Chapter 12. The Secret Of The Skeleton's Hand

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_ CHAPTER XII. THE SECRET OF THE SKELETON'S HAND

A little before noon Rod arrived at the top of the hill from which he could look down on their camp. He was filled with pleasurable anticipation, and with an unbounded swelling satisfaction that caused him to smile as he proceeded into the dip. He had found a fortune in the mysterious chasm. The burden of the silver fox upon his shoulders was a most pleasing reminder of that, and he pictured the moment when the good-natured raillery of Mukoki and Wabigoon would be suddenly turned into astonishment and joy.

As he approached the cabin the young hunter tried to appear disgusted and half sick, and his effort was not bad in spite of his decided inclination to laugh. Wabi met him in the doorway, grinning broadly, and Mukoki greeted him with a throatful of his inimitable chuckles.

"Aha, here's Rod with a packful of gold!" cried the young Indian, striking an expectant attitude. "Will you let us see the treasure?" In spite of his banter there was gladness in his face at Rod's arrival.

The youth threw off his pack with a spiritless effort and flopped into a chair as though in the last stage of exhaustion.

"You'll have to undo the pack," he replied. "I'm too tired and hungry."

Wabi's manner changed at once to one of real sympathy.

"I'll bet you're tired, Rod, and half starved. We'll have dinner in a hurry. Ho, Muky, put on the steak, will you?"

There followed a rattle of kettles and tin pans and the Indian youth gave Rod a glad slap on the back as he hurried to the table. He was evidently in high spirits, and burst into a snatch of song as he cut up a loaf of bread.

"I'm tickled to see you back," he admitted, "for I was getting a little bit nervous. We had splendid luck on our lines yesterday. Brought in another 'cross' and three mink. Did you see anything?"

"Aren't you going to look in the pack?"

Wabi turned and gazed at his companion with a half-curious hesitating smile.

"Anything in it?" he asked suspiciously.

"See here, boys," cried Rod, forgetting himself in his suppressed enthusiasm. "I said there was a treasure in that chasm, and there was. I found it. You are welcome to look into that pack if you wish!"

Wabi dropped the knife with which he was cutting the bread and went to the pack. He touched it with the toe of his boot, lifted it in his hands, and glanced at Rod again.

"It isn't a joke?" he asked.

"No."

Rod turned his back upon the scene and began to take off his coat as coolly as though it were the commonest thing in the world for him to bring silver foxes into camp. Only when Wabi gave a suppressed yell did he turn about, and then he found the Indian standing erect and holding out the silver to the astonished gaze of Mukoki.

"Is it a good one?" he asked.

"A beauty!" gasped Wabi.

Mukoki had taken the animal and was examining it with the critical eyes of a connoisseur.

"Ver' fine!" he said. "At Post heem worth fi' hundred dollars--at Montreal t'ree hundred more!"

Wabi strode across the cabin and thrust out his hand.

"Shake, Rod!"

As the two gripped hands he turned to Mukoki.

"Bear witness, Mukoki, that this young gentleman is no longer a tenderfoot. He has shot a silver fox. He has done a whole winter's work in one day. I take off my hat to you, Mr. Drew!"

Roderick's face reddened with a flush of pleasure.

"And that isn't all, Wabi," he said. His eyes were filled with a sudden intense earnestness, and in the strangeness of the change Wabi forgot to loosen the grip of his fingers about his companion's hand.

"You don't mean that you found--"

"No, I didn't find gold," anticipated Rod. "But the gold is there! I know it. And I think I have found a clue. You remember that when you and I examined the skeleton against the wall we saw that it clutched something that looked like birch-bark in its hand? Well, I believe that birch-bark holds the key to the lost mine!"

Mukoki had come beside them and stood listening to Rod, his face alive with keen interest. In Wabi's eyes there was a look half of doubt, half of belief.

"It might," he said slowly. "It wouldn't do any harm to see."

He stepped to the stove and took off the partly cooked steak. Rod slipped on his coat and hat and Mukoki seized his belt-ax and the shovel. No words were spoken, but there was a mutual understanding that the investigation was to precede dinner. Wabi was silent and thoughtful and Rod could see that his suggestion had at least made a deep impression upon him. Mukoki's eyes began to gleam again with the old fire with which he had searched the cabin for gold.

The skeletons were buried only a few inches deep in the frozen earth in the edge of the cedar forest, and Mukoki soon exposed them to view. Almost the first object that met their eyes was the skeleton hand clutching its roll of birch-bark. It was Rod who dropped upon his knees to the gruesome task.

