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CHAPTER XXVI
THE RUINED CITY
It would have been worse than useless for Tubby or Fred to have attempted flight, as the stout youth had rightly conjectured. Resistance would have been equally foolhardy. This would have been so in any case, but any move against the Indians was now rendered doubly dangerous by the fact that two of the odd-looking little natives had picked up the two rifles the boys had so foolishly forgotten and were examining them in a way that showed that they had knowledge enough of the white man’s weapons to use them, should occasion offer.
After a vast deal of jabbering in their unknown tongue, two of the Indians bound Tubby’s hands behind his back while the others stood guard to protect their companions against any sudden move. Then came Fred’s turn. This done, the boys were led across the open space to a clump of trees from amidst which the Indians had first appeared.
To Tubby’s astonishment he saw that a narrow, but well beaten trail ran through the jungle from this point. But in what direction it led he was, of course, ignorant. He guessed, however, that it must be one of the secret Indian paths to which Mr. Raynor had referred. On either side of the narrow trail the jungle grew up thick and impenetrable. Two Indians walked in front, then came the boys, behind marched the other Indians.
“W-w-w-w-what is going to become of us?” quavered Fred as they moved along at a swift though steady pace.
“I don’t know. I guess we are bound for some village or other back in the San Blas country. It’s a good sign though that they haven’t offered us any violence.”
Fred could not but agree that this was so. But little more talk was indulged in between the two captives. It was not a situation that adapted itself to conversation. Hour after hour they trudged along through the tropical forest until at last they came upon something startling.
In front of them, as they rounded a curve in the crooked trail, there suddenly rose up something that seemed menacingly to dispute their further passage through the forest.
There, facing them, was a hideous monster carved out of a white stone or marble, they could not be sure which. The thing loomed ghastly white against a background of dark trees. Spots of rank moss grew on its glaring stone face. Its stumpy hands were folded and tucked up on its breast; its legs and feet, shaped like a water creature’s, were drawn up under its belly. But it was the awful face with its sinister glare that gave the boys a start that quivered through their frames. As if in proof of its antiquity the statue was broken in places and leaned slightly to one side. Through the cracks in the white stone, great, twisted, gnarled tree trunks, like serpents, writhed in and out. Altogether it was as horrible an object to come upon in the depths of a great forest as the mind could conceive. Small wonder the boys shuddered at it. The Indians, however, did not appear to regard it with much awe.
“What an awful looking thing!” shuddered Fred, who had turned pale.
“Pshaw! It’s only an old idol,” Tubby scoffed, assuming a bold air for Fred’s comfort. “Lots of ’em in this part of the world. Crackers! Fred, I shouldn’t wonder but what we are coming to one of those ancient cities that have long been supposed to exist in this part of the world. I think – Great Cæsar! Look there, will you?”
A wilderness of ruins suddenly opened before them as they topped a small rise. Everywhere was a confusion of tumbled idols, pillars, blocks of stone, heavy walls, flights of steps, some whole, some tumbling with decay, others still upright. Roots, branches and curling vines writhed in and out of the scene of desolation like great snakes. Here and there trees shot up from the empty walls of roofless palaces. Their restless shadows waved mournfully above the ruins. Further back stood a building that surmounted a sort of platform of white stone. It was reached by a flight of steps on one side. On the other the walls towered up steep and slippery. They would not have afforded foothold to a fly.
The Indians marched the boys up the steps leading to this dismal palace. From the top of the platform they could see over the ruined city in all directions. And off to one side was a sight that made Tubby’s heart beat more quickly. He had caught the glint of a river, and on its banks he had seen three canoes drawn up. If only they could reach that stream they might still escape. But such a prospect appeared to be remote in the extreme.
They were marshaled into the chamber within the walls they had noticed from below. It was of massive but rude architecture and was roofless, but the walls sloped inward, making any idea of climbing them out of the question. From cracks in the walls grew tropic plants and creepers. To the boys’ surprise, once within this place, their hands were untied. But this in itself was a bad sign so far as hope of escape went. It meant that the Indians knew there was no hope of their captives getting away.
