The Gold Hunters Part 15

"Sh-h-h-h-h!"

"What is it?"

"I thought I heard a sound!" breathed Rod. "Did you hear it?"

"No."

The two listened. There was an awesome silence in the chasm now, broken only by the distant murmur of running water, a strange, chilling stillness in which the young hunters could hear the excited beating of their own hearts. To Roderick the minutes pa.s.sed like so many hours. His ears were keyed to the highest tension of expectancy, his eyes stared into the gloom beyond them until they ached with his efforts to see. At every instant he expected to hear again that terrible scream, this time very near, and he prepared himself to meet it. But the seconds pa.s.sed, and then the minutes, and still there came no quick running of mad footsteps, no repet.i.tion of the cry. Had the madman turned the other way? Was he plunging deeper into the blackness of this mysterious world of his between the mountains?

"I guess I was mistaken," he whispered softly to Wabigoon. "Shall we get out our blankets?"

"We might as well make ourselves comfortable," replied the young Indian. "You sit here, and listen while I undo the pack."

He went noiselessly to Mukoki, who was leaning against the pack, and Rod could hear them fumbling at the straps on the bundle. After a little Wabi returned and the two boys spread out their blankets beside the rock upon which they had been sitting. But there was no thought of sleep in the mind of either, though both were dead tired from their long day's work. They sat closer together, shoulder touching shoulder, and unknown to his companion Roderick drew his revolver, c.o.c.ked it silently and placed it where he could feel the cold touch of its steel between his fingers. He knew that he was the only one of the three who fully realized the horror of their situation.

Mukoki's mind, simple in its reasoning of things that did not belong to the wilderness, had accepted the a.s.surances and explanations of Rod and Wabigoon. Wabi, half-bred in the wild, felt alarm only in the sense of physical peril. It was different with the white youth. What is there in civilization that sends the chill of terror to one's heart more quickly than the presence of a human being who has gone mad? And this madman was at large! At that very instant he might be listening to their breathing and their whispered words half a dozen feet away; any moment might see the blackness take form and the terrible thing hurl itself at their throats. Rod, unlike Wabigoon, knew that the powers of this strange creature of the chasm were greater than their own, that it could travel with the swiftness and silence of an animal through the darkness, that perhaps it could smell them and feel their presence as it pa.s.sed on its way to the plain. He was anxious now to hear the cry again. What was the meaning of this silence? Was the madman already conscious of their presence? Was he creeping upon them at that moment, as still as the black shadows that shut in their vision? His mind was working in such vivid imaginings that he was startled when Wabi prodded him gently in the side.

"Look over there--across the chasm," he whispered. "See that glow on the mountain wall?"

"The moon!" replied Rod.

"Yes. I've been watching it, and it's creeping down and down. The moon is going to swing across this break in the mountains. In fifteen minutes we shall be able to see."

"It won't swing across so much as it will come up in line with us,"

replied Rod. "Watch how that light is lengthening! We shall be able to see for several hours."

He started to rise to his feet but fell back with an astonished cry.

For a third time there came the mad hunter's scream, this time far above and beyond them, floating down from the distance of the moon-lit plain!

"He pa.s.sed us!" exclaimed Wabi. "He pa.s.sed us--and we didn't hear him!" He leaped to his feet and his voice rose excitedly until it rang in a hundred echoes between the chasm walls. "He pa.s.sed us, and we didn't hear him!"

Mukoki's voice came strangely from out of the gloom.

"No man do that! No man--no man--"

"Hush!" commanded Rod. "Now is our time, boys! Quick, get everything to the creek. He's half a mile out on the plain and we can get away before he comes back. I'd rather risk a few rocks than another one of his golden bullets!"

"So had I!" cried Wabi.

As if their lives depended on their exertions the three set to work.

Mukoki staggered ahead over the rocks with his burden while the boys followed with the light canoe and the remaining pack. Their previous experiences in the chasm had taught them where to approach the stream, and ten minutes later they were at its side. Without a moment's hesitation Mukoki dropped his pack and plunged in. The edge of the moon was just appearing over the southern mountain wall and by its light Rod and Wabigoon could see that the water of the creek was rushing with great swiftness as high as the old warrior's knees.

"No ver' deep," said the Indian. "Rocks--"

"I followed this creek for half a dozen miles and its bottom is as smooth as a floor!" interrupted Rod. "There's no danger of rocks for that distance!"

He made no effort now to suppress the pleasure which he felt at the escape from their unpleasant situation. Mukoki steadied the canoe as it was placed in the water, and was the last to climb into it, taking his usual position in the stern where he could use to best advantage the powerful sweeps of his paddle. In an instant the swift current of the little stream caught the birch bark and carried it along with remarkable speed. After several futile strokes of his paddle Wabi settled back upon his heels.

"It's all up to you, Muky," he called softly. "I can't do a thing from the bow. The current is too swift. All you can do is to keep her nose straight."

The light of the moon was now filling the chasm and the adventurers could see distinctly for a hundred yards or more ahead of them. Each minute seemed to add to the swiftness and size of the stream, and by the use of his paddle Wabi found that it was constantly deepening, until he could no longer touch bottom. Rod's eyes were ceaselessly on the alert for familiar signs along the sh.o.r.e. He was sure that he knew when they pa.s.sed the spot where he killed the silver fox, and he called Wabi's attention to it. Then the rocks sped past with increasing swiftness, and as the moon rose higher the three could see where the overflowing torrent sent out little streams that twisted and dashed themselves into leaping foam in the wildness of the chasm beyond the main channel. These increased in number and size as the journey continued, until Mukoki began to feel the influence of their currents and called on Wabi and Rod for a.s.sistance. Suddenly Rod gave a m.u.f.fled shout as they shot past a ma.s.s of huge boulders on their right.

