I should," returned Biggles drily.
Leaving the machine where it had finished its run, they walked briskly to the ruins, for the buildings were no more than that, although it was obvious that at one time the place had been a town of importance. Certain buildings larger than the rest marked the sites of what had once been temples or palaces. The whole place, situated as it was on the edge of a chasm overlooking the southern forest, was in the nature of an eagle"s eyrie.
Ginger"s dream of gold was soon dispelled. With the exception of numerous broken potsherds, and a bronze hammer which Algy found, the houses-or as many as they visited-were empty.
I"m afraid we"re a few hundred years too late," smiled Biggles. "This place was either abandoned, or sacked, centuries ago. Still, it"s an interesting discovery, and archaeologists concerned with ancient American civilisations will be tickled to death when they hear about it." He pointed to an obelisk that stood in an open square, carved on its four sides. "That"s called a stele," he remarked. "There are any number of them in the forest. That weird-looking carving you can see is writing, but no one has yet learned how to read it. Mind you, I"m only speaking from what I"ve learned in books."
"You don"t think this is one of those old cities where excavations have been going on?"
inquired Algy.
"Definitely not, otherwise there would be trenches and other signs," answered Biggles. "
This is a new discovery."
"What I should like to know," put in Ginger, "is how on earth the people who lived here got up and down from the, forest-or did they spend their lives here?"
Even if they spent their lives up here, as they may have done after they were driven out of the forest by the people who conquered them, there must have been some way of getting up," replied Biggles. "If we look around we may find it."
It did not take them long to. Walking round the ruined wall, they came to an opening with the remains of an old gate, from which descended a staircase so fantastic that for a little while they could only stare at it with eyes round with wonder. It was partly natural and partly artificial. That is to say, a remarkable feat of Nature had been helped by the hand of man. It was fairly clear what had happened. At some period in the remote past, when the cliff-indeed, the whole mountain--was being formed, the rock, then in a plastic state, had settled down, leaving a narrow projecting cornice running transversely right across the face of the cliff, from top to bottom. The face of the cliff was not smooth, but in the form of gigantic folds, yet the cornice followed each fold faithfully.
There were places where it disappeared from sight behind mighty shoulders of rock.
In its original form the cornice had no doubt been extremely rough, and of a width varying from two to six feet, and in that state a mountain goat might well have hesitated to descend by it. Then had come man, presumably one of the extinct nations of America.
At any rate, men had worked at the cornice, cutting steps where they were required, so rendering the descent possible; but even so, the path was not one to be taken by a traveller subject to dizziness.
"Jacob"s Ladder," murmured Ginger.
Biggles nodded. "It certainly is a remarkable piece of work. I should say that it can"t be less than five or six miles from the top to the bottom, following the path, and therefore taking into account the irregular face of the cliff I remember reading in a book about Bolivia about just such a path on the eastern slope of the Andes. An amusing tale was told of an engineer being paid an enormous salary to superintend a gold mine at the bottom of the staircase; but when he got to it, and saw where he had to go, he not only chucked up the job but declared that he wouldn"t go down the path for all the gold in South America."
I don"t blame him," remarked Algy feelingly. I"d hate to go down this one."
Oh, I don"t know; it isn"t as bad as all that," returned Biggles. After all, some of the corniche roads in the Alps are pretty grim, and people who live in the mountain villages have to go up and down them constantly."
It must have been a colossal task, cutting those steps," put in Ginger.
"The ancients apparently liked colossal tasks," replied Biggles. "What about the pyramids of Egypt, and the Great Wall of China? This is nothing compared with them."
At this juncture, Dusky, who had so far remained silent, interrupted with the surprising statement that he had seen the bottom of the stairway. Interrogation elicited the information that while he had been working for Bogat, clearing undergrowth from the ruins in the jungle near the foot of a cliff, he had come upon just such a flight of steps leading upwards. Asked by Biggles if he had revealed this discovery to Bogat, he said no, the reason being that, although he did not know where the steps led, he thought they might one day provide a means of escape. He had made the discovery about six months ago, as near as he could judge.
"Well, I must say it seems highly improbable that there can be two such stairways,"
remarked Biggles. "In that case, if we followed these steps we should come out either in, or very near, the excavations where the Tiger and the two white men are working. When you think about it, that is not altogether surprising; in fact, it seems quite a natural thing that there should be a town at the foot of these steps as well as at the top."
