The Gold Hunters by James Oliver Curwood (page 3)

“Yes–but you. How–“

“Oh, I’ll swim!” said Wabi in rank bravado. “I don’t mind a little whirlpool like that at all!”

Mukoki chuckled in high humor, and Roderick asked no more questions, but at Wabi’s command dug in his paddle and kept at it until the birch bark safely made the point of land beyond the rock. When he looked back Wabi had tied the rope around his body and was already waist deep in the water. At a signal from Mukoki the young Indian plunged fearlessly into the edge of the whirlpool and like a great floundering fish he was quickly pulled across to safety. Most of his clothes had been brought over in the canoe, and after Wabigoon had exchanged his wet garments for these the adventurers were ready to continue their journey down the chasm. A short portage brought them to the main channel of the stream, where they once more launched their birch bark.

“If the whole trip is as exciting as this we’ll never reach our gold,” said Wabi, as they slipped out into the swift current. “A madman, a whirlpool and a prison, all in one night, is almost more than we can stand.”

“There’s a good deal of truth in the old saying that it never rains but it pours,” replied Rod. “Maybe we’ll have smooth sailing from now on.”

“Mebby!” grunted the old pathfinder from behind.

Rod’s optimism was vindicated for that day, at least. Until noon the canoe sped swiftly down the chasm without mishap. The stream, to which each mile added its contribution of flood water from the mountain tops, increased constantly in width and depth, but only now and then was there a rock to threaten their progress, and no driftwood at all. When the gold seekers landed for dinner they were confident of two things: that they had passed far beyond the mad hunter’s reach, and were very near to the first waterfall. Memory of the thrilling experiences through which they had so recently run the gauntlet was replaced by the most exciting anticipation of the sound and sight of that first waterfall, which was so vitally associated with their search for the lost treasure. This time a hearty dinner was cooked, and it took more than an hour to prepare and eat it.

When the journey was resumed Mukoki placed himself in the bow, his sharp eyes scanning the rocks and mountain walls ahead of him. Two hours after the start he gave an exultant exclamation, and raised a warning hand above his head. The three listened. Faintly above the rush of the swift current there came to their ears the distant rumble of falling water!

Forgetful now of the madman back in the chasm, oblivious of everything but the fact that they had at last reached the first of the three falls which were to lead them to the gold, Wabi gave a whoop that echoed and reechoed between the mountain walls, and Rod joined him with all the power of his lungs. Mukoki grinned, chuckled in his curious way, and a few moments later signaled Wabi to guide the canoe ashore.

“We portage here,” he explained. “Current swift there–mebby go over fall!”

A short carry of two or three hundred yards brought them to the cataract. It was, as Mukoki had said after his long trip of exploration a few months before, a very small fall, not more than a dozen feet in height. But over it there was now rushing a thundering deluge of water. An easy trail led to the stream below it, and no time was lost in getting under way again.

Although they had traveled fully forty miles since morning, the day had been an easy and most interesting one for the three adventurers. On the swift current of the chasm stream they had worked but little, and the ceaseless change of scenery in this wonderful break between the mountain ridges held an ever-increasing fascination for them. Late in the afternoon, the course changed from its northeasterly direction to due north, and at this point there was an ideal spot for camping. Over an extent of an acre or more there was a sweeping hollow of fine white sand, with great quantities of dry wood cluttering the edge of the depression.

“That’s a curious spot!” said Wabi as they drew up their canoe. “Looks like–“

“A lake,” grunted Mukoki. “Long time ago–a lake.”

“The curve of the stream right here has swept up so much sand that the water can’t get into it,” added Rod, looking the place over.

Wabi had gone a few paces back. Suddenly he stopped, and with a half shout he gesticulated excitedly to his companions. Something in his manner took Rod and Mukoki to him on the run.

When they came up the Indian youth stood mutely pointing at something in the sand.

Clearly imprinted in that sand was the shape of a human foot, a foot that had worn neither boot nor moccasin when it left its trail in the lake bed, but which was as naked as the quivering hand which Wabigoon now held toward it!

And from that single footprint the eyes of the astonished adventurers traveled quickly to a hundred others, until it seemed to them that a dozen naked savages must have been dancing in these sands only a few hours before.

And Rod, glancing toward the driftwood, saw something else,–something toward which he pointed, speechless, white with that same strange excitement that had taken possession of Wabigoon!

CHAPTER XIII

THE THIRD WATERFALL

The others followed Rod’s arm. Behind him he heard the gentle click of Wabigoon’s revolver and the sharp, vicious snap of the safety on Mukoki’s rifle.

From beyond the driftwood there was rising a thin spiral of smoke!

“Whoever they are, they have certainly seen or heard us!” said Wabi, after they had stood in silence for a full minute.

“Unless they are gone from camp,” replied Rod in a whisper.

“Keep eyes open!” warned Mukoki as they advanced cautiously in the direction of the smoke. “No can tell what, I guess so!”

He was first to mount the driftwood, and then he gave vent to a huge grunt. The smoke was rising from beside a charred log which was heaped half-way up its side with ashes and earth. In a flash the meaning of the ash and dirt dawned on Rod and his companions. The fire was banked. Those who had built it were gone, but they expected to return. The naked footprints were thick about the camp-fire, and close to one end of the charred log were scattered a number of bones. One after another Mukoki picked up several of these and closely examined them. While Rod and Wabigoon were still gazing about them in blank astonishment, half expecting attack from a savage horde at any moment, the old warrior had already reached a conclusion, and calling to his companions he brought their attention to the tracks in the sand.

“Same feet!” he exclaimed. “One man mak’ all track!”

“Impossible!” cried Wabi. “There are–thousands of them!”

Mukoki grunted and fell upon his knees.

“Heem big toe–right foot–broke sometime. Same in all track. See?”

Disgusted at his own lack of observation, Wabigoon saw at once that the old pathfinder was right. The joint of the big toe on the right foot was twisted fully half an inch outward, a deformity that left a peculiar impression in the sand, and every other track bore this telltale mark. No sooner were the two boys convinced of the correctness of Mukoki’s assertion than another and still more startling surprise was sprung on them. Holding out his handful of bones, Mukoki said:

“Meat no cook–eat raw!”

“Great Scott!” gasped Rod.

Wabi’s eyes flashed with a new understanding, and as he gazed into Rod’s astonished face the latter, too, began to comprehend the significance of it all.

“It must have been the madman!”

“Yes.”

“And he was here yesterday!”

“Probably the day before,” said Wabi. The young Indian turned suddenly to Mukoki. “What did he want of the fire if he didn’t cook meat?” he asked.

Mukoki shrugged his shoulders but did not answer.

“Well, it wasn’t cooked, anyway,” declared Wabi, again examining the bones. “Here are chunks of raw flesh clinging to the bones. Perhaps he just singed the outside of his meat.”

The old Indian nodded at this suggestion and turned to investigate the fire. On the end of the log were two stones, one flat and the other round and smooth, and after a moment’s inspection of these he dropped an exclamation which was unusual for him, and which he used only in those rare intervals when all other language seemed to fail him.

“Bad dog man–mak’ bullet–here!” he called, holding out the stones. “See–gold–gold!”

The boys hurried to his side.

“See–gold!” he repeated excitedly.

In the center of the flat stone there was a gleaming yellow film. A single glance told the story. With the round stone for a hammer the mad hunter had pounded his golden bullets into shape upon the flat stone! There was no longer a doubt in their minds; they were in the madman’s camp. That morning they had left this strange creature of the wilderness fifty miles away. But how far away was he now? The fire slumbering under its covering of ash and earth proved that he meant to return–and soon. Would he travel by night as well as by day? Was it possible that he was already close behind them?

“He travels with the swiftness of an animal,” said Wabi, speaking in a low voice to Rod. “Perhaps he will return to-night!”

Mukoki overheard him and shook his head.

“Mak’ heem through chasm in two day on snow-shoe,” he declared, referring to his trip of exploration to the first waterfall over the snows of the previous winter. “No mak’ in t’ree day over rock!”

“If Mukoki is satisfied, I am,” said Rod. “We can pull up behind the driftwood on the farther edge of the lake bed.”

Wabi made no objection, and the camp site was chosen. Strangely enough, with the discovery of the footprints, the fire, the picked bones and the stones with which the mad hunter had manufactured his golden bullets, Mukoki seemed to have lost all fear of the wild creature of the chasm. He was confident now that he had only a man to deal with, a man who had gone “bad dog,” and his curiosity overcame his alarm. His assurance served to dispel the apprehension of his companions, and sleep came early to the tired adventurers. Nor did anything occur during the night to awaken them.

Soon after dawn the trip down the chasm stream was resumed. With the abrupt turning of the channel to the north, however, there was an almost immediate change in the topography of the country. Within an hour the precipitous walls of the mountains gave place to verdure-covered slopes, and now and then the gold seekers found themselves between plains that swept back for a mile or more on either side. Frequent signs of game were observed along the shores of the river and several times during the morning moose and caribou were seen in the distance. A few months before, when they had invaded the wilderness to hunt and trap, this country would have aroused the wildest enthusiasm among Rod and his friends, but now they gave but little thought to their rifles. That morning they had set out with the intention of reaching the second waterfall before dusk, and it was with disappointment rather than gladness that they saw the swift current of the chasm torrent change into the slower, steadier sweep of a stream that had now widened into a fair-sized river. According to the map the second fall was about fifty-five miles from the mad hunter’s camp. Darkness found them still fifteen miles from where it should be.

Excitement kept Rod awake most of that night. Try as he would, he could not keep visions of the lost treasure out of his mind. The next day they would be far on their way to the third and last waterfall. And then–the gold! That they might not find it, that the passing of half a century or more might have obliterated all traces left by its ancient discoverers, never for a moment disturbed his belief.

He was the first awake the following morning, the first to take his place in the canoe. Every minute now his ears were keenly attuned for that distant sound of falling water. But hours passed without a sign of it. Noon came. They had traveled six hours and had covered twenty-five miles instead of fifteen! Where was the waterfall?

