The Boy Scouts' Mountain Camp

The great stone was as immovable as if it had formed a part of the living rock. Tubby actually gave a groan of despair.

“There’s not a thing we can do,” he moaned disconsolately. A sudden footfall above him made him dive into the brush. He flattened out, immovable, in a flash. The next instant Hunt strode into the glade, followed by his son. They also examined the stone.

“If they won’t come to our terms,” said Hunt, as they turned away again, “we can immure them in a living tomb.”

Tubby Hopkins, lying as quiet as a rabbit in his place of concealment, could not but feel the bitter truth the words held.

* * * * * * * *

“Those fellows are a long time getting that water, and I’m as dry as a jar of salt,” said Merritt, as they munched on their provisions.

“I guess we’re all pretty thirsty,” said the major. “Perhaps you’d better go and hurry them up, my boy.”

Merritt sprinted off on this errand. He had almost reached the ravine and was about to step on the narrow bridge across it when there was a sudden crashing jar that shook the earth.

Though, of course, he did not know it, the noise was occasioned by the falling rock dislodged by Hunt and his followers.

“Wonder what that was?” thought the boy, little guessing the real cause.

“If we were in the west I should think it was an earthquake. But I never heard of any in the Adirondacks.”

Before long he gained a point in the passage where he knew he should have seen a disc of daylight ahead of him. Puzzled by its absence, the boy pushed on. Every minute he expected to see the light, but the darkness continued to prevail. Sorely perplexed, he took a few steps more, when he was abruptly confronted by a mass of solid rock. The passage appeared to have terminated.

It was several moments before the meaning of this conveyed itself to the boy’s mind. When he mastered the situation it was with a sense of shock that for an instant almost deprived him of his senses.

Recovering his wits he lost no time in communicating his alarming intelligence. Incidentally, the cause of the noise he had heard was abundantly explained.

It required but a brief examination by the major, to make known the full extent of their calamity.

“We are walled in,” he said hoarsely.

“Is there no hope of escape?” gasped the professor. The boys were too much overcome to speak.

The major shook his head. Unconsciously he repeated Tubby’s words.

“Help, if it is to come, must come from the outside,” he said.

His words rang hollowly in the musty, subterranean passage.

CHAPTER XXIV

TWO COLUMNS OF SMOKE

Through the deep woods a boyish figure was creeping. It was Hiram, footsore, sick and despondent. It was the second day since he had left the scene of the Boy Scouts’ misfortune. Behind him lay the lake. And that was about all he knew definitely of his situation.

For the last hour of his slow progress over the cruelly rough ground, the lad’s heart had almost failed him. But he had kept pluckily on. At last, though, he was compelled, from sheer exhaustion, to sink down under a big hickory tree. He was lost, hopelessly lost in the midst of the Adirondack wilds.

Few men or boys who have ever been in a similar fix will not realize the extreme danger of Hiram’s position. There are still vast tracks in these mountains untrodden, except, perchance, at long intervals, by the foot of man. The predicament of one who misses his way in their lonely stretches is serious indeed. Hiram was a nervous, sensitive boy, moreover, and, as the dark shadows of late afternoon began to steal through the woods, he felt a sense of keen fear, and alarm. He even thought he could make out the forms of savage beasts prowling about him.

At last the boy determined, by a brave effort, to make the best of it. He ate a meal of bread and salt meat from his haversack and washed it down with water from his canteen. Then he set himself to thinking about a way out of his position.

But as is often the case with those hopelessly lost in the wilderness, his brain refused to work coherently. A sort of panic had clutched him. To his excited, overwrought imagination it appeared that it was his fate, his destiny to die alone in these great, silent woods, stretching, for all he knew, to infinity on every side of him.

“I must brace up and do something,” thought Hiram desperately; “maybe I haven’t wandered as far as I think. Perhaps a signal fire might be seen by somebody. I’ll try it, anyhow.”

The thought of doing something cheered him mightily. The task of gathering wood and bark to make his fire also helped to keep his mind off his predicament.

The young Scout built his fire on the summit of the highest bit of ground he could find. It was a bare hillock, rocky and bleak, rising amid the trees.

The fire Hiram constructed was, properly speaking, composed of two piles of sticks and dry leaves and bark. Close at hand he piled a big armful of extra fuel to keep it going. For he had determined to watch by the fires all night, if necessary. It was, he felt, his last hope.