Two guards were set to watch them at the door, and then the others left. The guards took up their station at the door with their wicked-looking spears all ready for instant action. Tubby, with his ruling passion still strong – and as a matter of fact he was fearfully hungry and faint after their long march – eyed longingly some red fruit that grew on one of the shrubs clinging to the wall. He was about to pluck some when Fred drew him back.
“Don’t touch those, Tubby, they’re not good to eat,” he exclaimed. “I recognize the leaf. It’s just like a deadly nightshade leaf at home. I guess they are a giant variety of that poisonous plant.”
“Phew! I’m glad I didn’t touch ’em. Would they kill you?”
“If you ate many. A few would only put you to sleep. They contain a drug called bella-donna which is a narcotic.”
Just then one of the natives appeared with two earthenware bowls full of half raw meat. The boys were hungry or they could not have touched the stuff. As it was, they ate all they could, but left quite a quantity. As they ate their guards eyed them in an odd way. It looked as if they were hungry, too, and would have liked to eat.
The boys could see out through the door, and, after eating all they could, they amused themselves by looking over the ruined city. They could see smoke rising some distance off among the trees, and guessed that the main camp of the Indians was there. Probably, they guessed – and in this they were right – the superstitious Indians did not like to camp among the ruins of the lost race, although they had no objection to jailing their prisoners there.
As it grew dusk, the sky clouded over. Thunder began to rumble in the distance and the wind moaned in a most melancholy way among the trees that overshadowed the ruins. Far off they could hear the Indians shouting and singing in a coarse, unmusical way. Seemingly they were celebrating the success of their chase and capture of the two white boys.
At any rate, they appeared to forget the two guards utterly. It grew dark and the men still sat there. They had lighted a small fire outside the ruined temple, or whatever it had been, and the glow of it revealed their still and silent figures to the boy captives. One of them took some kind of cake from his girdle presently and took a bite of it. Then he offered it to his companion who bit into it hungrily. It was plain that the two Indians were getting hungry.
Tubby was about to try to conciliate them by offering them what the boys had left in their bowls, when he had a sudden inspiration. He went to the wall and began picking some of the berries Fred had told him not to touch. Fred, who had fallen into a fitful slumber, did not notice him, and Tubby proceeded uninterruptedly with what he was about.
It was about a quarter of an hour later and the rumble of the approaching storm was growing nearer and nearer when Tubby arose and, picking up the two bowls, approached the guards. Instantly they sprang to their feet and presented their spear blades at him. But Tubby, by signs, explained that he and his companion had not been able to eat all their rations and wanted to give them the rest.
As Tubby’s shrewd mind had guessed from what he had seen, the two guards were famished. They saw no harm in taking the meat from the prisoner who was kind enough to offer it. They grabbed the bowls and in a minute, as it appeared to the astonished fat boy, they had emptied them. Tubby regarded the two Indians admiringly. He had never seen edibles disposed of so swiftly.
When they had eaten, the guards became stern again. They motioned Tubby back to the interior of the ruinous structure. The stout boy obeyed and sank down on the floor apparently composing himself to sleep, but in reality he was watching the two guards with intent eyes. Suddenly he gave a grunt of satisfaction. The guards began to nod sleepily. One almost fell over. He recovered himself, but in an instant he was off to sleep again; as for his companion, after an ineffectual effort to awaken his comrade, he too sank into a deep slumber, falling across the threshold of the place.
Instantly Tubby was all activity. Quickly he aroused Fred.
“Wake up! Quick! Don’t ask questions. Follow me.”
“Why? What?” began Fred sleepily.
“Not a word. We’ve got to move quick. I squeezed the juice of those berries you told me about into the remains of our supper. The guards ate it. They’re fast asleep. It’s up to us to cut and run for those canoes on the river bank.”
Fred was alert in an instant. As he rose softly to his feet a vivid flash of lightning illumined his face. Tubby saw that it was set and determined as became a Black Wolf Scout. He gripped Fred’s hand tightly.
“Whatever happens, keep your nerve,” he enjoined.
Then, hand in hand and on tiptoe, the two boys crept toward the doorway. As they were stepping over one of the sleeping guards Tubby, by the glow of the fire, saw that a small bag that the fellow had had tied at his waist had burst as he fell headlong in his slumber, and that a lot of odd-looking pebbles lay scattered about near it. Yielding to he knew not what impulse, he stooped and stuffed a handful of the rocks into the pocket of his Scout coat.