With a shudder at the touch of the cold bones he broke the fingers back. One of them snapped with a sharp sound, and as he rose with the bark in his hand his face was bloodlessly white. The bones were covered again and the three returned to the cabin.

Still silent, they gathered about the table. With age the bark of the birch hardens and rolls itself tightly, and the piece Rod held was almost like thin steel. Inch by inch it was spread out, cracking and snapping in brittle protest. The hunters could see that the bark was in a single unbroken strip about ten inches long by six in width. Two inches, three, four were unrolled--and still the smooth surface was blank. Another half-inch, and the bark refused to unroll farther.

"Careful!" whispered Wabi.

With the point of his knife he loosened the cohesion.

"I guess--there's--nothing--" began Rod.

Even as he spoke he caught his breath. A mark had appeared on the bark, a black, meaningless mark with a line running down from it into the scroll.

Another fraction of an inch and the line was joined by a second, and then with an unexpectedness that was startling the remainder of the roll released itself like a spring--and to the eyes of the three wolf hunters was revealed the secret of the skeleton hand.

Spread out before them was a map, or at least what they at once accepted as a map, though in reality it was more of a crude diagram of straight and crooked lines, with here and there a partly obliterated word to give it meaning. In several places there were mere evidences of words, now entirely illegible. But what first held the attention of Rod and his companions were several lines in writing under the rough sketch on the bark, still quite plain, which formed the names of three men. Roderick read them aloud.

"John Ball, Henri Langlois, Peter Plante."

Through the name of John Ball had been drawn a broad black line which had almost destroyed the letters, and at the end of this line, in brackets, was printed a word in French which Wabi quickly translated.

"Dead!" he breathed. "The Frenchmen killed him!"

The words shot from him in hot excitement.

Rod did not reply. Slowly he drew a trembling finger over the map. The first word he encountered was unintelligible. Of the next he could only make out one letter, which gave him no clue. Evidently the map had been made with a different and less durable substance than that with which the names had been written. He followed down the first straight black line, and where this formed a junction with a wider crooked line were two words quite distinct:

"Second waterfall."

Half an inch below this Rod could make out the letters T, D and L, widely scattered.

"That's the third waterfall," he exclaimed eagerly.

At this point the crude lines of the diagram stopped, and immediately below, between the map and the three names, it was evident that there had been considerable writing. But not a word of it could the young hunters make out. That writing, without doubt, had given the key to the lost gold. Rod looked up, his face betraying the keenness of his disappointment. He knew that under his hand he held all that was left of the secret of a great treasure. But he was more baffled than ever. Somewhere in this vast desolation there were three waterfalls, and somewhere near the third waterfall the Englishman and the two Frenchmen had found their gold. That was all he knew. He had not found a waterfall in the chasm; they had not discovered one in all their trapping and hunting excursions.

Wabi was looking down into his face in silent thought. Suddenly he reached out and seized the sheet of bark and examined it closely. As he looked there came a deeper flush in his face, his eyes brightened and he gave a cry of excitement.

"By George, I believe we can peel this!" he cried. "See here, Muky!" He thrust the birch under the old Indian's eyes. Even Mukoki's hands were trembling.

"Birch-bark is made up of a good many layers, each as thin as the thinnest paper," he explained to Rod as Mukoki continued his examination. "If we can peel off that first layer, and then hold it up to the light, we shall be able to see the impression of every word that was ever made on it--even though they were written a hundred years ago!"

Mukoki had gone to the door, and now he turned, grinning exultantly.

"She peel!"

He showed them where he had stripped back a corner of the film-like layer. Then he sat down in the light, his head bent over, and for many minutes he worked at his tedious task while Wabi and Rod hung back in soundless suspense. Half an hour later Mukoki straightened himself, rose to his feet and held out the precious film to Rod.

As tenderly as though his own life depended upon its care, Rod held the piece of birch, now a silken, almost transparent sheet, between himself and the light. A cry welled up into his throat. It was repeated by Wabi. And then there was silence--a silence broken only by their bated breaths and the excited thumpings of their hearts.

As though they had been written but yesterday, the mysterious words on the map were disclosed to their eyes. Where Rod had made out only three letters there were now plainly discernible the two words "third waterfall," and very near to these was the word "cabin." Below them were several lines, clearly impressed in the birch film. Slowly, his voice trembling, Rod read them to his companions.

"We, John Ball, Henri Langlois, and Peter Plante, having discovered gold at this fall, do hereby agree to joint partnership in the same, and do pledge ourselves to forget our past differences and work in mutual good will and honesty, so help us God. Signed,

"JOHN BALL, HENRI LANGLOIS, PETER PLANTE."