There was a little more of anxiety in Wabigoon’s eyes when they resumed their journey after dinner. Again and again Rod looked at his map, figuring out the distances as drawn by John Ball, the murdered Englishman. Surely the second waterfall could not be far away now! And still hour after hour passed, and mile after mile slipped behind them, until the three knew that they had gone fully thirty miles beyond where the cataract should have been, if the map was right. Twilight was falling when they stopped for supper. For the last hour Mukoki had spoken no word. A feeling of gloom was on them all; without questioning, each knew what the fears of the others were.

Was it possible that, after all, they had not solved the secret of the mysterious map?

The more Rod thought of it the more his fears possessed him. The two men who fought and died in the old cabin were on their way to civilization. They were taking gold with them, gold which they meant to exchange for supplies. Would they, at the same time, dare to have in their possession a map so closely defining their trail as the rude sketch on the bit of birch bark? Was there not some strange key, known only to themselves, necessary to the understanding of that sketch?

Mukoki had taken his rifle and disappeared in the plain along the river, and for a long time after they had eaten their bear steak and drank their hot coffee Rod and Wabigoon sat talking in the glow of the camp-fire. The old warrior had been gone for about an hour when suddenly there came the report of a gun from far down the stream, which was quickly followed by two others–three in rapid succession. After an interval of a few seconds there sounded two other shots.

“The signal!” cried Rod. “Mukoki wants us!”

Wabigoon sprang to his feet and emptied the five shots of his magazine into the air.

“Listen!”

Hardly had the echoes died away when there came again the reports of Mukoki’s rifle.

Without another word the two boys hurried to the canoe, which had not been unloaded.

“He’s a couple of miles down-stream,” said Wabi, as they shoved off. “I wonder what’s the matter?”

“I can make a pretty good guess,” replied Rod, his voice trembling with a new excitement. “He has found the second waterfall!”

The thought gave fresh strength to their aching arms and the canoe sped swiftly down the stream. Fifteen minutes later another shot signaled to them, this time not more than a quarter of a mile away, and Wabi responded to it with a loud shout. Mukoki’s voice floated back in an answering halloo, but before the young hunters came within sight of their comrade another sound reached their ears,–the muffled roar of a cataract! Again and again the boys sent their shouts of joy echoing through the night, and above the tumult of their own voices they heard the old warrior calling on them to put into shore. Mukoki was waiting for them when they landed.

“This is big un!” he greeted. “Mak’ much noise, much swift water!”

“Hurrah!” yelled Rod for the twentieth time, jumping up and down in his excitement.

“Hurrah!” cried Wabi.

And Mukoki chuckled, and grinned, and rubbed his leathery hands together in high glee.

At last, when they had somewhat cooled down, Wabi said:

“That John Ball was a pretty poor fellow at a guess, eh? What do you say, Rod?”

“Or else pretty clever,” added Rod. “By George, I wonder if he had a reason for making his scale fifty miles or so out of the way?”

Wabi looked at him, only partly understanding.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that our third waterfall is more than likely to be mighty close to this one! And if it is–well, John Ball had a reason, and a good one! If we strike the last fall to-morrow it will be pretty good proof that he drew the map in a way intended to puzzle somebody,–perhaps his two partners, who were just about to start for civilization.”

“Muky, how far have we come?” asked Wabigoon.

“T’ree time first fall,” replied the old Indian quickly.

“A hundred and fifty miles–in three days and one night. I don’t believe that is far out of the way. Then, according to the map, we should still be a hundred miles from the third fall.”

“And we’re not more than twenty-five!” declared Rod confidently. “Let’s build a fire and go to bed. We’ll have enough to do to-morrow–hunting gold!” The fourth day’s journey was begun before it was yet light. Breakfast was eaten in the glow of the camp-fire, and by the time dawn broke the adventurers were already an hour upon their way. Nothing but confidence now, animated them. The mad hunter and his golden bullets were entirely forgotten in these last hours of their exciting quest. Once, far back, Rod had thought with chilling dread that this might be the madman’s trail, that his golden bullets might come from the treasure they were seeking. But he gave no thought to this possibility now. His own belief that the third and last fall was not far distant, in spite of the evidence of the map, gradually gained possession of his companions, and the nerves of all three were keyed to the highest tension of expectancy. The preceding night Mukoki had made himself a paddle to replace the one he had broken, and not a stroke of the three pairs of arms was lost. Early in the morning a young moose allowed them to pass within a hundred yards of him. But no shot was fired, for to obtain the meat would have meant an hour’s loss of time.

Two hours after the start the country again began taking on a sudden change. From east and west the wild mountain ridges closed in, and with each mile’s progress the stream narrowed and grew swifter, until again it was running between chasm walls that rose black and silent over the adventurers’ heads. Darker and gloomier became the break between the mountains. Far above, a thousand feet or more, dense forests of red pine flung their thick shadows over the edge of the chasm, in places almost completely shutting out the light of day. This was not like the other chasm. It was deeper and darker and more sullen. Under its walls the gloom was almost that of night. Its solitude was voiceless; not a bird fluttered or chirped among its rocks; the lowest of whispered words sounded with startling distinctness. Once Rod spoke aloud, and his voice rose and beat itself in the cavernous depths of the walls until it seemed as though he had shouted. Now they ceased paddling, and Mukoki steered. Noiselessly the current swept them on. In the twilight gloom Rod’s face shone with singular whiteness. Mukoki and Wabigoon crouched like bronze silhouettes. It was as if some mysterious influence held them in its power, forbidding speech, holding their eyes in staring expectancy straight ahead, filling them with indefinable sensations that made their hearts beat faster and their blood tingle.

Softly, from far ahead, at last there came a murmur. It was like the first gentle whispering of an approaching wind, the soughing of a breath among the pines at the top of the chasm. But a wind among the trees rises, and then dies away, like a chord struck low and gently upon some soft-toned instrument. This whisper that came up the chasm remained. It grew no louder, and sometimes it almost faded away, until the straining ears of those who listened could barely detect it; but after a moment it was there again, as plainly as before. Little by little it became more distinct, until there were no longer intervals when it died away, and at last Wabigoon turned in the bow and faced his companions, and though he spoke no word there was the gleam of a great excitement in his eyes. Rod’s heart beat like a drum. He, too, began to understand. That moaning, whispering sound floating up the chasm was not the wind, but the far-away rumble of the third waterfall!

Mukoki’s voice broke the tense silence from behind.

“That the fall!”

Wabigoon replied in words scarcely louder than a whisper. There was no joyful shouting now, as there had been at the discovery of the second fall. Even Mukoki’s voice was so low that the others could barely hear. Something between these chasm walls seemed to demand silence from them, and as the rumble of the cataract came more and more clearly to their ears they held their breath in voiceless anticipation. A few hundred yards ahead of them was the treasure which men long since dead had discovered more than half a century before; between the black mountain walls that so silently guarded that treasure there seemed to lurk the spirit presence of the three men who had died because of it. Here, somewhere very near, John Ball had been murdered, and Rod almost fancied that along the sandy edge of the chasm stream they might stumble on the footprints of the men whose skeletons they had discovered in the ancient cabin.

Mukoki uttered no sound as he guided the canoe ashore. Still without word, the three picked up their rifles and Wabigoon led the way along the edge of the stream. Soon it dashed a swift racing torrent between the rocks, and Rod and his companions knew that they were close upon the fall. A hundred yards or more and they saw the white mist of it leaping up before their eyes. Wabi began to run, his moccasined feet springing from stone to stone with the caution of a hunter approaching game, and Mukoki and Rod came close behind him.

They paused upon the edge of a great mass of rock with the spray of the plunging cataract rising in their faces. Breathless they gazed down. It was not a large fall. Wabi silently measured it at forty feet. But it added just that much more to the depth and the gloom of the chasm beyond, into which there seemed no way of descent. The rock walls rose sheer and black, with clumps of cedar and stunted pine growing at their feet. Farther on the space between the mountains became wider, and the river reached out on either side, frothing and beating itself into white fury in a chaos of slippery water-worn rocks.

Down there–somewhere–was the golden treasure they had come to seek, unless the map lied! Was it among those rocks, where the water dashed and fumed? Was it hidden in some gloomy cavern of the mountain sides, its trail concealed by the men who discovered it half an age ago? Would they find it, after all–would they find it?

A great gulp of excitement rose in Rod’s throat, and he looked at Wabigoon.

The Indian youth had stretched out an arm. His eyes were blazing, his whole attitude was one of tense emotion.

“There’s the cabin,” he cried, “the cabin built by John Ball and the two Frenchmen! See, over there among those cedars, almost hidden in that black shadow of the mountain! Great Scott, Muky–Rod–can’t you see? Can’t you see?”

CHAPTER XIV

THE PAPER IN THE OLD TIN BOX

Slowly out of that mysterious gloom there grew a shape before Rod’s eyes. At first it was only a shadow, then it might have been a rock, and then the gulp in his throat leaped out in a shout when he saw that Wabigoon’s sharp eyes had in truth discovered the old cabin of the map. For what else could it be? What else but the wilderness home of the adventurers whose skeletons they had found, Peter Plante and Henri Langlois, and John Ball, the man whom these two had murdered?

Rod’s joyous voice was like the touch of fire to Wabi’s enthusiasm and in a moment the oppressive silence of their journey down the chasm was broken by the wild cheers which the young gold seekers sent echoing between the mountains. Grimacing and chuckling in his own curious way, Mukoki was already slipping along the edge of the rock, seeking some break by which he might reach the lower chasm. They were on the point of turning to the ascent of the mountain, along which they would have to go until they found such a break, when the old pathfinder directed the attention of his companions to the white top of a dead cedar stub projecting over the edge of the precipice.

“Go down that, mebby,” he suggested, shrugging his shoulders to suggest that the experiment might be a dangerous one.

Rod looked over. The top of the stub was within easy reach, and the whole tree was entirely free of bark or limbs, a fact which in his present excitement did not strike him as especially unusual. Swinging his rifle strap over his shoulders he reached out, caught the slender apex of the stub, and before the others could offer a word of encouragement or warning was sliding down the wall of the rock into the chasm. Wabi was close behind him, and not waiting for Mukoki’s descent the two boys hurried toward the cabin. Half-way to it Wabi stopped.

