IT IS NOW CLAY'S TURN
"Do you think we can raise her?" asked Case.
"We can if she has any bottom left," declared Clay. "If they only cut
a few holes in her and sunk her that way, we can get her out."
"Aw, what's the good of taking up time with the old wreck!" demanded
Alex, who had listened to the conversation. "It isn't our boat,
anyway."
"But the _Cartier_ is a splendid launch, and worth a lot of money,"
Clay suggested, "and we might pay the expenses of the trip by getting
her out for the Fontenelles. It won't do any harm to try."
"All right!" Alex cried. "Just remember I'm the champion long distance
diver, when you get ready to go down and look her over."
After breakfast the _Rambler_ was taken still farther upstream, as far
up, in fact, as the depth of the water would permit.
"There!" Captain Joe observed, pointing to a bend just above the prow
of the boat. "This is the strange thing that I called your attention
to. The river widens here in the most mysterious manner."
"It may be just back water," Clay ventured.
"No sir!" answered the captain. "There is no back water here. See how
steadily the current runs? And there's no creek running in, either."
"Then there must be a subterranean stream running--"
Clay checked himself with the sentence half finished.
"Suppose," he mused, "just suppose, there should be a subterranean
stream running in from under the hills--let us say from the north.
That would be a channel, wouldn't it? And it might be a lost channel
at that! Why didn't I think of that before."
The boy was so full of the thought, so enthusiastic over the thing it
might mean, that he concluded to make a quiet investigation on his own
hook, saying nothing to the others regarding the matter.
"What was it you said about some underground stream?" asked Captain
Joe. "You started in to say something about it and then stopped
abruptly."
"Oh, it just occurred to me that there might be an underground river
somewhere around here, but I guess that's just a dream. There couldn't
be any river, you see, for the ground is rocky, and there seems to be
no place for an underground stream to get its supply."
"No," the old captain agreed, "there can't be any underground stream
that's a sure thing. If there are caverns they are dry."
Clay chuckled to himself, and went into the cabin after Alex.
"Come on, Redhead!" he cried catching the boy by the arm. "We are now
going ashore to dig up the lost channel."
"That's a nice pleasant little job, too!" Alex declared.
"Well, come on," Clay insisted. "We'll go over and make a start,
anyway. We may be able to find out if the outlaws are really here."
Explaining to Captain Joe and the others that they were going only a
short distance from the shore, the boys launched the canoe and were
soon on the sloping shore of the peninsula. Once across they hid their
canoe in a thicket which overhung the stream and disappeared in the
interior.
"Now, look here," Clay said as he stopped and sat deliberately down in
the shade of a great tree, "I've got an idea."
Alex stared hard in pretended wonder and amazement.
"Where did you get it?" he asked.
"Brain cell opened and gave it to me," Clay answered.
"Well, come across with it," Alex urged.
"Captain Joe wants to know where the water comes from to make the west
river so large at its mouth," Clay went on. "I started in to tell him
that there might be a subterranean stream somewhere hereabouts, but I
thought he would laugh at me and so kept my mouth shut."
Alex sprang to his feet and swung round and round on his heels,
chuckling and shaking hands with himself.
"That's the idea!" he cried. "That's just the idea! There is a
subterranean stream here somewhere! Look at the way the rocks are
piled up, and look at the long slope from the top of the ridges to the
level of the river. There are catch basins here somewhere, and water
pouring into the river that no one knows anything about."
"Now go a little farther," Clay suggested. "Figure that at some time,
say two or three hundred years ago, this subterranean channel lay open
to the sun. Now what do you make of it?"
"Holy smoke!" almost shouted Alex. "I make a lost channel!"
"There you are!" Clay began, "and all we've got to do is to just look
around and find it. We've got plenty of time."
"That will be some cheerful job, too," Alex commented. "We've only got
about forty thousand square miles of territory to look over."
"I think," Clay said, "that we have the idea, and that is the main
thing. The rest is only a matter of detail."
As the boys sat under the tree, Alex having dropped down to the turf
again, a rustling of bushes was heard to the east and they turned in
that direction, scanning the thicket closely. Then Alex seized Clay by
the arm and pointed away through the underbrush.
"Did you ever see that figure before?" he asked.
"Looks to me to be about the size of Max," Clay answered. "I wonder if
he is watching us, or whether he is only looking in the direction of
the _Rambler_. Anyway, we'd better move."
The boys shifted their position some yards to the north and crouched
down again. The bushes showed motion once more, and they saw the
figure they had observed moving toward the bank of the west river.
"He never saw us!" cried Alex. "He is sneaking down on the _Rambler_."
"Yes," Clay replied, "and there are two or three just behind him."
"I had an idea," Alex chuckled, "that things would begin to liven up
as soon as we got into this country. This will please Captain Joe!"
