CHAPTER XVIITHE SECRET DECIPHERED
On the evening of the last day of August, a sort of reunion and farewell dinner took place in Mr. Cook’s bungalow. Two guests were particularly jovial. One of these, Sink Weston, had, as they say in the far north, “cast up” from Abaja with his gang the day before leaving the dry upper Montezuma choked with logs waiting for the winter rains. Another was old Dan Doolin just in with food supplies and gasoline from Dolores. The others were Roy Osborne and the host, Manager Cook.
Roy was to leave in the morning with Weston and Doolin on his homeward trip. That afternoon, he had made final settlement with the company.
“I’m sorry to be payin’ you this,” said Mr. Cook, as he wrote out a check for over seven hundred dollars, “because it means you’re goin’ to leave us. But, aside from that, it’s the best earned money I ever saw go out of this office.”
“And I’m sorry, too,” answered Roy. “I’m sorry to think I’ve got to give up theParowan,the mountains and the deserts. I’ve come to love ’em all. And I’m sorry to think I’m goin’ to leave the bungalow and you,” he added, holding out his hand to Mr. Cook. “I’ve seen some hard things out here, but among the worst of ’em, I’ve always found at least one man who stood for the fair and square, even if he didn’t talk about it.”
The boy and the man shook hands.
Mr. Cook was an abstainer as to intoxicants, but he always saw that his convivial guests were supplied with liquid refreshments. Both Doolin and Weston celebrated the occasion by reaching the talkative stage.
“I’m proud o’ the kid, Colonel,” announced Sink, at last. “An’ you got to give me credit fur bringin’ him to you. That right, Dan?”
“We shore did,” answered the grizzled teamster enthusiastically. “An’ I’m sorry to be takin’ him out. I reckon the boys out in the desert’ll be sorry to see him go. They tell me,” the old man continued, “’at he’s got a reg’lar mail route an’ took letters and papers leastways onct a week to them mis’able prospectors.”
“He did, and more,” replied Mr. Cook. “He’s changed the whole plan of doin’ thingsdown here. In a year we’ll know more about this forsaken country than we’d have known in ten without what he’s taught us.”
“Right,” interrupted Weston. “An’ I brung him in. Don’t fergit that. He ain’t disappointed no one but me—”
Mr. Cook and Roy looked up.
“I kind o’ counted on him gettin’ to Parowan an’ findin’ out somepin about my old High Mucky-Muck o’ the Lost Injuns.”
Mr. Cook laughed and Roy colored a little.
“Sink,” exclaimed the boy hastily, “the fact that I never had a chance to get to Parowan is one of the reasons I hate to leave this country. For a long time, I thought I’d get over there. But when the Aeroplane Express got down to a regular schedule, it seemed as if every hour was taken up with something. I just couldn’t work it in. And I’d liked to have gone for my mother’s sake.”
“Oh, I accept yer apology,” muttered Weston good naturedly.
“But don’t git the idee I’ve give up. I got the location o’ that sink hole comin’ to me yit.”
Mr. Cook laughed and laid his hand on Weston’s arm.
“Sink,” he said, “if you keep on you’ll get to believin’ that story some day.”
Old Doolin looked at Roy and made a desperate effort to wink his heavy eyelid. As he did so, Weston pulled himself up in his chair, hit the table with his clenched fist until the dishes and glasses rattled, and exclaimed, in a thick voice:
“Ye’ll acknowledge thet thar’s one feller ’at kem out hyar an’ showed you all a few things ye didn’t know. Why? ’Cause he was a sight smarter ’an some wise ones I could name—”
“Or touch,” laughed Mr. Cook.
“An’ bein’ smart enough he knows a fack when he hears it. Mr. Osborne,” went on the old plainsman, leaning toward Roy, “wuz they a sink hole, an’ a white priest, an’ lost Injuns, an’ treasure to fill a freighter, or wuz they not?”
Roy flushed again, looked at Mr. Cook in an embarrassed way, and then said:
“I’ve felt there were. But, well, I know one thing. There isn’t any doubt that there was a white man, and he was likely enough a priest. His name was certainly Willard Banks, and I know this man was my great uncle, a Mormon elder.”
“Thar you air,” shouted Weston, defiantly hanging the table again. “Did I dream that? Answer, whar did I git the paper?”