"The question that seems to arise in that case is, has the Tiger discovered the staircase since the time Dusky was working at the bottom?" put in Algy.
I should say not," answered Biggles without hesitation. "If the Tiger had discovered the steps he would most certainly have come up here, and even if he didn"t start excavating-as seems probable-he would surely have left some traces of his visit-old tins, or ashes of the fires where he did his cooking."
"Yes, that"s reasonable," agreed Algy. "What it comes to, then, is this. If Dusky"s supposition is correct, we have discovered a way down into the Tiger"s camp."
"That"s it," nodded Biggles.
"What are we going to do?" queried Ginger eagerly. "I"m all in favour of doing a bit of exploring up here on our own account."
"We might have time to do that later on, but at the moment, since our stores are not unlimited, I think we owe it to Carruthers to stick to our job."
"You mean-go down the steps and try to get hold of the Tiger?"
"What else?"
Ginger looked at the stairway and drew back, shuddering. "Strewth! I"m not so keen on that. I don"t mind looking down from a plane, but to crawl down that dizzy path, with all that way to fall if we miss a step, doesn"t strike me as a jaunt to be undertaken lightly."
Oh, that"s all right," replied Biggles calmly. "All the same, I"m not entirely happy at the idea of all of us going. Somebody ought to stay to look after the machine. Apart from that, if we got in a jam going down we should all be in the same boat, whereas if somebody stayed behind he might be able to help the others."
"That"s sound reasoning," murmured Algy.
I"ll tell you what: let"s compromise," decided Biggles. "Algy, you and Dusky stay up here to keep an eye on things. Ginger and I will do a bit of exploring. If we find it"s easy going all the way down we"ll come back and let you know; on the other hand, ifwe find we can"
t get down, we shall have to come back anyway."
"Good enough," agreed Algy. "When are you going?"
"Right away. There"s no need to wait until tomorrow." "What about kit?"
"We"ll take a tin of bully and some biscuits, a water-bottle and our rifles. That ought to be enough-for the first trip at any rate."
This being agreed, the party returned to the machine, where the necessary kit was obtained and a meal taken. They then returned to Jacob"s Ladder. Biggles, with his rifle slung on his left shoulder, started down. Ginger, after a deep breath, followed.
6.
DOWN THE UNKNOWN TRAIL.
FOR the first hundred steps Ginger"s head swam to such an extent that he felt sick and dizzy; more than once he had to halt and lean weakly against the sheer wall of the cliff that rose up on the right-hand side of the path, hardly daring to look at the frightful void that fell away on his left. In places the cliff was more than sheer; owing to faults in the rock, the path had been dug so far into it that the wall overhung the steps. There were places, too, where the path projected over the abyss in the manner of a cornice, so that one false step would mean a drop of four thousand feet or more to the forest. A slight heat haze hung over the tree-tops, making them look farther away than they really were; it also gave the forest an atmosphere of mystery, and created an impression of looking down upon another world. Thus, thought Ginger, might a man feel descending to Earth from another planet.
Biggles appeared to be little troubled by the terrifying drop. He strode on, rifle on his shoulder, whistling softly, and stopping only to warn Ginger of bad places, places where the wind and rain had worn the steps away so that no more than a smooth, narrow projection remained.
However, one becomes accustomed to anything, and after the first hundred yards Ginger began to breathe more freely. Once, while Biggles was waiting for him, he remarked, "What would happen if we met somebody coming the other way? I should hate to try to pa.s.s anybody."
Biggles laughed softly. "I don"t think we shall meet anyone on this path," he observed lightly. "Save your breath; we shall need it coming back."
They went on. Condors appeared, stiff-winged, looking as big as gliders; they circled slowly, their heads turned always to face the invaders of their domain. Ginger eyed them nervously.
"We should be in a mess if they decided to attack us," he said anxiously.
"So would they," answered Biggles briefly, tapping his rifle.
Rounding the shoulder of rock that up to now concealed what lay beyond, they stopped for a moment to admire the stupendous view that unfolded before them; it seemed that the very world was at their feet. The path, after cutting into a colossal gorge, reappeared again on the far side, five hundred feet below; a mere thread it looked, winding down and down interminably. For the first time Ginger appreciated the full length of it.
I shouldn"t think the people who lived up top were ever invaded," he opined. "Why, a couple of men could hold this path against an army."