The fires arranged to his satisfaction, the boy set a match to each pile in turn. From the midst of the forest two columns of smoke ascended. The afternoon was still. Not a breath of wind ruffled a leaf. In the calm air the columns of smoke shot up straight. Hiram piled green leaves on his blazing heaps and the smoke grew thicker.

The message the two smoke columns spelled out, in Scout talk, was this:

“I am lost, help!”

Hiram knew if there were any Scouts within seeing distance of the two smoke columns, that he would be saved. If not – but he did not dare to dwell on that thought.

The late afternoon deepened into twilight, and still Hiram sat on, feeding his fires, although the flames of hope in his heart had died out into gray ashes of despair. As the darkness thickened and a gloom spread through the woods, his fears and nervousness increased. It is one thing to have a companion in the woods and the surety of a camp fire and comfort at night, and quite another pair of shoes to be lost in the impenetrable forest. Anybody who has experienced the dilemma can appreciate something of poor Hiram’s state of mind.

It grew almost dark. The two fires glowed in the twilight like two red eyes.

All at once Hiram almost uttered a shout of alarm. Then he grew still, his heart beating till it shook his frame. Somewhere, close to him, a twig had cracked. He was certain, too, that he had seen a dark form dodge behind a tree.

“Who’s there,” he cried shrilly.

As if in reply, from behind the surrounding trees, a dozen dark forms suddenly emerged and started toward him. Half beside himself with alarm, Hiram, his mind full of visions of moonshiners, Indians and desperadoes, leaped to his feet and started to run for his life.

But he had not gone a dozen steps before he stumbled and fell. As he did so his head struck a rock and the blow stunned him.

The men who had emerged with such suddenness from behind the trees hastened up.

“We needn’t have feared a trap,” said one; “it was a genuine Scout signal. I’m glad my boys taught them to me or we might have been too late to save this boy.”

The speaker was the same man who had recognized Rob Blake, and whose two sons were members of the Curlew Patrol. He picked Hiram up.

“Lost and half scared to death,” he said tenderly; “and just to think that we crept up on him like a bunch of prowling Indians.”

“Well, we’ve got to look out for traps, you know,” put in the leader, the gray-moustached man; “those two smoke columns that you knew the meaning of might have been a trick to decoy us. I’m glad we approached stealthily, but I’m sorry we scared this poor kid so badly.”

“Oh, he’ll be all right directly,” was the easy reply. “Sam, you and Jim get a kettle boiling and make coffee. We’ll camp here to-night,” said Rob’s friend.

He set Hiram down at the root of a big tree just as the lad opened his eyes and gazed with astonishment on the group of stalwart, kind-eyed men gathered in wonderment about him.

* * * * * * * *

It was moonlight, and almost midnight, before Tubby deemed it safe to reconnoitre the vicinity of the cave mouth. Followed by Jumbo, who was quaking with fear, but accompanied the stout youth in preference to being left alone, Tubby cautiously made his way through the undergrowth. A spot of bright light above showed him the location of the camp fire of Hunt’s gang. It was hardly likely that they would be patroling the entrance to the cave, effectually blocked as it was. But Tubby took no chances. With the skill and silence of an Indian he wormed his way along.

He had almost reached the open space where they had chopped down the brush when, without an instant’s warning, the figure of Stonington Hunt strode into view.

At the same unlucky instant Jumbo, lumbering along quite silently, stubbed his toe against an out-cropping rock. He fell headlong with a crash.

“Gollygumptions! I’m killed dead!” he yelled at the top of his lungs, utterly regardless of consequences.

Tubby turned and was about to dodge back into the shelter of the dense growth when Hunt espied him. With an angry oath he sprang at him, pointing a pistol. But Tubby, in a flash, changed his tactics surprisingly. Converting himself into a human battering ram, he lowered his head and rushed full tilt at Hunt.

Completely taken by surprise by Tubby’s onslaught, Hunt stopped and hesitated. The fat boy, at the same instant, rushed between the man’s legs, seizing them in a firm grip as he did so. The unexpected assault resulted in hurling Hunt violently forward. He fell sprawling in a heap. At the same instant his pistol was discharged in the air.

