CHAPTER XX
_In the Footsteps of Quesada_
Once out of hearing, Stubbs, who had not spoken a word, broke out.
"If there ever was a devil treading the earth, it's that man. I'vetol' Danbury so from the first. Ye can't trust that sort. My fingersjus' itched along the butt of my weapin' all the while ye was talkin'.Seems though a man oughter have a right to plug sech as him an' bedone with it."
"You're prejudiced, Stubbs. I'll admit the man is queer, but, afterall, he is protecting his own beliefs and his own people. I don't knowas I would trust him any further than you, but--he is something of apathetic figure, too, Stubbs."
"Huh?"
"Looks to me almost like an exile. I've got more to hate him for thanyou have, but I don't very long at a time."
"Ye've got more t' like him for, too; he's doin' his best to git ridof Sorez fer you. But I says, 'Watch him. Watch him day an'night--mos' particlarly at night.'"
"But what did he mean by to-morrow? I don't know but what we ought tolet the treasure go and find Sorez first."
"Find Sorez and ye has ter help him; help him and the Priest fixes usimmejiate. Then where's yer girl? No, th' thing for us ter do is tergit th' treasure first and get it quick. Then we has somethin' terwork with."
"And if the treasure isn't there?"
"Get the girl an' make a run for home. The Priest won't touch her solong as he thinks she is jus' bein' fooled. If we joins th' band, hewon't think so an' will kill us all."
"I don't know but what you're right," answered Wilson.
They pushed their tired animals on to the foot of the mountain and,pausing here just long enough to catch their breath, began the longascent. It was no child's play from the first. The path was narrow,rocky, and steep, blocked by undergrowth and huge boulders, many ofwhich at a touch became loosened and plunged with a crashing roar downthe slope behind them. With any lesser incentive than that which drovethem on, they would have stopped a dozen times.
Ahead of them loomed the broken crater edge with just below it afringe of stubby trees which broke off abruptly where the barren lavabegan. The cone was like a huge sugar loaf with the upper third cutoff unevenly. The edges were sharp and made a wild jumble of cragswhich were broken by many deep fissures. Here and there the mountainwas split into a yawning chasm. But the growth extended to withinabout an eighth of a mile of the top. Here it stopped and the pathbecame nothing but a dizzy climb up a slope as steep and smooth as ahouse roof.
They tethered their animals on the edge of the green growth and hereStubbs set about making a camping place for the night.
"I don't want the dark comin' down on me," he growled as Wilsonsuggested leaving their things and pushing on to the top, "not until Ifinds a solid place fer my back where nothin' can come up behin'. Yougo on if ye wants to, an' I'll git things settled."
Wilson hesitated, but in the end he was drawn on. She lay beyond,somewhere upon the shores of the lake. It was a scramble almost uponhands and knees. It looked as though it were an impossibility for menheavily laden ever to make their way to the top. He turned once tolook back, and saw behind him the green sweep of the beautiful valleyof Jaula--then mile upon mile of heavy timber which extended to wherethe lusty mountains began once more. He attacked the trail anew and atthe end of twenty minutes reached the top, bruised, cut, andexhausted. He looked down within the cone--not upon death anddesolation, not upon ashes and tumbled rock, but upon the blue watersof the lake of Guadiva. It lay nestled within the bosom of this coneat a depth of just where, on the outside, the green began. The sunhad set early upon it and it now lay a grayish-blue surface surroundedby a luxuriant tangle of growing things. In a circle about it stoodthe dark buttress of the lava sides. It was like a turquoise set instone. The contrast to its surroundings was as startling as a livingeye of faultless blue in a grinning skull.
He did not have long to look at it--not long to search its borders forsome sign of the living. The dark came swiftly. As he was about toturn back, he thought he caught a glimpse of a spiral of smoke uponthe farther side, but as he stared at this, it faded until he was notsure it had been at all. He took it for a good-night message from her.Then gold and jewels, though they might be within arm's reach, becameas nothing before the deep desire which almost dragged his heart fromhis body--which almost sent him scrambling down the steep sides withinthe cone to make a wild dash to reach her side that night.
When he returned, he found Stubbs anxiously waiting for him withsupper ready and a shelter for the night picked out beneath two largerocks which effectively guarded their rear.
The next morning, as soon as the sun tipped with pink the snow-cappedtops of the Andes, Stubbs was up and studying the map again. The airduring the night had been sharp, but snugly wrapped in their blanketsboth men had secured a sound sleep. Towards the early morning,however, Wilson had begun to toss a little with thoughts of Jo. Itwas of her he first spoke. Stubbs interrupted him sharply.