At the very top of the map the impression of several other words caught Rod's eyes. They were more indistinct than any of the others, but one by one he made them out. A hot blurring film seemed to fall over his eyes and he felt as though his heart had suddenly come up into his throat. Wabi's breath was burning against his cheek, and it was Wabi who spoke the words aloud.

"Cabin and head of chasm."

Rod went back to the table and sat down, the precious bit of birch-bark under his hand. Mukoki, standing mute, had listened and heard, and was as if stunned by their discovery. But now his mind returned to the moose steak, and he placed it on the stove. Wabi stood with his hands in his pockets, and after a little he laughed a trembling, happy laugh.

"Well, Rod, you've found your mine. You are as good as rich!"

"You mean that we have found our mine," corrected the white youth. "We are three, and we just naturally fill the places of John Ball, Henri Langlois and Peter Plante. They are all dead. The gold is ours!"

Wabi had taken up the map.

"I can't see the slightest possibility of our not finding it," he said. "The directions are as plain as day. We follow the chasm, and somewhere in that chasm we come to a waterfall. A little beyond this the creek that runs through the gorge empties into a larger stream, and we follow this second creek or river until we come to the third fall. The cabin is there, and the gold can not be far away."

He had carried the map to the door again, and Rod joined him.

"There is nothing that gives us an idea of distance on the map," he continued. "How far did you travel down the chasm?"

"Ten miles, at least," replied Rod.

"And you discovered no fall?"

"No."

With a splinter picked up from the floor Wabi measured the distances between the different points on the diagram.

"There is no doubt but what this map was drawn by John Ball," he said after a few moments of silent contemplation. "Everything points to that fact. Notice that all of the writing is in one hand, except the signatures of Langlois and Plante, and you could hardly decipher the letters in those signatures if you did not already know their names from this writing below. Ball wrote a good hand, and from the construction of the agreement over the signatures he was a man of pretty fair education. Don't you think so? Well, he must have drawn this map with some idea of distance in his mind. The second fall is only half as far from the first fall as the third fall is from the second, which seems to me conclusive evidence of this. If he had not had distance in mind he would not have separated the falls in this way on the map."

"Then if we can find the first fall we can figure pretty nearly how far the last fall is from the head of the chasm," said Rod.

"Yes. I believe the distance from here to the first fall will give us a key to the whole thing."

Rod had produced a pencil from one of his pockets and was figuring on the smooth side of a chip.

"The gold is a long way from here at the best, Wabi. I explored the chasm for ten miles. Say that we find the first fall within fifteen miles. Then, according to the map, the second fall would be about twenty miles from the first, and the third forty miles from the second. If the first fall is within fifteen miles of this cabin the third fall is at least seventy-five miles away."

Wabi nodded.

"But we may not find the first fall within that distance," he said. "By George--" He stopped and looked at Rod with an odd look of doubt in his face. "If the gold is seventy-five or a hundred miles away, why were those men here, and with only a handful of nuggets in their possession? Is it possible that the gold played out--that they found only what was in the buckskin bag?"

"If that were so, why should they have fought to the death for the possession of the map?" argued Rod.

Mukoki was turning the steak. He had not spoken, but now he said:

"Mebby going to Post for supplies."

"That's exactly what they were doing!" shouted the Indian youth. "Muky, you have solved the whole problem. They were going for supplies. And they didn't fight for the map--not for the map alone!"

His face flushed with new excitement.

"Perhaps I am wrong, but it all seems clear to me now," he continued. "Ball and the two Frenchmen worked their find until they ran out of supplies. Wabinosh House is over a hundred years old, and fifty years ago that was the nearest point where they could get more. In some way it fell to the Frenchmen to go. They had probably accumulated a hoard of gold, and before they left they murdered Ball. They brought with them only enough gold to pay for their supplies, for it was their purpose not to arouse the suspicion of any adventurers who happened to be at the Post. They could easily have explained their possession of those few nuggets. In this cabin either Langlois or Plante tried to kill his companion, and thus become the sole possessor of the treasure, and the fight, fatal to both, ensued. I may be wrong, but--by George, I believe that is what happened!"

"And that they buried the bulk of their gold somewhere back near the third fall?"

"Yes; or else they brought the gold here and buried it somewhere near this very cabin!"

They were interrupted by Mukoki.

"Dinner ready!" he called. _

Read next: Chapter 13. Snowed In

Read previous: Chapter 11. Roderick's Dream

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