INTO THE STORM.
"Carry him into the house and get him to bed," cried Mrs. Bagley, the housekeeper, wringing her hands distractedly. "Oh dear! poor gentleman, he's bin a-workin' too hard, that's what's the matter."
Jupe and Hank Hawkins, the handy man, picked the unconscious man up and carried him to bed, where he was made comfortable.
Jack and Tom made an investigation of the workshop. At first the cut on Mr. Chadwick's head had given Jack the impression that he might have been the victim of foul play.
But a brief survey of the place soon dispelled these conclusions. When he fell, the inventor struck his head against the sharp corner of a table right behind him, Jack concluded, and in this way inflicted the wound.
The letter that his father had been reading when he was stricken still lay on the floor. Jack picked it up. It was from the brokers in New York, the same missive Mr. Chadwick had referred to over the radio 'phone just before the silence that so alarmed Jack.
Glancing over it Jack's eyes widened. He perceived at once that the cause of his father's sudden attack no doubt lay in the shock he had received when he opened the envelope. The letter was curt and to the point.
"Your securities wiped out in panic," it said. "Wire us and advise what to do."
That was all, but it was enough. Jack knew that most of his father's money was invested with the firm that had written the letter, and now they had been wiped out in a money panic. Jack had no idea how much of his father's fortune was affected, but it was evident from Mr. Chadwick's collapse that he had been dealt a heavy blow.
He was in the midst of talking to Tom about the letter when the housekeeper came running from the house.
"Oh, here you boys are!" she exclaimed. "You must get Dr. Mays at once. Those red drops he gave your father are finished and I can't find any more."
"I'll telephone," said Jack promptly, stuffing the letter into his pocket.
"I've already tried that," said Mrs. Bagley, "but the line is out of order."
"Can't we get some other doctor?" asked Tom.
Mrs. Bagley shook her head.
"Dr. Mays is the only one who understands your father's case," she said. "You must get him as soon as possible."
"Is dad conscious yet?" asked Jack anxiously.
"Yes, he has been trying to tell me something but I won't let him talk."
"We'll get Dr. Mays right away," said Jack, but then he suddenly recollected that the electric car was slightly out of order. There would be no time to stop and repair it then.
Luckily the Wondership still stood outside the shed. Five minutes later the boys were soaring aloft, bound for the doctor's house, which was some distance away. It was not till they had fairly started that they noticed the change in the weather.
The thunderheads they had seen earlier in the day now spread and covered the whole sky with a dark pall. The air was very still, as if nature was holding her breath. Far off, though in plain view, the sea was lying like a smooth sheet of steel-gray velvet. A sailing ship, with sails flapping, was becalmed some distance from shore.
"Going to rain," said Tom.
"Worse than that, I think," said Jack. "We're in for the storm that's been making up for two days now."
"Well, we can get there and back before it breaks."
"Easily. Let those motors out, Tom, we want to make good time."
It was oppressively hot, and had it not been for Jack's anxiety he would have enjoyed the swift cooling passage through the thundery air. But he was strangely troubled. Did that letter mean that his father was on the verge of ruin?
Suddenly he bethought himself of Ned Nevins' letter. He opened it, having pushed it into his pocket when they entered the workshop, where Mr. Chadwick had placed it before opening the ominous epistle from his brokers. It was a friendly, chatty note from the boy, and enclosed the checks covering the joint dividends of Jack and Tom in the Hydroaëroplane Company.
"Well, at any rate, that's something," declared Jack to Tom, as he handed him the letter and his check.
"Yes, but if Uncle Chester is ruined, it's only a drop in the bucket," said Tom.
"Well, it's no use crossing your bridges till you come to them," said Jack, "and anyhow, that letter may be only a false alarm. I've heard they get these financial panics in Wall Street just like kids get the measles, and they get over them as quickly."
"I trust it will be so in this case," said Tom.
"So do I," said Jack hopefully, but a cold fear that his father was ruined possessed him, and made his heart feel heavy as lead.
Suddenly, from the purple firmament, came the sound of distant thunder. Following it a puff of wind, hot as the exhalation of an opened oven, blew in their faces. In the distance they saw a ragged streak of lightning tear the cloud curtains.
THE "LIGHTNING CAGE."
"Look at that, will you!" exclaimed Tom.
"What, you are not scared, are you?" asked Jack.
"N-no, but I must say I'm not fond of thunderstorms Particularly when we are carrying all that gas over our heads."
"That new invention of mine will take care of that all right," said Jack confidently.
He referred to a new device of his with which the Wondership was equipped for protecting balloon bags from lightning. In a thunderstorm a balloon, or gas-filled dirigible, is subject to sudden variations of electric charge which, under certain conditions, might produce sparks leading to its annihilation.