"See here, m' son," he said with some irritation, "we ain't got but adarned short time in which to work. So th' only way is to mark out acourse now and stick to it. While you've been dreamin' of yerlady-love--which is right an' proper--I've been thinkin' on how we cangit her an' the other thing too. Here's the pint I hed reached whenyou interrupted me: first and foremost, ye can't git th' girl until yegits suthin' to git her with. Sorez ain't a-goin' to listen to youuntil ye can show him he's wrong. He ain't goneter b'lieve he's wronguntil ye can show him th' treasure. Secondly, the Priest gent ain'tgoneter sleep till he finds out what fer we are wanderin' 'round here.Thirdly, when he does find out, it ain't goneter be comfortable, as yemight say, to be seen in this here harbor. Fourthly, it ain't goneterbe easy to git away with what we does find with a couple of hundrednatives at our heels, which they will be mighty soon. So, says I, we'dbetter quit dreamin' an' begin fishin' right erway."
He paused to see what effect this had. Wilson nodded for him to goon.
"Then we'll take another p'int; this here map starts from the hutwhere the heathen image lived. Wherefore we've got ter find thet hutafore we can start. We've gotter lay our course from thet. So, says I,there's jus' one thing ter do--hunt fer it lively."
"On the other hand," broke in Wilson, "if Sorez is in danger, the girlis in danger. The treasure is going to be here for a while longer, butmaybe the girl won't. If we could combine forces with Sorez----"
"Well, I'm damned!" growled Stubbs. "See here, m' boy, the only thingthat will do is to bring the Priest down on _us._ If Sorez wasn'tcrazy, he wouldn't have come in here with thet idol with less than aregiment back of him. But he has, an' what we wanter do is ter keepouter the squall he's in."
"You don't understand the man. He is absolutely fearless. He knows theplace--he knows the natives--he knows the Priest. He won't be caughtnapping."
"Maybe so. Then he don't need us."
Wilson sprang to his feet. He was half ashamed of an obsession whichshut out thought of everything else but the girl.
"See here, Stubbs," he blurted out, "you're right and I'm a sicklysentimentalist. I've been thinking so much of her that I'm not fit foran expedition of this sort. But from now on I'm under your orders.We'll get this heathen treasure--and we'll take it down and show it toSorez--and we'll take the girl and fight our way out if we have to. Asyou say, we haven't much time and we've got to work hard. We know thehut is near the cone and overlooks the lake. Let's see----"
He reached for the map which he had fastened about his neck, butStubbs checked his hand.
"Easy, boy. Jus' as well not to let the shadders know we has maps.I've gut my copy here hidden in the grass. S'posin' the hut is in thecenter; this here docyment mentions two peaks--one 'kissed by the sun'which I take it is the highest, and t' other where 'the trees climbhighest.' Now at sea we often lays our course inshore by jus' sechmarks. I figgers it out this way; these p'ints bein' startin' p'intsfrom the hut mus' be somewhere nigh the hut. So if we finds thetallest peak on the horizon an' then the peak on the c
one where thetrees come up the farthest an' gits the two in line, we'll have astraight course for the hut. Ain't thet so?"
"Sounds right."
"Maybe it is; maybe it ain't. Anyhow, it's wuth tryin'. Now I'm forgivin' the burros lots er rope an' lettin' 'em nibble here. Then we'llhide our provisions in one place an' our ammunition in another andstart immedjiate. I 'spect there's a dozen of them niggers watchin'us. We'll take a good look roun' fore we begin."
Both men beat the bushes for the radius of a hundred rods or morewithout, however, bringing to light anything but a few birds. ThenStubbs piled the provisions and blankets together with the picks andshovels into a crevice between the rocks and covered them with dryleaves and bits of sticks. He made another reconnoitre before hidingthe ammunition. This he finally buried in another crevice, coveringit so skillfully that not a leaf beneath which it lay looked as thoughit had been disturbed. He piled a few stones in one place, notched atree in another, and left a bit of his handkerchief in a third spot,to mark the cache. Then, shouldering their rifles, the two men beganthe ascent.
Refreshed by their rest and the brisk morning air, they reached thesummit easily and once again Wilson gazed down upon the lake nowreflecting golden sunbeams until it looked as though it were of moltengold itself. Even Stubbs was moved by its beauty.
"Sorter makes you feel like worshipin' suthin' yerself," heexclaimed.
But he was the practical one of the two, or they would have got nofurther. His eyes swept the surrounding circle of peaks until theyrested upon a majestic pile which so clearly overtopped its fellows asto leave no doubt that this must be the one "kissed by the sun." Tothe right from where they stood the second landmark was equallydistinct, the green creeping up its sides several hundred rods higherthan upon the others.