Easily," agreed Biggles. "I"d rather be the man at the top than one of the fellows coming up."
After that, for an hour they walked on with hardly a word. The heat flung down by the sun, and radiated by the rock, always intense, became worse as they descended. As Ginger remarked, it was like going down into a furnace.
They were nearing the bottom-at least, they were more than three-quarters of the way down-when the steps ended abruptly in a veritable chaos of rock. At first Ginger thought they had reached the foot of the stairway, but Biggles pointed out that this was not so, and investigation soon proved his theory, which was that in the remote past a landslide had fallen across the path, carrying a section of it away.
If we can find a way across this ma.s.s of detritus we ought to strike the steps again on the other side," he declared. "We know that the steps go right down to the forest, because Dusky saw them there."
"Yes, of course," answered Ginger.
All the same, anyone coming up the steps, encountering this pile of debris, might well think that they had come to the end of the stairway," resumed Biggles. "Unless they persevered, and forced a way across the landslide, they would not know that the steps continued and went right on up to the top. Let"s push on. Be careful where you"re putting your feet, because some of this stuff doesn"t look any too safe. If we started a movement the whole lot might slide again. Come on this seems to be the easiest way."
Biggles proceeded, choosing his path carefully, with Ginger following close behind.
From his point of view there was now at least one advantage: there was no longer the precipice to fear, for the route Biggles had chosen traversed the landslide.
And so they came upon the village. It was entirely unexpected, for there had been absolutely nothing to indicate its presence. Reaching the bottom of a steep incline, across a confused jumble of mighty boulders, they found themselves confronted by a drop of some thirty or forty feet into a pleasant valley which the giant forest trees had failed to cross. That is to say, the valley marked the top limit of the big timber. Trees could be seen on the far side, and these, presumably, went right on down to the forest proper.
There were no trees on the side where they stood regarding the scene. Nor were there any big trees in the valley, which was carpeted with verdant gra.s.ses and flowering shrubs. Up the centre of it ran a wide track, ending at a modern village. Actually, it appeared to be something more than a village, although they used the term for want of a better one. In the centre of a fairly extensive group of ramshackle buildings stood a fine bungalow, well built of heavy timber. At the back of it, and evidently a part of the premises, was a range of outbuildings roofed with corrugated iron. Radiating from this centre were rows of small houses. From a courtyard between the bungalow and the outbuildings smoke was rising lazily into the air from an outside cooking stove. A woman, conspicuous with a scarlet handkerchief tied round her head, did something at the fire and then disappeared into the house. Apart from some mules grazing higher up the valley, which appeared to end abruptly, there was no other sign of life.
As soon as Biggles and Ginger came in sight of this utterly unexpected feature they stopped, and after a few seconds" incredulous contemplation of it, sat down abruptly.
"Great Scott!" Biggles muttered. "What the deuce is all this?"
Ginger, squatting beside him, answered, "Don"t ask me."
Biggles regarded the village thoughtfully. "There"s only one answer," he said slowly. "The Tiger would never tolerate a second gang in the same area, so this must be part of his organisation. If that is so-and I"m convinced I"m right-then this might even be his secret retreat: the place Dusky spoke about. The fact that there are women-or at least one woman-here, proves fairly conclusively that this is a permanent settlement. The big house proves it, too, if it comes to that."
"So what?" inquired Ginger. "We should be taking a chance if we tried to cross that valley. There must be others here besides that woman we saw. We should be spotted for a certainty."
"We may not have to cross the valley," answered Biggles. "I have a feeling that this is our objective."
Ginger started. "What do you mean-our objective?"
"Well, we were only going to the bottom of the stairway in order to locate the Tiger"s headquarters. There was no other purpose in our going down. That bungalow, unless I am mistaken, is the palace of the King of the Forest, so there is no need for us to go any farther."
"What are you going to do-go back and let Algy know what we"ve found?"
I don"t think so-not for the moment, anyway. We should only have to come down again."
If Carruthers and his police were here we could raid the place," murmured Ginger.
"Quite, but they don"t happen to be here. In any case, there wouldn"t be much purpose in raiding the place if the Tiger wasn"t here. He"s the man we want-he and Bogat. Unless they are captured the racket would still go on."
Ginger shrugged his shoulders. "Well, you"re the boss. What"s the plan-or haven"t you got one?"
