muscles here, when a little way to the north there is a capital spot to
rest? We can learn nothing here, and by floundering about like top-heavy
goblins we shall improve neither our minds, nor our morals, nor our
garments. At any rate, _I_ am going back; _I_ am not going to make an
Amazon of myself.”
Sooner or later, the most inattentive of readers will be struck with
admiration at the artifice which Charles displays in working on the
feelings of his comrades.
In this instance, though George had actually turned back, he paused
irresolute on hearing Charles exclaim sarcastically, “George, I’m afraid
you will never become an explorer. Why, if you only knew it, we are
penetrating a jungle now! Think of that! _We_ in a jungle!”
Though coaxing would not have influenced the sage, this happy expression
did. He cast a sweeping glance in search of Charley’s “jungle,” and then
went on with the others.
Charles was satisfied, for he knew that however much the boy might
grumble, he would not turn back again.
A certain word George had spoken, excited Steve’s curiosity. False
pride never restrained Stephen from asking for information, and he said
eagerly, “George, what’s a namazon?”
George’s smiling face discovered that the right cord had been struck
at last, and, always willing to enlighten the ignorant, he answered
benignly, “Steve, an Amazon is a West African woman warrior, who
fights instead of men. And she fights with a vengeance--harder than a
sea-serpent that I read about the other day. Why, she wears a sword
called a razor, and it’s so strong and heavy that she can chop off an
elephant’s head at one blow with it!--At least” truth obliged him to add,
“I guess she could, if she chose. And she will scale a rampart of briers
and thorns,--no, _brambles_ the book said,--of brambles, all in her bare
feet, and come back all covered with blood and chunks of bramble, but
with her arms full of skulls!”
Steve’s look of horror only encouraged George to make greater exertions.
But he was forced to pause for want of breath, and his hearer inquired in
alarm, “Where do they get the skulls? Do they kill folks for them?”
Now, it was very inconsiderate, very disrespectful, very _wrong_ in
Stephen to put such a question. George was wholly unprepared for
it; and it rather befogged his loquacity. After a doubtful pause,
he began blunderingly: “Why, as I told you, they scale a rampart of
bri--_brambles_,--sixty feet high, sometimes--and come off with those
skulls. I--I believe they are put there beforehand; and the feat is
to pounce on them.--I mean, the feat is to scramble over the brambles
barefooted. It is a valiant achievement!”
Then a bright idea occurred to him, and he continued impetuously, “Why,
Steve, you must be crazy, crazy as an organ-grinder! You don’t know what
a skull is; you don’t know a skull from a dead-head. Why, I’m astonished
at you!”
“Oh, of course. I see what you mean now; yes, of course they do;” Stephen
assented with alacrity.
“I might lend you my book about all these things,” George graciously
observed.
“Oh, thank you!” said Stephen with sparkling eyes.
Meanwhile, the heroes had been pressing deeper and deeper into the
“jungle,” and would soon be at their journey’s end. But at this critical
juncture the sage’s evil genius again preyed upon his spirits, and he
muttered with filial concern: “A boy’s first duty ought to be to take
care of his clothes, and--”
“But it never is!” Steve broke in.
“--and here we are destroying ours!” the sage continued, disregarding
Steve’s impertinent interruption.
“Never mind the ‘garments,’ George,” Charles replied. “Your old coat
looks as if it might survive the frolics of a hurricane; so, ‘banish care
and grim despair,’ as the second page of our new copy-book says.”
This was indiscreet in Charles. The aggrieved George was but a boy, and,
naturally, he was angered. “Look here,” he exclaimed, “what is your
object in dragging us through this dismal place? Where are we going? If
you should lead the way to a python’s lair, should I be bound to tag
blindly after you?”
This reasoning was forcible, and for a schoolboy, poetical. Will--knowing
that their scheme would be disconcerted if George should turn back, and
fearing that he would--bounded forward a little way, and then flung
himself plump into a certain pile of brush.
“Oh!” he screamed. “Come here! Boys, hurry! Something rattles all around
under me!”
The others quickly urged their way towards him, some in real, some in
pretended alarm.
George now proved himself a hero. The vigour of his intellect overawed
the others, and they made way for him respectfully. At length he was
about to derive some advantage from the ponderous tomes whose pages his
grimy thumbs had soiled so often.
“Yes,” he said, “I know just what you heard. Don’t be excited, Will; keep
very cool. _It’s a rattlesnake!_ The great naturalist says they skulk
around brush-heaps and tangled bushes, ready to pounce on their prey.
