TOM BREAKS THE TRAIL
The next ten days were dull ones for the Mystery Boys. Mexico was in a
state of excitement, due to the approach of the Presidential election;
and, while the revolutionary times were gone and a more orderly election
would take place, there were some excitable spirits in the city whose
outbreaks made it unwise for the youths to go out on the streets too
often.
Cliff was busy enough for he worked with his father: Mr. Gray was
working on a theory that all of the Indian tribes from North America,
through Mexico, Central America, Venezuela and down to Peru, were
offshoots of the same original migration from some other continent, many
centuries before the white people discovered the new continents. He was
writing a book about that migration, and his work in Mexico dealt with
studies of the old Toltecs, who preceded the establishing of the Aztec
empire.
It surprised the youths to learn how closely the Toltecs, and the Aztecs
later, were allied with the Incas of Peru in certain ways: both were
agriculturists of a high order, as were the Texcucans, kindred with the
Azteca. But there was a great contrast in the nature of the people;
while the Incas had been a mild people, ruling kindly, punishing justly,
fighting only for a necessary cause, the Aztecs had been a fierce,
cruel, actually brutal people, even giving the name of their war god,
Mexitli, to their land in the corrupted form, Mexico.
Mr. Gray was anxious to fill in many gaps in his history by studying the
life and customs and legends of the host of Central American tribes, the
Mayas, the Chocos, the Mosquito and Talamanca tribes, as well as the
Goajiras, the San Blas, and others.
But he hesitated, although the adventure offered in Henry Morgan’s
proposal would give him close contact with some of the natives of at
least one section—Spanish Honduras. The tribes were all rough, rather
fierce, very primitive; and he was aged, as well as having been
weakened, during his stay among the Incas. Nevertheless, had he seen a
way, he would have gone into the adventure.
Nicky, staying rather idly in their hotel with Tom, was glum. He craved
excitement; not only was he active and impulsive, but he was
adventure-loving, athletic and quick, and he liked to go into strange
places and meet new situations. Also Nicky sympathized keenly with Tom
over the loss of the latter’s sister, and the uncertainty of her fate.
Tom, for his part, most eager of all to go to the Mosquito country and
learn what could be learned about Margery, did not seem nearly as
despondent as Nicky, nor was he as busy as Cliff; yet he seemed able to
wear a confident air which puzzled both of his comrades.
Nicky sat with Tom in their hotel room, chafing at his long inactivity.
Tom was busy going over some books which Cliff’s father had found for
him in the public library.
“Here’s a funny one,” he exclaimed, indicating a passage in the book he
held. “One explorer was down in the Central Americas, and because it is
so rainy at times he had a mackintosh. Do you know, Nicky, that
mackintosh gave him more trouble than anything else, because when the
Indians saw him wearing it, as he came toward their villages on the
river in his canoe, they thought he was a priest, and because some
priests had sometimes been harsh in trying to compel the Indians to
adopt their creeds, the Indians all ran and hid and this explorer
couldn’t get any pictures of them or any stories.”
Nicky smiled forlornly. Cliff, coming in, with his father, saw Tom with
a grin on his face and his companion looking glum.
“I wish I knew what makes Tom so joyful,” Cliff said. “Tom, why don’t
you be a good fellow and tell your chums what you know that makes you
feel so good. Is it that telegram you got last Saturday?”
Tom grinned with a touch of malice.
“Maybe,” he admitted.
“Say, look here!” burst out Nicky, “you’re not acting fairly to the
Mystery Boys’ order. You are keeping a secret.”
“No,” Tom answered, grinning still more, “I’m simply living up to our
oath—with a vengeance. ‘Telling all, I tell nothing; Seeing All, I see
nothing, Knowing All, I know nothing!’” he quoted their oath of
allegiance.
“Father, do you know what it is that he knows?” Cliff appealed to Mr.
Gray who smilingly shook his head.
“Well, I’m going to shake it out of him,” cried Cliff. “Come on, Nicky.”
The two attacked Tom with gusto, letting off some of their pent-up
“steam” in an old-fashioned tussle that boded ill for the hotel
furniture. Mr. Gray, only watchful lest they harm any of his old
records, let them have their fun. Panting and laughing, at last they
gave up, still none the wiser. A knock on the door panels halted their
fun.
“Tom,” said Mr. Gray, turning from a brief conversation at the door,
“There is a gentleman in the office asking for you.”
“A gentleman?” cried Nicky. “Who is it?”
“Have him come on up, please, sir,” begged Tom, and then turned his back
deliberately on his companions while he stared out of the window; but
Cliff, watching, saw his shoulders shaking.
Tom expected this arrival! Who could it be? The door opened. With a
simultaneous shout three youths launched themselves toward the tall,
thin, lank figure that appeared.