More especially was this the case with such a craft as this Wondership, carrying as she did so much metal and steel wiring. The netting of the bag, with the idea of making it as conductive as possible, was of metal, connecting with the other metal parts of the craft so that when a steel drag rope was lowered to the ground a discharge of lightning striking the balloon would be passed off harmlessly into the earth, as is the case with a lightning conductor.
It might be supposed that making the outside of a balloon a good conductor would invite danger from lightning. But the Boy Inventors knew that this was not the case. While the ordinary balloon envelope is a fairly good insulator against low voltage, it is unable to resist the high tension of atmospheric electricity.
Jack ascertained these facts by touching an electroscope with a bit of balloon cloth of the kind used on the Wondership, and charged with 2,000 volts of electricity. The electroscope instantly responded.
This showed that the balloon bag increased the electrical tension immediately above and below it as much as it would do if it was a perfect conductor, but the destructive action of a lightning bolt would be greater in proportion to the resistance opposed to it. So that, in reality, Jack's device was one of the safest that could be imagined for protecting balloonists in a heavy storm.
In effect, the occupants of the Wondership were enclosed in a cage. Lightning might zip through the wires and stays, but it could not touch them. As to the danger of letting out gas through the valve in a strong electric field, which is almost certain to produce sparks, the boys did not have to worry about that for to deflate the bag they simply pumped some of its contents back into the reservoir with the powerful gas pumps.
But after all, Jack's device had never been tested. It looked as if it was due to be. The wind came in sharp puffs, now hot and now cold.
Ragged, white clouds, like wind-driven fragments of filmy lace, began to whip across the dark heavens. The sea turned a peculiar light green and was flecked with whitecaps.
"We're in for it," said Jack. "Better get up the storm curtains, Tom."
While Jack steered, Tom drew up the waterproof curtains and top which, in rainy weather, made the Wondership quite dry and weather-tight. Mica portholes gave light inside this extemporized cabin, and enabled the steersman to see.
This had hardly been done when a wild gust of wind struck the Wondership and sent it staggering off its course. But in a jiffy Jack regained control of the craft and headed her straight for the white house occupied by Dr. Mays, which could now be seen, its lofty cupola poking up above the trees surrounding it.
"Glad we're nearly there," said Tom. "I don't much like this."
"We're O.K.," Jack assured him. "We went through a lot worse than this in that circular storm in Yucatan."
"Can't we drop and run along the road?"
"It's much longer by the road than by the air line, and remember we are in a big hurry."
"That's so. But we've got the return trip ahead of us."
"Well, if it gets too bad, we'll have to come back by road," said Jack, "but I haven't got a doubt that she'll stand anything that will come out of this storm."
Crash!
The sky was rent from end to end by jagged lightning. With a deafening roar the thunder broke, rumbling and crashing in the sultry air.
S-w-i-s-h!
The rain came in torrents, tearing at the storm curtains. It beat frantically at them with a noise like that of surf on a beach. But inside the boys were snug and dry, and the Wondership forged steadily forward. It was a weird experience for the boys. About them the artillery of heaven thundered and flashed. They could see each other's faces and the black outlines of their craft in the livid flare of flash after flash of lightning.
Jack, with his hands firmly gripping the steering wheel, anticipating every move of the storm-tossed Wondership like a skillful pilot, felt his pulses throb. There was something fine in battling with the elements like this in a stanch craft they had perfected. He felt that no other airship then in existence would have been able to keep up the fight.
All at once there came a crash that drove his eardrums in. The Wondership staggered and then seemed to leap into lambent flame. Blinded, Jack threw his hands before his eyes, utterly forgetting for the minute the steering wheel.
Tom gave a shout of alarm, as he felt the craft stagger as if dealt a mortal blow, and then begin to drop earthward.
"We've been struck!" he yelled in panic.
THROUGH THE AIR.
For the fraction of a second the faculties of both boys were paralyzed. A tingling sensation was in their limbs. Jack was the first to recover his wits. He snatched his hands from his eyes and seized the wheel. In a jiffy the Wondership's earthward plunge was checked. Once more she regained an even keel.
"Wh-what happened?" stuttered Tom anxiously.
"We were hit by lightning," replied Jack.
"Goodness! I thought we were goners, for a minute."
"I confess that I did, too. But I guess the 'electric cage' worked. Everything seems to be shipshape."
Jack was right. Thanks to his ingenious invention, the lightning, which had struck the aircraft, had been diffused through the safety "cage" and safely convoyed to the earth by the ground chain made of light manganese bronze, which had been lowered when the storm broke.
"Just the same I don't want to get hit again," said Tom. "I thought for a minute the world had come to an end."
"My fingers are tingling yet," said Jack, "and I can see stars, but I think if it hadn't been for the cage we would have likely been blown to smithereens."