"That's where I camped the night I dreamed of the skeletons!" he cried. "I don't know what the stream is like from here on. Be careful!"

Wabi gave a terrific lunge with his paddle and the cone of a black rock hissed past half a canoe length away.

"It's as black as a dungeon ahead, and I can hear rocks!" he shouted.

"Bring her in if you can, Muky, bring her in!"

There came the sudden sharp crack of snapping wood and a low exclamation of alarm fell from Mukoki. His paddle had broken at the shaft. In a flash Rod realized what had happened and pa.s.sed back his own, but that moment's loss of time proved almost fatal. Freed of its guiding hand the birch bark swung broadside to the current, and at the same time Wabi's voice rose in a shrill cry of warning.

"It's not rocks, it's a whirlpool!" he yelled. "The other sh.o.r.e, swing her out, swing her out!"

He dug his own paddle deep down into the racing current and from behind Mukoki exerted his most powerful efforts, but it was too late!

A hundred feet ahead the stream tore between two huge rocks as big as houses, and just beyond these Rod caught a glimpse of frothing water churning itself milk-white in the moonlight. But it was only a glimpse. With a velocity that was startling the canoe shot between the rocks, and as a choking sea of spray leaped into their faces Wabigoon's voice came back again in a loud command for the others to hang to the gunwales of their frail craft. For an instant, in which his thoughts seemed to have left him, a roaring din filled Rod's ears; a white, churning mist hid everything but his own arms and clutching hands, and then the birch bark darted with the sudden impetus of a freshly-shot arrow around the jagged edge of the boulder--and he could see again.

Here was the whirlpool! More than once Wabi had told him of these treacherous traps, made by the mountain streams, and of the almost certain death that awaited the unlucky canoe man drawn into their smothering embrace. There was no angry raging of the flood here; at first it seemed to Rod that they were floating almost without motion upon a black, lazy sea that made neither sound nor riffle. Scarce half a dozen canoe lengths away he saw the white center of the maelstrom, and there came to his ears above the dash of the stream between the two great rocks a faint hissing sound that curdled the blood in his veins, the hissing of the treacherous undertow that would soon drag them to their death! In the pa.s.sing of a thought there flashed into the white youth's mind a story that Mukoki had told him of an Indian who had been lost in one of these whirlpools of the spring floods, and whose body had been tossed and pitched about in its center for more than a week. For the first time the power of speech came to him.

"Shall we jump?" he shouted.

"Hang to the canoe."

Wabi fairly shrieked the words, and yet as he spoke he drew himself half erect, as if about to leap into the flood. The momentum gathered in its swift rush between the rocks had carried their frail craft almost to the outer edge of the deadly trap, and as this momentum ceased and the canoe yielded to the sucking forces of the maelstrom the young Indian shrieked out his warning again.

"Hang to the canoe!"

The words were scarcely out of his mouth when he stood erect and launched himself like an animal into the black depths toward sh.o.r.e.

With a terrified cry Rod rose to his knees. In another instant he would have plunged recklessly after Wabi, but Mukoki's voice sounding behind him, snarling in its fierceness, stopped him.

"Hang to canoe!"

There came a jerk. The bow of the canoe swung inward and the stern whirled so quickly that Rod, half kneeling, nearly lost his balance.

In that instant he turned his face and saw the old warrior standing, as Wabigoon had done before him, and as Mukoki leaped there came for a third time that warning cry:

"Hang to canoe!"

And Rod hung. He knew that for some reason those commands were meant for him, and him alone; he knew that the desperate plunges of his comrades were not inspired by cowardice or fear, but not until the birch bark ground upon the sh.o.r.e and he tumbled out in safety did he fully comprehend what had happened. Holding the rope with which they tied their canoe, Wabigoon had taken a desperate chance. His quick mind had leaped like a flash of powder to their last hope, and at the crucial moment, just as the momentum of the birch bark gave way to the whirling forces of the pool, he had jumped a good seven feet toward sh.o.r.e, and had found bottom! Another twelve inches of water under him and all would have been lost.

Wabigoon stood panting and dripping wet, and in the moonlight his face was as white as the tub-like spot of foam out in the center of the maelstrom.

"That's what you call going to kingdomcome and getting out again!" he gasped. "Muky, that was the closest shave we've ever had! It has your avalanche beaten to a frazzle!"

Mukoki was dragging the canoe upon the pebbly sh.o.r.e, and still overcome by the suddenness of all that had happened Rod went to his a.s.sistance.

The adventurers now discovered themselves in a most interesting situation. The night had indeed been one of curious and thrilling happenings for them, and here was a pretty climax to it all! They had escaped the mad hunter by running into the almost fatal grip of the whirlpool, and now they had escaped the perils of that seething death-trap by plunging into a tiny rock-bound prison which seemed destined to hold them for all time, or at least until the floods of spring subsided. Straight above them, and shutting them in entirely, rose precipitous rock walls. On the only open side was the deadly maelstrom.

Even Mukoki as he glanced about him was struck by the humor of their situation, and chuckled softly.

Wabi stood with his hands deep in his soaked pockets, facing the moonlit walls. Then he turned to Rod, and grinned; then he faced the whirlpool, and after that his eyes swept the s.p.a.ce of sky above them.