THE FIGURE ON THE CLIFF.
The boys held a hasty consultation as soon as they had retreated a safe
distance from the reeking fumes of the Toltec excavation. Till the foul
air of the place, probably stagnant for many hundred years, had been
given a chance to pour out, it would have been folly to have wasted time
on an attempt to descend into the black hole that the swinging back of
the huge rock had revealed. There seemed to be little doubt, after the
mystery had been discussed again and again, that Harry’s lucky shot had
released some spring hidden in the quesal’s eye and caused the boulder
to open. It seemed incredible;—but there was no other explanation, and
it was decided to defer all discussion of the matter till a thorough
examination could be made of the interior of the cavern they had
stumbled upon for the hidden mechanism.
In the meantime a hasty camp was pitched, although there was little
thought of sleep in the minds of any of the boys and after supper had
been despatched they sat up long, with eyes that refused to grow drowsy,
talking over what they were likely to find on their exploration trip,
which they had agreed to undertake as soon as it grew light enough to
make a start—always providing that the foul air of the place had cleared
sufficiently to make such a thing feasible.
At Frank’s suggestion watches were finally set, the night being divided
into three sections. Harry volunteered for the first, Frank for the
second and Billy agreed to tackle the last. He was given the opportunity
to select a short period of watching as both boys realized, although he
indignantly disclaimed it, that he must be still feeling some effects of
exhaustion from his wound.
Harry kept up a fire, for although it was not chilly the boys knew that
once in a while a jaguar, bolder than his fellows, had been known to
attack rubber-cutters, and they were by no means inclined to have the
success of their expedition marred by anything approaching a tragedy.
Having nothing better to do the lad amused himself by singing in a not
particularly melodious way. Harry knew more about aeroplanes than he did
of music and the tone effects he produced were something weird.
He had just attained a particularly high note and was congratulating
himself—as is the way of people who have accomplished something they
didn’t think they could do—when a sound that had startled both Frank and
himself before, suddenly brought his satisfaction to an abrupt period.
It was the mysterious bell again!
It was pealing with the same frenzied, timeless clamor that it had
manifested on the two previous occasions they had heard it, but it
sounded somehow much nearer than it had from the camp on the plateau.
“Ahoy there!” shouted Harry; determined if there was a human agency at
work to get some sort of reply, “ahoy!”
There was only the echo of his voice coming hollowly back from the face
of the cliff for an answer.
His shouts, however, awoke Frank and Billy.
“Whatever is the matter, Harry?” demanded Frank.
“It’s the bell again,” replied Harry in awestruck tones.
Before Frank could frame an answer or Billy could speak, the furious
pealing broke out anew.
“Why, it’s close at hand—somewhere!” exclaimed Frank, after he had
listened attentively, his head on one side, for several seconds.
“Sounds as if it might come from the cliff itself;” said Billy; who was
feeling rather nonplussed as the metallic clashing continued without
interruption, but in the same furious aimless way already familiar to
the boys.
“That’s right, Billy,” agreed Frank, “if I’ve got any ear for location
of sound it is coming from the cliff.”
“How can it come from there!” protested Harry, as the bell ceased as
suddenly as it had begun, “I’m sure we looked carefully enough over that
wall of rock, and there’s nothing even resembling an opening in it—even
supposing,” he added “that anyone would be crazy enough to climb up
there—which they couldn’t do anyhow—and ring a bell.”
“Perhaps it’s some kind of a bird or animal,” suggested Billy, eager to
find some satisfying solution of the uncanny sound.
“Yes, a chimes-bird or a bell-rabbit,” scornfully snorted Harry, “no,
we’ll have to do better than that.”
“There’s no doubt it’s a sure-enough bell,” decided Frank.
“And a good loud one, too,” replied Harry. “I never heard a clearer or
better one even on a church.”
“But who in thunder can be ringing it?” resumed Frank.
“There we are, back at the beginning of the question again,” rejoined
Harry disgustedly.
“You can’t convince me that it hasn’t got something to do with the
cave,” exclaimed Frank. “Possibly with the very door we uncovered
to-day.”
“I suppose the man who rings it marches in prompt at midnight every
night—when we had to dig up the ground with pick-axes before we could
get it loose enough to shovel—try again, Frank;” laughed Harry.
“Mightn’t it be monkeys?” was Billy’s contribution.
“Where would they get the bell?” demanded Frank.
“Hum; that’s so,” replied Billy, abashed at the dashing to earth of the
theory he had so hopefully advanced.