I know, for I’ve read all about it; and luckily, I am prepared for the
worst. Now, where are you bitten, and I’ll cauterize it.”
And the speaker busied himself by stripping his pockets of their
treasures, which he dropped on the ground at random.
Jim, however, did not view the matter so philosophically. At the bare
mention of the word _rattlesnake_, he turned and tore wildly through
the “jungle,” crying piteously: “Oh! I’ve got the chills! I’ve got the
chills! the chills! the chills! awful chills!”
_Chapter VIII._
GEORGE COMES OUT AHEAD.
Meanwhile, Will stepped out of the pile of brushwood and said, somewhat
foolishly, “Now, George, don’t be foolish; you know well enough there are
no rattle-snakes in this part of the country. Put up your instruments of
cauterization, and let us all take a squint under these ‘brambles.’”
Poor George looked so crestfallen that Will almost relented. “Didn’t you
get bitten?” the former asked blankly.
“What could bite me, George!” Will asked mildly.
“Well, _I_ don’t know what,” George said savagely, “But Charles
Goodfellow declares this is a jungle; and we all know, I hope, that
poisonous lizards, and reptiles, and centipedes, and tarantulas, and
all hideous creatures, live in just such a place as this--I mean in
jungles. So, _what_ disturbed you in that brush-heap! Answer that
question!--Botheration!” he continued furiously, “here you’ve led me into
this horrible place, made fun of me, and contradicted me--you, who have
no practical knowledge. And now, to cap it all, I’ve lost my jack-knife,
the best jack-knife in these regions, and I got it only yesterday!”
Poor George! One thing after another had happened to irritate him, and he
was now in a savage mood. In fact, he was really angry, and the boys had
never seen him angry before.
Charles felt a pang in the region of his heart, and Stephen was very
uneasy.
“Never mind George,” Will said soothingly. “I’ll help you to look for
your knife as soon as we see what is under the brush.”
He stooped over the brush-heap, groping, and then said with awe, as
_he_ supposed: “Boys, here are bones! It was bones that rattled under
me!--George,” conciliatingly, “what does that mean?”
“Well, I don’t care what it means. My knife is worth more than all
the bones you can find in a whole summer; and I intend to look for
it in spite of everything. You boys may squabble over those bones
till--till--any time you choose.”
Charley was dismayed. George was too sullen to catch at the bait, and
their little scheme seemed likely to end ingloriously. Was it for this
that they had toiled and plotted?
But Marmaduke, who had hitherto held his tongue, now came to the front,
saying eagerly, “Bones! Bones! Let me see!”
He rummaged among the branches, and while Will, Charles, and Stephen,
crowded around him, George looked on “askance.”
“O-o-h!” gasped Marmaduke, “what a horrible discovery we have made!
Bones! Bones of a mortal! Boys,” with emotion, “SOME ONE WAS FOULLY
MURDERED HERE.”
“O-o-h!” echoed all the boys, as in duty bound.
But Steve gave a horrible chuckle, and whispered to Charles, “It works
already with _him_; and,” pointing his elbow at George, “_he’ll_ come
around.”
The pain in Charley’s heart was not very deep-seated, and it now made
room for exultation. The searcher was left to his own musings, and the
rest were absorbed in the discovery.
Marmaduke paused a moment, to realize the awfulness of the word _murder_;
then, snatching up the branches, he nervously tossed them out of the way.
A little heap of white substances was disclosed which--to Marmaduke’s
heated imagination--were all that remained of a human skeleton.
Now, the writer has so much respect for the feelings of his readers that
he herewith warns them, in all honesty, that what is immediately to
follow, borders upon the grisly; and that consequently it would be well
for the queasy reader of fashionable fiction to skip the rest of this
chapter and all of chapter the twelfth.
Marmaduke was now in his element; he felt somewhat as a philosopher does
when a new theory in science bursts upon him; he was happy. All boyish
bashfulness forsook him, and he began rapturously:--
“Yes, boys, we have made a great, an _appalling_, discovery! We have
certainly stumbled on a dreadful mystery! It now remains for us to solve
this great problem, and gain immortal renown. In the near future, I see
us sitting in the courts of law, with the ferret-eyed reporters; the grim
lawyers; the shrill-voiced foreman keeping order among the honest and
eager jury; the gaping multitude; the venerable judge; and the quaking
murderer, found at last, and his crime unearthed and fastened on him by
_us_. Then the grand old judge, in solemn tones, will turn to us and say,
“You are now called upon to give your conclusive evidence, and charge the
crime--long hidden, but brought to light at last--upon the trembling,
cringing wretch--this murderer!” Oh! what a proud day it will be for us!
