The Gold Hunters Part 8

"I've been thinking about this all day," he said, spreading it out so that the others could see. "Somehow I haven't been able to get the idea out of my head that--"

"What?" asked Rod.

"Oh, nothing," hastily added Wabi, as if he regretted what he had said. "It's a mighty curious map, isn't it? I wonder if we'll ever know its whole story."

"I believe we know it now," declared Rod. "In the first place, we found it clutched by one of the skeletons, and we know from the knife wounds in those skeletons, and the weapons near them, that the two men fought and killed themselves. They fought for this map, for the precious secret which each wished to possess alone. Now--"

He took the map from Wabi's fingers and held it up between them and the fire.

"Isn't the rest of it clear?"

For a few moments the three looked at it in silence.

From the faded outlines of the original it had been drawn with painstaking accuracy.

With a splinter Rod pointed to the top of the map, where were written the words, "Cabin and head of chasm."

"Could anything be clearer?" he repeated. "Here is the cabin in which the men killed themselves, and where we found their skeletons, and here they have marked the chasm in which I shot the silver fox, and down which we must go to find the gold. According to this we must go until we come to the third waterfall, and there we will find another cabin--and the gold."

"It all seems very simple--by the map," agreed Wabi.

Under the crude diagram were a number of lines in writing. They were:

"We, John Ball, Henri Langlois, and Peter Plante, having discovered gold at this fall, do hereby agree to joint partners.h.i.+p in the same, and do pledge ourselves to forget our past differences and work in mutual good will and honesty, so help us G.o.d. Signed,

"JOHN BALL, HENRI LANGLOIS, PETER PLANTE."

Through the name of John Ball had been drawn a broad black line which had almost destroyed the letters, and at the end of this line, in brackets, was printed a word in French, which for the hundredth time Wabi translated aloud:

"Dead!"

"From the handwriting of the original we know that Ball was a man of some education," continued Rod. "And there is no doubt but that the birch-bark sketch was made by him. All of the writing was in one hand, with the exception of the signatures of Langlois and Plante, and you could hardly decipher the letters in those signatures if you did not already know their names. From these lines it is quite certain that we were right at the cabin when we concluded that the two Frenchmen killed the Englishman to get him out of the partners.h.i.+p. Isn't that story clear enough?"

"Yes, as far as you have gone," replied Wabi. "These three men discovered gold, quarreled, signed this agreement, and then Ball was murdered. The two Frenchmen, as Mukoki suggested at the cabin, came out a little later for supplies, and brought the buckskin bag full of gold with them. They had come as far as the cabin at the head of the chasm when they quarreled over possession of the map and agreement, fought, and died. From the old guns and other evidences we found near them we know that all this happened at least fifty years ago, and perhaps more. But--"

He paused, whistling softly.

"Where is the third waterfall?"

"I thought we settled that last winter," replied Rod, a little irritated by his companion's doubt. "If writing goes for anything, Ball was a man of education, and he drew the map according to some sort of scale. The second fall is only half as far from the first fall as the third fall is from the second, which is conclusive evidence of this. Now Mukoki discovered the first waterfall fifty miles down the chasm!"

"And we figured from the distances between John Ball's marks on the birch, that the third fall was about two hundred and fifty miles from our old camp at the head of the chasm," rejoined Wabigoon. "It looks reasonable."

"It is reasonable," declared Rod, his face flushed with excitement.

"From the head of the chasm our trail is as plain as day. We can't miss it!"

Mukoki had been listening in silence, and now joined in the conversation for the first time.

"Must get to chasm first," he grunted, giving his shoulders a hunch that suggested a great deal.

Wabi returned the map to his pocket.

"You're right, Muky," he laughed. "We're climbing mountains before we come to them. It will be tough work getting to the chasm."

"Much water--ver' swift. River run lak twent' t'ous'nd cari-boo!"

"I'll bet the Ombabika is a raging torrent," said Rod.

"And we've got forty miles of it, all upstream," replied Wabi. "Then we come to the Height of Land. After that the streams run northward, to Hudson Bay, and when we reach them we'll hold our breath and pray instead of paddling. Oh, it will be exciting fun rus.h.i.+ng down-stream on the floods!"

"But there is work before us to-morrow--hard work," said Rod. "And I'm going to bed. Good night!"

Mukoki and Wabigoon soon followed their companion's example, and half an hour later nothing but the crackling of the fire disturbed the stillness of the camp. Mukoki was as regular as clockwork in his rising, and an hour before dawn he was up and preparing breakfast.

When his young comrades aroused themselves they found the ducks they had shot the preceding day roasting on spits over the fire, and coffee nearly ready. Rod also noticed that a part of the contents of the canoe were missing.

"Took load up to river," explained Mukoki in response to the youth's questioning.

