OVER THE RIO GRANDE.
A week later, during which there had been busy days at the mining camp,
the boys received answers to their letters. They came in the shape of
telegrams, for the lads had asked their parents to wire instead of
waiting to write. Each one received permission to make the trip into the
land of the Montezumas.
"Hurrah!" yelled Bob, making an ineffectual attempt to turn a
somersault, and coming down all in a heap.
"What's the matter?" asked Nestor, coming out of the cabin. "Wasp sting
ye?"
"We can go to Mexico!" cried Ned, waving the telegram.
"Same thing," replied the miner. "Ye'll git bit by sand fleas,
tarantulas, scorpions, centipedes, horse-flies an' rattlesnakes, down
there. Better stay here."
"Is it as bad as that?" asked Bob.
"If it is I'll get the finest collection of bugs the college ever saw,"
put in Professor Snodgrass.
"Well, it may not be quite as bad, but it's bad enough," qualified
Nestor. "But don't let me discourage you. Go ahead, this is a free
country."
So it was arranged. The boys decided they would start in three days,
taking the professor with them.
"And we'll find that buried city if it's there," put in Ned.
The next few days were busy ones. At Nestor's suggestion each one of the
boys had a stout money-belt made, in which they could carry their cash
strapped about their waists. They were going into a wild country, the
miner told them, where the rights of people were sometimes disregarded.
Then the auto was given a thorough overhauling, new tires were put on
the rear wheels, and a good supply of ammunition was packed up. In
addition, many supplies were loaded into the machine, and Professor
Snodgrass got an enlarged box made for his specimens, as well as two new
butterfly nets.
The boys invested in stout shoes and leggins, for they felt they might
have to make some explorations in a wild country. A good camp cooking
outfit was taken along, and many articles that Nestor said would be of
service during the trip.
"Your best way to go," said the miner, "will be to scoot along back into
New Mexico for a ways, then take over into Texas, and strike the Rio
Grande below where the Conchas River flows into it. This will save you
a lot of mountain climbing an' give you a better place to cross the Rio
Grande. At a place about ten miles below the Conchas there is a fine
flat-boat ferriage. You can take the machine over on that."
The boys promised to follow this route. Final preparations were made,
letters were written home, the auto was gone over for the tenth time by
Jerry, and having received five hundred dollars each from Nestor, as
their share in the mine receipts up to the time they left, they started
off with a tooting of the auto horn.
"That's more money than I ever had at one time before," said Bob,
patting his money-belt as he settled himself comfortably down in the
rear seat of the car, beside Professor Snodgrass.
"Money is no good," said the naturalist.
"No good?"
"No; I'd rather catch a pink and blue striped sand flea, which is the
rarest kind that exists, than have all the money in the world. If I can
get one of them or even a purple muskrat, and find the buried city, that
will be all I want on this earth."
"I certainly hope we find the buried city," spoke up Ned, who was
listening to the conversation, "but I wouldn't care much for a purple
muskrat."
"Well, every one to his taste," said the professor. "We may find both."
The journey, which was to prove a long one, full of surprises and
dangers, was now fairly begun. The auto hummed along the road, making
fast time.
That night the adventurers spent in a little town in New Mexico. Their
arrival created no little excitement, as it was the first time an auto
had been in that section. Such a crowd of miners and cowboys surrounded
the machine that Jerry, who was steering, had to shut off the power in a
hurry to avoid running one man down.
"I thought maybe ye could jump th' critter over me jest like they do
circus hosses," explained the one who had nearly been hit by the car.
Jerry laughingly disclaimed any such powers of the machine.
Two days later found them in Texas, and, recalling Nestor's directions
about crossing the Rio Grande, they kept on down the banks of that
mighty river until they passed the junction where the Conchas flows in.
So far the trip had been without accident. The machine ran well and
there was no trouble with the mechanism or the tires. Just at dusk, one
night, they came to a small settlement on the Rio Grande. They rode
through the town until they came to a sort of house-boat on the edge of
the stream. A sign over the entrance bore the words:
FERRY HERE.
