The Ghost of St. Elmo

by L. Parks Sanford

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  MINE CAVE IN

  We rode hard for about ten minutes until Katie abruptly pulled up to the entrance of an old mine and quickly slid off her saddle. We tied our horses to the decaying trunk of an old pinion pine and scouted around the area but could see no tracks or signs of anyone. I grabbed my flashlight from my saddlebags, turned it on, and we carefully entered the darkness leading into the side of the mountain. It was nothing like our entrance at Falcon Falls Lake back home. The three of us could easily stand erect and maneuver our way into its dark belly. As we trampled our way through the cold darkness, we listened intently for any sounds. We could see by the bright beam of light shining from the flash light that there was a tunnel straight ahead that sloped sharply downward into the musty darkness. As we trekked deeper into the bowels of the mine, we suddenly reached the flat floor of the cave and stopped in our tracks. There were the remnants of an old campfire, rusty cans, cigarette butts and a discarded shovel with a broken handle.

  “Looks like someone visits here frequently,” Zack said. His voice echoed hauntingly in the chilly cavern. I was about to reply when we heard the sound of muffled voices.

  “Did you hear that?” Katie whispered.

  “I sure did,” I answered quietly. We all froze in our tracks, trying to become as one with the silence and darkness that surrounded us. As the three of us froze, the voices came closer.

  “Ga – Ga – Ghosts,” Zack stuttered as he grabbed my arm. We switched off the light and stood as still and quietly as possible.

  The voices soon faded away as quickly as they had come. We waited cautiously, being quiet for a few minutes, but it felt like an eternity. I guardedly moved away from the cave wall and turned on the light. Katie and Zack quickly moved in behind me. I kneeled down by an old campfire and searched through the ashes. I sifted through as carefully as possible hoping to find any clues as to who had been here. Zack and Katie both soon joined in. “Hey, what’s this?” Zack asked, holding a piece of old wood. He rubbed it with his fingers and blew as much dirt away as he could. “I think this is a piece of bone,” Zack said. “It’s got a letter on it, I think.”

  “Let me see,” Katie said excitedly as she jerked it from his hands. “It’s a…I think it’s a…it’s a J…J…JG…the initials of someone named JG. JG? . .JG? . .Jeb Griswold! This belongs to Jeb,” Katie said astonished.

  “Who’s Jeb?” Zack asked.

  “He’s our foreman,” Katie answered.

  “Your foreman? What’s he doing in here?” Katie rubbed the piece harder.

  “You know what this is?” Katie shot back. “This is a bone handle to his pistol. Keep looking,” Katie said. “Maybe there’s more.” We all joined in and clawed at the loose, powdery soil around us. As cold as it was, we were all soon sweating and panting from all the excitement. Zack strode off by himself toward the broken shovel.

  “Hey, you guys, what’s this?” Zack asked. I shined the light quickly in his direction and saw he had what looked like a piece of paper in his hand. Katie and I stood up and walked in his direction.

  Just as Zack sat down leaning against the wall of the mine, we heard a loud cracking noise from above. I quickly shined the light in the direction of the ominous sound. “Look out!” I cried out to Katie and Zack. I ran toward Zack and dove straight at him driving my shoulder hard into his stomach, knocking him backwards. No sooner had I done that than we heard a thunderous rumble and saw the ceiling was sagging and collapsing all around us. I quickly grabbed Katie’s hand and pulled Zack by his shirt, running to the opposite side of the mine. Then we took shelter beneath an old, rusted, iron ore car. The sounds all around us rumbled with a deafening roar as the rocks smashed down on each other, exploding on impact.

  “Holy cow!” Zack said, staring at the collapse in awe. “You saved our lives. That’s another one I owe you, good buddy,” he said, pushing his hand toward mine and squeezing it tightly as we shook. I knew in my heart how he felt, for I felt the same way about him. The bond we had developed in the orphanage was very strong. He was my family, and I was his. We were like brothers and watched out for each other and had shared many exciting times together.

  I shined the light toward the cave-in but could see nothing through the thick, billowing dust. We started coughing and covering our mouths with our hands to help keep the dust from choking us. “Let’s get out of here,” Katie shouted. “I can’t breathe.”

  “Don’t panic, Katie. We’ll be alright.” Zack urged, trying to reassure her.

  “How do we get out of here?” she shot back.

  “Well, we’ll…we’ll…we’ll just have to dig our way out,” Zack answered. As the dust began to settle, we could see huge, jagged pieces of rock and rotting wooden timbers that had fallen from the ceiling above. We crawled out from beneath the old ore car as the dust began to slowly settle. I shined the light toward the tunnel we had entered through. It was totally blocked.

  “Don’t worry. We can still dig through,” I tried to reassure them. “Here Katie, you shine the light while we try to move this stuff.” Zack and I dug in and started moving pieces of stone and wood out of the way. In a few short minutes we were out of breath and soaked from head to toe with perspiration.

  “We’re not going to make it,” Zack said panting harder. “We have no idea how far this cave-in extends.”

  “We can’t give up,” I quickly answered, trying to encourage Zack. I leaned back against the cold, damp wall to regain some energy. Katie turned off the light to conserve the batteries, and we sat still and silent in the cold darkness.

  A few minutes had passed when Katie suddenly whispered, “Do you feel that?”

  “Feel what?”

  “Come here,” she said quietly. “Feel this.” We carefully moved in her direction as she switched on the light. “Do you feel it?” Katie asked, holding her hand up in the air behind her. Zack and I put our hands by hers.