"Working while we sleep, as usual," exclaimed the disgusted Wabigoon.

"If it keeps on we'll deserve another whipping, Rod!"

Mukoki examined a fat bluebill, roasted to a rich brown, and gave it to Rod. Another he handed to Wabigoon, and with a third in his own hands he found a seat for himself upon the ground close to the coffee and bread.

"Ah, if this isn't fit for a king!" cried Rod, poising his savory bluebill on the end of a fork.

Half an hour later the three went to their canoe. Mukoki had already packed a half of its contents to the river, a quarter of a mile away, and he now loaded himself with the remainder while the two boys hoisted the light birch upon their shoulders. As Roderick caught his first glimpse of the Ombabika in the growing light of day he gave a cry of astonishment. When he had gone up the stream the preceding winter it was scarce more than a dozen gun lengths in width. Now it was a veritable Amazon, its black, ugly waters rolling and twisting like the slow boiling of a thick liquid over a fire. There was little rush about it, no frenzied haste, no mountain-like madness in the advance of the torrent. Rod had expected to see this, and he would not have been startled by it.

But there was something vastly more appalling in the flood that rolled slowly before his eyes, with its lazily twisting whirlpools, its thousand unseen currents, rolling the water here and there--always in different places--like the gurgling eruptions he had often observed in a pot of simmering oatmeal. There was something uncanny about it, something terribly suggestive of giant hands under the surface, waiting to pull them down. He knew, without questioning, that there was more deadly power in that creeping flood than in a dozen boisterous torrents thundering down from the mountains. In it were the c.u.mulative waters of a score of those torrents, and in its broad, deep sweep into the big lake the currents and perils of each were combined into one great threatening force.

The thoughts that were in Rod's mind betrayed themselves as he looked at his companions. Mukoki was reloading the canoe. Wabi watched the flood.

"She's running pretty strong," said the Indian youth dubiously. "What do you think of it, Muky?"

"Keep close to sh.o.r.e," replied the old warrior, without stopping his work. "We mak' heem--safe!"

There was a good deal of consolation in Mukoki's words, for both youths still bore smarting reminders of his caution and good judgment.

In a short time the canoe was safely launched where a small eddy had worked into the sh.o.r.e, and the three adventurers dug in their paddles.

Mukoki, who held the important position in the stern, kept the bow of the birch within half a dozen yards of the bank, and to Rod's mind they slipped up-stream with amazing speed and ease. Now and then one of the upheavings of the currents would catch the canoe, and from the way in which it was pitched either to one side or the other Rod easily imagined what perils the middle of the stream would have held for them. Quick action on the part of Mukoki and Wabigoon was always necessary to counteract the effect of these upheavals, and in the bow Wabi was constantly on the alert. At no time could they tell when to expect the attacks of the unseen forces below. Ten feet ahead the water might be running as smooth as oil, then--a single huge bubble, as if a great fish had sent up a gasp of air--and in an instant it would be boiling like a small maelstrom.

Rod noticed that each time they were caught near one of these some unseen power seemed sucking them down, and that at those times the canoe would settle several inches deeper than when they were in calm water. The discovery thrilled him, and he wondered what one of the big eruptions out in mid-stream would do to them if they were caught in it. Other perils were constantly near them. Floating logs and ma.s.ses of brush and other debris swept down with the flood, and Wabi's warning cries of "right," "left," and "back" came with such frequency that Rod's arms ached with the mighty efforts which he made with his paddle in response to them. Again the stream would boil with such fury ahead of them that Mukoki would put in to sh.o.r.e, and a portage would be made beyond the danger point. Five times during the day were the canoe and its contents carried in this manner, so that including all time lost an average of not more than two miles an hour was made. When camp was struck late that afternoon, however, Mukoki figured that they had covered half the distance up the Ombabika.

The following day's progress was even slower. With every mile the stream became narrower and swifter. The treacherous upheavals caused by undercurrents no longer hara.s.sed the gold seekers, but logs and debris swept down with greater velocity. Several times the frail canoe was saved from destruction only by the quick and united action of the three. They worked now like a well-regulated machine, engineered by Wabigoon, whose sharp eyes were always on the alert for danger ahead.

This second day was one of thrills and tense anxiety for Rod, and he was glad when it came to an end. It was early, and the sun was still two hours high, when they stopped to camp.

Mukoki had chosen an open s.p.a.ce, backed by a poplar-covered rocky ridge, and scarce had the bow of the canoe touched sh.o.r.e when Wabi gave an excited exclamation, caught up his rifle, and fired three rapid shots in the direction of a small clump of spruce near the foot of the mountain.

"Missed, by all that's good and great!" he yelled. "Quick, Mukoki, shove her in! There's the biggest bear I've seen in all my life!"

"Where?" demanded Rod. "Where is he?"