AN OLD LETTER
The next day, directly after breakfast, Mary and Dora began to expect
someone to arrive. The roof of the front porch was railed around and when
they had made their bed and tidied their room they stepped out of the
door-like window and stood there gazing about them. From that high
elevation they had a view of the road coming from Tombstone as it climbed
to the tableland and also they could see for miles across the desert
valley toward the _Bar N_ ranch.
“Who do you think will be the first to arrive?” Dora asked as she slipped
an arm about her friend’s waist.
Mary shook her head without replying. Then, because her conscience had
been troubling her, Dora said impulsively, “Mary, dear, I didn’t mean,
last night, that Harry Hulbert says nice things to you without meaning
them. No one could help thinking you’re—”
Mary laughed and put a finger on her friend’s lips. “Now, who’s
flattering?” Then, excitedly, “I hear a car, but I don’t see it.”
“There it is, by the post office,” Dora pointed, then, in a tone of
disappointment, “Oh, it’s only that funny little Jap vegetable man from
Fairbanks.”
A moment later, when they were looking in different directions, they both
exclaimed in chorus, “Here come Jerry and Dick!”
“There’s the Deputy Sheriff’s little car.”
In through the window they leaped, down the front stairway they tripped
and were standing in the graveled walk between the red and gold
border-beds when the two cars arrived, Jerry’s in the lead.
Mary’s heart was heavy, though she tried to smile brightly, when she saw
that Etta Dooley was again on the front seat with Jerry. Dick, this time,
was quite alone. Harry Hulbert, although in the rear, leaped out and
bounded to Mary so quickly that he reached her first.
Her welcome, though friendly, lacked the eager graciousness of the day
before. Harry, however, did not seem to notice it. “I’ve got the
translation here,” he said, waving the old yellow envelope.
Jerry got out of his car, turned to speak to Etta and then walked toward
the waiting group. Dick had already disappeared into the house in search
of his mother.
Etta, remaining in the car, called, “Good morning” to the girls. Jerry
explained, “I haven’t told Etta the whole story, just the part about
Little Bodil and the rock house. She was so interested, I told her we’d
be glad to have her go with us.”
Mary smiled at him rather wistfully, Dora thought. Then she walked to the
side of the car and said, “Won’t you get out, Etta, while we read the
letter?”
Jerry, who had followed her, said, “Dick wanted us to wait till we got to
the rock house before we read the letter. Can you girls go now?”
“Yes, I’ll get my hat.” Mary turned to go indoors. Dora went with her and
they were back almost at once to find Jerry beside Etta, with Dick
waiting to help Dora to her usual place in the rumble.
Harry, his rather thin face alight with pleasure, took Mary’s arm and,
giving it a slight pressure, exclaimed in a low voice, “The gods are
kind! I hardly dared hope that your old friends would let me have you
today. I’ve thought of you every minute since I left you last night.”
Mary, seated at his side in the small car, turned serious eyes toward
him. “Harry,” she said almost pleadingly, “please don’t talk to me that
way. I—I’d rather you wouldn’t.”
An expression of sadness for a moment put out the eager light in his
eyes, then, good sportsman that he was, he said, “Very well, Mary. I
think I understand.”
After that his conversation was interesting, but general, until they
reached the towering rock gate where Jerry’s car was standing, waiting.
“What a lonely, awesome spot this is!” Harry exclaimed.
“If you think _this_ is awesome,” Mary laughed, “wait until we pass
through those gates.”
Jerry climbed out, helped Etta, then turned to call, “Don’t get off the
road, Harry. The sand’s so soft we’d have a time pulling you out.”
Dora and Dick leaped from the rumble and were joined by Mary and Harry.
“We walk the rest of the way,” Dick told the air scout, “and believe me
it’s hard going.”
Mary glanced ahead, saw Jerry assisting Etta as in former times he had
assisted her when her feet sank ankle deep in the soft, white sand. Harry
gallantly took her arm to aid her. Mary smiled at him wanly. “Thank you,”
she said. “I wish I were the self-reliant athletic type like Dora. She
never needs help.”