“This isn’t fair. We’ve got to wait for Muky.”

They looked back. Mukoki was not following. The old warrior was upon his knees at the base of the dead tree, as though he was searching for something among the rocks at its foot. Then he rose slowly, and rubbed his hands along the stub as high as he could reach. When he saw that Rod and Wabi were observing him he quickly came toward them, and Wabigoon, who was quick to notice any change in him, was confident that he had made a discovery of some kind.

“What have you found, Muky?”

“No so ver’ much. Funny tree,” grunted the Indian.

“Smooth as a fireman’s brass pole,” added Rod, seeing no significance in Mukoki’s words. “Listen!”

He stopped so suddenly that Wabigoon bumped into him from behind.

“Did you hear that?”

“No.”

For a few moments the three huddled close together in watchful silence. Mukoki was behind the boys or they would have seen that his rifle was ready to spring to his shoulder and that his black eyes were snapping with something not aroused by curiosity alone. The cabin was not more than twenty paces away. It was old, so old that Rod wondered how it had withstood the heavy storms of the last winter. A growth of saplings had found root in its rotting roof and the logs of which it was built were in the last stage of decay. There was no window, and where the door had once been there had grown a tree a foot in diameter, almost closing the narrow aperture through which the mysterious inhabitants had passed years before. A dozen paces, five paces from this door, and Mukoki’s hand reached out and laid itself gently upon Wabi’s shoulder. Rod saw the movement and stopped. A strange look had come into the old Indian’s face, an expression in which there was incredulity and astonishment, as if he believed and yet doubted what his eyes beheld. Mutely he pointed to the tree growing before the door, and to the reddish, crumbling rot into which the logs had been turned by the passing of generations.

“Red pine,” he said at last. “That cabin more’n’ twent’ t’ous’nd year old!”

There was an awesome ring in his voice. Rod understood, and clutched Wabi’s arm. In an instant he thought of the other old cabin, in which they had found the skeletons. They had repaired that cabin and had passed the winter in it, and they knew that it had been built half a century or more before. But this cabin was beyond repair. To Rod it seemed as though centuries of time instead of decades had been at work on its timbers. Following close after Wabi he thrust his head through the door. Deep gloom shut out their vision. But as they looked, steadily inuring their eyes to the darkness within, the walls of the old cabin took form, and they saw that everywhere was vacancy. There was no ancient table, as in the other cabin they had discovered at the head of the first chasm, there were no signs of the life that had once existed, not even the remnants of a chair or a stool. The cabin was bare.

Foot by foot the two boys went around its walls. Mukoki took but a single glance inside and disappeared. Once alone he snapped down the safety of his rifle. Quickly, as if he feared interruption, he hurried around the old cabin, his eyes close to the earth. When Rod and Wabi returned to the door he was at the edge of the fall, crouching low among the rocks like an animal seeking a trail. Wabi pulled his companion back.

“Look!”

The old warrior rose, suddenly erect, and turned toward them, but the boys were hidden in the gloom. Then he hurried to the dead stub beside the chasm wall. Again he reached far up, rubbing his hand along its surface.

“I’m going to have a look at that tree!” whispered Wabi. “Something is puzzling Are you coming?”

He hurried across the rock-strewn opening, but Rod hung back. He could not understand his companions. For weeks and months they had planned to find this third waterfall. Visions of a great treasure had been constantly before their eyes, and now that they were here, with the gold perhaps under their very feet, both Mukoki and Wabigoon were more interested in a dead stub than in their search for it! His own heart was almost bursting with excitement. The very air which he breathed in the old cabin set his blood leaping with anticipation. Here those earlier adventurers had lived half a century or more ago. In it the life-blood of the murdered John Ball might have ebbed away. In this cabin the men whose skeletons he had found had slept, and planned, and measured their gold. And the gold! It was that and not the stub that interested Roderick Drew! Where was the lost treasure? Surely the old cabin must hold some clue for them, it would at least tell them more than the limbless white corpse of a tree!

From the door he looked back into the dank gloom, straining his eyes to see, and then glanced across the opening. Wabi had reached the stub, and both he and Mukoki were on their knees beside it. Probably they have found the marks of a lynx or a bear, thought Rod. A dozen paces away something else caught his eyes, a fallen red pine, dry and heavy with pitch, and in less than a minute he had gone to it and was back with a torch. Breathlessly he touched the tiny flame of a match to the stick. For a moment the pitch sputtered and hissed, then flared into light, and Rod held the burning wood above his head.

The young gold seeker’s first look about him was disappointing. Nothing but the bare walls met his eyes. Then, in the farthest corner, he observed something that in the dancing torch-light was darker than the logs themselves, and he moved toward it. It was a tiny shelf, not more than a foot long, and upon it was a small tin box, black and rust-eaten by the passing of ages. With trembling fingers Rod took it in his hand. It was very light, probably empty. In it he might find the dust of John Ball’s last tobacco. Then, suddenly, as he thought of this, he stopped in his search and a muffled exclamation of surprise fell from him. In the glow of the torch he looked at the tin box. It was crumbling with age and he might easily have crushed it in his hand–and yet it was still a tin box! If this box had remained why had not other things? Where were the pans and kettles, the pail and frying-pan, knives, cups and other articles which John Ball and the two Frenchmen must at one time have possessed in this cabin?

He returned to the door. Mukoki and Wabigoon were still at the dead stub. Even the flare of light in the old cabin had not attracted them. Tossing his torch away Rod tore off the top of the tin box. Something fell at his feet, and as he reached for it he saw that it was a little roll of paper, almost as discolored as the rust-eaten box itself. As gently as Mukoki had unrolled the precious birchbark map a few months before he smoothed out the paper. The edges of it broke and crumbled under his fingers, but the inner side of the roll was still quite white. Mukoki and Wabigoon, looking back, saw him suddenly turn toward them with a shrill cry on his lips, and the next instant he was racing in their direction, shouting wildly at every step.

“The gold!” he shrieked. “The gold! Hurrah!”

He was almost sobbing in his excitement when he stopped between them, holding out the bit of paper.

“I found it in the cabin–in a tin box! See, it’s John Ball’s writing–the writing that was on the old map! I found it–in a tin box–“

Wabi seized the paper. His own breath came more quickly when he saw what was upon it. There were a few lines of writing, dim but still legible, and a number of figures. Across the top of the paper was written,

“Account of John Ball, Henri Langlois, and Peter Plante for month ending June thirtieth, 1859.”

Below these lines was the following:

“Plante’s work: nuggets, 7 pounds, nine ounces; dust, 1 pound, 3 ounces. Langlois’ work: nuggets, 9 pounds, 13 ounces; dust, none. Ball’s work: nuggets, 6 pounds, 4 ounces; dust, 2 pounds, 3 ounces. Total, 27 pounds.
Plante’s share, 6 pounds, 12 ounces. Langlois’ share, 6 pounds, 12 ounces.
Ball’s share, 13 pounds, 8 ounces.
Division made.”

Softly Wabigoon read the words aloud. When he finished his eyes met Rod’s, Mukoki was still crouching at the foot of the stub, staring at the two boys in silence, as if stupefied by what he had just heard.

“This doesn’t leave a doubt,” said Wabi at last. “We’ve struck the right place!”

“The gold is somewhere–very near–“

Rod could not master the tremble in his voice. As though hoping to see the yellow treasure heaped in a pile before his eyes he turned to the waterfall, to the gloomy walls of the chasm, and finally extended an arm to where the spring torrent, leaping over the edge of the chasm above, beat itself into frothing rage among the rocks between the two mountains.

“It’s there!”

“In the stream?”

“Yes. Where else near this cabin would they have found pure nuggets of gold? Surely not in rock! And gold-dust is always in the sands of streams. It’s there–without a doubt!”

Both Indians went with him to the edge of the water.

“The creek widens here until it is very shallow,” said Wabi. “I don’t believe that it is more than four feet deep out there in the middle. What do you say–” He paused as he saw Mukoki slip back to the dead stub again, then went on, “What do you say to making a trip to the canoe after grub for our dinner, and the pans?”

The first flash of enthusiasm that had filled Wabigoon on reading the paper discovered by Rod was quickly passing away, and the white youth could not but notice the change which came over both Mukoki and his young friend when they stood once more beside the smooth white stub that reached up to the floor of the chasm above. He controlled his own enthusiasm enough to inspect more closely the dead tree which had affected them so strangely. The discovery he made fairly startled him. The surface of the stub was not only smooth and free of limbs, but was polished until it shone with the reflecting luster of a waxed pillar! For a moment he forgot the paper which he held in his hand, forgot the old cabin, and the nearness of gold. In blank wonder he stared at Mukoki, and the old Indian shrugged his shoulders.

“Ver’ nice an’ smooth!”

“Ver’ dam’ smooth!” emphasized Wabi, without a suggestion of humor in his voice.

“What does it mean?” asked Rod.

“It means,” continued Wabigoon, “that this old stub has for a good many years been used! by something as a sort of stairway in and out of this chasm! Now if it were a bear, there would be claw marks. If it were a lynx, the surface of the stub would be cut into shreds. Any kind of animal would have left his mark behind, and no animal would have put this polish on it!”

“Then what in the world–“

Rod did not finish. Mukoki lifted his shoulders to a level with his chin, and Wabi whistled as he looked straight at him.

“Not a hard guess, eh?”

“You mean–“

“That it’s a man! Only the arms and legs of a man going up and down that stub hundreds and thousands of times could have worn it so smooth! Now, can you guess who that man is?”

In a flash the answer shot into Rod’s brain. He understood now why this old stub had drawn his companions away from their search for gold, and he felt the flush of excitement go out of his own cheeks, and an involuntary thrill pass up his back.

“The mad hunter!”

Wabi nodded. Mukoki grunted and rubbed his hands.

“Gold in bullet come from here!” said the old pathfinder. “Bad dog man ver’ swift on trail. We hurry get canoe–cut down tree!”

“That’s more than you’ve said in the last half-hour, and it’s a good idea!” exclaimed Wabi. “Let’s get our stuff down here and chop this stub into firewood! When he comes back and finds his ladder gone he’ll give a screech or two, I’ll wager, and then it will be our chance to do something with him. Here goes!”