  “Yeah! I do feel it. It’s a breeze blowing,” I said excitedly. “Come on! Let’s dig.” The three of us started pawing wildly at the loose stone behind us. We knew our situation was becoming desperate, and that thought alone drove us even harder. After what seemed like hours, we suddenly broke through the final foot, and Zack and I fell headfirst into a large, dimly lit cavern. We glanced back at Katie kneeling about eight feet above us shining the light our way.

  “Wow! Another tunnel,” she exclaimed. “Give me a hand and help get me down.” Zack and I stood up, brushed ourselves off and climbed toward Katie. Zack took one arm, and I grabbed the other and gently helped her down. The three of us stood there looking around. “Looks like another tunnel,” Katie said as she slowly and carefully walked forward. “Let’s get out of here,” she said as she walked in my direction. “Here. You lead the way,” she said handing me the flashlight.

  “Okay,” I agreed as we all headed off single file into the unknown darkness. This passage way was much smaller and narrower and called for us to crawl on our hands and knees in some spots. We walked, crawled and slithered on our stomachs until at last we saw a glimmer of light. We were ecstatic and about to shout out with excitement about our success, when out of nowhere we heard the sound, once more, of muffled voices.

  We all froze, not making a noise or moving a muscle. Was someone up ahead waiting for us? Putting my finger to my mouth, I motioned to Zack and Katie to be quiet. I started cautiously moving toward the voices and the entrance to the tunnel. I stopped quickly when I heard a man’s voice. “Don’t worry. Those bratty kids won’t be nosin’ round no more,” he laughed. “I guess now they’ll always be in the dark about us,” the voice continued. “Get it?…In the dark?”

  “Ha Ha Ha Ha,” they all laughed.

  “Never did like that little blond,” came a gruff voice. “She was nothing but a spoiled brat.”

  In the meantime Katie had crawled forward and overheard their remarks. She looked at me and silently mouthed the word, “Slim.” She was right. That was Sl
im’s voice. But why?

  “Are you sure that tunnel was completely blocked?” came an angry voice. “Get back in there and check! I don’t want any slip-ups. Go in the side vent,” the voice of mystery man ordered. I quickly turned and motioned to the both of them to back up. The whistling wind shooting through the mine helped cover up any noise we made as we quickly retreated.

  Suddenly a man’s figure appeared in the opening, and he began moving in our direction on all fours. We had backed up about fifty feet when we could see the approaching figure suddenly stop. But, why? The figure muttered something under his breath, sat back against the wall and lit up a cigarette. The unmistakable stench of the smoke drifted past our noses. There was no mistake; it was Slim. He sat there for a few minutes and then abruptly turned and headed back out toward the others. He stood up and stretched as he exited. “They’re goners,” he told the others. “It’s nothing but a heap of rock in there. Old man McVicars gonna be one sad man tonight. Come on. Let’s get outta here. We got work to do.”

  We could hear the whinny of horses as they headed away. Just to be on the safe side, we waited a few more minutes, then headed out into the cold, windy and snowy brightness. We had been gone for hours, and the snow had become quite deep. You could see the storm blowing across the wide valley below, and we realized this was our signal to get back to the ranch. We had traveled about fifteen miles over timbered ridges and stony, bad trails. Now, the trip home would be even tougher with the ice and snow accumulations of the last few hours. But, first we had to find our horses. We had entered the mine through one tunnel, but we were forced to exit from another. Where were we?

  I walked forward a few steps, and discovered we were on a narrow trail that led to the valley below. We all trekked slowly being very cautious as we approached the side of the steep hill. Squinting and peering through the heavy snow and biting winds, we could barely make out the dark outline of a horse in the distance. “Come on. Let’s get out of here before we freeze to death,” Katie implored. There was no arguing with that statement. We started our descent down the narrow, slippery trail with me leading, Katie following and Zack taking up the rear, as usual. The hike down was long and steep and hard on our bodies as we slipped and fell frequently on the uneven terrain. By the time we finally reached the road below, we were all soaked and feeling icy cold. We took off running as best we could through the deep snow toward the horses. “Yes!” Katie shouted. “Let’s get out of here!” We approached our horses and brushed the snow from the saddles and quickly mounted. Kneeing them hard, we set out heading into the cold and stormy, west wind.

  Shortly, we arrived at the small creek we had ridden through, but by now it had become a raging torrent. We came to an abrupt halt so that we could survey how to proceed, and the horses began pawing at the snow to uncover any grass to chew. As we looked around, we could see snow slides on all the steep mountains that surrounded us and realized our travels were going to be very difficult. There were no signs of any wild game to be seen, and the valley seemed eerily quiet other than the harsh wind whistling through the pines scattered throughout the rocky cliffs.

  “We’re in trouble,” Zack whispered in my ear, so as to not frighten Katie.

  “It doesn’t look good,” I quietly answered. The snow was drifting badly and beginning to pile up.

  “Follow me!” Katie yelled through the howling wind. “Let’s head for Brice’s Canyon.” I hadn’t heard of Brice’s Canyon before this, but I knew Katie had grown up on this land and probably knew every square inch. This was becoming a horrible day, snowing and blowing furiously, and we all knew we had to get back to the ranch quickly. Our bodies were telling us so. I also knew enough about horses to realize they were in danger, also. If we allowed the horses to drink the icy, cold water for any extended time, they would become chilled and could rapidly lose strength and could die. We accepted Katie’s invitation without a dissenting voice and kept up with her pace. We continued riding hard through the deepening snow and blowing gale until we could see a large rock formation ahead. We followed an old road, up a ravine, from the bottom of a mountain for about a mile.