The aged man stood for a moment as though tranced at sound of the engineer's voice. Then, tapping feebly with his staff, he advanced a pace or two into the dungeon. And Stern and Beatrice--who now had sprung up, too, and was likewise staring at this singular apparition--heard once again the words: "Peace, friends! Peace!"
Stern snatched up the revolver and leveled it.
"Stop there!" he shouted. "Another step and I--I--"
The old man hesitated, one hand holding the staff, the other groping out vacantly in front of him, as though to touch the prisoners. Behind him, the dull blue light cast its vague glow. Stern, seeing his bald and shaking head, lean, corded hand, and trembling body wrapped in its mantle of coarse brown stuff, could not finish the threat.
Instead, his pistol-hand dropped. He stood there for a moment as though paralyzed with utter astonishment. Outside, the chant had ceased. Through the doorway no living beings were visible--nothing but a thin and tenuous vapor, radiant in the gas-flare which droned its never-ending roar.
"In the name of Heaven, who--what--are you?" cried the engineer, at length. "A man who speaks English, here? Here?"
The aged one nodded slowly, and once again groped out toward Stern.
Then, in his strangely hollow voice, unreal and ghostly, and with uncertain hesitation, an accent that rendered the words all but unintelligible, he made answer: "A man--yea, a living man. Not a ghost. A man! and I speak the English. Verily, I am ancient. Blind, I go unto my fathers soon. But not until I have had speech with you. Oh, this miracle--English speech with those to whom it still be a living tongue!"
He choked, and for a space could say no more. He trembled violently. Stern saw his frail body shake, heard sobs, and knew the ancient one was weeping.
"Well, great Scott! What d'you think of that?" exclaimed the engineer. "Say, Beatrice--am I dreaming? Do you see it, too?"
"Of course! He's a survivor, don't you understand?" she answered, with quicker intuition than his. "He's one of an elder generation--he remembers more! Perhaps he can help us!" she added eagerly. And without more ado, running to the old man, she seized his hand and pressed it to her bosom.
"Oh, father!" cried she. "We are Americans in terrible distress! You understand us--you, alone, of all these people here. Save us, if you can!"
The patriarch shook his head, where still some sparse and feeble hairs clung, snowy-white.
"Alas!" he answered, intelligibly, yet still with that strange, hesitant accent of his--"alas, what can I do? I am sent to you, verily, on a different mission. They do not understand, my people. They have forgotten all. They have fallen back into the night of ignorance. I alone remember; I only know. They mock me. But they fear me, also.