At that instant there was an aftershock. The earth rumbled briefly. The old house where Pilcher had spent his captivity collapsed completely into a pile of termite dust.
17
An Ancient Mystery
The Three Investigators were ready and waiting when Dr. Gonzaga arrived at The Jones Salvage Yard a week later. As the professor from Ruxton drove them up the coast toward Malibu, the boys filled him in on their upcoming visit.
“You’re going to like Mr. Sebastian,” Pete promised. “He’s a terrific guy. He used to be a private eye in New York. Now he writes mysteries out here. He’s got this neat house that used to be a restaurant.”
“And he’s got a houseman from Vietnam,” added Bob. “Hoang Van Don. You just call him Don. He’s nice, but he’s kind of weird about food. Some of the stuff he cooks is great, but some of it is — bleaaah!”
Following Jupe’s directions, Dr. Gonzaga soon turned off the Coast Highway and drove slowly up a rutted canyon road to a big white-painted house.
“Hey, look!” Pete pointed. The house door was open and a very small girl stood on the porch. She wore a headband with a red feather stuck in it.
“Ah,” said Dr. Gonzaga. “A little Indian girl. You didn’t tell me about her.”
“She’s a new member of the cast,” Jupe said, “and I don’t think she’s an Indian.”
Dr. Gonzaga saw then that the child was Oriental. She smiled shyly and waved. Hoang Van Don came onto the porch and took her by the hand.
“Chumash princess!” he called. He pointed to the child. “Learning ways of early people in California.”
As the visitors headed for the porch, other small children appeared from the house. All were Oriental and all wore Indian costumes. “Small friends are project of East-West Fellowship,” Don explained. “We find fun ways to teach American customs. When children go to school, they will be already Americans. Will find much acceptance from schoolmates.”
“Kind of a Vietnamese Head Start project, huh?” said Bob.
“More fun than Head Start,” Don told him. “Today we cook like Chumash Indians, make lunch with things we find on hillsides. Acorn cakes. Creamed dandelion. Also rosehip tea, good for digestion.”
“Oh, no!” moaned Pete.
Don shooed the children into the house as Hector Sebastian appeared. Jupe introduced the professor. Mr. Sebastian hardly had time to shake Dr. Gonzaga’s hand before Pete piped up.
“What about this creamed dandelion stuff?” said Pete.
The mystery writer chuckled. “Fear not, Pete. I’ve given strict orders. We are not Chumash children, and we aren’t going to eat anything foraged from the hills! I went out this morning and bought some real food. We’ll eat after you’ve told me about your case.”
The boys looked relieved. They always survived Don’s experimental meals, but they weren’t anxious to munch on acorns or dandelions.
Mr. Sebastian led the way to a big room with a spectacular view of the ocean. This had been the main dining room when the house was a restaurant. Now it served as a combination living room, library, and office. When everyone was settled around the coffee table, Bob handed over his notes on the Pilcher case.
“Dr. Gonzaga has some details to add to these,” he told the mystery writer.
Dr. Gonzaga nodded. “Read Bob’s notes first. My part of the story concerns a really ancient mystery. It happened four hundred years ago, so there is no hurry about retelling the tale.”
Mr. Sebastian began to read, tuning out the sound of children happily chattering in the kitchen. When he had finished Bob’s account of the bizarre kidnapping of the collector, he looked up and laughed. “So Jeremy Pilcher was still griping when the firemen hauled him out after the earthquake!”
Jupe grinned. “The leopard can’t change his spots! And Navarro is no angel, either.”
“Navarro’s wanted by the police in a couple of South American countries,” said Bob. “He’s a two-bit crook and he’s spent lots of time in prison. Dr. Gonzaga has the scoop on the theft of the bishop’s diary. That was the first time Navarro swiped something and got caught, but it wasn’t the last time. And he’s sure to go to jail again for abducting Pilcher.”
Dr. Gonzaga opened his attaché case and took out the leather-bound book that Jupe had found aboard the Bonnie Betsy. “It’s been confirmed,” he said. “This is the missing diary of Bishop Enrique Jiminez, who lived in Bogotá long, long ago. He was called the bloodstained bishop because people thought he was to blame for the mistreatment of the Indians who worked the gold mines and the emerald mines for the Spanish conquerors. The clergy had so much to say about the government of the Spanish colonies that the bishop could hardly escape blame.
“In his diary, however, the bishop wrote that he was alarmed by the tales of brutality at the mines. He wanted to investigate, so he journeyed to one of them — an emerald mine. It was a sort of strip mine — the Indians dug on the surface, not down in a pit. They were being treated horribly. The bishop hurried back to Bogotá to pressure the Spanish governor into making changes to protect the Indian workers. Before the governor could act, there was a landslide in the mountains. The mine that the bishop had seen was buried.”
Dr. Gonzaga began to read from the diary, translating as he read. “Men have been digging for months. They try to clear away the fallen earth, but it is very dangerous. There are always more landslides. Now word has come. There is a mutiny. The Indians refuse to dig more. Yesterday the governor gave the order; the mine will be abandoned. It is as well. The tears of the gods have caused too much weeping among men.”
“Hmmm!” said Mr. Sebastian. “So the bishop wasn’t a villain after all.”
“He got a bum rap,” said Pete.
“But what about the pages that are missing from the book?” Mr. Sebastian asked. “Do they have something to do with the mystery?”
“They have everything to do with it,” said Dr. Gonzaga. “The exact location of the mine was lost after the landslide. However, from the position of these pages in the diary, we know they must have been an account of the bishop’s journey from Bogotá to the mine. Any treasure hunter could retrace the bishop’s route and go straight to Sogamoso. At the place where the Old Woman casts her shadow, he would find the mine. The Old Woman is a mountain in the Andes. The natives refer to the peak that way.
“The bishop’s diary was in a private collection for many years. The owners couldn’t have known what they had. Eventually a rare-book dealer bought the diary, suspecting that it might be a rich find. Before he could have the book examined by experts, it was stolen. The police were tipped off that the dealer’s assistant had the book. They went to the man’s room and found several rare documents that the fellow had taken from the shop, but no diary.”
“Aha!” said Mr. Sebastian. “Was the assistant our friend Navarro?”
“Right,” said Pete. “At first Navarro denied everything. Then he said an American had come into the shop and had walked off with the diary hidden under his jacket. The police didn’t believe this, so Navarro went to prison.”
“We have to guess what really happened,” said Bob, raising his voice to be heard above a sudden gale of laughter from Don’s kitchen. “Neither Navarro nor Pilcher is talking. We know from Marilyn that when her father was a sailor, traveling all over the world, he didn’t just hang around ports when his ship docked. He traveled inland whenever he could. He was ambitious, always looking for an opportunity to get ahead. Somehow Pilcher met Navarro in Bogotá. Somehow Navarro had learned what the diary said — at least about the emerald mine at Sogamoso. Somehow the two schemed together to steal the book, and then it seems Pilcher double-crossed Navarro. Navarro was arrested, and Pilcher came back to the States with a whole lot of money.”