At 8 dial that bright day of January 5, 2001, an expectant and anxious party left the deck of the San Francisco, and landed at the mole of Noniva. The Doctor had two men from the ship to carry the stretcher—he was a thoughtful man, and always had a stretcher along for emergencies—and the tools and such things as he believed might be needed. In the town, saddle mules were obtained, and the party of five quietly left the vicinity, as if for a day’s camping in the hills.

The journey was through a broken and thickly-wooded country, and the traveling slow and tedious. It was long past the meridian when the party reached and passed up the dry bed of the Ninta River, and nearly 15 dial when “The Finger of God,” which all recognized from the description furnished by the natives of Noniva, was reached.

The gray cliffs on either bank of the river were steep and rugged. Huge festoons of tropical growth covered them from top to bottom, and stunted pines stood nodding their crested heads among the rocky crevices. Already the shadow of the rock was creeping up the eastern bank, and by its position the pathway ledge was easily found.

Leaving the two seamen at the base of the rock, Dr. Town, with the tools which he had brought, and followed by the two girls, carefully made his way up the narrow, overhanging ledge, and stood near the point of the dark shadow on the face of the rock. With watch in hand, which he had set to the meridian of Guadalupe, he awaited the time of 16 dial, or 4 P.M., as recorded by the author of the letter of instructions.

The minutes passed slowly—too slowly for the two girls, who stood by his side. Their feelings were wrought to a fever heat; their hearts beat a tattoo within their bosoms, and a fear of some dreadful revelation possessed their souls.

The shadow crept on; the sun was going down to its bed in the ocean, which spread out in every direction. On moved the shadow; it had reached a dense cluster of mountain-ivy, which completely hid the rock from view: the hour was 15:55 dial.

Seizing a large knife from his bundle of tools, the doctor sprang quickly to the spot, and with dispatch, cleared away the evergreen, exposing the solid rock of the cliffs. With his eyes upon his watch, he noted the passing moments.

“Sixteen dial!” he cried, and placed the point of his knife at the end of the shadow of the “Finger of God.”

Carefully marking the spot, he diligently searched for the letters mentioned in the communication. Not a trace of a letter was visible; the virgin rock lay bare, and undefiled by human hands. Above, below, and on either side, his search was equally unsuccessful, and as he communicated the result of his examination to Mollie and Marie, consternation seized upon them. Could it be that they had been deceived, and that the contents of the letter were false, and made for some purpose of alluring Junius Cobb to this spot? They looked at each other in bewilderment.

Suddenly the doctor exclaimed:

“Ah! It may be that!”

“What, doctor?” they both cried, excitedly.

But the doctor made no reply; he was climbing up the cliff, straight up from the knife-mark in the rock. With the celerity of a man intensely excited, he cut and slashed away the ivy, and threw it into the ravine; then, looking at his watch, he noted that twenty-five minutes had passed since the shadow of the rock had reached the point which he had marked. Noting the variation of the shadow from the vertical for these twenty-five minutes, he drew his knife slowly and carefully up the face of the cliff, from the mark which he had made to where the shadow of the “Finger of God” then rested, the knife describing the path of the shadow.

Turning to Mollie, who had been watching his movements in wonder, he said:

“If the instructions are correct, then will the characters ‘J.C.’ be found near the line which my knife has described; for the letter, if true, as I have remarked, was written a long time ago, and the ‘Finger of God’ was taller then than it is to-day, as the elements must have worn many inches from its top in the course of a great number of years; its shadow was higher up the cliff, at any particular hour of the day, at a remote period, than it is to-day. Now come and examine closely along the line I have described.”

With diligence and care, all three scanned the face of the rock, scraped away the mold, and sought to find the key to the mysterious cavern.

Suddenly Mollie gave a scream—an exultant scream—and cried:

“Here it is! Here it is! I have found them!”

Crowding about her, the other two saw before them the letters in the rock. Small, discolored, and covered with a green moss, it was a wonder they had been discovered at all. Yes, there they were, “J.C.” Leaning over, Dr. Town took his penknife and carefully dug the moss away from the point of the J, and exposed the hole mentioned in the letter.