"This is the place we're looking for, I guess," said Jerry. He drove the
machine up to the entrance and brought it to a stop. A dark-featured
man, with a big scar down one side of his face, slouched to the door.
"Well?" he growled.
"We'd like to be ferried over to the other side," spoke Jerry.
"Come to-morrow," snarled the man. "We don't work after five o'clock."
"But we'd like very much to get over to-night," went on Jerry. "And if
it's any extra trouble we'd be willing to pay for it."
"That's the way with you rich chaps that rides around in them horseless
wagons," went on the ferrymaster. "Ye think a man has got to be at yer
beck an' call all the while. I'll take ye over, but it'll cost ye ten
dollars."
"We'll pay it," said Jerry, for he observed a crowd of rough men
gathering, whose looks he did not like, and he thought he and his
friends would be better off on the other side of the stream, on Mexican
territory.
"Must be in a bunch of hurry," growled the man. "Ain't tryin' to git
away from th' law, be ye?"
"Not that we know of," laughed Jerry.
"Looks mighty suspicious," snarled the man. "But, come on. Run yer
shebang down on the boat, an' go careful or you'll go through the
bottom. The craft ain't built to carry locomotives."
Jerry steered the car down a slight incline onto a big flat boat, where
it was blocked by chunks of wood so that it could not roll forward or
backward.
By this time the ferrymaster and his crew had come down to the craft.
They were all rather unpleasant-looking men, with bold, hard faces,
and it was evident that each one of the five, who made up the force
that rowed the boat across the stream, was heavily armed. They wore
bowie-knives and carried two revolvers apiece.
But the sight of armed men was no new one to the boys since their
experience in the mining camp, and they had come to know that the chap
who made the biggest display of an arsenal was usually the one who was
the biggest coward, seldom having use for a gun or a knife.
"All ready?" growled the ferryman.
"All ready," called Jerry. He and the other boys, with the professor,
had alighted from the auto and stood beside it on the flat boat.
Pulling on the long sweeps, the men sent the boat out into the stream,
which, at this point, was about a mile wide. Once beyond the shore the
force of the current made itself felt, and it was no easy matter to keep
the boat headed right.
Every now and then the ferryman would cast anxious looks at the sky,
and several times he urged the men to row faster.
"Do you think it is going to storm, my dear friend?" asked the
professor, in a kindly and gentle voice.
"Think it, ye little bald-headed runt! I know it is!" exploded the man.
"And if it ketches us out here there's goin' to be trouble."
The sky was blacking up with heavy clouds, and the wind began to blow
with considerable force. The boat seemed to make little headway, though
the men strained at the long oars.
"Row, ye lazy dogs!" exclaimed the pilot. "Do ye want to upset with this
steam engine aboard? Row, if ye want to git ashore!"
The men fairly bent the stout sweeps. The wind increased in violence,
and quite high waves rocked the ferryboat. The sky was getting blacker.
Jagged lightning came from the clouds, and the rumble of thunder could
be heard.
"Row, I tell ye! Row!" yelled the pilot, but the men could do no more
than they were doing. The big boat tossed and rocked, and the automobile
started to slide forward.
"Fasten it with a rope!" cried Jerry, and aided by his companions they
lashed the car fast.
"Look out! We're in for it now!" shouted the ferryman. "Here comes the
storm!"
With a wild burst of sky artillery, the clouds opened amid a dazzling
electrical display, and the rain came down in torrents. At the same time
the wind increased to hurricane force, driving the boat before it like a
cork on the waves.
Three of the men lost their oars, and the craft, with no steerage way,
was tossed from side to side. Then, as there came a stronger blast of
the gale, the boat was driven straight ahead.
"We're going to hit something!" yelled Jerry, peering through the mist
of rain. "Hold fast, everybody!"
The next instant there was a resounding crash, and the sound of breaking
and splintering wood.
[Illustration: THE NEXT INSTANT THERE WAS A RESOUNDING CRASH.]