He started to climb the stub, and a minute or two later stood safely on the rock above.

“Slippery as a greased pole!” he called down. “Bet you can’t make it, Rod!”

But Rod did, after a tremendous effort that left him breathless and gasping by the time Wabi stretched out a helping hand to him. Mukoki came up more easily. Taking only their revolvers with them the three hurried to the birch bark, and in a single load brought their possessions to the rock. By means of ropes the packs and other contents of the canoe, and finally the canoe itself, were lowered into the chasm, and while the others looked on Mukoki seized the ax and chopped down the stub.

“There!” he grunted, as a last blow sent the tree crashing among the rocks. “Too high for heem jump!”

“But a mighty good place for him to shoot from,” said Wabi, looking up. “We’d better camp out of range.”

“Not until we know what we’ve struck,” cried Rod, unstrapping a pan from one of the packs. “Boys, the first thing to do is to wash out a little of that river-bed!”

He started for the creek, with Wabi close behind him bearing a second pan. Mukoki looked after them and chuckled softly to himself as he began making preparations for dinner. Choosing a point where the current had swept up a small bar of pebbles and sand Wabi and Rod both set to work. The white youth had never before panned gold, but he had been told how it was done, and there now shot through him that strange, thrilling excitement which enthralls the treasure hunter when he believes that at last he has struck pay dirt. Scooping up a quantity of the gravel and sand he filled his pan with water, then moved it, quickly back and forth, every few moments splashing some of the “wash” or muddy water, over the side. Thus, filling and refilling his pan with fresh water, he excitedly went through the process of “washing” everything but solid substance out of it.

With each fresh dip into the stream the water in the pan became clearer, and within fifteen minutes the three or four double handfuls of sand and gravel with which he began work dwindled down to one. Scarcely breathing in his eagerness he watched for the yellow gleam of gold. Once a glitter among the pebbles drew a low cry from him, but when with the point of his knife he found it to be only mica he was glad that Wabi had not heard him. The young Indian was squatting upon the sand, with his pan turned toward a gleam of the sun that shot faintly down into the chasm. Without raising his head he called to Rod.

“Found anything?”

“No. Have you?”

“No–yes–but I don’t think it’s gold”

“What does it look like?”

“It gleams yellow but is as hard as steel.”

“Mica!” said Rod.

Neither of the boys looked up during the conversation. With the point of his hunting-knife Rod still searched in the bottom of his pan, turning over the pebbles and raking the gravelly sand with a painstaking care that would have made a veteran gold seeker laugh. Some minutes had passed when Wabi spoke again.

“I say, Rod, that’s a funny-looking thing I found! If it wasn’t so hard I’d swear it was gold? Want to see it?”

“It’s mica,” repeated Rod, as another gleam, of “fool’s gold” in his own pan caught his eyes. “The stream is full of it!”

“Never saw mica in chunks before,” mumbled Wabi, bending low over his pan.

“Chunks!” cried Rod, straightening as if some one had run a pin into his back. “How big is it?”

“Big as a pea–a big pea!”

The words were no sooner out of the young Indian’s mouth than Roderick was upon his feet and running to his companion.

“Mica doesn’t come in chunks! Where–“

He bent over Wabi’s pan. In the very middle of it lay a suspiciously yellow pebble, worn round and smooth by the water, and when Rod took it in his fingers he gave a low whistle of mock astonishment as he gazed down into Wabigoon’s face.

“Wabi, I’m ashamed of you!” he said, trying hard to choke back the quiver in his voice. “Mica doesn’t come in round chunks like this. Mica isn’t heavy. And this is _both_!”

From the cedars beyond the old cabin came Mukoki’s whooping signal that dinner was ready.

CHAPTER XV

THE TREASURE IN THE POOL

For a few moments after Rod’s words and Mukoki’s signal from the cedars Wabigoon sat as if stunned.

“It isn’t–gold,” he said, his voice filled with questioning doubt.

“That’s just what it is!” declared Rod, his words now rising in the excitement which he was vainly striving to suppress. “It’s hard, but see how your knife point has scratched it! It weighs a quarter of an ounce! Are there any more nuggets in there?”

He fell upon his knees beside Wabi, and their two heads were close together, their four eyes eagerly searching the contents of the pan, when Mukoki came up behind them. Rod passed the golden nugget to the old Indian, and rose to his feet.

“That settles it, boys. We’ve hit the right spot. Let’s give three cheers for John Ball and the old map, and go to dinner!”

“I agree to dinner, but cut out the cheers.” said Wabi, “or else let’s give them under our breath. Notice how hollow our voices sound in this chasm! I believe we could hear a shout half a dozen miles away!”

For their camp Mukoki had chosen a site in the edge of the cedars, and had spread dinner on a big flat rock about which the three now gathered. For inspiration, as Wabi said, the young Indian placed the yellow nugget in the center of the improvised table, and if the enthusiasm with which they hurried through their meal counted for anything there was great merit in the golden centerpiece. Mukoki joined the young gold seekers when they again returned to the chasm stream, and the quest of the yellow treasure was vigorously renewed in trembling and feverish expectancy.

Only those who have lived in this quest and who have pursued that elusive _ignis fatuus_ of all nations–the lure of gold–can realize the sensations which stir the blood and heat the brain of the treasure seeker as he dips his pan into the sands of the stream where he believes nature has hidden her wealth. As Roderick Drew, a child of that civilization where the dollar is law as well as might, returned to the exciting work which promised him a fortune he seemed to be in a half dream. About him, everywhere, was gold! For no moment did he doubt it; not for an instant did he fear that there might be no more gold in the sand and gravel from which Wabigoon’s nugget had come. Treasure was in the very sandbar under his feet! It was out there among the rocks, where the water beat itself angrily into sputtering froth; it was under the fall, and down in the chasm, everywhere, everywhere about him. In one month John Ball and his companions had gathered twenty-seven pounds of it, a fortune of nearly seven thousand dollars! And they had gathered it here! Eagerly he scooped up a fresh pan of the precious earth. He heard the swish-swish of the water in Wabigoon’s and Mukoki’s pans. But beyond this there were no sounds made by them.

In these first minutes of treasure seeking no words were spoken. Who would give the first shout of discovery? Five minutes, ten, fifteen of them passed, and Rod found no gold. As he emptied his pan he saw Wabi scooping up fresh dirt. He, too, had failed. Mukoki had waded out waist deep among the rocks. A second and a third pan, and a little chill of disappointment cooled Rod’s blood. Perhaps he had chosen an unlucky spot, where the gold had not settled! He moved his position, and noticed that Wabigoon had done the same. A fourth and a fifth pan and the result was the same. Mukoki had waded across the stream, which was shallow below the fall, and was working on the opposite side. A sixth pan, and Rod approached the young Indian. The excitement was gone out of their faces. An hour and a half–and no more gold!

“Guess we haven’t hit the right place, after all,” said Wabi.

“It must be here,” replied Rod. “Where there is one nugget there must be more. Gold is heavy, and settles. Perhaps it’s deeper down in the river bed.”

Mukoki came across to join them. Out among the rocks he had found a fleck of gold no larger than the head of a pin, and this new sign gave them all fresh enthusiasm. Taking off their boots both Rod and Wabi joined the old pathfinder in midstream. But each succeeding pan added to the depressing conviction that was slowly replacing their hopes. The shadows in the chasm began growing longer and deeper. Far overhead the dense canopies of red pine shut out the last sun-glow of day, and the gathering gloom between the mountains gave warning that in this mysterious world of the ancient cabin the dusk of night was not far away. But not until they could no longer see the gleaming mica in their pans did the three cease work. Wet to the waist, tired, and with sadly-shattered dreams they returned to their camp. For a short time Rod’s hopes were at their lowest ebb. Was it possible that there was no more gold, that the three adventurers of long ago had discovered a “pocket” here, and worked it out? The thought had been growing in his head. Now it worried him.

But his depression did not last long. The big fire which Mukoki built and the stimulating aroma of strong coffee revived his natural spirits, and both Wabi and he were soon laughing and planning again as they made their cedar-bough shelter. Supper on the big flat stone–a feast of bear steak, hot-stone biscuits, coffee, and that most delectable of all wilderness luxuries, a potato apiece,–and the two irrepressible young gold hunters were once more scheming and building their air-castles for the following day. Mukoki listened, and attended to the clothes drying before the fire, now and then walking out into the gloom of the chasm to look up to where the white rim of the fall burst over the edge of the great rock above them. All that afternoon Wabi and Rod had forgotten the mad hunter and the strange, smoothly worn tree. Mukoki had not.

In the glow of the camp-fire the two boys read over again the old account of John Ball and the two Frenchmen. The tiny slip of paper, yellow with age, was the connecting link between them and the dim and romantic past, a relic of the grim tragedy which these black and gloomy chasm walls would probably keep for ever a secret.

“Twenty-seven pounds,” repeated Rod, as if half to himself. “That was one month’s work!”

“Pretty nearly a pound a day!” gasped Wabi. “I tell you, Rod, we haven’t hit the right spot–yet!”

“I wonder why John Ball’s share was twice that of his companions’? Do you suppose it was because he discovered the gold in the first place?” speculated Rod.

“In all probability it was. That accounts for his murder. The Frenchmen were getting the small end of the deal.”

“Eighteen hundred fifty-nine,” mused Rod. “That was forty-nine years ago, before the great Civil War. Say–“

He stopped and looked hard at Wabigoon.

“Did it ever strike you that John Ball might not have been murdered?”

Wabi leaned forward with more than usual eagerness.

“I have had a thought–” he began.

“What?”

“That perhaps he was not killed.”

“And that after the two Frenchmen died in the knife duel he returned and got the gold,” continued Rod.

“No, I had not thought of that,” said Wabi. Suddenly he rose to his feet and joined Mukoki out in the gloom of the chasm.

Rod was puzzled. Something in his companion’s voice, in his face and words, disturbed him. What had Wabigoon meant?

The young Indian soon rejoined him, but he spoke no more of John Ball.

