THE VOICE OF THE MOUNTAIN
Frank's wound fortunately turned out to be nothing very
serious--though painful enough--and after it had been treated with
antiseptics from the medicine chest he declared that, aside from the
stiffness and soreness, he felt no ill effect.
"Those fellows certainly gave us a sample of what we may expect,"
remarked Harry, examining the hole in his shirt where the arrow had
ripped through.
"It was quite as narrow an escape as I care to experience," agreed
Frank. "How about you, Ben?"
"Wall," said the old adventurer, "I don't know as how I think that
kind of excitement is as beneficial fer the health as the rest
cure."
Meanwhile the Golden Eagle, plowing through the clear African air at
fifty miles an hour, rapidly drew nearer and nearer to the
mysterious Moon Mountains.
As they neared the range the extraordinary character of it was
revealed more and more clearly. Seamed with deep gloomy abysses and
almost bare of vegetation, except a few scanty groves of palms and
the hardier tropical trees, they seemed indeed fitted to be the
theater of dark mysteries and the haunt of savage tribes.
"Well," exclaimed Harry, as he scrutinized the strange mountain mass
through the glasses, "I should say that if those Winged Men are to
be found anywhere, here is where they'd reside."
"I should think they'd use their wings to get out--a nastier looking
lot of mountains I never saw," was Ben's reply.
Frank made no comment, but the sinister character of the mountains
they were so rapidly approaching impressed itself on his mind
nevertheless. Eagerly he scanned the range for the first sign of
"The Upturned Face." Harry and Ben, too, gave quite as eager
scrutiny toward the discovery of this striking mark of the ivory's
hiding-place.
All at once it shot into view with a suddenness that made the boys'
beads swim.
It was as clear as daylight. The line of the mountain for which
Frank had the Golden Eagle II now directly headed was unmistakably
the outline also of a hawk-nosed facet.
If the mountains themselves had an evil, menacing look, the stone
face possessed this same quality in an infinitely greater degree.
"Well, if we've got to go looking for ivory right under that face
the sooner we find it the better," exclaimed Ben. "I'd hate to be
shipmates with the fellow who sat for that portrait."
"No human being ever sat for it, Ben," laughed Frank; "it's a mere
freak of nature which has so disposed the mountain mass at this
point as to give the semblance of what the map-maker terms The
Upturned Face."
"Well, if I had a mug like that I'd turn it down instead of up
before some one did it for me," was Ben's comment.
The Golden Eagle landed on a plateau about halfway up the mountain,
beneath the upturned face. It made an almost ideal camping-place,
considering the rugged nature of their surroundings. In one part of
it a small grove of bananas and palms had taken root, and their
smiling greenery offered a refreshing contrast to the dark
oppressive gloom of the giant rock masses piled all about. From the
center of this oasis in the rocky range bubbled a tiny spring of
water as clear and cold as if it had been filtered and iced.
Frank's first act was to send out a wireless to the River Camp,
telling of their arrival.
"Well, thank goodness, we've got something green and pleasant to
look at," remarked Ben, as they set about transforming the chassis
of the Golden Eagle into a comfortable tent by means of running up
the canvas curtains on the aluminum frames provided for that
purpose. Thus equipped, the chassis served the uses of an improved
tent, as the floor was well above the ground and out of all danger
of the unwholesome, vapors rising from the ground and also the
scorpions and other reptiles.
But if the oasis itself was a pretty spot, it was made doubly so by
the contrast it afforded to the scenery surrounding it. On all
sides shot up frowning walls of rugged black rock which seemed to
have been torn and ripped in some remote period by a terrific
convulsion of nature. In places, too, the rock masses seemed to
have been seared by subterranean fires. Frank gazed upward at the
terrific character of the scenery about them.
"We shall need the rope-ladder," he announced suddenly after a long
silence.
"The rope-ladder?" inquired Harry, "what for?"
Frank laughed.
"I mean the rope-ladder we use in the Golden Eagle. As you know,
the only way to locate the cache is to strike a direct line down
from the nose of the upturned face. That will bring us to the small
cairn or pile of rocks that marks the Arab's hiding-place."
"He could hardly have chosen a better," remarked Harry. "Who would
ever guess, unless they had the key to the mystery, that these
mountains held such a fortune in tusks."
The rest of that day was spent in overhauling the outfit which they
would need to use on their expedition of the morrow. Luckily the
boots they wore had been fitted with "hob-nails" so that they were
ideal for the tough climb that they had ahead of them. Each member
of the three was to carry a pick and of course they all were to be
armed, carrying several rounds of ammunition each in their
cartridge-belts.
