They wasted no time, tired as they were, for the fever was now upon them — the treasure-hunting fever that begins slowly and then steadily and ever increasingly takes over the mind and the body until it reaches the raging heat that sometimes consumes those who harbor the insidious disease.
"There's one of those crazy mule shoes," said Sue, pointing to a symbol carved on a squat boulder.
Gary looked at it. It did look like a mule shoe except for the three dots within the shoe. "It's not a mule shoe," he said slowly and quietly. "That symbol means a flight of steps, indicating that the treasure is down in a shaft or a cave."
"But where?" said Sue. She looked at the wild and forbidding area about them and then dropped her hands helplessly by her sides.
"Fifty varas away," said Gary in a faraway voice. He walked to the upper end of the squat boulder and pointed to an odd-looking symbol carved there.
"Varas?" questioned Sue.
"A vara is thirty-three and one-third inches," said Gary.
"Which way?" asked Sue.
"Will that help?" said Tuck. He pointed beyond the boulder to yet another symbol, a horizontal cross. The long part of the upright pointed directly up the slope.
"About forty-six paces," said Sue, "figuring on a three-foot pace, or thereabouts. There should be something else in that area to show us the rest of the way."
"How confident she is," said Tuck.
Gary began his pacing, but it was almost impossible to keep to a standard pace because of the terrain. When he reached the end of his pacing he stood in an area where openings of all sizes and shapes, some of them in the ground, others against the side of the canyon, showed like the unseeing eyes of the blind. There must have been at least two dozen of them.
In and out of the holes they popped like busy ground squirrels, but found nothing to indicate that the holes were anything but works of nature. Gary looked along the slope. "There are other holes along there," he said wearily.
"Too far from the symbol," said Sue.
Gary nodded. He shoved back his hat. He leaned back against a flat slab of rock upon which Tuck Browne stood like a gaunt statue eying the jumbled slope. The flat slab was almost against the canyon wall. Tuck moved his feet. Gary's mouth dropped open. He leaned forward and shoved Tuck's left foot over. "Say!" said the lean one. His jaw dropped too as he saw Gary pointing to a carved sign where Tuck had been standing. "Treasure in a tunnel, directly beneath this sign," said Gary.
An intense, brooding quiet seemed to shroud the canyon. Then the faint, far-off muttering of thunder sounded over it.
12
The Lost Espectro
Gary got down on his knees and examined the thick slab of rock supposedly resting atop a tunnel which held the treasure that had been lost for so long. It would take powerful modern equipment to move the slab, yet it had either been placed there above the tunnel about a hundred years ago, or the tunnel had been dug beneath it. Gary reached for his pack and took out his light, folding entrenching tool. He pulled loose rock aside and then began to probe into the hardened earth beneath the slab.
"Chow time," said Sue laconically. She placed the food on the slab.
Gary nodded absentmindedly. Tuck came up the slope and dumped a load of driftwood near the slab. "I picked out the strongest of the stuff for shoring, Gary," he said. He shook his head. "I still don't like the idea of digging down under that slab."
"How else do you expect to get into the tunnel?" snapped Gary. His nerves were getting edgy.
"We could go back outside and get help," said Tuck.
Gary stubbornly shook his head. "We've got to find out what is under here first, Tuck, before we go and make fools out of ourselves."
"He's right, Tuck," said Sue.
They ate quickly and with little talk. Now and then they could hear the far-off rumbling of thunder high over the darkening Espectros. The canyon was a gloomy, forbidding place at any time, but now with the darkening sky it was positively frightening. A cold wind swept through it now and then, thrashing through the brush and moaning around the bends.
Gary finished his meal and set to work again driving a shallow hole beneath the edge of the slab. Tuck and Sue looked at each other over Gary's head. Now that they had reached their goal they were feeling somewhat let down; both of them had expected to walk into a neatly shored drift and find piles of gold ingots covered with dust, ready for the taking. Now they did not know how long it would take to find out just how true those symbols atop the rock slab might be. The noise of the thunder, and the wind, and the utter loneliness and isolation of the place had begun to prey on their nerves. Yet neither of them had the courage to tell Gary what they thought. Gary was stubborn, and he was determined to get beneath that slab. Meanwhile, the sands of time were running steadily and a little too swiftly to suit the Brownes. Darkness would trap them in the canyon if Gary did not agree to leave soon.
He was on his belly now, driving the tool deep beneath the slab. Despite the coolness of the air he was dripping sweat, and his hands had begun to redden with forming blisters from the hard work.
Tuck shrugged at Sue. "Let me take over, Gary," he said.
"I'm doing all right," said Gary.
"Two of us taking turns can dig faster than one alone."
Gary looked up. He wiped the sweat from his dirty face. "The quicker we find out, the quicker we can leave, eh?" he said a little sarcastically.
Tuck picked up the tool. "Take it easy," he said quietly. "No use getting gold fever."
"Sure," agreed Sue. "Like in the books where one man goes loco and kills off the others once they find the gold. You know, in that picture we saw one time. I…" Her voice trailed off as she saw the look on Gary's dirty face. "Heh, heh," she said. "Well I better do the dishes, fellas, being as how I am cocinera. Heh…" She began to gather the food supplies and to repack them in Tuck's haversack.
"See if you can find a water hole," said Gary shortly. "Don't go too far!"
"I'll be all right," she said. "Besides, Lobo is down the slope. He won't let anyone bother me."
Tuck was digging steadily. He looked back at Gary. "You think this slab might cave in?"
"Most of it seems to be resting solidly."
"Yeh, well I don't want it resting solidly on me."
Gary walked around the slab and examined the ground between it and the cliff face. He took the other entrenching tool and began to dig. Here the earth seemed softer, and in no time at all he was down several feet. He threw off his hat and shirt and began to dig steadily.
Tuck stood up and wiped the sweat from his face. "Well, that was a waste of time," he said. "Struck solid rock down there."
"Give me a hand!"
The two of them made the earth fly until they were waist-deep in the hole. Gary crawled out to get his canteen, for it was hot, dry work. He drank and then started toward the hole to give Tuck the canteen. He stopped as though he had run into a stone wall when the terrified scream came from the canyon below him. He dropped the canteen and snatched up his rifle. He ran down to the place where he had last seen Sue, for it was her voice that was awakening the echoes. Then she appeared, legging it up the slope as hard as she could go. Gary ran down to meet her with ready rifle. She staggered a little. "Don't go down there!" she gasped. She reached Gary and gripped his arm. "I saw somebody down there!"
Gary crouched behind a rock ledge and motioned her to do the same. He eyed the lower canyon. There was no sign of life down there. "Did you see who it was?" he asked.
She swallowed hard. "All I really saw was a head. I had found water in a hole and was just bending down to see if it was good enough to use when I had the oddest feeling I was being watched. I looked up and there he was — about fifty yards from me, on the other side of the dry watercourse, staring right at me, Gary. I got scared, I tell you! I opened my mouth to yell and nothing came out."