When the two boys went to their blankets Mukoki still remained awake. For a long time he sat beside the fire, his hands gripping the rifle across his knees, his head slightly bowed in that statue-like posture so characteristic of the Indian. For fully an hour he sat motionless, and in his own way he was deeply absorbed in thought. Soon after their discovery of the first golden bullet Wabigoon had whispered a few words into his ear, unknown to Rod; and to-night out in the gloom of the chasm, he had repeated those same words. They had set Mukoki’s mind working. He was thinking now of something that happened long ago, when, in his reasoning, the wilderness was young and he was a youth. In those days his one great treasure was a dog, and one winter he went with this faithful companion far into the hunting regions of the North, a long moon’s travel from his village. When he returned, months later, he was alone. From his lonely hunting shack deep in the solitudes his comrade had disappeared, and had never returned. This all happened before Mukoki met the pretty Indian girl who became his wife, and was afterward killed by the wolves, and he missed the dog as he would have missed a human brother. The Indian’s love, even for brutes, is some thing that lives, and more than twenty moons later–two years in the life of a man–he returned once again to the old shack, and there he found Wholdaia, the dog! The animal knew him, and bounded about on three legs for joy, and because of the missing leg Mukoki understood why he had not returned to him two years before. Two years is a long time in the life of a dog, and the gray hairs of suffering and age were freely sprinkled in Wholdaia’s muzzle and along his spine.

Mukoki was not thinking of Wholdaia without a reason. He was thinking of Wabigoon’s words–and the mad hunter. Could not the mad hunter do as Wholdaia had done? Was it possible that the bad-dog man who shot golden bullets and who screamed like a lynx was the man who had lived there many, many years ago, and whom the boys called John Ball? Those were the thoughts that Wabi had set working in his brain. The young Indian had not suggested this to Rod. He had spoken of it to Mukoki only because he knew the old pathfinder might help him to solve the riddle, and so he had started Mukoki upon the trail.

The next morning, while the others were finishing their breakfast, Mukoki equipped himself for a journey.

“Go down chasm,” he explained to Rod “Fin’ where get out to plain. Shoot meat.”

That day the gold hunters were more systematic in their work, beginning close to the fall, one on each side of the stream, and panning their way slowly down the chasm. By noon they had covered two hundred yards, and their only reward was a tiny bit of gold, worth no more than a dollar, which Rod had found in his pan. By the time darkness again compelled them to stop they had prospected a quarter of a mile down stream without discovering other signs of John Ball’s treasure. In spite of their failure they were less discouraged than the previous evening, for this failure, in a way, was having a sedative and healthful effect. It convinced them that there was a hard and perhaps long task ahead of them, and that they could not expect to find their treasure winnowed in yellow piles for them.

Early in the evening Mukoki returned laden with caribou meat, and with the news that the first break in the chasm walls was fully five miles below. The adventurers now regretted that they had chopped down the stub, for it was decided that the next work should be in the stream above the fall, which would necessitate a ten-mile tramp, five miles to the break and five miles back. When the journey was begun at dawn the following morning several days’ supplies were taken along, and also a stout rope by means of which the gold hunters could lower themselves back into their old camp when their work above was completed. Rod noticed that the rocks in the stream seemed much larger than when he had first seen them, and he mentioned the fact to Wabigoon.

“The floods are going down rapidly,” explained the young Indian. “All of the snow is melted from the sides of the mountains, and there are no lakes to feed this chasm stream. Within a week there won’t be more than a few inches of water below the fall.”

“And that is when we shall find the gold!” declared Rod with his old enthusiasm. “I tell you, we haven’t gone deep enough! This gold has been here for centuries and centuries, and it has probably settled several feet below the surface of the river-bed. Ball and the Frenchmen found twenty-seven pounds in June, when the creek was practically dry. Did you ever read about the discoveries of gold in Alaska and the Yukon?”

“A little, when I was going to school with you.”

“Well, the richest finds were nearly always from three to a dozen feet under the surface, and when a prospector found signs in surface panning he knew there was rich dirt below. Well find our gold in this chasm, and near the fall!”

Rod’s confidence was the chief thing that kept up the spirits of the treasure seekers during the next few days, for not the first sign of gold was discovered above the fall. Yard by yard the prospectors worked up the chasm until they had washed its sands for more than a mile. And with the passing of each day, as Wabigoon had predicted, the stream became more and more shallow, until they could wade across it without wetting themselves above their knees. At the close of the fourth day the three lowered themselves over the face of the rock into the second chasm. So convinced was Rod in his belief that the gold was hidden deep down under the creek bed that he dug a four-foot hole by torch-light and that night after supper washed out several pans of dirt in the glow of the camp-fire. He still found no signs of gold.

The next day’s exertions left no room for doubt. Beyond two or three tiny flecks of gold the three adventurers found nothing of value in the deeper sand and gravel of the stream. That night absolute dejection settled on the camp. Both Rod and Wabigoon made vain efforts to liven up their drooping spirits. Only Mukoki, to whom gold carried but a fleeting and elusive value, was himself, and even his hopefulness was dampened by the gloom of his companions. Rod could see but one explanation of their failure. Somewhere near the cataract John Ball and the Frenchmen had found a rich pocket of gold, and they had worked it out, probably before the fatal tragedy in the old cabin.

“But how about the mad hunter and his golden bullets?” insisted Wabi, in another effort to brighten their prospects. “The bullets weighed an ounce each, and I’ll stake my life they came from this chasm. He knows where the gold is, if we don’t!”

“Come back soon!” grunted Mukoki. “Watch heem. Fin’ gol’!”

“That’s what we’ll do!” cried the young Indian, jumping suddenly to his feet and toppling Rod backward off the rock upon which he was sitting. “Come, cheer up, Rod! The gold is here, somewhere, and we’re going to find it! I’m heartily ashamed of you; you, whom I thought would never get discouraged!”

Rod was laughing when he recovered from the playful mauling which Wabi administered before he could regain his feet.

“That’s right, I deserve another licking! We’ve got all the spring and summer before us, and if we don’t find the gold by the time snow flies we’ll come back and try it again next year! What do you say?”

“And bring Minnetaki with us!” added Wabi, jumping into the air and kicking his heels together. “How will you like that, Rod?” He nudged his comrade in the ribs, and in another moment both were puffing and laughing in one of their good-natured wrestling bouts, in which the cat-like agility of the young Indian always won for him in the end.

In spite of momentary times like this, when the natural buoyancy and enthusiasm of the young adventurers rose above their discouragement, the week that followed added to their general depression. For miles the chasm was explored and at the end of the week they had found less than an ounce of gold. If their pans had given them no returns at all their disappointment would have been less, for then, as Wabi said, they could have given up the ghost with good grace. But the few precious yellow grains which they found now and then lured them on, as these same grains have lured other hundreds and thousands since the dawn of civilization. Day after day they persisted in their efforts; night after night about their camp-fire they inspired each other with new hope and made new plans. The spring sun grew stronger, the poplar buds burst into tiny leaf and out beyond the walls of the chasm the first promises of summer came in the sweetly scented winds of the south, redolent with the breath of balsam and pine and the thousand growing things of the plains.

But at last the search came to an end. For three days not even a grain of gold had been found. Around the big rock, where they were eating dinner, Rod and his friends came to a final conclusion. The following morning they would break camp, and leaving their canoe behind, for the creek was now too shallow for even birch-bark navigation, they would continue their exploration of the chasm in search of other adventures. The whole summer was ahead of them, and though they had failed in discovering a treasure where John Ball and the Frenchmen had succeeded, they might find one farther on. At least the trip deeper into the unexplored wilderness would be filled with excitement.

Mukoki rose to his feet, leaving Rod and Wabi still discussing their plans. Suddenly he turned toward them, and a startled cry fell from his lips, while with one long arm he pointed beyond the fall into the upper chasm.

“Listen–heem–heem!”

The old warrior’s face twitched with excitement, and for a full half minute he stood motionless, his arm still extended, his black eyes staring steadily at Rod and Wabigoon who sat as silent as the rocks about them. Then there came to them from a great distance a quavering, thrilling sound, a sound that filled them again with the old horror of the upper chasm–the cry of the mad hunter.

At that distant cry Wabigoon sprang to his feet, his eyes leaping fire, his bronzed cheeks whitening in an excitement even greater than that of Mukoki.

“Muky, I told you!” he cried. “I told you!” The young Indian’s body quivered, his hands were clenched, and when he turned upon Rod the white youth was startled by the look in his face.

“Rod, John Ball is coming back to his gold!”

Hardly had he spoken the words when the tenseness left his body and his hands dropped to his side.

The words shot from him before he could control himself enough to hold them back. In another moment he was sorry. The thought that John Ball and the mad hunter were the same person he had kept to himself, until for reasons of his own he had let Mukoki into his secret. While the idea had taken larger and larger growth in his mind he knew that from every logical point of view the thing was impossible, and that constraint which came of the Indian blood in him held him from discussing it with Rod. But now the words were out. A quick flush replaced the whiteness that had come into his face. In another instant he was leaning eagerly toward Rod, his eyes kindling into fire again. He had not expected the change that he now saw come over the white youth.

“I have been thinking that for a long time,” he continued. “Ever since we found the footprints in the sand. There’s just one proof that we need, just one, and–“

“Listen!”

Rod fairly hissed the word as he held up a warning hand.

This time the cry of the mad hunter came to them more distinctly. He was approaching through the upper chasm!

The white youth rose to his feet, his eyes steadily fixed upon Wabigoon’s. His face was deathly pale.

“John Ball!” he repeated, as if he had just heard what the other had said. “John Ball!” What seemed to him to be the only truth swept upon him like a flood, and for a score of seconds, in every one of which he could hear his heart thumping excitedly, he stood like one stunned. John Ball! John Ball returned to life to find their gold for them, to tell them of the tragedy and mystery of those days long dead and gone! Like powder touched by a spark of fire his imagination leaped at Wabi’s thrilling suggestion.

Mukoki set to work.

“Hide!” he exclaimed. “Hide thees–thees–thees!” He pointed about him at all the things in camp.

Both of the boys understood.

