"What was that?" I asked twenty minutes after we had left Tom and Juarez. We stopped and listened intently. There was the faint sound of a distant report.
"They have found it," exclaimed Jim.
We took the back trail and we made good time too. In a short while we saw the two of them way down the wall of the canyon. They waved their hands to us.
"We have got it," yelled Tom when we came within hearing.
"What, the treasure?" cried Jim.
"No, the side canyon," replied Tom.
"My! how narrow," exclaimed Jim, as he got a first view of it.
"It looks just as if someone had taken an axe and split the wall right down," I remarked.
That expresses it. It was only a few feet across, extending the whole height of the cliff. In most places the light was shut out as in a cave, in other places there was just a narrow piece of blue ribbon for the sky and a little white sunshine spilt along one upper edge.
We went single file--in many places there was no other choice.
"This is what they call Fat Man"s Nursery," said Jim. "Fortunately we are a lean and hungry lot."
"How are we ever going to get out of this lateral?" asked Tom. "The gold chest will be high up."
"I tell you, Tom," said Jim. "Just put a foot on one side and the other on the other side and straddle up."
This really looked possible in some places. The floor of "Lean Canyon"
was mostly of solid rock, worn into hollows and curves by running water.
Occasionally we came to places where our way was blocked by some huge boulder that had fallen from the cliff above.
Or there would be one wedged in half way down from the top. It was a curious sort of a place.
"If you see an old woman"s face in the rock," said Juarez, "tell me; that is one sign on this trail."
We then realized that Juarez had not told us all his secret paper contained. It was the natural secretiveness of the Indian that he had not been able to throw off.
We traveled thus for half an hour, the canyon broadening, and then we came to a steady and rugged ascent.
"There is the face," exclaimed Tom suddenly.
There was no denying it. It was formed in the end of the western wall of the canyon, a perfect outline of an old woman"s face with a p.r.o.nounced chin and munched-in mouth.
"Yes, oh, yes," said Juarez, a dark flush showing on his cheeks. "She is looking at the place of the sign."
With great difficulty we made our way up to the top of the western end of "Lean Canyon," where we could ask the question of the sphinx who watched the sign of the treasure. In one place that was narrow we had to leap across to the other wall.
There was a fall of three hundred feet below us. If we had allowed ourselves to become nervous we might have missed the narrow ledge which gave us footing, but we were too eager in our quest to take account of danger.
Our moccasined feet helped to give us a secure foothold and we made the jump of six feet with safety. Juarez was the first to leap and he did it with a measured nonchalance, while Jim, with his long legs, seemed to step lightly across.
As Jim and Juarez stood on either side to catch me, I jumped with confidence. Tom, however, got a bad takeoff and would have fallen back into the canyon head first if Jim and Juarez had not gripped him.
It tested their steel sinews to maintain their balance and to keep from being carried down into the canyon below. We made our way without further incident to the top of the canyon and could see the outline of the old woman"s face three hundred feet above us.
She seemed to be looking at a great cliff about a half mile distant. We scanned every inch of the cliff for something that looked like the mystic sign, but even my imagination could not conjure up anything that resembled it.
Jim meanwhile had moved off some distance and was studying the old woman in the rock with the keenest interest and intelligence.
"Say, boys," he exclaimed suddenly, "she is not looking out or up. The old lady is looking down."
"It"s so," someone exclaimed. "Now we may locate it."
Jim moved from one point to another of observation. Finally he came to a pile of stones, something like a surveyor"s monument, only it was about ten feet high. This he climbed.
No sooner had he taken his position on top of the cairn, for such it seemed to be, than he gave a yell of exultation.
"I see it, boys. There"s the sign as big as life."
We were upon top of the cairn in a moment, that is to say, Tom and I were, but Juarez would not come up.
"No, no," he said, shaking his head. "I take your word, Jim, but I will not step up there."
"All right, my boy. I won"t urge you," said Jim good naturedly. He seemed to understand Juarez.
We followed the pointing of Jim"s hand and saw the ancient symbol [Symbol -O] about seventy feet below the old woman, upon the surface of a rock that curved out.
"That must be twelve feet across," said Jim, "in both directions."
"How do you suppose it was done?" I asked.
"By water possibly, and it may have been carved too," Jim replied.
"And the white coloring?" I inquired.
"It comes from some wash above, or it may sweat out of the rock itself."
"Well," said Tom, "let"s begin our search."
"I"m willing," responded Jim.
By cutting a few steps in the sandstone we were able to reach the sign.
As Jim was busily engaged with the pick upon the rock, making the red chips fly, he turned to us who were waiting our turn below.
"What does this remind you of, boys?" he asked.
"Of the moonlight night in our first canyon in Colorado," I said, "when we had to dig steps for you to get down from the cliff and an Indian took a snap shot at us with an arrow."
"Right you are," responded Jim.
"I hope we will get something really valuable this time," remarked Tom coolly.