MYSTERIES GALORE.
The excitement which resulted from Texas’ amazing discovery may be
imagined. If he had found a “Megatherium,” feet and all, there could
not have been more interest. Texas was dragged down by the legs, and
then there was a wild scramble among the rest, the “invalid” excepted,
to see who could get up there first and try the echo.
The entrance, it seemed, was a narrow hole in the rock, completely
hidden by a growth of bushes and plants. And the echo! What an amazing
echo it was, to be sure! Not only did it answer clearly, but it
repeated, and muttered again and again. It took parts of sentences and
twisted them about and made the strangest possible combinations of
sounds.
“It must be an enormous cave!” cried Mark.
“It has probably fissures to a great distance,” observed the geologist.
“The freaks of water action are numerous.”
“I wonder if there’s room for a man to get in,” Mark added.
“Ef there ain’t,” suggested Texas, “we kin force Indian through to make
it bigger.”
Indian shrank back in horror.
“Ooo!” he cried. “I wouldn’t go near it for a fortune. Bless my soul,
there may be bears or snakes.”
This last suggestion made Dewey, who was then peeping in, drop down in
a hurry.
“B’gee!” he gasped. “I hadn’t thought of that. And who knows but what a
live Megatherium preserved from the tertiary periods may come roaring
out?”
“I wish we had a light,” said Mark. “Then we might look in and see. I
wonder if we couldn’t burn that book the Parson has?”
The Parson hugged his beloved “Dana’s Geology” in alarm.
“Gentlemen,” he said, severely, “I would rather you burned me than this
book.”
“B’gee!” cried Dewey. “You’re most as dry! But a fellow couldn’t find a
match for you, Parson, if he hunted from now till doomsday.”
Parson Stanard turned away with the grieved look he always wore when
people got “frivolous.” But that mood did not last long; they were
all too excited in their strange find to continue joking. They spent
half an hour after that peering in cautiously and seeing nothing but
blackness. Texas even had the nerve to stick one arm in, at which the
rest cried out in horror. Indian’s direful hint of snakes or bears had
its effect.
It took no small amount of daring to fool about that mysterious black
hole. Dewey, ever merry and teasing, was keeping them all on pins and
needles by being ceaselessly reminded of grisly yarns. He told of a
cave that was full of rattlesnakes, “assorted sizes, all genuine and no
two alike, b’gee!” Of another that had been a robber’s den with great
red-faced, furious, black villains in it, to say nothing of gleaming
daggers. Of another, with pitfalls, with water in them and no bottom,
“though why the water didn’t leak out of where the bottom wasn’t,
b’gee, I’m not able to say.”
It got to be very monotonous by and by, standing about in idleness and
curiosity, peeping and wondering what was inside.
“I think it would be a good idea for some one to go in and find out,”
suggested Mark.
“Bless my soul!” gasped Indian. “I won’t, for one.”
“And I for two, b’gee!” said Dewey, with especial emphasis.
The rest were just as hasty to decline. One look at that black hole
was enough to deter any one. But Mark, getting more and more impatient
at the delay, more and more resolved to end that mystery, was slowly
making up his mind that he was not going to be deterred. And suddenly
he stepped forward.
“Give me a ‘boost,’” he said. “I’m going in.”
“You!” echoed the six, in a breath. “Your arm!”
“I don’t care!” responded he, with decision. “I’m going to find out
what’s inside, and I’m going to hurry up about it, too.”
“Do you mean you’re going to crawl through that hole?”
“That’s just what I do,” he said.
Texas sprang forward with an excited look.
“You ain’t!” he cried. “Cuz I’m not going to let you!”
And before Mark could comprehend what he meant his devoted friend had
swung himself up to the ledge again, and was already halfway in through
the opening.
The others stared up at him anxiously. They saw the Southerner’s arms
and head vanish, and then, while they waited, prepared for almost
anything horrible, they heard an excited exclamation. A moment later
the head reappeared.
“Hello!” cried Texas. “Fellers, there’s a ladder in thar!”
“A ladder!”
“Yes, sah! That’s what I said, a ladder! A rope one!”
Once more the head disappeared; the body followed wriggling. Then
with startling suddenness the feet and legs flew in, and an instant
afterward, to the horror of the frightened crowd, there was a heavy
crash.
Mark made a leap for the opening.
“What’s the matter?” he cried.
“Ouch!” they heard the bold Texan growl, his voice sounding hollow and
muffled. “The ole ladder busted.”
“Ooo!” gasped Indian. “Are you dead?”
Texas did not condescend to answer that.