Now, boys, an unpleasant duty lies before us, and if any of you wish to
withdraw, do so at once. As for me, I will not drop the matter till the
mystery is cleared up, and the murderer gibbeted. But who ever wishes to
take a bold part with me, must continue in it till justice is satisfied.
Then together we shall reap the fruits of our zeal.”
This neat little speech amply repaid the boys for all the perils they
had encountered in penetrating into Charley’s jungle. Their delight is
beyond our description. Charley, Will, and Steve, exchanged winks most
recklessly.
Marmaduke, however, paid no attention to them, but drew a scrap of paper
and a lead-pencil, which he always carried, from his pocket.
“What are you going to do now?” Steve queried of the romance-stricken boy.
“I am going to make a memorandum of this affair,” was the answer.
“Where is Jim?” Will asked, thinking that youth would enjoy the scene.
“Oh,” said Steve, “his old and convenient disorder seized him when George
spoke of rattle-snakes, and he skedaddled.”
“Yes,” supplemented George, who was recovering his temper, “there is a
good deal of philosophy in his complaint; for, like most things cold, it
vanishes away when heat is applied; and, to generate heat, Jim sets out
on a run.”
“Good for you!” Charley said promptly, hoping to induce the boy to
examine and pass an opinion on the bones.
But George still felt too sore--perhaps, too obstinate--to yield.
“Look here, Marmaduke,” he said, “how are you going to prove that
somebody was _murdered_ here? Perhaps he was gobbled up by an
unprincipled and broken-down quadruped--say, a shipwrecked gorilla.”
“Yes,” chimed in Steve, “perhaps a devouring monster of a famished
sea-cow fell on him, and gnawed him, and wallowed him around, and
extinguished him!”
Marmaduke was now being jeered in his turn. Considering that he was only
a boy, he put up with their banter with stoical unconcernedness; but
his quivering lips and humid eyes betrayed that he felt it, and turning
to Will, he said, “In such a case as this, you always find something
to discover the guilty one,--a pet dog’s collar, a monogrammed metal
tooth-pick, an old card case, a seal-ring, a gold watch-key, a book-mark,
a--a--or something else.”
“Why, have you found anything?” Steve asked quickly.
No answer. Silence, in this instance, was peculiarly golden; more, it was
sufficient.
“Then how do you know, and how are you going to prove it was murder?”
Then Marmaduke’s indignation was roused, and he scowled upon Stephen
so malignantly that this worthy quailed, unable to bear up under that
“steady gaze of calm contempt.”
Turning to Will and Charles, the persecuted boy thus explained himself:
“Not long ago, I read in a story how an awful murder was cleared up,
simply because a cast-off wig, that had fallen into the murderer’s pocket
by accident, and belonged to nobody in particular, fell out again at
the fatal moment, and proved the whole crime. You boys might read about
such things from to-day till your hair turns gray; and you would find
that some little trinket, some trifle, turns the evidence one way or the
other, and decides the verdict. Why, where would the romance of romances
be, if it wasn’t so?” excitedly. “I mean to hunt for that lost trinket
when I get ready; it has been here all this time, and it isn’t going to
disappear forever now.”
“How long has it been here?” asked George, laying stress on the word
_how_.
“When we stumbled on this mystery,” pursued Marmaduke, too much absorbed
to regard George’s incivilities, “it was about ten o’clock.”
Having made a note of this, he went on, “the scene was a tangled glade in
a thick jungle.”
Another note.
“Fit scene for such a tragedy!” Charles commented.
“The bones were hidden under brush-wood, which _I_ removed,” and again
his pencil was heard to scribble a note.
We say, _scribble_. The boy intended to “polish” his notes at a more
convenient season.
“I say,” interrupted Stephen, “it isn’t _your_ place to take all these
notes; you ought to inform a constable, or, a bailiff,--or, better still,
a detective!”
Marmaduke scowled at him again, but held his peace.
“Oh, I see,” continued Stephen, bent on teasing the poor boy; “you’ll
hand your notes over to some detective, so that he’ll see how clever you
are.”
Then Marmaduke spoke. “Boys,” he said, “I’m astonished at your levity and
indifference in such a case as this.”
With that, he laid down his pencil and paper, and again examined the
bones, handling them with reverence, and muttering what he supposed to be
their names.