It was work to bring the lads’ hearts into their mouths, this advance out upon the open platform with the firelight on them to betray their every movement. Far off they could catch the glow of the Indians’ campfire; but for all they knew other guards might be about and at any minute they expected to hear a spear or an arrow whiz by them. But nothing of the sort happened. They reached the river bank in safety.
The lightning was now flashing incessantly. By its gleam they saw the canoes, with their paddles alongside, lying as they had last seen them. Tubby advanced, and, catching hold of one, turned it over. The next instant he gave a terrified yell. As he had turned it, there had leaped from under it, where he had evidently been sleeping, an Indian armed with a spear.
Before he could cast it, Tubby ducked low and rushed in on the man like a young bullock. The little San Blas native went down in the mud with a splash. Tubby wrested the spear from him and sent it flying. As the Indian struggled to his feet Fred gave him a blow on the mouth that must have driven some of his teeth in, to judge by the sound.
“Quick!” ordered Tubby in a tense undertone, “into the water with those other canoes now.”
“But we only want one.”
“We don’t want ’em to chase us, do we?” exclaimed the fat boy sharply. “Over with ’em I say.”
Fred shoved the two dugouts off. In a jiffy the current caught them and they went sailing out of sight. At the same instant there came another flash of lightning. It showed the river, swollen and angry, racing furiously along.
“Can you handle a paddle, Fred?” asked Tubby.
“Yes; I had a canoe on the Hudson,” was the reply.
“Well, this is going to beat any Hudson you ever saw. There’s a storm in the mountains evidently, and the river is rising every minute. It can’t be helped, though. Take a paddle and shove off.”
Luckily both boys knew something about canoes or the start of that dugout would likewise have been its finish. But they saved it by skillful, swift handling from a capsize. The next instant they were in it, being hurled off at a dizzy pace down the rushing current. Behind them came yells and savage shouts. Their escape had evidently been discovered, probably when a change of guards was made.
“Whoop!” shouted Tubby back defiantly. “We’re off on the Chagres Limited, you shirtless sons of iniquity; it’ll take better men than you to catch us now!”
The cranky canoe rocked wildly, and then shot off into the darkness, hurtled along by the sweeping current of an unknown river.
CHAPTER XXVII
“BE PREPARED.”
We must now go back to Mr. Raynor and Merritt whom we left in the launch, a prey to no very enviable thoughts. As the sound of Rob’s and Mr. Mainwaring’s footsteps died away in the forest, they fell to speculating on the fate of their young comrades. All at once Merritt turned to his companion with an exclamation.
“Isn’t the river current flowing more swiftly?” he asked.
Mr. Raynor gazed over the side at the muddy stream.
“It surely is,” he decided. “I shouldn’t wonder but there’s a storm back in the mountains.”
As the stream flowed more swiftly and with greater volume Merritt looked with some anxiety at their anchor rope. It was not a particularly thick one and the stream was tugging frantically at the launch. Suddenly, without the slightest warning, there was a sharp snapping sound and the rope parted. Before they had time to exchange a word, the launch was a hundred yards down stream. It was almost impossible to turn her about or direct her course, but accident accomplished for them what they had not been able to do for themselves. The Pathfinder suddenly struck a sand bank, gave a giddy sort of yaw and swung round, heading bow on down the stream.
The next instant the current which was still rising caught her and shot her off down stream with her bow pointing in the right direction. Mr. Raynor grabbed the spokes of the steering wheel before the craft had a chance to smash into the bank and Merritt set the engine slowly going on reverse so as to check, as much as possible, the furious speed. He had grave doubts of the patched-up link holding, but he nursed it along as carefully as he could.
It was not till they had gone some distance that either of them had a chance to speak, and then naturally their first words were about those they had left behind. What anxieties beset them may be imagined. Two of their number were lost; the pair that had set out to find them would return either with or without the castaways, but in any case to find the launch gone. That it was all as unavoidable as fate made no difference to the seriousness of the situation.
The Pathfinder, handled with consummate skill by Mr. Raynor, reached the Gatun settlement that evening, and the news spread like wildfire that the boys were lost and that Mr. Mainwaring had been left, by force of circumstances, in the forest. Everyone there appreciated the gravity of the situation. The river was rising and it might be impossible to ascend it for a week, even if then.
