manner of their end is 2 in the hand of Providence But for the rest you shall not make this journey I alone that is if you care to have me I for a companion for i will accompany youYou You senor you Think what it t means the certainty of every sort of I danger the risk of every kind of death and at the end probability of failure It is folly senor I I Ignatio he answered I will be f frank with you Notwithstanding all the prophesies about the wonders that I will follow the reuniting of the Heart 1 and the messages from the old man i in the temple I think your scheme for building up an Indian empire greater I than that which Cortes destroyed as Impracticable as It Is grand since the time has gone by when it could have been done or perhaps It has not yet comeBefore Before the Indians can rule again they must forget the bitter lessons and the degradation of ages in short they must be educated Ignatio Still if you think otherwise that Is your affair af-fair you can only fall and there are failures more glorious than most successes suc-cesses Do you understand me Perfectly senor Very well And now as regards the search for this Golden City To me the matter seems very vague since your hopes of finding it are based upon a travelers tale told by a man who died seventy or eighty years ago and the chance that a certain person whom you have not yet seen has come from there and is willing to guide you back to It ItStill Still the prospect of hunting for that city pleases me for I am an adventurer ad-venturer to my heart If we ever get further than the forest country In Tabasco Ta-basco where your friend with the token to-ken Is waiting for you our search will probably end in the leaving of our bones to decorate some wilderness or mountain top in the unknown regions of Guatemala But what of that I have no chick or child my death would matter nothing no-thing to any living soul For years I have worked hard with small results why should I not follow my natural j bent and become an adventurer I 2 can scarcely do worse than I have J done and I think that such way of life would suit me That mine you showed me is rich enough no doubt but I have no capital to deal with It and If 1 had my experience ex-perience of the place was such that I never wished to set foot in it again I In short I am ready to start for Tabasco Ta-basco and the Sacred City and where ever else you like as soon as you are fit to travel tlDa you swear that on the Heart senor I asked By all means but I should prefer to give you my hand upon it And ha stretched out his hand which I took Good You swear on the Heart and < yoi give me your hand the oath is perfect We are comrades henceforth hence-forth senor and for my part I ask no better one For the rest I have nothing noth-ing to say I cannot promise that you f will find this city or that if you find it it will advantage you I am an unlucky j un-lucky man and it is more likely that by yoking yourself with me you will bring my misfortunes upon your head This I swear however that I will b a true comrade to you as you were to me yonder in the mine and for the rest J the adventure must be its own reward To be continued |