Harry bit his lip to keep from saying aloud what he thought. Before he
could think of something else to say, Dick looked back and called to him,
“Were you ever any place where there was such a deathlike stillness as
there is in this small walled-in spot?”
Harry shook his head. “Never!” he replied. Then, glad of the
interruption, he asked, “That’s the rock house, up there, isn’t it?”
Dick nodded. “That’s where the poor old fellow they called ‘Lucky Loon’
buried himself alive, if there’s any truth in the yarn.”
“Believe me, that would take more courage than I’ve got,” Harry declared
with a shudder.
Jerry, glancing back, and finding that he and Etta were quite far ahead,
turned and waited, still holding his companion’s arm.
Etta’s intelligent face _never_ had seemed more attractive to Mary. The
melancholy expression, which the girls had noticed, especially, the day
they had called upon her, had vanished. Her eyes were bright with
interest.
They walked on in a close group. “I’m simply wild to know what’s in the
letter Little Bodil translated,” Dora exclaimed.
Dick laughed. “I suppose we will call that dignified Sister Theresa
‘Little Bodil’ till the end of time,” he said.
When they reached the foot of the leaning rock, which had one time been
the stairway to the rock house, they gathered about Jerry who was opening
the yellowed envelope. Intense interest and excitement was expressed in
each face.
Sister Theresa had written a liberal translation between the almost faded
lines of her dead brother’s letter.
“Dear Little Bodil—
“In my heart I feel you are alive. I have hunted all over Arizona, New
Mexico and across the border. No one has heard of you. I can’t search
any longer.
“Before I die I want to tell you where my gold is. Silas Harvey will
tell you where my rock house is. Secret entrance—”
Jerry paused and looked in dismay at the interested listeners.
“What’s up?” Dick asked.
“The old writing was so faded Sister Theresa couldn’t make it out.”
“How terrible!” Dora cried. “How to get _into_ the rock house is the
_very thing_ we need to know.”
“Well, at least we know there _is_ a secret entrance,” Mary told them.
“Isn’t there any more of the translation, Jerry?”
The cowboy had turned a page. He nodded. “Yes, here’s something but I
reckon it won’t help much. There are only a few words.” He read, “Find
money—walled in—turquoise eye.” Jerry looked from one to the other and
said, “That’s all. Doesn’t help out much, does it?”
Mary took the letter. “Here’s a note at the bottom. Sister Theresa wrote,
‘I am sorry I could not make out the entire message. I do hope this much
will aid you in finding the money if it has not been stolen.’”
“Well,” Dick was looking along the base of the almost perpendicular cliff
on which the rock house stood, “I vote we start in hunting for a secret
entrance.”
“O. K.,” Harry said. “Let’s divide our forces, one going to the right and
the other to the left.”
Jerry, as though it were the natural thing to do, said to Etta, “Shall
_we_ go this way?”
Mary turned and started in the opposite direction. Harry was quick to
follow her. Dora and Dick remained standing directly under the rock
house. Dora said, “I’m puzzled! _Not_ about the secret entrance but about
Mary and Jerry.”
“Oh, that’ll come out all right.” It was plain that Dick wasn’t giving
romance much thought, for he added, “I’m going in between the main cliff
and this broken off piece.”
Dora, going to his side, peered into the crack. The winds of many years
had blown sand into it. She was surprised to see Dick start pulling the
sand away from the wall.
“Have you a hunch?” she asked with interest.
“No, not really,” he told her. Then remarked, “Wish I had a shovel.”
“You may have one,” Dora said, “if you want to go back to the road. I saw
a shovel and an axe fastened under the Deputy Sheriff’s car.”
Jerry and Etta, having found nothing, were returning.
“What are you uncovering, Dick?” the cowboy called.
“Say, fetch a shovel, will you?” was the answer he received. “Dora says
there’s one under the ‘Dep’s’ car.”
“Righto.” The cowboy’s long legs carried him rapidly toward the rock
gate. He had returned with the shovel just as Mary and Harry came up.
They had found nothing that could possibly be a secret entrance.
“What’s your reasoning, Dick, old man?” Jerry asked as he handed him the
shovel.
“Well, there’s _something_ here that caught and held the sand,” Dick
replied. “It may not be what we’re looking for but I’m curious to know
what it is.”