From the vivid flashes of lightning visible in the far-off peaks it was clear that back in the wild Cordillera the storm was raging savagely. The water continued to rise. After supper Mr. Raynor, in charge during Mr. Mainwaring’s absence, wrote out a telegram to Lieut. Col. Goethals informing him of what had happened. Merritt, who was aching for something to do, volunteered to take it to the little telegraph office by the railroad track; for the head official of the canal was in Colon inspecting the work there, having left the day before in his private car.
Mr. Raynor, perhaps seeing that Merritt would feel better with some employment to take his mind off his worry, readily consented. The Boy Scout set out at once. As he went he looked back at the distant peaks several times. The lightning was playing a witches’ dance above them, and he thought with a pang of those near and dear to him who might be wandering at that very moment among them.
The operator at the Gatun station was a talkative chap and he chatted to Merritt while he waited for an open wire. He told him that he had had a busy evening and grumbled quizzically at his own good nature in trying to please other people.
“Why, only half an hour ago,” he said, “a chap, a young American, I guess, was in here and borrowed two of my batteries. Said he was experimenting. Well, I knew him by sight and I let him have ’em. What’s the result? I’ve had to charge two more and the line don’t work as good.”
Merritt only half listened to the voluble operator’s relation of his troubles. But presently he looked up languidly as the operator said brusquely:
“Why, here’s the chap coming back now. Well, if he’s after any more batteries he don’t get ’em.”
A footfall sounded on the platform outside, the door opened and in came a man at sight of whom Merritt almost fell off his chair. It was the young man that he had seen in the barn with Jared and with whom the latter had driven to the station the night of the fire in Hampton.
Merritt was sitting back in a corner. For the sake of coolness, there was only one lamp in the place, a shaded one above the operator’s table. A pile of boxes stood close to Merritt and he slipped in behind them. He had reasons of his own for not wanting to be seen just then.
“No more batteries,” began the operator truculently as the stranger came in. But the other laughed.
“It’s not batteries this time,” he said with a slightly foreign accent. “It’s a telegram I want to send.”
“Oh, that’s different. There’s one ahead of you, though.”
“All right; there is no hurry. I’ll write mine out now.”
The man sat down and rapidly wrote on a sending blank. He handed it in. The operator looked at it a minute and then handed it back.
“Sorry; I can’t take it.”
“Why not? I can pay you.”
The man drew out a roll of bills.
“That’s not it. Your message is in cipher and we are not allowed to take such telegrams in the zone.”
“Whose orders?”
“Lieut. Col. Goethals and the U. S. Government.”
“Curse them both,” ground out the stranger angrily. The operator jumped to his feet.
“See here, friend,” he said, “I’m an American and I think Goethals is a mighty fine man, too. See the point? There’s the door. Now get! I’m blamed sorry I lent you those batteries, but I’d rather you didn’t return them than come back.”
Without a word the man turned and half slunk out of the door. As he passed close by Merritt, the Boy Scout heard him mutter:
“Yes, and you and all Yankees will be sorrier yet before morning.”
Merritt looked around. There was an open door behind him. Quick as a flash he slipped through it and the next moment was following the man through a clump of bananas that grew on each side of the road. Dodging among the broad leaves Merritt kept his quarry in sight and stuck close to his heels. The man walked on and then suddenly turned aside from the main road that led back to the “gold-men’s” quarters and headed down into a sort of wild gully running to the river.
With Merritt close on his heels and blessing the shrubs that grew at the path-side, the man, quite unconscious that anyone was on his tracks, kept on. At length he came to a more or less tumble-down hut not far from the river bank.
He paused here a minute and gave three low whistles. In response out came an old negro.
“Dis funny time ob night to call?” said the old darky questioningly.
“This is a good time of night to call,” said the man with a peculiar emphasis. To Merritt it sounded as if the words just spoken were a sort of countersign. At any rate nothing more was said. The old negro admitted the stranger to the hut and closed the door.
“Now what sort of work is on foot,” muttered Merritt to himself. “What mischief are those rascals up to? It’s all most mysterious. This fellow whom we’ve seen with Jared first borrows electric batteries and then tries to send a cipher message. I can’t make it out.”