"There ye are!" he exclaimed, pointing them out to Wilson. "Clear asthough they was labeled. An' now we can't stand here admirin' thescenery. There ain't no trolley to where we're bound."
He led the way, keeping as closely as possible to the crater's edge.But the path was a rugged one and frequently broken by half-hiddenravines which often drove them down and in a wide circle around. Itwas a place for sure feet and sound nerves for they skirted the edgeof sheer falls of hundreds of feet. Before they reached a positionopposite the crater peak, they found themselves almost down to thegreen line again. Here they discovered a sort of trail--scarcelymarked more than a sheep path, but still fairly well outlined. Theyfollowed this to the top again. When they looked down upon the lakeand across to the distant summit, they found the two landmarks inline. But neither to the right nor to the left could they see thehut--that magnet which had drawn them for so many miles over the sea.Stubbs looked disconsolate.
"Well," he said finally, "jus' my luck. Mighter known better."
"But we haven't given up yet," said Wilson. "Did you expect to find adriveway leading to it? You get out to the right and I'll explore tothe left."
Stubbs had not been gone more than ten minutes before he heard a shoutfrom Wilson and hurrying to his side found him peering into a smallstone hut scarcely large enough to hold more than a single man.
As the two stood there they felt for the first time the possibilitieswhich lay before them. The quest loomed larger and more real than everbefore. From a half ghost treasure it became a reality. As the firstactual proof of the verity of the map which they possessed it gavethem a keener vision of what was to come.
"Lord, if it should be true!" gasped Stubbs.
"Man--man, it is!" cried Wilson. "I feel it tingling through everyvein. We are on the very edge of the biggest treasure a man everfound!"
"What--did the paper say there was? Can you remember?"
"Gold plate and jewels--over six hundred pieces. No one knows howvaluable they are. Each one might be a fortune in itself."
"Gawd!"
Stubbs sat down on the threshold of the little hut. He drew out hispipe.
"Let's jus' think on 't a minute," he said.
It was not so much the money value these things represented thatappealed to the men. They could not grasp that. Nor was it theintrinsic beauty of the objects themselves. It was just the thrillingconsciousness of being within that golden zone which had been soughtby so many during so many centuries. Men from the four corners of theearth had come in search of what now lay within a day's reach of them;brave men, men who had made history. Yet they had failed; themountains had kept their secret and the little blue lake had laughedat their efforts.
Wilson broke the spell. He was feverish with the desire to go farther.It was the exciting finish to a long race; the last move in a puzzlewhich had challenged men for centuries.
"The map, Stubbs! We mustn't stop here now."
Stubbs put up his pipe and unrolled once more the bit of parchment.The directions now seemed brutally calm.
"From where the peaks kiss," he read, "take one hundred strides to theright."
"We must go back to there," said Wilson. "Come on."
He led the way at a run. This starting point was a distance of severalhundred yards from the hut itself. From there Wilson took the statednumber of steps. He stopped with a start upon the brink of a hiddenprecipice. The chasm was narrow, scarcely ten feet wide, and fromwhere he stood slanted so that the bottom could not be seen. But alittle way to the right of here one looked into a sheer drop whichended in darkness. Wilson wiped his forehead.
"I guess we had better remember what the Priest says about those withunsteady steps. Another yard and I would have gone down."
But Stubbs was again bending over the map.
"The brave do not falter," it read, "for the seeming is not always thetrue. The path leads down twice the length of a man's body, then tenpaces to the left. Again the seeming is not true, for it leads backagain and under."
"Lord!" exclaimed Stubbs, "Why couldn't he put this in plain English.There is no sense in that."
"The path leads down," repeated Wilson. "That can mean but one thing;it leads over the edge here."
"To what? You get into that hole an'----"
"Let's have a closer look."
The opposite side was smooth and sloped in so that it was lost beneaththe side upon which they stood. A man dropping over would strike thisslanting surface.
"If we had brought a bit of rope now."
"We'll have to take the next best thing," said Wilson. "Peel off yourcoat."
"You don't mean to go over the side, m' son?"
"It's only twice the length of a man's body," repeated Wilson. "Ifthat is so, I ought to strike something below--a ledge--that we can'tsee now."
"Better wait until we can get a rope. If it ain't so, you may drop amile."
"It would take two hours to go back. I believe that phrase 'theseeming is not always the true' means something. Those things were notput in there for nothing. And it isn't likely that such a treasure asthis was hidden where it could ever be found by accident."
He had stripped off his coat and stood waiting impatiently for Stubbs.The latter delayed.