There was no farce, no falsehood in the communication, after all; at least, not as regards the letters “J.C.” and the hole in the J. The decisive moment had arrived.

Putting the point of the steel rod, which he had brought along for the purpose, into the hole, the doctor drove it in to its full length. A creaking, cracking sound followed, and the rock in front of them sank into the side of the cliff, leaving exposed a doorway about six feet high by three in width. Involuntarily all started back as the yawning, dark passage was exposed, and a cry of alarm escaped the lips of Marie.

The opening had been made, but the interior was dark and unknown.

“I will go in,” said the doctor, “and explore the place; I will return, and inform you if it is safe.”

“Oh, I am not afraid,” returned Mollie; “certainly there can be nothing there to harm us.”

“Oh, but there may be!” broke in Marie.

“Go in, doctor; we will follow you,” not heeding Marie’s alarm.

Dr. Town lighted a lantern, and, followed by the girls, passed in through the opening. A passage of some fifteen feet in length hewed into the solid rock, led them into a large chamber with a high and arched roof. As the light of the lantern threw its rays about the room, its contents were plainly discernible by all.

The walls were draped with beautiful silks and plushes; chandeliers were suspended from the arched roof; costly chairs with embroidered cushions were upon every side; books and works of art lay upon the massive center-table and about the room. A thousand objects of beauty and richness adorned the large chamber.

As they walked across the room, a light cloud of dust rose at their feet as the carpet gave way in its rottenness. Reaching out her hand, Mollie took a book from the table, and was about to open it, when it fell to the floor in a mass of rotten fibre. A beautiful picture hanging on the wall, its oil coloring still fresh and its gilded frame yet bright and handsome, was accidentally struck by the doctor, and came tumbling to the ground, in a heap of decayed wood and canvas. The table, with all its beautiful ornaments, was but a phantom; for, as they endeavored to move it to one side, it fell to the floor in ruins. Time and nature had caused such decay that it seemed to need but the touch of man to change the vision of enchantment into a scene of ruin and chaos.

There was no moisture, no mold; but apparently a dry-rotting process had been at work for years, and the destructible articles of the chamber were ready to fall in pieces at the least shock.

From the first chamber opened a second, to the left, and here was found what appeared to have been a kitchen. Utensils of all kinds were scattered about as if left where they had been last used; dishes of finest china lay broken on the floor, where also lay the once beautiful sideboard, now fallen by its weight and rottenness; decay worse than was found in the first chamber pervaded the place. A large oil-stove in one corner, and glass bottles with seals upon them, gave evidence of the methods which had been pursued in this the culinary department of the establishment.

From this room a long passage opened to the right, and led deep into the cliff. With feelings of awe, not unmixed with terror on the part of Marie, the three moved forward. The light flashed upon the dark, rocky walls, and was absorbed in their dingy gray.

Moving cautiously forward, a dozen steps brought them to a third chamber, small and low. Mollie, who was close in rear of the doctor, glanced in as the light penetrated the darkness of the room. With a scream, she drew back, shuddering with fear, and clasped Marie in her arms:

“A skeleton!” she cried. “A coffin!”

The fear was contagious; Marie sank to the ground, trembling like a leaf, and, in her fall, dragged Mollie with her. There they lay, frightened, and with chattering teeth.

“Come, young ladies,” brusquely said the doctor, “there is nothing to be afraid of. Scared at a skeleton, eh? I thought you had more nerve,” to Mollie.

“But it was so sudden,” she gasped; “and it seems so terrible.”

“Well, there is nothing to fear,” as he assisted them to their feet.

“O Mollie! Let us go!” cried Marie.

“Stuff and nonsense!” broke in the doctor. “Let us fathom this mystery. We will go in.”

In the center of the chamber and on a high bier, covered with black velvet, which fell in great folds to the floor, lay a golden casket. It bore no ornamentation, save the beading of silver about its edges. Its top was of glass, and a wreath of the most exquisite flowers lay near the head. On the four corners of the great black pall were sprigs of immortelles, and at the head of the casket, a wreath of orange blossoms. The floor of the chamber was of slabs of white marble, skillfully laid and joined together.

