HE WHO WALKS ALONE
Dorn, the young French boy, awoke early on the morning after Johnny's
disappearance. He had fallen asleep in the middle of the night confident
that he would find his good American friend sleeping peacefully by his
side in the morning. That he was not there alarmed him.
Like most French boys of the better class, Dorn was endowed with a sense
of responsibility beyond his years. He awakened Pompee and Curlie Carson
and was for starting a search at once, even without breakfast.
This plan Curlie vetoed. He had been out prowling around late at night
and was hungry. Besides, being something of a soldier of fortune, who had
been lost many times himself, he did not share the French boy's
apprehension.
"He'll show up," he said, digging in his pack for a match to light the
fire. "Pompee won't be any good without his morning cup of coffee; for
that matter, neither will I."
A half hour later, having eaten a hasty breakfast of cassava bread,
coffee and mangoes, Dorn struck away across the court that led to the
main stairway of the Citadel.
His heart was heavy for he had taken a great liking to the frank, free
and kindly American boy, Johnny Thompson. He knew, too, what a dangerous
thing it is to be lost in a jungle.
With his eyes and ears open, he wandered among the ruins. Up a stair
here, down one there, peering here, there, everywhere he went. Always
hoping to catch sight of Johnny's sturdy figure yet always disappointed,
he spent the whole bright tropical morning hunting.
At times he came upon Curlie Carson or Pompee. They, too, were searching.
Curlie was taking the affair seriously at last.
"If we don't find him trapped somewhere in the Citadel," he said to Dorn,
"we'll have to take to the jungle trails. He may have been spirited
away."
"Spirited away?" The French boy's tone showed surprise.
"Yes, by the natives. There's been a lot of queer doings around this
mossy old pile of stone. Remember that native who took the trouble to
hang a ladder before my window and look in?"
"Yes."
"He didn't do that just for fun. These natives are serious folks, despite
all their drumming, dancing and singing. I've seen natives of other
lands, Central America, Alaska, Siberia. I tell you they're different.
"But they're superstitious, too," he went on. "Look at the way I
frightened that fellow," he laughed. "Never meant to at all. Didn't even
know he was there. But look! A little flash of red light, a little
something for him to see and Bim! Down he goes, head over heels. Wonder
he didn't break his neck.
"Know what, Dorn?" he suddenly grew serious. "Know what I could do? I
could walk from one end of this island to the other and take you with me,
and you'd never see a native; at night I mean, always at night."
"But there are thousands of homes right by the roadside."
"Plenty of homes. Homes can't run away. People can. You might see their
bare heels. That would be all."
It was Pompee who made the discovery of the day. There were many strange
secrets hidden away behind Pompee's wrinkled old brow. As a boy he had
wandered many days among these ruins. Fear had been upon him then and a
great dread, a dread of the spirits of those who had lived there in the
past. Yet a boy's consuming curiosity had led him on and on until he knew
every dungeon, every secret passage as an American boy knows the secrets
of the woods at the back of his pasture.
While Curlie and Dorn searched every dark corner, Pompee had eyes only
for the new, the unfamiliar. In time he found it, a fresh break in the
top of the Citadel.
There he dropped on hands and knees to shade his aged eyes and peer into
the darkness below.
Long he remained there motionless. Then of a sudden, a low exclamation
escaped his lips. Having moved a little to one side, he had allowed a
glimmer of light to touch a spot on the floor of that dark hole where
Johnny had come upon a misadventure.
Another moment of silence, then he spoke a name:
"Johnny."
He spoke it so softly it could not have been heard ten yards away.
He listened. No answer.
"Johnny," a little louder this time. Still no answer.
"Johnny Thompson!" His lips were at the jagged opening now. His voice
sounded out like the roar of a great beast in the hollow enclosure. A bat
beat the air with its wings.
Still no answer.
The old man rose to his feet. On his face was a look of fear, the fear
that had gripped him here as a boy. His voice trembled, his words came
out through chattering teeth as he called again and again:
"Dorn! Dorn! Dorn!"
And this time there came an answering call.
After a long day of weary search Dorn had seated himself on a stone
parapet to watch the sun, a fiery red ball slowly sinking toward the sea.
As he sat there it seemed to him that the sun of hope for a little valley
that he and Johnny and the Professor had learned to love, was sinking
never to rise with another morn.
"The valley has seen triumph and tragedy," he told himself. "Time was
when one could not have found a richer valley. And yet, even then those
who labored there were poor. They were slaves. After that freedom and
revolution, a hundred years."
But now, how his hopes had grown. America, the United States, great,
strong, beautiful America had come to the aid of little Haiti. Valleys
were blossoming as of old. Health was returning to the people. And all
this time they were free. "Free," he repeated the word reverently.
"We hoped so much for our little valley too," he told himself. "But there
is not money for all. Some must wait. And now," his throat tightened.
"Johnny Thompson is lost, perhaps gone forever. And our golden dream will
soon be forgotten."
It was at this moment that he heard the call of old Pompee. It was a
strange call, he thought. These Haitians express so much in a call. But
this call spoke neither of joy nor sorrow.