"I'll be damned if you go down there," he said finally. "If anyonegoes, it's me. In these sorter hills ye can't tell how deep a holeis."
"I wouldn't drop any farther than you."
"Maybe not. But if anyone gits foolish round here, it's me." He added,looking Wilson squarely in the eyes, "There ain't no one waiting ferme to come back."
But Wilson refused to listen.
"In the first place, I'm the lighter man, Stubbs; and in the second,I'm the younger. This isn't a matter for sentiment, but bullstrength. I'm in earnest, Stubbs; I'm going."
For a moment Stubbs considered the advisability of attempting to knockhim down. It seemed foolish for the boy to risk his life to save amatter of two hours. But when he met again the stubborn eyes and thejaw which was locked upon the resolution, he recognized the futilityof further protest. He took off his coat and they tied the two sleevestogether.
"Once more afore ye start, boy,--won't ye consider?"
"Stub
bs, this isn't like you. There is no danger. Get a good bracewith your feet. You won't have to bear the full weight because I canclimb a little."
Without more ado Wilson let himself slowly over the edge. He slippedthe length of the sleeves, his feet dangling in the air over whatdepth he did not know. He swung his toes in either direction and feltthem strike the opposite wall. He lowered himself a bit more, and histoe rested upon what seemed a firm platform. He was on a projectionfrom the opposite cliff face which slanted under. He let go the sleeveand looked down. He found he could step from here to a narrow pathupon the nigh side where at this point the two walls came almosttogether. He was now beneath the place where he had started, whichhung over him like a canopy. The walls again separated below,revealing a dark cavern.
At the end of a few steps taken with his face flat to the rock, hefound himself again on a narrow trail which threaded its way over ayawning chasm. He moved slowly, shuffling one foot ahead and draggingthe other after it. In this way he had gone perhaps one hundred feetwhen the path seemed to come to an abrupt end. His foot dangled overnothing. He almost lost his balance. When he recovered himself, he wasso weak and dizzy that it was with difficulty he clung to the rock. Ina moment he was able to think. He had been moving on a downward slopeand it was probable that this was only a more abrupt descent in theshape of steps. One thing was sure: the path did not end here, if itreally was a path, and not a chance formation. The opposite ledge hadconstantly receded until it was now some thirty feet distant. The pathupon which he stood had narrowed until it was scarcely over eighteeninches wide at this spot. There was one other possibility: the ledgeat this point might have crumbled and fallen. In his progress he hadloosened many stones which rattled downwards out of hearing.
He secured a good balance on his left foot and cautiously loweredthe other. Inch by inch he groped down keeping his arms as faroutstretched as possible. Finally his toe touched something solid.He ventured an inch farther at the risk of losing his balance. Hefound a more secure footing and, taking a chance, rested his fullweight. The base was firm and he drew down the other foot. He was on awider path than that above. He paused here for the effort had made hisbreath come short. It was more the mental than the physicalstrain which had weakened him. It was nerve-racking work. The darkand the silence oppressed him. There was almost a tomb-like effectin this slit of the earth where man had not been for centuries.Once he had ventured to shout to Stubbs but his voice had sounded somuffled and the effort had produced in him such a panicky feelingthat he did not try it again.
Once more he shuffled forward and once more his foot dangled overnothing. But he had gained more confidence now and lowered it to findanother firm base. Two more steps came after this, and then the pathproceeded on the level once more. He had gone some forty paces on thislast lap when he was brought up against a face of solid rock. He movedhis hands over it as far as possible in every direction, but he couldnot detect any boundaries. It appeared to be a part of the cliffitself. But once more he recalled the warning, "The seeming is notalways the true." Then he tried to recall the details of thedirections. His map was about his neck but he was in such a positionthat it would be hazardous to attempt to reach it. In spite of themany times he had read it, he could not now remember a word. The morehe tried, the more confused he became.
After all, he had gone farther than he had intended. The thought ofreturning came as a relief. The next time he would have moreconfidence and could proceed with less of a strain. And so, step bystep, he began to retrace the path. He was forced to keep his cheekalmost flat to the rock. The dry dust sifted into his nostrils andpeppered his eyes so that he was beginning to suffer acutely from theinflammation. His arms, too, began to pain him as he had been unableto relieve them at all from their awkward position. The last fiftyfeet were accomplished in an agony that left him almost too weak toraise his voice. But he braced himself and shouted. He received noresponse. He lifted his head and reached up an aching arm for thesleeve which he had left dangling over the cliff. It was not there.With a sinking heart he realized that something must have happened toStubbs. The coats had probably fallen into the chasm below.
The Web of the Golden Spider Page 21