As the report rang out from close at hand half a dozen figures sprang into being. They were those of his followers who had been behind him at some distance on this nocturnal visit of inspection.

Dale and Bumpus instantly recognized Tubby.

“That’s the fat kid who wrecked our sloop!” cried Dale.

“A hundred dollars to the one that gets him!” shouted Hunt from the ground where he still lay.

“How under the sun did he escape?” shouted Freeman Hunt, taking up the chorus of cries and exclamations.

But before Dale, agile as he was, could reach him, Tubby had darted nimbly off. He was heading for the bushes. In another instant he would have reached them but a second figure suddenly dodged into the moonlight and blocked his way. It was Black Bart. He outspread his long arms to catch the hunted youth.

The next instant he had shared Hunt’s fate. Tubby, for the second time that night, executed his skillful tackle. Black Bart, with a string of bad words accompanying his fall, was upset without ceremony. But Dale was close on Tubby’s nimble heels. As the lad dodged from his fallen foe Dale reached out, and his big hand grabbed the fleeing lad’s collar. Tubby gave a dive and a twist but he could not get away.

“Good boy, Dale. Hold him!” came Freeman Hunt’s voice.

Suddenly another figure appeared. The newcomer sprang out of the shadows behind them. With one blow this personage knocked Dale sprawling beside Black Bart, and the next instant, as Pete Bumpus essayed to take part in the fray, he was sent to join the other two.

Tubby felt himself snatched up and carried swiftly off into the darkness of the friendly brush.

“Gollygumptions!” chuckled Jumbo, for it was he, as he ran, “but it shuah did feel good to swat dem no-good trash.”

“Hullo, Jumbo, is that you?” asked Tubby as he heard; “I’ll forgive you for almost getting us captured.”

“Tank you, Marse Hopkins,” rejoined Jumbo gravely; “but we bes’ keep our words till we get furder away. Hark!”

Behind them they could hear angry voices, and shouts and trampling in the brush.

The strong-muscled black, bent almost double, ran swiftly with his burden for some distance further. Then he set Tubby down and rested, breathing heavily. The sounds of the chase came from afar to them, much fainter now.

“Ha! ha!” chortled Jumbo; “dey look an’ look, but dey no find us.”

“That’s all right, too, Jumbo,” said Tubby, sitting down on a decayed log; “but it doesn’t help to get the major and the rest out of that hole in the ground.”

“Maybe Marse Hiram got frough,” suggested Jumbo hopefully.

“I hope so, I’m sure,” said Tubby with a mournful intonation; “it looks now as if that was our only chance of saving them.

“Where are we?” added Tubby, suddenly gazing about him. There was something familiar about the scenery. Especially about a tall, cone-shaped rock that loomed up close at hand.

“That’s Ruby Glow!” he exclaimed the next instant.

“And gollygumptions, ef dere ain’t a spook or suthin’ on top of it,” cried Jumbo.

He pointed to a dark figure standing upright in the white moonlight that flooded the isolated mass of rock.

CHAPTER XXV

THE HEART OF THE MYSTERY – CONCLUSION

We left the major and his party marooned in the cave, and overcome by the suddenness of the disaster that had overtaken them like a bolt from a clear sky. We must now return to them.

After the first shock of the discovery the major suggested that they retreat to the chamber and talk things over as calmly as possible. Each one of the party, with a strong effort to master his feelings, followed the advice. A long consultation followed, the result of which was that they determined that the first thing to be done was to institute a search for water.

The far end of the cavern had not yet been explored and it was decided to begin with that. Headed by the major, they started for what seemed a blank wall at the end of the chamber. But on nearing it, it proved that its appearance of blankness was chiefly caused by a sort of screen of rock that masked an opening as effectually as if it had been placed there by someone anxious to conceal it.

“We’ll penetrate beyond this,” announced the major, and holding his lantern high, was stepping forward when he stopped. One word came to his lips:

“Water!”

From a tiny rift in the rock, sure enough, a small but blessed stream of clear water was flowing. The delight with which the imprisoned party hailed the discovery may be imagined. For a short time, while they assuaged their pangs of thirst, already painful, they almost forgot the seriousness of their situation.

While the others drank, Andy Bowles, who had been one of the first to taste the cool water, strayed further into the passage. Presently his voice was borne back to the others.