That night after a supper of fried ham, canned corn and pancakes--all
cooked by the skilful Ben over a fire of wood collected from the
little grove--Frank sent out a wireless to the members of the camp
on the river bank and felt much reassured when Lathrop's "All
well--good luck," came back through the air. It was delightfully
cool on the mountain-side after the oppressive fetid air of the
river and its neighborhood, and as Ben had remarked before they
turned in:
"Fine weather for sleeping."
But sleep would not come to Frank. He tossed and turned on his
transom bed and several times gazed out into the night through the
canvas curtains. An unaccountable feeling of unrest possessed him.
Could they get the ivory out of the cache before Muley-Hassan and
his band arrived by land?
Fast as they had traveled through the air Frank realized that the
Arab, who doubtless by this time had been informed by the
treacherous Diego of the boys' bold dash, would push on at furious
speed in order to head them off. That he would come accompanied by
a well-armed band Frank could not doubt. He and Harry and Ben could
only put up a feeble resistance against such an attack. There was
only one chance to secure the ivory and that was to get at it before
the Arab arrived. It all depended then on how quickly they could
find the cache. Frank lit the lantern and shielding it so that it
would not strike in the eyes of his sleeping brother, drew out the
map and scanned it attentively.
Yes, here were the directions written in the queer hand of
Muley-Hassan's follower.
"A line from the nose straight down to the cairn of stones."
It seemed simple enough and certainly the nose of the Upturned Face
was as clearly to be made out as a ship at sea. But Frank had been
too long trained in the hard school of adventure to underestimate
the difficulties of any piece of work. They faced a hard job and
none realized the fact better than the young leader.
At last he blew the lantern out and once more composed himself to
sleep. He was just dozing off when a sufficiently startling
interruption occurred. One which drove all further thoughts of rest
from his head.
It was an extraordinary sound that brought the boy out of his bed
with a bound and caused him to clutch his revolver with a heart that
beat loud and thick in spite of himself.
Clutching his weapon the boy rushed to the door of the chassis tent
and gazed out.
There was a bright moon which threw into inky blackness the
depressions of the rugged mountains and threw up their projections
into a blue glare. It was almost as light as day under that
wonderful African moon. Had there been any one near the boy must
have been able to see them.
But look as he would there was not a soul in sight. All about him
stretched the barren frowning mountains sleeping under the moon.
But the sound that he had heard?
There was no mistaking it. It had been too like the low humming of
a human voice for him to have been misled. Perhaps he had been
dreaming?
But as if to give the lie to any such supposition the strange sound
that had so alarmed him at that moment made itself manifest once
more:
"A-hooo-A-AH-HOOO-00-a-ho-ho-ho-o-!"
It started softly and gradually ran up the scale till it reached a
crescendo shout and then died out in a soft sound like a woman's
wail. Heard anywhere the sound would have been alarming enough, but
coming as it did in the midst of these unknown, mysterious Mountains
of the Moon it struck a chill to the boy's heart and caused his
scalp to tighten in a manner that even the bravest man or boy in the
world would have had no reason to feel shame over.
A human enemy, a foe he could see, Frank would have faced with iron
nerve; but this strange wailing noise coming from what quarter of
the compass he could not judge--was so uncanny that he was really
disturbed. He bounded into the chassis and roused Ben and Harry.
He had hardly whispered to them the extraordinary intelligence when
again the voice arose.
"A-ho-ho-h-o-o-o-A-h-hoo-ho-AH-HO-HO-O-O-O-AH-ho-h-o-o-o-o-o-o!"
"Well, who?" roared Ben angrily, "come out and show yourself, you
human hyena, and I'll put so much lead in your system you'll be
worth a nickel a pound. Come, you old Ah-Hoo, and I'll show you who
I am quick enough--shiver my topsails!"
But the only reply to Ben's tirade was the dismal echo of his voice
among the rocky chasms.
"Shiver my topsails!" roared the echo and then the hills bandied the
cry about from ridge to ridge till it died out in a whisper:
"My topsails!"
"Hum," remarked Ben, "I don't think I'll talk so loud around here.
There seem to be a lot of folks listening. Such a dreary hole as
this I never--"
"Never," sighed the echoes, "--never."
"Here, I can't stand this," cried Harry. "I'm going to send a
bullet up there the next time that fellow starts 'Ah-hooing."'
But as the strange mournful cry rang out once more the boys paused
in bewilderment.
There was no locating the sound.
It seemed to fill the air. To come from every quarter of the
compass at once.