“Some o’ you fellers come in hyar now!” he roared. “I ain’t a-goin’ to
stay alone.”
“What’s it like in there?” inquired Mark.
“I can’t see,” answered the other’s muffled voice. “Only it’s a floor
like, an’, say, it’s got carpet!”
“A carpet!” fairly gasped those outside. “A carpet!”
“I’m going in and see,” exclaimed Mark. “Help me up.”
The rest “boosted” him with a will. With his one free arm he managed to
worm his way through the opening, and then Texas seized him and pulled
him through. After that the others followed with alacrity. Even Indian
finally got up the “nerve,” though loudly bemoaning his fate; he didn’t
want to come, but it was worse out there all alone in the woods.
Coming in from the brilliant sunlight they were blind as bats. They
could not detect the faintest shade of difference in the darkness, and
they stood huddled together timidly, not even daring to grope about
them.
“Let us remove ourselves further from the light,” suggested the Parson,
ever learned. “Then we may get used to the darkness, for the retina of
the visual organ has the power of accommodating itself to a decrease in
intensity of the illuminating----”
They prepared to obey the suggestion, without waiting for the
conclusion of the discourse. But moving in that chasm was indeed a
fearful task. In the first place, there were possible wells, so the
Parson said, though the presence of the mysterious carpet made that
improbable. The first thing Mark had done when he reached bottom was to
stoop and verify his friend’s amazing statement. And he found that it
was just as the other had said. There was carpet, and it was a soft,
fine carpet, too.
What that could mean they scarcely dared to think.
“Somebody must live here,” whispered Mark. “And they can hardly be
honest people, hiding in a place like this.”
That did not tend to make the moving about any more pleasant. They
caught hold of each other, though there was little comfort in that, for
each found that his neighbors were trembling as much as himself. Then,
step by step (and very small steps) they advanced, groping in front
with their hands, and feeling the ground in front of them with their
feet.
“Bless my soul!” gasped Indian. “There might be a trapdoor!”
That grewsome and ghastly suggestion caused so much terror that it
stopped all further progress for a minute at least, and when finally
they did go on, it was with still more frightened and thumping hearts.
They took two or three more steps ahead; and then suddenly Mark, who
was a trifle in the lead, sprang back with a cry.
“What is it?” gasped the rest.
“There’s something there,” he said. “Something, I don’t know what. I
touched it!”
They stood in a huddled group, straining their eyes to pierce the
darkness. It was horrible to know that something was there, and not to
know what. One might imagine anything.
“It’s a Megatherium,” whispered Dewey, irrepressible even here.
In the suspense that followed the frightened crowd made out that Mark
was leaning forward to explore with one hand.
And then suddenly, with a cry of real horror this time, he forced them
back hastily.
“It’s alive!” he cried.
They were about ready to drop dead with terror by that time, or to
scatter and run for their lives. Every one of them was wishing he had
never thought of entering this grewsome, black place, with its awful
mysteries, its possibilities of fierce beasts or still more fierce and
lawless men, or ghosts and goblins, or Heaven only knew what else.
Most men do not believe in ghosts or goblins until they get into just
some situation like this.
Indian was moaning in terror most appalling, and the rest were in but
little better state of mind. And then suddenly the Parson uttered a
subdued exclamation. They turned with him and saw what he meant. Facing
the darkness as they had, when they turned in the direction of the
light that streamed in from the opening, they found that they really
could begin to see. But how? The light was so dim and gray that it only
made things worse. The seven saw all kinds of horrible shadows about
them, above them, beneath them, and not one single object could they
distinguish to allay their fears.
Still huddled together, still silent and trembling, they stood and
gazed about them, waiting. There was not a sound but the beating of
their own hearts until all of a sudden Dewey was heard to whisper.
“B’gee, I’ve got a match!”
Fumbling in his pockets for a moment he brought that precious object
out, while the others crowded about him anxiously. A match! A match!
They could hardly believe their ears. Robinson Crusoe never welcomed
that tiny object more gratefully.
With fear and trembling Dewey prepared to light it. Every one of them
dreaded the moment; horrible though the darkness was, it might be a
black shroud for yet more horrible things.
Mark caught him by the arm just as he was in the act of doing it; but
it was not for that reason. He suggested that they have papers ready
to keep that precious fire going. It was a good idea, and proved so
popular that the Parson, filled with a spirit of self-sacrifice, even
tore out the blank title pages of his Dana to contribute. And then at
last Dewey struck the light.
The match was a good one fortunately. It flickered and sputtered a
moment, seeming to hesitate about burning, while the lads gasped in
suspense. Then suddenly it flared up brightly, and they gazed about
them in dread.