“He must see no signs of our presence from the top of the fall!” cried Wabi, gathering an armful of camp utensils. “Hide them back among the cedars!”

Mukoki hurried to the cedar bough shelter and began tearing it down. For five minutes the adventurers worked on the run. Once during that time they heard the madman’s wailing cry, and hardly had they finished and concealed themselves in the gloom of the old cabin when it came again, this time from not more than a rifle-shot’s distance beyond the cataract. It was not a scream that now fell from the mad hunter’s lips, but a low wail and in it there was something that drove the old horror from the three wildly beating hearts and filled them with a measureless, nameless pity. What change had come over the madman? The cry was repeated every few seconds now, each time nearer than before, and in it there was a questioning, appealing note that seemed to end in sobbing despair, a something that gripped at Rod’s heart and filled him with a great half-mastering impulse to answer it, to run out and stretch his hands forth in greeting to the strange, wild creature coming down the chasm!

Then, as he looked, something ran out upon the edge of the great rock beside the cataract, and he clutched at his own breast to hold back what he thought must burst forth in words. For he knew–as surely as he knew that Wabi was at his side–that he was looking upon John Ball! For a moment the strange creature crouched where the stub had been, and when he saw that it was gone he stood erect, and a quavering, pitiful cry echoed softly through the chasm. And as he stood there motionless the watchers saw that the mad hunter was an old man, tall and thin, but as straight as a sapling, and that his head and breast were hidden in shaggy beard and hair. In his hands he carried a gun–the gun that had fired the golden bullets–and even at that distance those who were peering from the gloom of the cabin saw that it was a long barreled weapon similar to those they had found in the other old cabin, along with the skeletons of the Frenchmen who had died in the fatal knife duel.

In breathless suspense the three waited, not a muscle of their bodies moving. Again the old man leaned over the edge of the rock, and his voice came to them in a moaning, sobbing appeal, and after a little he stretched out his arms, still crying softly, as if beseeching help from some one below. The spectacle gripped at Rod’s soul. A hot film came into his eyes and there was an odd little tremble in his throat. The Indians were looking with dark, staring eyes. To them this was another unusual incident of the wilderness. But to Rod it was the white man’s soul crying out to his own. The old man’s outstretched arms seemed reaching to him, the sobbing voice, filled with its pathos, its despair, its hopeless loneliness, seemed a supplication for him to come forth, to reach up his own arms, to respond to this lost soul of the solitudes. With a little cry Rod darted between his companions. He threw off his cap and lifted his white face to the startled creature on the rock, and as he advanced step by step, reaching out his hands in friendship, he called softly a name:

“John Ball, John Ball, John Ball!”

In an instant the mad hunter had straightened himself, half turned to flee.

“John Ball! Hello, John Ball–John Ball–“

In his earnestness Rod was almost sobbing the name. He forgot everything now, everything but that lonely figure on the rock, and he drew nearer and nearer, gently calling the name, until the mad hunter dropped on his knees and, crumpled in his long beard and gray lynx skin, looked down upon Rod and sent back a low moaning, answering cry.

“John Ball! John Ball, is that you?”

Rod stopped, with the madman forty feet above him, and something seemed choking back the very breath in him when he saw the strange look that had come into the old man’s eyes.

“John Ball–“

The wild eyes above shifted for a moment. They caught a glimpse of two heads thrust from the door of the old cabin, and the madman sprang to his feet. For a breath he stood on the edge of the rock, then with a cry he leaped with the fierce agility of an animal far out into the swirl of the cataract! For an instant he was visible in the downward plunge of the water. Another instant and with a heavy splash he disappeared in the deep pool under the fall!

Wabi and Mukoki had seen the desperate leap and the young Indian was beside the pool before Rod had recovered from his horrified astonishment. For centuries the water of the chasm stream had been tumbling into this pool wearing it deeper and deeper each year, until the water in it was over a man’s head. In width it was not more than a dozen feet.

“Watch for him! He’ll drown if we don’t get him out,” shouted Wabi.

Rod leaped to the edge of the pool, with Mukoki between him and Wabigoon. Ready to spring into the cold depths at the first sign of the old man’s gray head or struggling arms the three stood with every muscle ready for action. A second, two seconds, five seconds passed, and there was no sign of him. Rod’s heart began to beat with drum-like fierceness. Ten seconds! A quarter of a minute! He looked at Wabigoon. The young Indian had thrown off his caribou-skin coat; his eyes, as he turned them for a moment toward Rod, flashed back the white youth’s fear.

“I’m going to dive for him!”

In another instant he had plunged head foremost into the pool. Mukoki’s coat fell to the ground. He crouched forward until it seemed he must topple from the stone upon which he stood. Another fifteen seconds and Wabigoon’s head appeared above the water, and the old warrior gave a shout.

“Me come!”

He shot out and disappeared in a huge splash close to Wabi. Rod stood transfixed, filled with a fear that was growing in him at every breath he drew. He saw the convulsions of the water made by the two Indians, who were groping about below the surface. Wabigoon came up again for breath, then Mukoki. It seemed to him that an age had passed, and he felt no hope. John Ball was dead!

Not for a moment now did he doubt the identity of the mad hunter. The strange, wistful light that had replaced the glare in the old man’s eyes when he heard his own name called to him had spoken more than words. It was John Ball! And he was dead! For a third time, a fourth, and a fifth Mukoki and Wabigoon came up for air, and the fifth time they dragged themselves out upon the rocks that edged the pool. Mukoki spoke no word but ran back to the camp and threw a great armful of dry fuel upon the fire. Wabigoon still remained at the edge of the pool, dripping and shivering. His hands were clenched, and Rod could see that they were filled with sand and gravel. Mechanically the Indian opened his fingers and looked at what he had unconsciously brought up from under the fall.

For a moment he stared, then with his gasping breath there came a low, thrilling cry.

He held out his hands to Rod.

Gleaming richly among the pebbles which he held was a nugget of pure gold, a nugget so large that Rod gave a wild yell, and in that one moment forgot that John Ball, the mad hunter, was dead or dying beneath the fall!

CHAPTER XVI

JOHN BALL AND THE MYSTERY OF THE GOLD

Mukoki, hearing Rod’s cry, hurried to the pool, but before he reached the spot where the white youth was standing with the yellow nugget in his hand Wabigoon had again plunged beneath the surface. For several minutes he remained in the water, and when he once more crawled out upon the rocks there was something so strange in his face and eyes that for a moment Rod believed he had found the dead body of the madman.

“He isn’t–in–the–pool!” he panted. Mukoki shrugged his shoulders and shivered.

“Dead!” he grunted

“He isn’t in the pool!”

Wabigoon’s black eyes gleamed in uncanny emphasis of his words.

“He isn’t in the pool!”

The others understood what he meant. Mukoki’s eyes wandered to where the water of the pool gushed between the rocks into the broader channel of the chasm stream. It was not more than knee deep!

“He no go out there!”

“No!”

“Then–where?”

He shrugged his shoulders suggestively again, and pointed into the pool.

“Body slip under rock. He there!”

“Try it!” said Wabigoon tersely.

He hurried to the fire, and Rod went with him to gather more fuel while the young Indian warmed his chilled body. They heard the old pathfinder leap into the water under the fall as they ran.

Ten minutes later Mukoki joined them.

“Gone! Bad-dog man no there!”

He stretched out one of his dripping arms.

“Gol’ bullet!” he grunted.

In the palm of his hand lay another yellow nugget, as large as a hazelnut!

“I told you,” said Wabi softly, “that John Ball was coming back to his gold. And he has done so! The treasure is in the pool!”

But where was John Ball?

Dead or alive, where could he have disappeared?

Under other conditions the chasm would have rung with the wild rejoicing of the gold seekers. But there was something now that stilled the enthusiasm in them. At last the ancient map had given up its secret, and riches were within their grasp. But no one of the three shouted out his triumph. Somehow it seemed that John Ball had died for them, and the thought clutched at their hearts that if they had not cut down the stub he would still be alive. Indirectly they had brought about the death of the poor creature who for nearly half a century had lived alone with the beasts in these solitudes. And that one glimpse of the old man on the rock, the prayerful entreaty in his wailing voice, the despair which he sobbed forth when he found his tree gone, had livened in them something that was more than sympathy. At this moment the three adventurers would willingly have given up all hopes of gold could sacrifice have brought back that sad, lonely old man who had looked down upon them from the wall of the upper chasm.

“I am sorry we cut down the stub,” said Rod.

They were the first words spoken.

“So am I,” replied Wabi simply, beginning to strip off his wet clothes. “But–” He stopped, and shrugged his shoulders.

“What?”

“Well, we’re taking it for granted that John Ball is dead. If he is dead why isn’t he in the pool? By George, I should think that Mukoki’s old superstition would be getting the best of him!”

“I believe he is in the pool!” declared Rod.

Wabi turned upon him and repeated the words he had spoken to the old warrior half an hour before.

“Try it!”

After the attempts of the two Indians, who could dive like otter, Rod had no inclination to follow Wabi’s invitation. Mukoki, who had hung up a half of his clothes near the fire, was fitting one of the pans to the end of a long pole which he had cut from a sapling, and it was obvious that his intention was to begin at once the dredging of the pool for gold. Rod joined him, and once more the excitement of treasure hunting stirred in his veins. When the pan was on securely Wabi left the fire to join his companions, and the three returned to the pool. With a long sweep of his improvised dredge Mukoki scooped up two quarts or more of sand and gravel and emptied it upon one of the flat rocks, and the two boys pounced upon it eagerly, raking it out with their fingers and wiping the mud and sand from every suspicious looking pebble.

“The quickest way is to wash it!” said Rod, as Mukoki dumped another load upon the rock. “I’ll get some water!”

He ran to the camp for the remaining pans and when he turned back he saw Wabi leaping in a grotesque dance about the rock while Mukoki stood on the edge of the pool, his dredge poised over it, silent and grinning.

“What do you think of that?” cried the young Indian as Rod hurried to him. “What do you think of that?”

He held out his hand, and in it there gleamed a third yellow nugget, fully twice as large as the one discovered by Mukoki!

Rod fairly gasped. “The pool must be full of ’em!”