Mr. Cook seemed amused. He had many times heard the wild tale of Weston’s fabled sink hole, but the Parowan end of the story, the knowledge that here old man Banks had lived, was unknown to him until the day Roy named the aeroplane. Weston’s positive manner aroused his interest anew in the story.
“I never saw your cipher or hieroglyphics, Sink,” he answered, ignoring Weston’s question. “I’d like to have a look at it.”
Helping himself to another drink, Weston slowly produced his old wallet, and, with much ceremony, finally laid the faded and much-worn brown paper upon the table. Mr. Cook took a long look at it, and then carried it to a wall light that he might better examine the dim characters. Plainly he made nothing of it. Roy stepped to his side and pointed out the dim name at the bottom—“Willard Banks.”
“I had a great uncle of that name out here in Utah. He lived in Parowan. They drove him out of the Mormon Church for some reason. But he was an elder in it once.”
Mr. Cook shook his head, and was, apparently,about to hand the sheet back to its owner when he stopped, straightened up, made another close survey of it and then said:
“Sink, let me have your mysterious paper to-night. I’d like to look it over.”
“I ain’t objectin’ to yer lookin’ it over,” answered Weston, “so long as ye keep yer hands on it. But, Colonel Cook, I wouldn’t part with that dockymint fur the best oil well yur agoin’ to find in Utah.”
Old Doolin’s head was nodding.
“Well,” suggested the manager, in a low tone to Weston, “just to be sure it ain’t mislaid, if you’re thinkin’ of escortin’ Dan to his bunk now, come back in an hour and I’ll return it to you.”
This was as good as a command to Weston. A few minutes later, arousing the well-dined teamster, the two men disappeared in the direction of the “Crater.” The uncouth freighter dispensed with the formalities of a good night to his host, but, as he followed his friend out into the sandy street, he did not fail to mutter:
“The kid’s shore all right. An’ we brung him, didn’t we, Sink?”
Plainly enough, the tale of the Sink Hole was not on Old Dan’s mind.
“What is it?” exclaimed Roy, impetuously, as the two men disappeared. He knew that Mr. Cook had an idea. Without answering at once, his host walked to the bookcase, and returned with the little Mormon Bible that had been taken from the hand of murdered “Utah” Banning.
“You’ve found something,” added Roy, almost catching his breath.
“This was the first Mormon Bible I ever saw,” said Mr. Cook, pushing the supper things aside, and bringing a lamp to the dining table. “Several times in your absence, I’ve amused myself looking it over. A very curious religion,” he added, as he drew up a chair and motioned Roy to do the same. “You saw the notes on the back flyleaf didn’t you?” he asked, turning to Roy.
The boy flushed with chagrin. He had not. Nor had he looked at the book since his first cursory examination of it.
Hanging over Mr. Cook’s shoulder, he watched the manager turn to the back of the book and finally expose a yellow edged page.In ink that had turned to a faint brown, the boy read, at the top of the page, these words:
“Deseret Alphabet.”
Beneath it, in a fine, close hand, were two columns of characters. Manifestly, it was the Mormon phonetic alphabet. After each odd character, the sound was indicated with a syllable in English.
“That’s it,” shouted Roy, almost snatching the book from Mr. Cook’s hand. “Those are the letters on Mr. Weston’s paper. Here, see,” he added nervously catching up the paper and confirming his theory. “They’re the same. We found it. Sink’s found his treasure.”
“One moment,” interrupted the less exuberant Mr. Cook. “Let’s see what we can make of it.”
“We’ve got to make something,” insisted the boy, impulsively. “It has to work out. The man who wrote on Mr. Weston’s paper was my great uncle. He helped to make this alphabet. I know that. That’s what the Banks’ history says.”
“Then I reckon we’ve got it,” answered Mr. Cook. He began to read off the characters with their equivalents in English.
“Come on,” broke in Roy, “let’s see what we can find. Here, what’s this?”
He pointed to a letter like a capital “O” with a little ridge in the bottom. It was easily found.
“‘K,’” answered Mr. Cook. “Put it down.”