"There"s only one thing we can do, as far as I can see,," replied Biggles, "and that"s have a look round the village while we"re here, while the place is comparatively deserted. We may not get another such chance. Don"t forget that so far we have no actual proof of what the Tiger is doing-that is, proof that would carry weight in a court of law. It wouldn"t be any use just talking vaguely about the Tiger being a crook, a slave-driver, a chicle thief, without evidence to prove it. This may be our chance to get such evidence. I"
m going down into the village."
Ginger stared aghast. "Going down! You must be crazy."
"We shan"t collect any evidence sitting here."
"We could watch them, though, and spot what was going on."
Even so, I can"t see that we should learn more than we already know. We must get some concrete proof to secure a conviction. All the same, if we could capture the Tiger, or Bogat, and get back to the coast, we might hold him until we"d obtained the proof we need. Perhaps some of the slaves would give evidence. But we shan"t get any of these things sitting here. I"m going down."
"What do you want me to do? Shall I come with you, or stay here?"
Biggles thought for a moment. "I think you"d better come with me," he decided. "I may need a witness if I find anything-otherwise I should only have my unsubstantiated word."
"Suppose things go wrong? Algy won"t know what"s happened to us."
"We can easily get over that."
Taking his notebook from his pocket, Biggles tore out a page and scribbled a brief message to the effect that a village was in the valley just ahead, and they were going down into it. Returning to the stairway, he put the message under a stone in a conspicuous place, and built a little cairn beside it so that it could not be missed by anyone coming down. This done, they returned to the valley, and after hunting about for a little while found a way down into it.
"Keep this place in your mind"s eye," said Biggles quietly, surveying the spot where they had descended. "We may have to come back this way-in a hurry. Try to get a mental photograph of the silhouette of the rocks, in case we have to find it in the dark."
This did not take long, after which Biggles turned towards the village.
I think our best policy is to go straight up to the house," he surprised Ginger by saying. "
In fact, I don"t see that we can do anything else. There"s no real cover, so even if we tried stalking tactics it is almost certain that we should be seen; and if we were spotted skulking like a couple of thieves, there would probably be an outcry. I think this is a case of bluff. All the same, we needn"t expose ourselves unnecessarily; we"ll just stroll along, and if n.o.body sees our faces we may get away with it."
"You know best," agreed Ginger, "but it seems a risky business to me. I never was one for jumping into a lion"s den without first making sure that the lion wasn"t at home."
Biggles smiled, and walked on towards the village, the nearest buildings of which were not more than a hundred yards away.
They had covered about half the distance when Biggles touched Ginger on the arm, and with an inclination of his head indicated something that he had seen. The boundaries of the valley were now apparent. Hemmed in by cliffs, sometimes high, and, in a few places, fairly low, such as at the spot where they had entered it, there was only one proper entrance. This was a narrow pa.s.s at the southern end of the track, a mere defile through the rock wall, presumably where those who lived in the village descended to the forest some four hundred feet below. At this natural gateway two men were on guard; at least, they were armed with rifles. Smoking, they lounged against the wall of the pa.s.s.
If that is the only entrance to the valley, those fellows will wonder how the deuce we got in," said Biggles softly. "There is this about it, though; the people in the village-if there are any-knowing that men are on guard at the entrance, might suppose that we are here on business. My word," he went on, glancing round, "what a spot for a hide-out. Carruthers was right. An army might have wandered about in the forest for years without even suspecting that this place was here. It would need an army to capture it, too, against a score of determined men."
"There"s one thing that puzzles me," remarked Ginger. "Dusky said he found the foot of the stairway. Anyway, he saw a stairway, so we must a.s.sume that it was the terminus of the path we came down. Yet, judging by the way he mentioned it-he was actually clearing the jungle, you remember? it seems that those steps weren"t used, which means there must be another way up. In fact, the Tiger may still not know that Dusky"s stairway exists."
"By jove! I didn"t think of that," returned Biggles quickly. "You"re dead right. Whether they have known about the stairway all along, or discovered it since Dusky was there, it seems unlikely that it is used. There is probably an easier way down. It doesn"t matter at the moment, but we"ll bear it in mind."
By this time they had reached the village, still without seeing anyone apart from the two men on duty. A drowsy silence broken only by the hum of insects hung on the air.
Biggles avoided the main street, a dusty track often interrupted by outcrops of rock, which wound a crooked course between the houses-most of them little better than hovels-and kept to the rear of the buildings, moving steadily towards the big bungalow.