He forced himself to tear his eyes away from The Needle. Weird thoughts teemed through his mind. He reached for his rifle and then thought better of it. The Cole pride would not allow him to be frightened enough to ride with his rifle in his hand. In any case, if he were shot at, he'd hardly have time to fire back, or even to see who was shooting at him. But the Cole pride would not let him turn back either. There was a job to be done.
It was a wild and forbidding place in which he found himself — a chaotic tangle of brush and rocks, bleached dead wood and splintered boulders. He turned in his saddle to look back down the canyon and found himself looking directly at a deeply chiseled marking on slanted rock ledge. It was an equilateral triangle with a curved line starting from the apex of the triangle and curving downward to the right of the triangle.
His breath caught in his throat. This sudden discovery, after so many months of searching, seemed to stun his senses, but not so much that he did not know what that symbol meant. "Travel around a bend from this symbol," he said aloud.
He looked to his left. A huge outcropping of rock thrust itself into the canyon like the great paw of some primeval beast. Gary slid from the saddle and snatched the reins. He led the claybank toward that outcropping. Forgotten were his father's warning about going past The Needle and also his day's work for Jim Kermit. The sun was at its peak when he found a second symbol, an arrow with a broad head, slanted in the direction he was going. "Trail to treasure or mine; other signs further on. ." Gary said breathlessly.
The canyon beyond was thick with tangled brush and shattered rock, seemingly from a huge landslide of years past, leaving a narrow passageway beyond into shadowed darkness. To his right was yet another narrow canyon curving around to the south in the general direction of The Needle Canyon.
An hour drifted past while Gary hunted for another code symbol. He plowed through catclaw and skirted thick clumps of painful jumping cholla, eagerly scanning rock faces, boulders, and the high crumbling cliffs. No luck. Nothing at all.
He picketed his horse and took the rifle, walking up the side canyon, peering through the brush for symbols. There was nothing to be seen. The Needle towered to his right, and he was quite sure that if he continued on down the canyon he would reach the great canyon below the landmark and easily see the Cole place far below on the level ground. A cold feeling came over him as he realized he must also be close to the general area where he had seen the mysterious spurts of flickering light. He knew now that it was not a figment of his imagination, for hadn't Sue Browne seen the light just the night before?
He continued on, then turned to his left up a steep slope of loose rock. He climbed steadily until the going was a little easier. Now he could see The Needle Canyon as well as Cholla Canyon and the mouth of Split Rock where it joined Cholla. The mysterious, partially blocked canyon was beyond the crest, high above him.
He drove himself on though his legs began to tire a little, and his breath came harshly in his dry throat. Gary stopped and leaned on his rifle for support while he looked upward. There was a dark opening in the naked rock almost at the crest. It was the mouth of a cave that had been well shielded from view below by scattered rock and a screen of brush.
Gary worked his way slowly up to the scattered rock wall and levered a round into his Winchester. He eased himself between two huge boulders and saw the cave mouth. About ten feet within it something was hanging — something that moved a little in the vagrant wind that swept now and then up the canyon. He stared at it, suddenly realizing that it was a sheet of faded canvas, dyed a dun color.
He walked forward slowly and drew back the canvas to peer into the darkened interior of a cave that went far back into the living rock. A damp odor came from the cave, mingled with the smell of old fires and other stale things. He pushed back the thin canvas so that light penetrated into the cave. As he walked into the cave, his left boot struck something that rolled beneath his foot. Gary looked down to see an empty bottle. He stooped and peered into the uninviting darkness. It was almost as though something were far back in there, watching him, waiting for him to come in. He stepped back.
The wind shifted and a faint sound came to Gary — the sound of a man's voice calling out at intervals. Gary took his courage in his hands and walked farther into the cave. To one side was a pile of blankets. Tin cans littered the floor. He bent to look at them. Most of them were without labels but on several of them he saw the labels — they had been cans of Elberta peaches. Beyond the blankets was a crude fireplace filled with ashes and charred wood. He peered into the thick darkness.
The voice was calling again. A sudden fear came over Gary. He ran back to the cave entrance and then stopped in surprise. From where he stood he could see the entire floor of The Needle Canyon and the Cole Ranch far below, and even beyond the ranch to the distant irregular patch against the desert floor that was Cottonwood Wells. Nothing could move on that canyon floor without being seen from the cave entrance, while no one could possibly see that cave from the canyon floor.
Gary stepped beyond the rocks that shielded the cave entrance and looked farther up the slope. He could hear the voice again. He worked his way up the loose and treacherous slope to stand at last on a level area above the cave. He stared in surprise. From where he stood he could see into every canyon about him, while to his right, the east, was a wide tableland stretching into the heart of the Espectros, with the open areas of canyons all about it. From where he stood a man could walk easily to the lips of any of those canyons and see who was in them. From the cave he could see anyone probing about in Cholla Canyon or The Needle Canyon.
The voice called again. Gary turned and looked down into Cholla. A man stood down there with two horses behind him. It was Jim Kermit looking for Gary. Gary turned and slid down the slope. He reached a level place and started across it, only to slip and fall in greasy mud. He shook his head in pain, then saw beyond his muddy boots a set of sharp tracks crossing the mud area. He got to his feet and eyed the strange tracks. They were made by rather small feet, and must have been made sometime that morning after the rain had stopped, for the heavy rains of the day before would have washed them out.
He walked around the muddy area and studied the boot marks. The nail pattern of the left boot heel was clearly marked — a double crescent of nails. The boot heel had either slipped to one side of the boot sole or had been nailed crookedly in place. Beyond the mud, he could see tracks leading down the slope toward Cholla Canyon, only to be lost in the scrub brush halfway down the slope.
Gary slid down the slope to the canyon floor and walked quickly to where Jim Kermit stood, set-faced and with hard eyes. "You figure my strays might be up there, Gary?" the rancher asked coldly.
There was nothing for Gary to say. He was wrong.
"You don't expect me to pay you for today's work, do you, Gary?"
"No, sir."
"What were you doing up there?"
"Just looking around."
"Just looking around," mimicked Jim. His voice was heavy with sarcasm. "The Lost Espectro again? You're as big a fool as your great-grandfather was! You take my advice and forget about that fairy tale!" Jim mounted his horse and rode down the canyon. He did not speak again until he was near the first symbol Gary had found, then he turned in his saddle and eyed Gary. "By jiminy," he said. "I'll just bet you saw those phony signs in here: the triangle with the curlicue atop it and that arrow. Was that it, Gary? Were you looking for more of them?"