“Bill—‘quipu’ Bill!”
They grabbed him: they pawed him; they pounded him.
Bill Saunders had been prospecting in the Peruvian Andes at the time
that Cliff had gone to try to discover if his father was still alive
among a hidden Inca tribe in the cordilleras. Bill had taken active part
in their adventures. After the successful end of the trip he had, with
his share of money paid him by Mr. Gray, bought a Texas ranch. The
youths heard from him often. Now, here he was.
“What are you doing here—how did you know——” Nicky began. Then he turned
suddenly on Tom.
“So that’s why you ran off by yourself to telegraph when we got back to
the city, and that’s why you wouldn’t tell us what was in the telegram
you got!” he accused. “You sent for Bill.”
“I told you at the mine, I would leave no stone unturned to get news of
Margery,” Tom admitted. “I said I knew one stone I’d turn.”
“And I guess I was it,” grinned Bill Saunders, depositing his long
length in a chair. “Your telegram hit me just in time. I don’t know your
mind and you don’t know mine, but if there’s any chance for a rolling
stone to gather a little more moss, here’s the stone, all ready to roll.
Cow-raisin’ is not very profitable, just now, and my bank book could
stand a little more fattening. I never did—and I never will—forgive you
fellows for leaving me out when you found the Captain Kidd treasure—and
me a full-fledged member, paying dues and all, in the Mystery Boys.”
“We got ourselves into that adventure so fast that we didn’t have time
to send word or even to think about you,” Tom admitted, with some
regret, for Bill was a good companion on adventure trails, and he was,
as he said, a regular member of their order since they had initiated him
during their Inca experience.
“Well, give me the adventure, this time, anyhow,” urged Bill.
“And maybe some gold, too,” supplemented Cliff.
Then Tom related the story of their mine adventure and Henry Morgan’s
tale.
To say that Bill was intrigued and eager would put it mildly. The ranch
life had begun to grow tame to him: he loved adventure for its own sake,
and for its thrills, as did Nicky. He began planning a trip without a
delay.
Of course Mr. Gray’s last objection was removed. He had good reason to
know and to trust Bill Sanders, and he did both to the full.
“I wasted no time,” Bill said. “I hopped my cayuse and galloped for the
railroad, leaving my top hand in charge: but while I was laying over in
a Texas town I got a long-distance telephone call in to a chum of mine
in Galveston, asking if he had that cruising boat of his that he used to
take me on hunting trips in. He did. We can charter it. It’s got an
engine. Lots of cabin and storage room. It can go up pretty shallow
rivers. It’s just what we need to go on an exploring trip.”
“You wasted no time,” said Mr. Gray. “You took it for granted that you
and the boys would go.”
“That’s Bill!” praised Tom. “My telegram told him enough to get him
started. I thought I’d better break a trail—we seemed to be stuck down
here in this old hotel.”
His comrades praised his idea of summoning their former comrade. The
very next day Bill and Tom returned to the mine, found Henry Morgan and
had a talk. Bill asked some pretty sharp questions, but “Hen” gave
satisfying replies and Bill arranged with him to return to Mexico City
with them at once. This he did.
It seemed no time at all until the trim, staunch cruiser _Porto Bello_
was in harbor, with the chums, Bill and Henry aboard, well supplied.
with gasoline, both in her tanks and in five gallon reserve cans, and
with plenty of tinned food, as well as some arms and ammunition aboard.
They waited only for Mr. Gray who had determined to become a passenger.
He could explore the coast, he said, and if any real information could
be gleaned he was determined to secure it. He had as much enthusiasm for
his historical records as the chums had for Tom’s quest, or Henry Morgan
and Bill for news of the mine—the one Henry’s unnamed friend called “The
Golden Sun.”
“Anchor a-weigh!” cried Nicky, when Mr. Gray came aboard with clearance
papers from the port authorities. “Man the capstan, me bully boys!”
“Man it yourself,” laughed Cliff, working with his chum at the small
winch forward which drew the cable: they had been off on a trial spin to
see that the engine worked perfectly, and had dropped anchor a little
away from the wharves. “To be nearer being somewhere else,” as Nicky put
it.
“Full speed ahead, Andy,” called Bill, already elected Captain by
unanimous consent. The engineer, who accompanied the cruiser to help and
to represent his employer, the boat’s owner, eased his throttle forward,
and engaged the clutch sending the propeller around in the proper
direction. The bow parted the waters of the bay, and with caps waving,
and hurrah after hurrah, Tom, Nicky and Cliff stood on the after deck
and watched Mexico’s humid, sweltering coastline drop away aft.
“Lay your course for the Golden Sun!” begged Nicky.
“And the mystery man of Hen-ry Mo-r-r-r-gan!” chanted Cliff.
“And news of Margery!” added Tom, soberly, but hopefully.