He stood a moment irresolute as to what course to pursue. Should he go back and tell Mr. Raynor what he had discovered? But the next minute he decided not to. After all he had no proof; he would try to peep into the hut and see what was going on. Cautiously he reconnoitered, completely circling the hut. But not a gleam of light was visible.
Bit by bit he crept closer, using the utmost caution. At length he got close to the rear wall and here, to his huge delight, he found a crack through which he could peer at what was going on within. What he saw made his heart leap. Round a table were seated Estrada, Alverado, the strange man and Jared Applegate. Jared’s face was white and frightened but the others wore a sort of deadly composure. In the background stood the old darky who had opened the door. On the table was a smoky kerosene lamp.
But on the table also were some objects that puzzled Merritt. There was a brass lever, not unlike a telegraph key, and by it an array of batteries with wires leading from them. The strange man was seated near the brass key, with which he was toying carelessly, and yet with a certain caution.
“Be careful,” Alverado was warning him, “don’t be premature, my dear Castro; in your eagerness you have already broken two batteries.”
“Yes, but the accommodating station agent replaced them. Ha! ha! if he had known what they were for! But he wouldn’t handle cipher, confound him!”
“That was the order of these hated Yankees. But after to-night we shall triumph over them. One touch of that key in the right direction and – ”
Estrada, who was speaking, spread his hands expressively. The others’ eyes blazed; only Jared cowered and looked badly frightened.
“Why can’t you put it off till I get out of the country?” he begged.
“So we would have, because of the service you did us in showing us where to place the – the little matter you know of. But you have been well rewarded. Why repine? As for putting it off, what time like the present? Mainwaring is away and those cursed little rats of spies, Boy Scouts, as you call them, are with him. We are safe.”
But Jared only cowered and quivered the more. As for Alverado, who had uttered the words just recorded, he lit a fresh cigarette and regarded the whining youth with scorn.
Merritt’s blood almost froze as he looked on at this strange scene. He had a quick mind, and from almost the first he had guessed what that paraphernalia on the table meant, what the “patriots,” as they doubtless called themselves, were waiting for. But the Boy Scout did not wait. He ran, as if on wings, from that hut in the hollow, his pulses beating like snare drums and a fearful doubt assailing his mind.
“Would he be too late?” That was the fear that pounded at Merritt’s brain as he raced along for the “gold-men’s” row of houses. At the summit of the little hill, leading up from the hollow of the hut, he stumbled over something, something that entangled his foot. He leaned to examine it and then gave an astonished cry. The next moment he had whipped out his scout knife and cut his foot loose of the encumbrance. After that for some reason he went more slowly, but still he ran, ran to summon aid for Uncle Sam against a gang of foul plotters.
* * * * * * * *
Half an hour later the scene in the hut was not much changed, but a tense silence had fallen over its inmates. On every face was a strained, anxious look, yet underlaid by an expression of exultation. Jared alone was missing. In an agony of fear and remorse he had broken from the hut a short time before. They had not tried to check him.
“Ready?” said Estrada, who held a watch. He was deadly pale.
The strange young man by the table shoved back a stray lock of black hair with long, thin fingers. One hand trembled on that brass key that Merritt had noticed.
“Let the invader! the usurper! the tyrant take warning from to-night!” cried Alverado solemnly in a declamatory tone.
Suddenly there came a crash outside. The door was carried inward off its hinges. A crowd of men, in the uniform of the Gatun police, burst into the room.
“Seize that man!” cried Mr. Raynor, who was in the lead. He pointed to the strange young man whose fingers were already pressing the key downward.
“Betrayed!” shrieked Alverado as a revolver was knocked upward out of his hand.
The police, taking no chances after this, sprang forward toward the man at the key with leveled weapons.
“Surrender!” they called out.
“Not till I’ve blown Uncle Sam’s work to Kingdom Come!” cried the wretch with a hideous laugh.
His fingers pressed the key. But no earth-shaking explosion followed. The tons of dynamite that had been cunningly concealed in a spill-way half a mile off did not explode. The Gatun Dam was not hoisted skyward and the work of years ruined.
There was only a feeble “click,” echoed by two more as the handcuffs were snapped on Alverado and Estrada.
Mr. Raynor fairly embraced Merritt and the rest crowded round him.