He half-filled his pan with the sand and gravel and ran knee-deep out into the running stream. In his eagerness he splashed over a part of his material with the wash, but he, excused himself by thinking that this was his first pan, and that with the rest he would be more careful. He began to notice now that all of the sand was not washing out, and when he saw that it persisted in lying heavy and thick among the pebbles his heart leaped into his mouth. One more dip, and he held his pan to the light coming through the rift in the chasm. A thousand tiny, glittering particles met his eyes! In the center of the pan there gleamed dully a nugget of pure gold as big as a pea! At last they had struck it rich, so rich that he trembled as he stared down into the pan, and the cry that had welled up in his throat was choked back by the swift, excited beating of his heart. In that moment’s glance down into his treasure-laden pan he saw all of his hopes and all of his ambitions achieved. He was rich! In those gleaming particles he saw freedom for his mother and himself. No longer a bitter struggle for existence in the city, no more pinching and striving and sacrifice that they might keep the little home in which his father had died! When he turned toward Wabigoon his face was filled with the ecstasy of those visions. He waded ashore and held his pan under the other’s eyes.

“Another nugget!” exclaimed Wabi excitedly.

“Yes. But it isn’t the nugget. It’s the–” He moved the pan until the thousand little particles glittered and swam before the Indian’s eyes. “It’s the dust. The sand is full of gold!”

His voice trembled, his face was white. From his crouching posture Wabi looked up at him, and they spoke no more words.

Mukoki looked, and was silent. Then he went back to his dredging. Little by little Rod washed down his pan. Half an hour later he showed it again to Wabigoon. The pebbles were gone. What sand was left was heavy with the gleaming particles, and half buried in it all was the yellow nugget! In Wabi’s pan there was no nugget but it was rich with the gleam of fine gold.

Mukoki had dredged a bushel of sand and gravel from the pool, and was upon his knees beside the heap which he had piled on the rock. When Rod went to that rock for his third pan of dirt the old warrior made no sign that he had discovered anything. The early gloom of afternoon was beginning to settle between the chasm walls, and at the end of his fourth pan Rod found that it was becoming so dark that he could no longer distinguish the yellow particles in the sand. With the exception of one nugget he had found only fine gold. With Wabi’s dust were three small nuggets.

When they ceased work Mukoki rose from beside the rock, chuckling, grimacing, and holding out his hand. Wabi was the first to see, and his cry of astonishment drew Rod quickly to his side. The hollow of the old warrior’s hand was filled with nuggets! He turned them into Wabigoon’s hand, and the young Indian turned them into Rod’s, and as he felt the weight of the treasure he held Rod could no longer restrain the yell of exultation that had been held in all that afternoon. Jumping high into the air and whooping at every other step he raced to the camp and soon had the small scale which they had brought with them from Wabinosh House. The nuggets they had found that afternoon weighed full seven ounces, and the fine gold, after allowing the deduction of a third for sand, weighed a little more than eleven ounces.

“Eighteen ounces–and a quarter!”

Rod gave the total in a voice tremulous with incredulity.

“Eighteen ounces–at twenty dollars an ounce–three hundred and sixty dollars!” he figured rapidly. “By George–” The prospect seemed too big for him, and he stopped.

“Less than half a day’s work,” added Wabi. “We’re doing better than John Ball and the Frenchmen. It means eighteen thousand dollars a month!”

“And by autumn–” began Rod.

He was interrupted by the inimitable chuckling laugh of Mukoki and found the old warrior’s face a map of creases and grimaces.

“In twent’ t’ous’nd moon–mak’ heem how much?” he questioned.

In all his life Wabigoon had never heard Mukoki joke before, and with a wild whoop of joy he rolled the stoical old pathfinder off the rock on which he was sitting, and Rod joined heartily in Wabi’s merriment.

And Mukoki’s question proved not to be so much of a joke after all, as the boys were soon to learn. For several days the work went on uninterrupted. The buckskin bags in the balsam shelter grew heavier and heavier. Each succeeding hour added to the visions of the gold seekers. On the fifth day Rod found seventeen nuggets among his fine gold, one of them as large as the end of his thumb. On the seventh came the richest of all their panning, but on the ninth a startling thing happened. Mukoki was compelled to work ceaselessly to keep the two boys supplied with “pay dirt” from the pool. His improvised dredge now brought up only a handful or two of sand and pebbles at a dip. It was on this ninth day that the truth dawned upon them all.

The pool was becoming exhausted of its treasure!

But the discovery brought no great gloom with it. Somewhere near that pool must be the very source of the treasure itself, and the gold hunters were confident of finding it. Besides, they had already accumulated what to them was a considerable fortune, at least two thousand dollars apiece. For three more days the work continued, and then Mukoki’s dredge no longer brought up pebbles or sand from the bottom of the pool.

The last pan was washed early in the morning, and as the warm weather had begun to taint the caribou meat Mukoki and Wabigoon left immediately after dinner to secure fresh meat out on the plains, while Rod remained in camp. The strange thick gloom of night which began to gather in the chasm before the sun had disappeared beyond the plains above was already descending upon him when Rod began preparations for supper. He knew that the Indians would not wait until dark before reentering the break between the mountains, and confident that they would soon appear he began mixing up flour and water for their usual batch of hot-stone biscuits. So intent was he upon his task that he did not see a shadowy form creeping up foot by foot from the rocks. He caught no glimpse of the eyes that glared like smoldering coals from out of the half darkness between him and the fall.

His first knowledge of another presence came in a low, whining cry, a cry that was not much more than a whisper, and he leaped to his feet, every nerve in his body once more tingling with that excitement which had possessed him when he stood under the rock talking to the madman. A dozen yards away he saw a face, a great, white, ghost-like face, staring at him from out of the thickening shadows, and under that face and its tangled veil of beard and hair he saw the crouching form of the mad hunter!

In that moment Roderick Drew thanked God that he was not afraid. Standing full in the glow of the fire he stretched out his arms, as he had once before reached them out to this weird creature, and again, softly, pleadingly, he called the name of John Ball! There came in reply a faint, almost unheard sound from the wild man, a sound that was repeated again and again, and which sent a thrill into the young hunter, for it was wondrously like the name he was calling: “John Ball! John Ball! John Ball!” And as the mad hunter repeated that sound he advanced, foot by foot, as though creeping upon all fours, and Rod saw then that one of his arms was stretched out to him, and that in the extended hand was a fish.

He advanced a step, reaching out his own hands eagerly, and the wild creature stopped, cringing as if fearing a blow.

“John Ball! John Ball!” he repeated. He thought of no other words but those, and advanced bit by bit as he called them gently again and again. Now he was within ten feet of the old man, now eight, presently he was so near that he might have reached him in a single leap. Then he stopped.

The mad hunter laid down his fish. Slowly he retreated, murmuring incoherent sounds in his beard, then sprang to his feet and with a wailing cry sped back toward the pool. Swiftly Rod followed. He saw the form leap from the rocks at its edge, heard a heavy splash, and all was still!

For many minutes Rod stood with the spray of the cataract dashing in his face. This time the madman’s plunge into the cold depths at his feet filled him with none of the horror of that first insane leap from the rock above. Somewhere in that pool the old man was seeking refuge! What did it mean? His eyes scanned the thin sheet of water that plunged down from the upper chasm. It was a dozen feet in width and hid the black wall of rock behind it like a thick veil. What was there just behind that falling torrent? Was it possible that in the wall of rock behind the waterfall there was a place where John Ball found concealment?

Rod returned to camp, convinced that he had at last guessed a solution to the mystery. John Ball was behind the cataract! The strange murmurings of the old man who for a few moments had crouched so close to him still rang in his ears, and he was sure that in these half-articulate sounds had been John Ball’s own name. If there had been a doubt in his mind before, it was wiped away now. The mad hunter was John Ball, and with that thought burning in his brain Rod stopped beside the fish–the madman’s offering of peace–and turned his face once more back toward the black loneliness of the pool.

Unconsciously a sobbing cry of sympathy fell softly from Rod’s lips, and he called John Ball’s name again, louder and louder, until it echoed far down the gloomy depths of the chasm. There came no response. Then he turned to the fish. John Ball wished them to be friends, and he had brought this offering! In the firelight Rod saw that it was a curious looking, dark-colored fish, covered with small scales that were almost black. It was the size of a large trout, and yet it was not a trout. The head was thick and heavy, like a sucker’s, and yet it was not a sucker. He looked at this head more closely, and gave a sudden start when he saw that it had no eyes!

In one great flood the truth swept upon him, the truth of what lay behind the cataract, of where John Ball had gone! For he held in his hands an eyeless creature of another world, a world hidden in the bowels of the earth itself, a proof that beyond the fall was a great cavern filled with the mystery and the sightless things of eternal night, and that in this cavern John Ball found his food and made his home!

CHAPTER XVII

IN A SUBTERRANEAN WORLD

When Mukoki and Wabigoon returned half an hour later the hot-stone biscuits were still unbaked. The fire was only a bed of coals. Beside it sat Rod, the strange fish upon the ground at his feet. Before Mukoki had thrown down the pack of meat which he was carrying he was showing them this fish. Quickly he related what had happened. He added to this some of the things which he had thought while sitting by the fire. The chief of these things were that just behind the cataract was the entrance to a great cavern, and that in this cavern they would not only find John Ball, but also the rich storehouse of that treasure of which they, had discovered a part in the pool.

And as the night lengthened there was little talk about the gold and much about John Ball. Again and again Rod described the madman’s visit, the trembling, pleading voice, the offering of the fish, the eager glow that had come into the wild eyes when he talked to him and called him by name. Even Mukoki’s stoic heart was struck by the deep pathos of it all. The mad hunter no longer carried his gun. He no longer sought their lives. In his crazed brain something new and wonderful was at work, something that drew him to them, with the half-fear of an animal, and yet with growing trust. He was pleading for their companionship, their friendship, and deep down in his heart Rod felt that the spark of sanity was not completely gone from John Ball.

When the three adventurers retired to their blankets in the cedar shelter it was not the thought of gold that quickened their blood in anticipation of the morning. The passing of an age would not dull the luster of what they had come to seek. It would wait for them. The greatest of all things–the sympathy of man for man–had stilled that other passion in them. John Ball’s salvation, and not more gold, was the day’s work ahead of them now.