“Say!” he cried; “there’s a funny sort of box in here.”

“What kind of a box?” hailed the major, alert in an instant.

“Why, it’s awful old by the looks of it. It’s all bound with iron, and nails are stuck all over it. And – say! There are two more back beyond it.”

“The treasure trove!” gasped the professor.

“Beyond a doubt,” said the major. Then he added gloomily, “but what good is it to us now? If we cannot escape from here before long we shall perish miserably, and nothing but dynamite can release us.”

“At any rate we must not give up hope,” counselled the professor; “suppose we investigate these boxes. At any rate it will give us something to do. It is better than doing nothing.”

“That is right,” declared the major; “it may keep us from dwelling on the situation.”

Merritt’s axe was called into requisition, and, as the others stood round with upraised lanterns, the boy swung the weapon down on the iron lock of the first of the old chests. It was old and rotten, and, after a few blows, it gave way.

With trembling, nervous hands the lid of the box was pushed back. But a surprise greeted the fortune hunters. Instead of a mass of gold objects or coins meeting their eyes only a faded piece of red velvet, covering the contents of the box, met their gaze.

“Pull it off!” ordered the major.

Merritt and the professor raised the bit of fabric and then started back with startled faces. Under the velvet was a picture. A grim portrait of a tall man in black garments holding a skull in his hands, while he knelt beside an open grave. Under it was painted in old fashioned letters:

“The End Of The Quest for Riches.”

“Good heavens,” exclaimed the major, who had paled a little under his tan, “that seems almost like a warning.”

Mastering a feeling of dread, Merritt helped the professor to raise the picture. Under it was an old sea cloak, a brass spy glass of antique make, and an old-fashioned compass and – that was all.

“It begins to look as if my ancestor had played a grim joke on posterity,” said the major; “however, let us see what is in the other two boxes.”

Crash!

Down came Merritt’s axe on the first of the remaining two chests. The lid flew open with such suddenness that it startled them. It was operated by concealed springs.

As the light of the lanterns fell on the contents of this box, however, all doubt as to the success of the quest was removed. It was filled to the brim with golden candlesticks, vases, plates and cups of priceless value. Some of them flashed with gems. The hoarded treasure of the wicked old pirate of the Spanish seas lay before them.

“Now the other,” said the professor in a faint voice, “I can hardly believe my eyes.”

“It does seem incredible,” commented the major.

The contents of the other chest, which was speedily opened, proved to be of the same nature as that of the second one rifled. On the interior of the lid, however, there had been a secret chamber. The spring of this, rotten with age, gave way as the cover was lifted. A niagara of coins of all nations, Spanish doubloons, French crowns, English Rose nobles and florins, and queerly-marked Oriental wealth, flowed out.

“What should you think was the value of all this, professor?” asked the major when he recovered his voice.

“At least two million dollars,” was the rejoinder in tones the man of science tried in vain to render steady.

“I’d give half of it now if we could get out of here,” said the major.

“Perhaps there is a way.”

It was Merritt who spoke.

“What makes you think so, my boy?”

“Why, while we’ve been standing here I’ve noticed a draught. Look at the lantern flames flicker in it. It comes from further down the passage. We might explore it, anyway.”

“I think so, too,” said the major, and followed by the others, still dazed by the sight of the hoarded fortune, he struck out into the darkness. For some distance the passage into which he had plunged was level. Then his feet encountered rough steps. Calling to the others to follow him the major mounted them.

Up and up they climbed, the wind blowing more freshly in their faces every instant. All at once, without any warning, the major emerged into the open air. He looked about him amazed. The others, as they joined him, heard his astonishment. They seemed to be on the summit of a small island in the midst of a sea of woods.

Gazing over the edge, they soon ascertained that they were at the summit of a high cone-shaped mass of rocks. The sides were steep as church walls, and offered no foothold.

All at once the explanation burst upon the major. “We are at the summit of Ruby Glow!” he cried.

Astonishing as it appeared, this was the truth. The professor regarded it as a proof of his theory that the place had been used as an Indian watch tower.

“I know now what puzzled me before,” he said, “and that was the manner in which they gained the summit of the cone.”

“But that doesn’t help us to get down,” said Merritt, “it looks as if we are as badly off as before.”

“I’m afraid you’re right,” said the major; “no living being could scale those walls.”