Chuckling and enthusiastic, the boy ran to Mr. Cook’s desk for a piece of paper. With this before them, the boy and his hardly less interested elder, began to work out the mystery. Both the flyleaf characters and Mr. Weston’s scrap were dim with age, but, by finally applying a reading glass to the Bible key, the first line of characters was turned into this—two of the Mormon letters standing in English for sounds instead of letters:
“KAIPUROWITTS”
“That’s easy,” announced Mr. Cook, when the interpretation was complete. “Should have been ‘Kaiparowits’. But it’s close enough. There’s a peak o’ that name at the north end of the Kaiparowits Plateau.”
“Where’s that?” exclaimed Roy.
“The plateau’s northwest of where the San Juan hits the Colorado.”
“That’s it,” almost shouted the excited boy. “That’s where Weston got out of the canyon.”
Mr. Cook was already busy on the next line. It resulted in this word:
“ELLSURTH”
“Another mountain?” asked Roy.
“Probably means Ellsworth. There is such a peak east of Pine Alcove River. Hi. Clark worked up that way this summer.”
“But they are a long ways apart,” exclaimed the boy. “How far?”
Mr. Cook consulted the large wall map.
“Nearly a hundred miles.”
The boy’s face fell.
“Anyway,” he said, “these mountains have something to do with each other and the Sink Hole. Looks as if it might be between ’em, don’t it?”
“Let’s spell the other word,” suggested his companion. When this had been done, the letters read:
“SKALAENTE”
Mr. Cook eyed it a long time and then shook his head. Finally, he went to the map again, but apparently with no better success.
“Looks like Swedish,” suggested Roy.
Mr. Cook returned to the table, held the sheet at all angles before him and then suddenly broke out into a laugh.
“Escalante!” he exclaimed. “Mustn’t forget the characters are phonetic. That’s the Escalante River—first one south of Horse Creek. I guess that’s it.”
Roy had hurried to the map. With his pencil he drew a line under Mr. Cook’s direction, from Ellsworth mountain to Kaiparowits. Where it crossed the river, he made a cross.
Then, his hand trembling, he wrote at the intersection, “Sink Hole of the Lost Indians.”
“What do you think of Sink’s story now?” he broke out, boy fashion.
“All he has to do,” answered Mr. Cook, relieving his excitement by lighting a cigar, “is to find something there. What he tells about, he saw fifteen years ago. A good many people have been prowling about there in fifteen years.”
“Anyway,” exclaimed Roy, “he can have another look at the place.”
“But,” said Mr. Cook, after a pause, “I never saw a sink hole on or near a flowing river.”
Roy’s jaw fell. He was looking at Weston’s paper. Suddenly his face lit up. Then he pointed to the arrow.
“That’s pointin’ south,” he exclaimed.“Now, we got it. Where a line between the two mountains crosses the Escalante, turn south until you come to the Sink Hole.”
“Not bad,” said Mr. Cook. “Very probable. That’s the trail I’d take.”
The excited boy wanted to rush out on a search for Weston, but Mr. Cook stopped him.
“Leave that to me,” he said, after he and Roy had retired to the cool porch. “When Weston comes, say nothing. Let me do the talking.”
They had not long to wait. In a short time, the veteran guide was with them. As Mr. Cook handed Weston his precious paper and proffered him a cigar, he said:
“Sink, that looks mighty interesting. Why don’t you find the Treasure Cave?”
“Humph,” grunted Weston, as he lit his cigar. “Why don’t I? Read this fur me an’ I will.”
“What’ll you give to have it read?”
“I’ll give you my livery stable, an’ my house—yes, sir,” he added with a grim smile, “I’ll even throw in my real ’state office.”
“Would you give half of anything you might find in your underground safety deposit vault?”
Weston looked up, without any trace of liquor now, and said:
“To the man ’at’ll take me to that pint, I’ll give ever’ other dish and bowl we git. I reckon that’d be fair.”
“Well,” went on Mr. Cook, “here’s the man that can do it,” pointing to Roy. “He knows where your cave is. Is it an even divide?”
Weston sprang up with a shout. At the same time, Roy stepped to Mr. Cook’s side in protest. The only answer he got was:
“I’ve got to pay you for what you said when you gave me the ring, Kid. This is my contract.”
Weston’s shout had died to a note of alarm.
“You ain’t kiddin’ me, Colonel? I’m sober.”
“Be sure you are in the same condition to-morrow morning at seven o’clock, Sink,” exclaimed Mr. Cook. “Roy’s put off his return a day or so. He’s goin’ to give you a little ride in theParowan. And remember our bargain.”