At the side of the room, upon a low couch, lay the skeleton of a human being; the grinning skull was turned upon one side, with its yawning, eyeless sockets turned toward the casket in the center of the chamber.

The garments which had been worn in life, still clung about the form, and showed it to have been a man. Upon a small table, at the head of the couch, stood a bronze lamp, from which the oil had long since passed into vapor; a paper lay by its side, and at the foot of the couch stood an iron box.

Reverently they moved toward the casket, and, with feelings wrought up to the highest pitch, looked through the glass top. Again did the girls cry out in their wonder and awe; and the doctor, accustomed though he was to sights of death, pressed his hand to his head, and stared with eyes almost starting from their sockets.

Within the casket, upon the whitest silk, lay the form of a woman of wondrous beauty—a form of the most exquisite shape, a face of the rarest mold; hair of the fairest golden blonde, and hands and feet as delicate and small as a girl’s. Naked from her feet to her loins, and exposing a bust of wondrous form, she lay among the folds of the white silk lining. A swathing of bandages covered the abdomen, and the mouth was wrapped in cloth. By her side lay a golden saucer, and another, filled with a black substance, lay at her head.

Silently they stood and gazed upon the motionless form. Within her casket she lay in death before them, but such a death as none had ever seen before. The eyelids closed, the face as white as the driven snow, the hands folded upon her bosom, it seemed to all that sacrilege had been committed by intruding within the sacred precincts of her tomb.

The awe-inspiring silence was at last broken by the voice of the doctor, who had recovered himself, and whose thoughts had come back again to the duty of the present.

“This is a most remarkable discovery, ladies,” he slowly said; “but we should look for a further solution of the mystery. We can do nothing by standing here and gazing at this wondrous vision.”

Laying his hand on the pall near the head of the casket, the velvet fell in dust and rags to the floor, and the sprig of immortelles, striking the marble slab, became mashed and battered. Picking up the flowers, he examined them carefully.

“Why, they are made of gold and silver and precious stones,” he exclaimed, in astonishment.

Then they examined the three remaining sprigs, and the wreath of orange blossoms at the head of the casket; all were of the finest gold and silver, and diamonds were the petal-points of the flowers. Wondering much, the doctor then took those from the top of the casket, and found them, likewise, of the same precious materials. But in removing the last bunch of flowers, a discovery had been made. Where the wreath of golden flowers had lain, was now seen a silver plate, covered with engraved letters.

“Perhaps we have a clue to the identity of the beautiful woman who lies in this casket,” exclaimed the doctor, as he threw the rays of the light upon the plate on the top of the casket.

Crowding close to him, all three read the words cut in the silver plate:

“My Daughter: To God I trust thee; into His keeping I give thee. O Junius! If thou hast, in years past and numbered in the great cycle of time, loved, and loved with steadfast heart, then arise and rescue that love from oblivion; but—and search thy heart to its utmost depths—if such love has never been, or is past and gone, turn back again, and leave to eternal rest the being who lies entombed before you—my daughter, Marie Colchis.

“Within the second chamber are batteries and means of obtaining heat, and fluids of life-giving principles. Cause the chamber to be warmed, arrange the batteries for current, and prepare the nourishment which you will find in the glass jars. When all is ready, cover your nostrils well, break the top glass of the casket, quickly seize the form therein lying, and bear it to the second chamber.

“Once within the warmth of that room, tear off the bandages, and apply the poles of the battery to the heart, in front, and over the fifth rib, in the back. Let the current come with all its force. If it be God’s will, the form will shake, will quiver, open its eyes, will breathe, and become a living woman once again. Nourishment and care are all that will be required to complete the resurrection. Within the folds of the bandages over the heart lies a golden case containing a letter which is to be read by my daughter alone. Give it to her when she is recovered, and may God be with you.

“Jean Colchis.”