For some time a fierce conflict had been raging in George’s
mind--curiosity battling with wounded vanity. Which would triumph?
While Marmaduke mumbled, George took mental notes. Soon a broad grin
spread over the latter’s face, and he said, “Look here, boys; Marmaduke
has named five thigh-bones, and thirty-one ribs! I know, for I’ve kept
count. Now, the skeleton of a common man has no business with so many
thighs and ribs; and Marmaduke isn’t supposed to know the name of a bone
as soon as he sees it. Now, I’ve studied into the matter, and I ought to
know something about it. I’m just going to see them for myself.”
Curiosity had triumphed!
This disconcerted poor Marmaduke. He made room for George, and sat down
beside Charles. A look of dismay appeared in his face, and he pondered
deeply. “Boys,” he said, “did you ever hear that anybody was ever
murdered in this neighborhood?”
“Never!” shouted all four in a breath.
“I don’t care; it _is_ a skeleton!” doggedly. “I know as much about it
as _he_ does,” glaring at George, “and I will stick to it, it was a
skeleton.”
“Whatever it _was_ it’s not a skeleton _now_!” roared George.
Do not take alarm, gentle reader: this history is not the register of any
squabbles among savants: the writer is too tender-hearted to inflict such
a punishment on you.
George resumed: “That is a foolish conclusion; for there are no human
bones here at all! Not a skull, nor a radius, nor a--, a--”
At this point Charley interrupted the osteologist by saying, “George,
don’t tell off the parts of a skeleton with such disgusting gusto; have a
little respect, even for bones.”
“Well, I will;” George assented--the more willingly because he found
himself less versed in the matter than he had imagined. “But it was very
foolish to think of murder. Boys, do you want to know what it is? _I_
know; _I’ve_ solved your mystery: _I’ll_ reap all the glory!” he cried,
so excited that he lost control of his voice.
“Well, what is it?” Will asked sharply, perhaps afraid that George had
detected the fraud.
Groundless fear; George was quite as credulous as Marmaduke.
Wild with excitement, his voice rang out loud and discordant. He shouted,
at the top of his voice, “Boys, _it’s a fossil_!”
“A _what_?” Charley demanded.
“A _fossil_! An _extinct animal_! A _mastodon_! A _gyasticütûs_! (If
this word is new to the reader, let him raise his voice and pronounce
it according to the accents.) Yes; here is a field for a geologist or
naturalist; not for a humdrum, cigar-puffing, bejewelled detective!”
And the Sage’s form dilated with pride and complacency. His day had come.
He could have it all his own way now; for what did the others know about
geology?
Poor George! his imagination was as powerful as Marmaduke’s; but he could
not equal him in oratory.
As for the boys, they were thunder-struck; this exceeded their utmost
expectations.
Steve was the first to speak. “Don’t yell so loudly, George; there are no
geologists near to hear you;” he said.
Then again the boys, Marmaduke excepted, huddled around the bones, and
expressed unqualified astonishment.
“What will you do about it, George?” Will inquired.
“Travel them around the country for a show;” Marmaduke sneered.
But George was too much elated to regard such gross indignities. Let
the envious little simpleton rave; hadn’t he read that every great man
has his enemies and detractors? He would ignore the mean wretch and his
insulting words.
But for all his philosophy, the words did rankle in his breast.
“Well, what will you do?” Will inquired again.
“Ship them to a geologist, I suppose;” George said jocosely.
“Excuse me, George,” Charles broke in, “but I always used to think they
found those old mastodons under ground; and these bones are _on_ the
ground.”
“EH?”
“Yes; don’t they dig all those horrid old telegraph poles of bones out of
the ground?”
George rose, looking very black and wretched. That important fact had
escaped him. His castle in the air toppled down as Marmaduke’s had done,
and all his grand ideas were buried in its ruins.
“Perhaps I’m wrong,” Charles continued; “but,” proudly, “I’ve read a
little about such things, and I believe they come out of the ground. But
you know better than I do, George; so, which way is it? Which of us is
right?”
It was cruel for him to ask such a question. George, however, was not
a boy obstinately to persist that he was right, when common sense said
that he was not. In justice to the boy, it must be observed that,
although he was fully aware of his own cleverness, he did not consider
himself infallible, but was at all times open to reason. To be still more
explicit, he was apt to change his opinions very abruptly.
“No, Charley,” he said, “you are right enough. But I’m astonished to
think we should take those paltry bones for a fossil! Why--”
“I never did!” Marmaduke interrupted furiously.