"Captain Joe," Clay replied, "seems inclined to take things rather
seriously. The chances are that he is wondering now, night and day,
how four rattleheaded boys ever got so far over the world without
being murdered or sent to the penitentiary. Still, he isn't always
passing out advice."
From their new shelter, the boys now saw Max and three men pass to the
west and stand under a screen of boughs looking down toward the
_Rambler_.
"The war is on, I guess," Clay said. "Those fellows were here waiting
for us to come back. Did it ever occur to you that they know about our
having that mysterious map?"
"Now you've said something," Alex exclaimed. "That map was intended
for those opposing the Fontenelles. It was given to us by mistake, and
the people who should have had it know that we've got it. That's why
they're watching us so. Wonder we never thought of that before."
"It seems to me that you've struck it right," Clay answered. "They've
been waiting here all this time for us to come back it seems."
"Then I should think they'd keep out of sight until we get busy
looking for the channel. They surely won't want to drive us away
before we demonstrate what we know about it."
"I presume they think they are keeping out of sight," Clay decided.
"Well, they're not keeping very close watch, for they don't seem to
know that we're on shore."
"Don't be too sure of that," Clay answered. "They may be watching us
this minute. Perhaps we'd better move."
As the boys spoke, Max and his three companions started at a swift
pace up the bank of the stream keeping always out of view of the boat.
They passed the place where the boys lay in hiding and for a moment
the lads heard them pushing through the underbrush.
"They've probably gone to their tent now," Alex suggested, "and I'm
going to follow on and see if I can locate them."
"All right," Clay said, "only be careful. I'll go back to the boat and
tell the boys what's going on. Be sure you don't get captured, now,"
he added as Alex turned to the thicket to the north.
"No danger of that," the boy grinned and the next moment he was out of
sight, pushing through the thicket in the direction taken by Max.
Clay stood for an instant longer where the boy had left him and then
moved in the direction of the river.
But his progress toward the stream came to an abrupt termination in a
minute. He tripped over what he at first believed to be a running vine
and fell to the ground. Then, as he lifted himself to a sitting
position, he saw the obstacle over which he had fallen was a rope and
that it was held in the hands of two evil looking men.
The men, bearded and dirty, broke into a laugh over Clay's look of
amazement. They sprang toward him and in a moment he was relieved of
his weapons. The boy sat perfectly still, for the attack had come so
suddenly that he could hardly comprehend the situation.
"Ain't it the cute little child?" guffawed one of the men, slapping
his knees and bending down to look the boy in the face.
"He's all of that," replied the other. "This is the little boy that's
come out here to find a hidden channel that no one else can find. He
used to be a real cute little newsboy in Chicago, and directly he'll
wish he was back selling newspapers on Clark street!
"Are these all the poppers you have, kid?" he asked pointing to the
revolvers which had been taken from the boy. "You might injure
yourself by carrying them."
Clay glanced at the fellow steadily. He had now in a measure recovered
his equilibrium. His impulse was to smash a blow into the grinning
face bent over him.
He didn't like the black, matted beard. He objected to the greasy,
frayed jacket. The man's snaky, near-set eyes offended him. More than
once he drew back a clenched fist to strike the evil face.
"It seems to me," the boy said, restraining himself with a great
effort, "that I walked right into a den and found the snakes at home."
"Yes, little one," the man replied, "We sort of dipped you up in a
bottle. I bet my chum, here, a dollar that he wouldn't get you the
first time he tried. I lose, so you'd better pass out the dough and
I'll pay up. I always pay my sporting debts."
"Perhaps you'd better take the whole roll," Clay said, producing a
small handful of change and passing it over. "You'll get it in time,
anyway."
The man took the money, counted it slowly with clumsy fingers and
thrust it into a pocket.
"As long as you have money, you know," Clay said sneeringly, "you
won't have to be taking pennies away from children or stealing from
blind men. You're quite welcome to what I have."
"You just cut that stuff quick," snarled the man rising to his feet,
his face blotching red. "Cut that quick!"
He might have struck the boy only his companion drew him away.
"Keep back, you fool," the cooler man said, "Do you want him to bring
all the others here with his yelping? Why, we can't even shoot him
till sundown, so we'd better gag him to keep him from squealing."
"You needn't worry about me squealing," Clay said. "I learned how to
keep my mouth shut when you ruffians were serving your last sentence
in the penitentiary."
One of the men drew out a knife and flashed it angrily before the
boy's face.
"Keep a civil tongue in your head," he said, "and you, Ben, chase up
to the north and get the kid that followed Max. We'll tie 'em up
together."
Clay was now drawn to his feet and his hands tied tightly behind his
back. In this condition, he was marched swiftly through the brush,
vines and boughs striking his unprotected face. He paid little
attention, however, to his physical discomforts. He was listening for
some indication of the capture of Alex.