"Say," spoke up Ray, who had hitherto been a silent listener, "and I"ll bet that poor pickaninny will be telling the other pickaninnies what a narrow escape he had, and how he"s sure it was I and Norris that got after him."
We began now to think upon the next move. Robert was for making a trip to the _Pearl_, to see how Julian Lamartine and Rufe fared, and give them the news; and incidentally, he would add something to our stock of provisions. But Norris maintained that, while he felt it too bad to keep Julian so long in suspense, he felt more that there was no time to be lost. "Some roaming, black voodoo may happen to get an eye on us," he said, "and then we"d likely have a regular swarm of them about our ears.
And we"ve already seen evidence that Duran"s sailors must be getting restless."
Captain Marat agreed with Norris. "Julian weel be ver" patient," he said. "And there ees no time to lose."
And then, while we three boys and Carlos busied ourselves with making a cache of a portion of our belongings, the two elders set themselves to discuss, in some detail, a plan of action.
It must have been near midnight when we moved, all in single file. On our hands and knees, one after the other, we scurried through that vale of water and pa.s.sed into the cavern in the cliff; then up that steep slope within, and again down the more gentle, rocky slope without, on the other side of the high wall.
Each carried, mostly in his pockets, some little portion of the food that remained; and Norris had insisted on taking along his rifle with several rounds of ammunition.
"We"re not looking for any of that kind of trouble," he said, "but if--"
"Yes," interrupted Ray, "it"s sure to rain if you don"t carry an umbrella."
We found Duran"s rope ladder tucked up in the cedars, held by the halliard, which was taut, having been fastened among the vines on that sloping ledge down below. It took some tugging to tear loose the piece of vine to which the halliard was knotted down there; but at last it came away, and we got the ladder slung down the cliff-side.
When we all had got down to the ledge, we again hauled the ladder aloft, and tied the halliard to another piece of vine, so that Duran should not suspect that it had been tampered with. In twenty minutes we had made to that place in the brush where Ray, Norris, and I had pa.s.sed a night.
For the rest of that night we got what sleep we could, taking watches, turn about. Andy Hawkins had left one of the mosquito-bars at the place, which served the turn of the sleepers. Day had not yet dawned, when Hawkins crept into the brush--Norris and I chanced to be taking the watch at the time.
"I"m right glad to see as "ow ye"ve got back," he said, still at his bodily contortions. "The boss got back, an" "ee routed us hout, an"
seems to be a bit hoff "is hoats. "Ee ain"t noway satisfied with the way "ee"s gettin" out the bloomin" gold. "Ee says as "ow there ain"t a"goin to be much o" the stuff for any of us, if we don"t get a big "ustle on."
Norris put it to Hawkins that he was expected to help us this day to find the storehouse whence Duran took the gold that went out water-wise, through that hole in the cliff.
"I s"y!" began Hawkins, fairly dancing on the ground in his excitement.
"I got me orders from the boss long ago; and "ee marches the n.i.g.g.e.r an"
myself hoff to the diggin"s each day that "ee"s "ere, an" if I so much as turns me "ead to see w"ich way "ee"s goin", "ee"ll plug me carca.s.s full o" cold lead."
And then Hawkins told how, long ago, he had searched a cavern that he had found in the cliffs, during Duran"s absence, but had not got trace of Duran"s depository. And then, more than a year back, Duran had cooled his zeal for further search, by warning him that if his curiosity got the better of him, and he went poking his nose about those cliffs, he would certainly fall into a trap, and pull some tons of rock down on his head for his pains.
When day broke, Hawkins made a detour, going back to the huts; and Norris and I aroused such of our party as were still asleep. Our first move was to seek out and establish our headquarters on the other, north, side of the stream. And then while we made a cold breakfast, our plans came to a head. Ray and Robert were to try to keep an eye on Duran, while Captain Marat, Carlos, Norris, and I should visit the scene of the mining, and incidentally, to have a try at a piece of proselyting.
The four of us crept through the undergrowth on this north side of the creek, for some hundreds of yards. A harsh sound, like the shaking down of a furnace, presently set our ears alert. We crept forward till we came in view of the source. And there in the edge of the creek-bed stood Andy Hawkins, hoe in hand, stirring dirt and gravel in a long box, into the one end of which water flowed from a dam in the stream. Beside him was the negro lad, wielding a shovel. Another object caught my eye, for, perched on the edge of the box was a monkey.
As far as we could see up the stream the rocks were denuded of soil, showing that operations in this small way must have been going on a long, long time. Norris breathed fast, and his eyes shone with excitement. It was by no means the first gold-diggings his eyes had looked on, but the tussle with nature for her treasures was no less meat for the keen spirit of this soldier of fortune than the smell of battle in any appealing cause.
Captain Marat and Carlos moved forward. Then the black boy discovered them, dropped his shovel in panic, and was about to flee. But Carlos spoke a word in a soft tone, and the lad stood, staring his wonder.
Carlos and Marat, together, engaged the black lad in talk; and Norris and I joined the group. A pair of mining pans lay nearby, and two wooden buckets stood on the ground. I could see shining, yellow particles of gold in the long box, called a Long Tom by the miners, as I learned.
Norris scrutinized every detail, and poked among the gravel with the acutest interest.
At last Jean Marat turned to Norris and myself, and gave us some part of the black boy"s story; more of it came to us, piecemeal, later.