With the dawn they were up, and by the time it was light enough to see they were ready for the exploration of whatever was hidden behind the fall. In a rubber blanket Wabigoon wrapped a rifle and half a dozen pine torches. Mukoki carried a quantity of cooked meat. Standing on the edge of the pool Rod pointed into the falling torrent.

“He dived straight under,” he said. “The opening to the cavern is directly behind the shoot of falling water.”

Wabi placed his hat and coat upon a rock.

“I’ll try it first. Wait until I come back,” he said.

Without another word he plunged into the pool. Minute after minute passed, and he did not reappear. Rod was conscious of a nervous chill creeping into his blood. But Mukoki was chuckling confidently.

“Found heem!” he replied in response to the white youth’s inquiring look.

As he spoke Wabigoon came up out of the pool like a great fish. Rod helped him upon the rocks.

“We’re two bright ones, we are, Muky!” he exclaimed, as soon as he gained his breath. “Just behind the fall I ran up against the wall of rock we found when we were hunting for John Ball, stood on my feet, and–” he swung his arms suggestively–“there I was, head and shoulders out of water, looking into a hole as big as a house!”

“Dive easy!” warned the old pathfinder, turning to Rod. “Bump head on rock–swush!”

“We won’t have to dive,” continued Wabi. “The water directly under the fall of the stream isn’t more than four feet deep. If we wade into it from over there we can make it easy.”

Taking his waterproof bundle the young Indian slipped into the pool close up against the wall of rock that formed the foundation of the upper chasm and plunged straight into the tumbling cataract. Mukoki followed close behind and preparing himself with a long breath Rod hurried into this new experience. For a moment he was conscious of a smothering weight upon him and a thunderous roaring in his ears, and he was borne irresistibly down. There was still air in his lungs when he found himself safely through the deluge so he knew that its passage had taken him only a brief but thrilling instant. For a time he could see nothing. Then he made out a dark form drawing itself up out of the water. Beyond that there lay a chaos of midnight blackness, and he knew that his eyes were staring into the depths of a great cavern!

Gripping the edge of the rock ledge he dragged himself up as both Wabigoon and Mukoki had done, and found his feet upon a soft floor of sand. Suddenly he felt a hand clutch his arm. A half-shout, rising faintly above the wash of the cataract, sounded in his ear.

“Look!”

He wiped the water from his eyes and gazed ahead of him. For a moment he saw nothing. Then, so faintly that at first it appeared no larger than a star, he caught the faint glimmer of a light. As he looked it became more and more distinct, and to his astonishment he saw that it was slowly rising, like a huge will-o’-the-wisp that had suddenly risen from the floor of the cavern to float off into the utter blackness of space above. And even as he stared, gripping Wabi’s arm in his excitement, the strange light began to descend, and quickly disappeared!

The two boys saw Mukoki slip off into the gloom, and without questioning his motive they followed close behind. As they progressed the sound of the fall came more and more faintly to their ears. A blackness deeper than the gloom of the darkest night environed them, and the three now held to one another’s arms. Rod understood why his companions lighted no torches. Somewhere ahead of them was another light, carried by the mad hunter. His blood thrilled with excitement. Where would John Ball lead them?

Suddenly he became conscious that they were no longer walking on a level floor of sand but that they were ascending, as the light had done. Mukoki stopped and for a full minute they stood and listened. The tumult of the fall came to them in a far, subdued murmur. Beyond that there was not the breath of a sound in the strange world of gloom about them. They were about to start on again when something held them, a whispering, sobbing echo, and Rod’s heart seemed to stop its beating. It died away slowly, and a weird stillness fell after it. Then came a low moaning cry, a cry that was human in its agony, and yet which had in it something so near the savage that even Wabigoon found himself trembling as he strained in futile effort to pierce the impenetrable gloom ahead. Before the cry had lost itself in the distances of the cavern Mukoki was leading them on again.

Step by step they followed in the path taken by the strange light. Rod knew that they were climbing a hill of sand, and that just beyond it they would see the light again, but he was not prepared for the startling suddenness with which the next change came. As if a black curtain had dropped from before their eyes the three adventurers beheld a scene that halted them in their tracks. A hundred paces away a huge pitch-pine torch a yard in length was burning in the sand, and crouching in the red glow of this, his arms stretched out as if in the supplication of a strange prayer, was John Ball! Just beyond him was the gleam of water, inky-black in the weird flickerings of the torch, and toward this John Ball reached out in his grief. His voice came up softly to the three watchers now, so low that even in the vast silence of the cavern it could barely be heard. To Roderick Drew it was as if the strange creature below him was sobbing like a heart-broken child, and he whispered in Wabigoon’s ear. Then, foot by foot, so gently that his moccasined feet made no sound, he approached the madman.

Half-way to him he paused.

“Hello, John Ball!” he called softly.

The faint light of the torch was falling upon him, and he advanced another step. The murmuring of the wild man ceased, but he made no movement. He still knelt in his rigid posture, his arms stretched toward the black chaos beyond him. Rod came very close to him before he spoke again.

“Is that you, John Ball?”

Slowly the kneeling figure turned, and once more Rod saw in those wild eyes, gleaming brightly now in the torch-light, the softer, thrilling glow of recognition and returning reason. He reached out his own arms and advanced boldly, calling John Ball’s name, and the madman made no retreat but crouched lower in the sand, strange, soft sounds again falling from his lips. Rod had come within half a dozen feet of him when he sprang up with the quickness of a cat, and with a wailing cry plunged waist deep into the water. With his arms stretched entreatingly into the mysterious world beyond the torch-light he turned his face to the white youth, and Rod knew that he was trying as best he could to tell him something.

“What is it, John Ball?”

He went to the edge of the black water and waded out until it rose to his knees, his eyes staring into the blackness.

“What is it?”

He, too, pointed with one arm, and the madman gave an excited gesture. Then he placed his hands funnel-shaped to his mouth, as Rod had often seen Wabi and Mukoki do when calling moose, and there burst from him a far-reaching cry, and Rod’s heart gave a sudden bound as he listened, for the cry was that of a woman’s name!

“Dol–o–res-s-s-s–Dol–o–res-s-s-s–“

The cry died away in distant murmuring echoes, and with an answering cry Rod shouted forth the name which he fancied John Ball had spoken.

“Dolores! Dolores! Dolores!”

There came a sudden leaping plunge, and John Ball was at his feet, clasping him about the knees, and sobbing again and again that name–Dolores. Rod put his arms about the old man’s shoulders, and the gray, shaggy head fell against him. The sobbing voice grew lower, the weight of the head greater, and after a little Rod called loudly for Mukoki and Wabigoon, for there was no longer movement or sound from the form at his feet, and he knew that something had happened to John Ball. The two Indians were quickly at his side, and together they carried the unconscious form of Ball within the circle of torch-light. The old man’s eyes were closed, his claw-like fingers were clenched fiercely upon his breast, and not until Mukoki placed a hand over his heart did the three know that he was still breathing.

“Now is our time to get him to camp,” said Wabi. “Lead the way with the torch, Rod!”

There was not much weight to John Ball, and the two Indians carried him easily. At the fall the rubber blanket was wound about his head and the adventurers plunged under the cataract with their burden. It was an hour after that before the old man opened his eyes again. Rod was close beside him and for a full minute the mad hunter gazed up into his face, then once more he sank off into that strange unconsciousness which had overcome him in the cavern. Rod rose white-faced and turned to Mukoki and Wabigoon.

“I’m afraid–he’s dying,” he said.

The Indians made no answer. For several minutes the three sat silently about John Ball watching for signs of returning consciousness. At last Mukoki roused himself to take a pot of soup from the fire. The movement seemed to stir John Ball into life, and Rod was at his side again, holding a cup of water to his lips. After a little he helped the old man to sit up, and a spoonful at a time the warm soup was fed to him.

Through the whole of that day he returned to consciousness only for brief intervals, lapsing back into a death-like sleep after each awakening. During one of these periods of unconsciousness Wabi cut short the tangled beard and hair, and for the first time they saw in all its emaciation the thin, ghastly face of the man who, half a century before, had drawn the map that led them to the gold. There was little change in his condition during the night that followed, except that now and then he muttered incoherently, and at these times Rod always caught in his ravings the name that he had heard in the cavern. The next day there was no change. And there was still none on the third. Even Mukoki, who had tried every expedient of wilderness craft in nursing, gave up in despair. So far as they could see John Ball had no fever. Yet three-quarters of the time he lay as if dead. Nothing but soup could be forced between his lips.

On the second day Wabi revisited the subterranean world beyond the cataract. When he came back he had discovered the secret of the treasure in the pool. The gold came from the cavern. The soft sand through which they had followed the strange light was rich in dust and nuggets. During the floods of spring water came into the cavern from somewhere, and flowing for a brief space out through the mouth of the cave brought with it the precious burden of treasure-laden sand which was dumped into the pool. The constant wash of the cataract had caused most of the sand to overflow into the running stream, but the heavier gold-dust and nuggets remained in the trap into which they had fallen.

But the joy that came of this discovery was subdued by thoughts of John Ball. The gold meant everything to Rod, the realization of his hopes and ambitions; and he knew that it meant everything to his mother, and to all those who belonged to Mukoki and Wabigoon. But the gold could wait. They had already accumulated a small fortune, and they could return for the rest a little later. At present they must do something for John Ball, the man to whom they were indebted for all that they had found, and to whom the treasure really belonged. On the third day Rod laid his plans before Wabi and Mukoki.

“We must take John Ball back to the Post as quickly as we can,” he said. “It is our only chance of saving him. If we start now, while the water in the creek is deep enough to float our canoe, we can make Wabinosh House in ten or fifteen days.”

“It will be impossible to paddle against the swift current,” said Wabi.

“That is true. But we can put John Ball into the canoe and tow him up-stream. It will be a long wade and hard work, but–“

He looked at Wabi in silence, then added,

“Do we want John Ball to live, or do we want him to die?”

“If I thought he would live I would wade a thousand miles to save