"What can it be?" he asked himself as, springing down from his seat, high
above the mountain crest, he went racing down at a reckless pace.
"What is it? Have you found him?" he cried as he came near.
Pompee did not answer. He merely stood and pointed at his feet.
Only when the boy stood at his side did he see that he was pointing at a
hole in the Citadel's stone top.
Dropping on one knee, he stared into the darkness of that man-made cavern
but could see nothing. The sun had sunk too low. The spot of light was no
longer there.
Only by lighting a match and allowing it to drop was he able to see. Then
he gave forth a sharp exclamation. What he saw was a khaki handkerchief.
The ownership of that bit of cloth was unmistakable. A little friend of
Johnny's had embroidered a large red J in each of his handkerchiefs.
"It's Johnny's!" he said in a low, tense tone. "He has been down there.
He--he fell in."
Pompee nodded.
"Is he down there still?"
Pompee shook his head solemnly.
"Where can he be?"
"How can one say? See!" said the faithful old servant. "The sun is gone.
Night comes swiftly. Caught on the top of this place where spirits walk,
who can say what may happen to us?"
"Spirits do no harm," said Dorn. "It is only the living ones. But we will
go down." He led the way.
* * * * * * * *
And what of Johnny? Where was he?
He had accepted the proffered aid. He had climbed the rope ladder. What
else was there to do? The native who looked down upon him, who earlier in
the night had looked in upon Curlie Carson at his work, might be a
villain. What of it? If he had cared to he might have murdered Johnny,
then closed up the hole in the fortress roof. That he had not chosen to
do so was in his favor.
"Probably an innocent, kindly fellow," Johnny told himself. "A little
curious, that's all. Most of the natives down here are like that."
He did not feel too certain that this conclusion was correct.
Nevertheless, up the rope ladder he went. And as he climbed, all
unbeknown to him, his handkerchief fluttered from his pocket and dropped
to the floor, there to remain as mute evidence that its owner had spent
some time in that dungeon-like hole. Hours later, as you have seen, it
was found by Pompee.
On clambering over the rough entrance to the pitfall he found himself
surrounded by three stalwart brown men. These men were armed only with
steel pointed spears and machetes, a thing Johnny marveled at. In the
part of Haiti which he had visited, spears were scarce, bows and arrows
practically unknown, and rifles very common.
As he thought this through he recalled his own bow and quiver of arrows.
He had taken them with him on his lonely ramble; in fact he never left
camp without them.
In his fall the bow had been knocked from his hand and the quiver, caught
on a jagged bit of rock, had broken the light thong that held it to him.
"Where are they now?" he thought.
Ah, there they were!
With a sigh of relief he stooped to pick up his bow. He was not
interrupted in this procedure, but as his right hand gripped the bow, one
of the natives seized the quiver of razor-pointed arrows.
A thrill shot through him. His brow grew suddenly cold. "So that's that,"
he thought. "At least they don't trust me too much."
Turning about, the native who had seized the quiver started away, over a
dim trail that did not lead toward the boy's camp.
For a moment the boy stood where he was. Then a hand pushed him very
gently forward.
"What's the use?" he thought. "They are three. I am one. It is night. I
am unarmed. Whatever they will to do they can do."
He thought of the young French boy. "Shouldn't have brought him," he told
himself. "But old Pompee will care for him."
He thought of the needy valley people, of the old Professor and his
dreams, of the 'Rope of Gold'.
"This is the end of that," he told himself as he followed on in the
darkness.
They led him along the top of the Citadel for a time, then, after
descending stone stairways into the heart of the fortress, lost him
completely in a maze of rooms and passageways to at last emerge upon the
top of a stairway that, hidden as it was by great over-hanging treetops,
had escaped the eager eyes of the three boys.
"They know a great deal about this old fortress," Johnny told himself.
"Shouldn't wonder if they could lead me to the 'Rope of Gold'.
"But where do we go from here?" he asked himself, as the leader moved on
down the moss-grown stairs.
At the foot of the stairs were some twenty natives. Apparently Johnny and
his guards had been expected. He noted with a little tremor that two of
the men carried light strong ropes.
Without a word the men formed in line, some in front, some behind him.
Then, slowly, the procession moved forward single file over a narrow
trail Johnny had not known before.
The boy's head was in a whirl. They had not said "Come." They had not
said, "You must go with us." They had said nothing. And yet, there was a
subtle something about their actions that said plainer than words, "It is
useless to resist. You must come with us."
"But where am I going?" he asked himself. "Where will I be when I get
there? And why am I going at all?" Since he could find no answer to these
questions, he gripped his stout bow (now quite useless without his
arrows) and trudged silently on into the night.
Several hours later he found himself lying upon his back beneath a giant
mahogany tree. He was far up the mountain side. Greenish-gray moss hung
like beards from the tree branches. Here it was cool even in daytime.
They had left the trail a half hour before, he and the strange group of
natives. He guessed they were hiding until dark. When darkness came they
would travel again. Where would they go? What was the end of the trail?
To these questions he could form no answer. He had dined well enough on
native food. He was not being disturbed now; watched that was all.
"Strange business," he grumbled to himself.