“Why,” he continued, “of course not! A real fossil would be ashamed to
look at such bones; they would be to him what a minnow’s bones are to
ours. I--I didn’t think, boys; I know what a fossil is, of course.”
George was miserable if he fancied any one thought him ignorant in any
matter; and he was about to give the natural history of the mastodon,
when Steve diverted the train of his thoughts by asking, “If it ain’t a
fossil, what is it?”
“Well, it’s part of the remains of some very rare animal, I should
say,--a bison; or a wolverine; or a jackal; or--or----”
It is the needle that breaks the camel’s back. Will, Charles, and Stephen
could suppress their laughter no longer; they shouted and guffawed like a
desperate villain who fancies that he has married the heroine and lodged
a bullet in the hero’s heart.
“What’s the matter?” George asked in astonishment.
Another roar of laughter was the only answer vouchsafed. Steve lay on the
ground, and enjoyed the joke heartily; Charles and Will endeavoured to
take it more moderately.
Then George’s suspicions were excited. “You boys are fooling me!” he
cried angrily. “Why did you coax Marmaduke and me to look at these bones?
Why did you make us speak about them? Why didn’t _you_ have anything to
say about it? Boys, _why_ did we come here at all?”
After these direct questions an explanation could be delayed no longer.
The three looked guilty and ceased from laughing. “We never coaxed you to
look at them; and you arrived at your own conclusions. You know you did,
George,” said Charles.
Will explained as follows: “George, we fixed those bones ourselves, on
purpose to draw you and Marmaduke out. We gathered up a heap of bones of
all kinds, from all over, and brought them here, and covered them up with
boughs. Then we six came here to explore the jungle--we found them--and
you did the rest.”
The victimized boys did not swoon away, but they were more or less
exasperated. That was the worst feature in the “trick”--it provoked anger
in George and Marmaduke, and lessened their faith in human nature.
“What a mean, hateful, nasty set of fellows!” was George’s natural
comment. “They must be fond of prowling around bone-heaps; and handling
them; and carrying them up and down the country; eh, Marmaduke? They
ought to be told off--clapper-clawed--bastinadoed--soused in hot water!
We’ll fix them some day; won’t we?”
“Only,” Steve observed, “_we_ didn’t finger the bones as you two did;
_we_ put them into a basket, and then brought ’em here, and dumped ’em
out--without _once_ touching ’em! Therefore, I advise you both to lather
and scrub your paws with all the soap you can find. Scrub ’em hard, boys,
if you know what is good for ’em.”
“Yes,” put in Will, “it is polite to handle skeletons and fossils, but
not vulgar bones like these.”
“Oh! what scurvy boys!” was all poor George could say.
As for Marmaduke, he held his tongue, being too sulky, too horrified, to
do more than gurgle out a few dismal moans.
“Well, boys,” said Charley, “it will soon be dinnertime; so let us cover
up these mysterious old bones, and start for home and the soap-barrel.”
But George was recovering his equilibrium, and he thirsted for revenge. A
light that boded no good to his deceivers shone in his eyes; he was bent
on mischief.
“Look here, boys,” he began, “how do you know these are the same bones
you accumulated? We stumbled around in the woods just as it happened; we
found ourselves here; and Will suddenly found himself floundering in this
brush-heap. Can you _prove_ this is the place you think it is?”
“It is not likely that there are bones under all these bushes, George;”
said Charley. “Besides, we took notice where we were going, and we’ve
often been here. I’m certain its the place.”
“No; you can’t be _certain_; absolutely _certain_;” George replied, so
positively that Will, who lacked firmness, wavered, and helped George’s
cause by saying, “Well, the place has a different look, I believe! But
these _must_ be the bones, surely!”
“It looks different, because we generally came in from the south;” Steve
returned. “Any boy with two eyes isn’t going to get so far astray in
these woods.”
“Well, what if it isn’t the place we think it is?” Will asked.
“Oh, you will have to give in that it’s murder,” Marmaduke said. “I knew
it was murder all the time. How do you know that nobody was ever murdered
here? You don’t know anything about bones; George is most likely right.”
“Don’t make a fool of yourself again, Marmaduke; let us go home,” Steve
growled, and he had taken a step homeward, when a long and doleful cry,
followed by a hideous and piercing scream, electrified all the boys.
They conjured up all sorts of horrors, and the bravest turned pale with
fright. Suddenly the “glade” became gloomy and awful; bugbears lurked
in the shadows; ghost stories flitted through their heads; the “Phantom
Ship” loomed before them.