“And no living being could move that rock from the entrance to the cave,” echoed Rob miserably.

They retraced their steps. The hours passed slowly in the cavern. But in order to employ them somehow they made an inventory of the contents of the treasure boxes.

Supper was eaten from their fast diminishing store of eatables. Nobody talked much. They did not feel inclined for conversation. At length nature asserted itself. Rob actually began to feel sleepy. Andy and the professor had already flung themselves down and were fast asleep.

“Guess I’ll take one more look out from Ruby Glow before I turn in,” thought Rob to himself.

With this intention in mind he left the cave. He did not take long to reach the top of the cone. Moonlight flooded it, and the surrounding forest. Rob looked about him. It was a lovely scene, but somehow its beauty didn’t impress him much just then. All at once he became aware of two figures below the cone gazing curiously up at it. One was oddly familiar to him. In fact they both were.

“Who is it?” he asked, feeling that there was no danger in speaking clearly.

“Hush!” came up the answer in Tubby’s voice, in a low, but penetrating whisper, “it’s me, Tubby. Jumbo’s with me. How under the canopy did you get up there?”

“It’s a long story,” responded Rob, in the same cautious tones; “the question is how are we going to get down again?”

“Gee whiz! that’s so. There’s no way of clambering down the sides. If only we had a rope.”

“We’ve got one. The canoe ropes joined together would be long and strong enough,” said Rob, “but how could you get them up to us? No trees grow close enough. I don’t see how – ”

He stopped short. Tubby had suddenly begun to execute a grotesque sort of war-dance. His figure capered oddly about in the moonlight.

“Wait there till I come back!” he exclaimed, and suddenly darted off, followed by Jumbo.

“Well, if that isn’t just like Tubby,” said Rob; “what in the world is he up to now?”

But Rob knew Tubby well enough to divine that the lad would not have told him to wait if there had not been some good reason for it. So he sat down with what patience he could. It was some time before Tubby reappeared. When he did, he had something in his hands.

“Watch out!” he cried to Rob.

The leader of the Eagle Patrol watched his Scout carefully. Suddenly he realized what Tubby was doing. He had made a bow and arrow out of springy wood. Then he had attached one end of a light string to the arrow. To the other extremity of the string, which was long enough to reach the summit of the cone, was attached the knotted lengths of canoe and pack rope. Rob had hardly time to take in the details of this clever trick before the arrow came whizzing by his ear. He grabbed the string as it followed and began hauling in.

Before long he had reached its end, and started pulling on the rope. He made one end fast about a projecting pinnacle of rock, and then called down his congratulations to Tubby in a low but hearty voice.

“I always told you I could do something else than fall in,” was the message Tubby sent back as he strutted about below.

Rob’s next act was to arouse the sleepers and Major Dangerfield. They were all naturally warm in praise of Tubby’s clever device. It was tested by Rob who slid down it in perfect safety, but landed with barked shins and scraped hands. That was a cheap price to pay for deliverance, though, and the others, when they followed him, felt the same way about it.

“Now what are we going to do?” said the major as they all stood in a group on the ground.

“I think – ” began the professor.

But the words were taken out of his mouth. Rob made a hasty sign to the others to conceal themselves. A sudden heavy rumbling sound had echoed through the air. It was followed by a red flash from the direction of the mouth of the cave.

“They’ve blown the rock up!” cried the major.

“That’s why they were all prowling around there to-night, I suppose,” exclaimed Tubby.

“Let’s get to the canoes and arm ourselves,” said the major; “we can catch them all red-handed.”

First the rope by which they had escaped was cut as high as possible from the ground, and then the major’s suggestion was carried out. They reached the entrance of the cave just in time to hear footsteps approaching down the passage.

They crouched quietly till Dale emerged from the cavern entrance, stumbling over the shattered fragments of the big rock that had blocked it. His arms were full of plunder from the chests, and he was able to offer little resistance. He was seized and bound and gagged without his having any opportunity to make an outcry. One after another, as they came out, the rest of Hunt’s gang were served the same way. Hunt and his son, however, in some manner became alarmed as they neared the entry. They dashed back, outfooting the lads who pursued them. Down the passage they fled and stumbled blindly, in their fear, along the further passage and up the steps to the top of the Ruby Glow peak.