He had a very imperfect recollection of the coming into this hidden vale. Indeed, he was a creeping babe when his father carried him there.
The father, he said, was a cripple, with a very crooked leg, and who ever lived in great fear of Duran, and whose sole business was the digging in the creek, and separating out the yellow grains, and tending the chickens, and waiting upon Duran when he appeared.
The father told him nothing of the world without, but ever taught him to seek to please Duran and never ask questions; and that one day they would move from the place into another world, and live happy in a home of their own. It was some years after the boy had become strong enough for the work, that his father went to his sleep one night never to waken. It appears that the boy drooped with his loneliness, thereafter, and Duran brought him the monkey for a companion. And then, finally, he came with the grimacing white man (Andy Hawkins). Duran warned him, on pain of death, not to seek to learn any words of the white man"s language, nor to make the white wise in any of his French speech.
Jean Marat said the black lad was struck with wonder at some simple things he had told him of the world; and he was greatly elated over Marat"s promise to take him to witness what was described.
"Do you think he"ll have the wit to hold his tongue?" asked Norris.
Marat spoke with the lad again, who listened with intentness, and nodded eloquently.
"He understand the importance to not betray us," said Marat. "We can depend on him."
The monkey had scrambled to the black boy"s shoulder on our first appearance; and he eyed us, and seemed to scold, during the whole talk.
It was the same animal, without the least doubt, that we had come upon far up on the higher cliffs of the mountain that overlooked this vale.
It was arranged that Hawkins should come to us in our covert, whenever the opportunity should offer, and bring some small quant.i.ty of provision. We did not scruple to take some sustenance of Duran"s providing, since it was paid for out of Carlos" gold.
"Blyme-me if I don"t fetch ye a roasted chicken," said Andy Hawkins, punctuating his speech with a violent jerking of his shoulders. "I can roast it right under the boss" nose, an" "ee won"t see it. Oh, Hi"m slick, Hi am."
And then, astonishing thing! He began to distribute among us, things that he had conjured out of our pockets; some rifle cartridges to Norris, a knife to Marat, my flash-lamp. And then another curious thing happened. The monkey, witnessing this distribution, scrambled down to the Long Tom, plunged in his fist, and handed up to me--who chanced to be nearest--a little gold nugget, the size of a bean. He looked up, watching me while I tied the little lump of gold in a corner of my handkerchief and tucked it into my pocket. He let me take his hand by way of thanking him, and took kindly to the fondling bestowed on him; climbing to my shoulder, looking into my face, and chirping some kind of monkey talk.
We finally tore Norris away from his explorations in the diggings, which he declared still held unlimited store of gold, and we got back to our new camp site. Carlos and I forded the creek, to go to seek out Ray and Robert. And we found them at the edge of the clearing wherein stood those structures.
They were just on the point of moving over to the path that went down to the lower western end of this sunken vale. For they said that Duran had just gone that way, carrying a pack on his back, having come out of the thick wood at the rear of the huts.
"Well," I suggested, "if you, Ray, will go with Carlos and have an eye on Duran, Bob and I can slip over into that brush and see if we can find the place where he gets his goods."
We found the way easy going in the woods for a piece; but when we neared the cliffs of this south wall of the vale, the undergrowth impeded us.
With much going about, we finally won in to the cliffs; and after moving some way to the east, we came upon the mouth of a cavern.
"There!" said Robert. "How about that?"
But Hawkins had been all through that, as he had a.s.sured us, and we must seek elsewhere.
We finally concluded that we had better have taken the way in the other direction, along the cliff foot, and so we retraced our steps. The farther to the west that we went, the more dense the tropic growth. The damp heat here, too, was stifling, and our progress was most slow. We had struggled on, keeping close to the high, sheer, rocky wall for half an hour, almost, and finding nothing to our present interest, when a cautious whistle brought us to a stand. We moved out toward the sound and joined Ray, who informed us that Duran was on his way back.
"There"s no telling where he"ll come through here," I said. "Let us get back across the clearing."
When Duran appeared, after one look toward the huts, he plunged into that brush we had just come out of. In twenty minutes he appeared again, and again he stooped under a heavy pack. He but repeated that journey down the path that he had made so many times before. Carlos had continued on down the vale, Ray said, to discover where Duran went to set afloat the gold-laden bamboo.
I have forgotten how many trips Duran made this day, transporting that gold. As often as we sought to discover whence he took his freight, we came no nearer a solution of that mystery than on that first search in the back of that jungle. Once, when Duran climbed out by his ladder, to go to that cavern where he made temporary storage of the treasure, Norris took Andy Hawkins" place at the diggings, while that gesticulating individual went to act as guide to the rest of us in the search. But he proved as helpless as the rest. So when night found us all gathered together in our cheerless camp, we were conscious of a day pa.s.sed with meager progress.
"Wherever that hiding place is," Norris was saying, "I"ll bet there"s a big heap of the stuff there."
"But he"s been toting a lot of it away," suggested Ray.
"Toting it away!" burst out Norris. "Ask Captain Marat, here, what that n.i.g.g.e.r told him about the lot of stuff that"s been mined all these years."
"Yes," agreed Jean Marat, "thad boy say ver" ver" much gold have come out of thee creek. I theenk not one ten" part have Duran take away."
It was not long till Andy Hawkins appeared. And true to his word, he brought a roast chicken.