“If it hadn’t been for you, my boy, and your presence of mind in guessing what that wire was you stumbled across and cutting it, the dam might have been blown up in accordance with this wretch’s desires,” he declared, and then, as the miscreant, who had in vain tried to send the fatal spark to the dynamite, was made a prisoner, Mr. Raynor raised his voice:
“Three cheers for the Boy Scouts!” he cried, “and in particular for Merritt Crawford of the Eagles. Had it not been for his quick wits in guessing that a plot was on foot when he saw that wretch yonder at the Gatun station, this might have been a black night for Uncle Sam and the Panama Canal.”
The cheers were given with right good will. Soon afterward the prisoners, including the old black man, were marched off to the lock-up maintained at Gatun for offenders on the canal work, although, it is safe to say, it never before housed such monsters as the would-be dynamiters of the Gatun Dam.
“If only the rest were here and safe,” said Merritt to Mr. Raynor late that night, “I should be perfectly happy. As it is I don’t feel as if I could rest till we are reunited.”
* * * * * * * *
It was the next day that the entire community, already wild with excitement over the discovery of the plot against the dam and the capture of the chief conspirators, was treated to a fresh thrill. Down the river, which had somewhat subsided, came two canoes. In the first one were Rob and Mr. Mainwaring. In the second sat Tubby and Fred. How they had met is soon explained.
As Tubby had guessed, the river they had seen from the ruins was the Chepalta. Its swift current had carried them into the Chagres itself and in course of time they came to the spot where Mr. Mainwaring and Fred, sadly distressed and worried over the loss of the launch, had decided to spend the night. They had built a roaring fire to keep off serpents or wild beasts, and Tubby and Fred, as soon as they saw the blaze, had made for it. In a few seconds a joyful reunion had taken place. As more sleep that night was out of the question, they had waited till the first flush of dawn and then emptied one of the provision canoes. In this Mr. Mainwaring and Rob seated themselves and they all paddled back to civilization.
Their amazement when they heard of what had been taking place at Gatun during their absence may be, to use a phrase hackneyed but apt, “better imagined than described.” There is no space here to relate all that followed or to give the details of the trial and sentencing of the rascally plotters. It was found, for they confessed in hope of immunity, that the plot was far more widely organized than had been thought. Dozens of laborers were implicated before the end, and it was the number engaged that had made it possible for them to elude the vigilance of the Gatun Guards, secrete so much dynamite and then connect it with wires to the lonely hut in the hollow. As for the strange young man, it was found that he had been a chemist specializing on explosives, who had thought to avenge his country’s fancied wrongs by enlisting with the plotters.
Had it not been for Merritt, who received the personal congratulations of Col. Goethals and the Commission, there is little doubt but that the great dam might have been damaged almost beyond hope of reconstruction. The boy bore his honors modestly, as became a true Scout, and of course the story did not get to the newspapers, so that he was spared the embarrassment of being interviewed and lionized. His comrades felt for him nothing but pride and admiration.
Those pebbles that Tubby picked up proved to be raw emeralds of great value and you may be sure that each of his friends was presented with one. The chums of Lucy Mainwaring, too, have noticed that she now wears a brooch set with a magnificent emerald, by which she seems to set great store. Who gave it to her we will leave our readers to guess.
Jared Applegate managed in some way to evade the drag-net set for him, and has not been seen or heard of since the night he slipped out of the hut overcome at the last minute by the thought of the terrible crime he had committed.
I should like to linger with you in this fascinating old land with its new interests and tell you how the ruined city in which Tubby and Fred passed such an uncomfortable time was explored and rare treasures of antiquity found. I should also like to relate more of the adventures that befell the chums among the “Gold-men” of the Isthmus, but I must content myself with what has been written and my readers with the prophecy that the future will be able to recall no more noble achievement than this that has been the subject of our tale.
You are assured, however, that the Boy Scouts returned to their studies and to the States better citizens, better patriots and better Scouts for the exciting times they spent on Uncle Sam’s big ditch – the eighth wonder, and the greatest of the world. Let every American boy, who gets a chance, see it. It will strengthen and cement his love for the Stars and Stripes and for the U. S. A., the country that put the gigantic enterprise through in spite of almost overwhelming difficulties.