“If he’d start up again,” said Frank suddenly, “we could get a line on
just where the sound is coming from and then when it gets light examine
every foot in that direction.”
Both his listeners agreed that this would be a good idea. But if the
bell-ringer had heard them and maliciously made up his mind not to grant
their wish he could not have remained more silent.
“Perhaps if you’ll sing again, Harry,” remarked Frank, unkindly, after
the younger boy had related for the dozenth time how the bell-ringing of
that particular night had started; “he will get mad and start pulling
the rope once more.”
Overlooking the deliberate insult, in his desire to find out if the
bell-ringer would not oblige, Harry lustily started an old high-school
song. But though he sang till his throat cracked, and his listeners’
ears ached, he disturbed nothing but an old white owl that flew from
some hiding-place on the face of the cliff, and flapped solemnly round
the boys’ camp,—its great yellow eyes gleaming wickedly.
“R-r-r-r-r,” shivered Billy, as the silent bird wheeled by them so close
they could almost have touched it, and suddenly let out an ear-splitting
screech that made all the boys jump in spite of themselves. “I hope that
it isn’t some spirit, or something, of the old Toltecs that has been
ringing the bell to keep us away from their cave. I don’t mind anything
I can hit with a firearm but I haven’t much fancy for going into a
haunted cave.”
“The only ‘hants’ you’ll find in there will be bats and a few relatives
of our white-feathered friend that just disturbed you—I hope you are not
going to sport any plumage of his color,” laughed Frank.
“Come, Frank, that isn’t fair,” protested Billy, indignantly, “and I saw
you jump yourself when that old owl let out that holler.”
“I didn’t mean it seriously,” laughed Frank, good-naturedly, seeing that
he had really hurt Billy’s feelings, “but you don’t, for a moment
suppose that there is anything in whatever those steps may lead down to
but dust and darkness and bad air, do you?”
“I don’t, eh?” retorted Billy angrily, “well, what do you think I dug
till I nearly dropped dead for—my health?”
“I suppose you are figuring on running into a treasure trove as soon as
we get in there,” grinned Harry. “If they took as much care to hide
their valuables as they did to lock the front door we’ll be a long time,
and have a lot of hard work before us,—before we discover the Toltecs’s
secret.”
“Pshaw,” replied Billy magnanimously, “what do you suppose I care for
the hard work? Anyhow I wasn’t serious with you fellows. There might be
all the treasure the Toltecs ever saw,—and Captain Kidd and Sir Henry
Morgan thrown in, concealed in that cave, or whatever it is at the
bottom of that passage, but I’ve no right to even a share of it—I’m far
too deeply in the debt of you fellows for anything like that.”
“No, Frank; no, Harry; it isn’t the money I care about at all—though I
don’t deny I can always use all I get my hands on. That’s not the point,
however, this is your discovery, not mine, and I’m going to help you out
on it all I can. I don’t want a penny, but if we really find any buried
treasure the very idea of it will be all I want in the way of a big
sensation.”
“Nonsense, Billy,” rejoined Frank, touched at the reporter’s
earnestness. “We are in this thing as partners. We all share the
dangers, we’ll each take an equal share of the reward, always supposing
there is any.”
“Of course we will, Billy,” put in warm-hearted Harry, “and when we get
back to America you’ll be able to buy the _Planet_ and fire your
managing editor.”
“I don’t know of anything I’d like better,” replied Billy in all
seriousness, while the boys shouted with laughter at his grave face,
“although,” he added, “I do owe him a debt of gratitude for sending me
down here.”
“I don’t see what you’ve done for the paper, Billy, however,” returned
Frank.
“The wires are all tied up, aren’t they?” replied the business-like
Billy, “what could I get through? As a matter-of-fact I’m getting more
good material, sticking round with you fellows, than I could collect in
a year by myself.”
Further conversation was cut short at this point by a sudden cry from
Harry, who had been sitting with his knees clasped gazing up at the dark
sky, which was dissected as though by a knife-blade by the black wall of
the cliff-summit where it cut across it.
“What is it, Harry?” demanded Frank.
“Well, there’s something very funny about that cliff, that’s all,—or
else I’ve got optical delusions,” rejoined the youth in an earnest tone.
“Yes,” said his hearers breathlessly, for Harry’s startled face was
sufficient evidence that he had seen something surprising.
“You can believe me or not, as you like,” returned Harry, “but a few
seconds ago, as you and Billy were talking, I’ll swear I saw a man’s
figure outlined against the sky at the top of the cliff.”