By this time they were almost over the doctor's house and extensive grounds. Jack manipulated the Wondership against the storm, flying in a circle, and snapped on the powerful searchlight. With the help of its rays he picked out a good landing place, and having set the pumps at work abstracting gas from the bag, they soon made a good landing.
Doctor Mays stood on his porch as they left the ship and ran through the downpour for the house.
"Gracious, boys!" he exclaimed, "but you certainly gave me a fright. I thought when that bolt hit you that you were going to be annihilated."
"How did it look from below?" asked Jack.
"As if you were enveloped in blue flame. Then suddenly a ball of red fire slid from the ship to the ground——"
"Down the conducting rope," put in Jack.
"And exploded with a loud bang when it struck the ground," continued the doctor. "But all's well that ends well, and now tell me what brings you here, for I know it must be urgent business or you'd never have ventured through such a storm."
Jack hastily told the doctor of his father's stroke. The medical man looked grave.
"I'll go with you just as soon as I can pack my bag," he said. "Your father had been overworking. I warned him of what would happen if he did not rest up, some time ago, but he has, seemingly, disregarded my advice."
In a few minutes the doctor, muffled up in a raincoat, was ready to start. But he stipulated that the run to High Towers should be made by the road.
"I like excitement as well as anybody," he said, "and I've been up in your Wondership before——"
"When it was the Roadracer," interpolated Jack.
"Exactly; but I must confess that when I saw you a short time ago looking like a floating ball of fire, I lost my taste for aërial travel."
"We'll go back by road, then," said Jack, as through the rain, which was falling in torrents, they ran to the Wondership.
"My, but you have it snug in here," said the doctor, as he entered the tight, waterproof cabin.
"Hang up your coat, doctor," said Tom, and he took the physician's dripping mackintosh and slung it on a hook attached to one of the stanchions. Then the start was made, with the bag partially deflated and lying in limp, wet folds on its framework.
Through the night, under skies fretted with lightning, the Wondership shot forward. Out on the open road Jack ordered full speed, the great searchlights illuming the roadway as if it were day. He felt little apprehension of meeting other vehicles. The night was too bad to permit of any save emergency traveling.
The roads were deep in mud, and water spurted up from the wheels of the flying car as it raced through the storm. But seated snug and dry in the cabin none of them bothered about this. Little was said. Jack had to concentrate his mind on handling the Wondership, for driving under the conditions, and at such speed, required all the wheel-handler's attention.
On and on they flew, down hills and over bridges, under which, ordinarily, quiet streams flowed, but now swollen by the rains, they boiled and raced like angry torrents. They flashed through villages and past farmhouses without encountering a soul, while overhead the tempest roared and raged and flared.
They were shooting down a hill at top speed when Jack suddenly gave a gasp. Right in front of them, vividly outlined in the searchlight's glare, was an obstacle. A big wagonload of hay, covered with a tarpaulin, and deserted by its driver who, despairing of mounting the hill in the storm, had unhitched his horses and driven off till the weather cleared.
The wagon was in such a position that it blocked the road, which was sunken between high banks at that point. Jack ground down his brakes in chagrin.
"Blocked!" he exclaimed disgustedly.
VAULTING TO THE RESCUE.
"What awful luck," muttered Tom.
"Isn't there any way we can get by?" inquired the doctor anxiously. "It's important that I should reach Mr. Chadwick as soon as possible."
Jack made no reply, but bent over the gas-valve. In an instant the gas was hissing into the balloon bag. Its wet folds swelled out, and presently Jack started the propellers. Like a racehorse leaping a barrier, the Wondership rose skyward.
"Hold fast!" cried the boy in a triumphant voice.
"Wow!" yelled Tom, "there are more ways of killing a cat than by choking it with cream."
The next moment the Wondership was in the road on the other side of the hay wagon, having hurdled it like a high jumper, and was once more on her way.
"Jove, you boys are marvels!" exclaimed the doctor. "Is there anything you can't do with this craft, or auto, or whatever it is, of yours?"
"Lots of things, I guess," said Tom, "but we haven't found many of them yet."
At uninterrupted speed the journey was resumed. At times so swift was the pace that the Wondership seemed to be half flying. Thanks to her shock absorbers, but little motion was felt, although in places the roadway had been washed out by the torrential downpour and was very rough.
"Whereabouts are we?" shouted Tom, as they rushed along.
"Near the Coon Creek Bridge," flung back Jack over his shoulder. "We ought to sight it at any moment now."
He peered through the blackness ahead. The searchlights failed to show any bridge. But the young driver saw an abandoned cottage by the roadside which had formerly been used as a toolhouse. Just beyond it he knew the bridge should loom up with its white railings.
But there was not a sign of it.
Not till it was too late to stop did Jack realize what had happened. The bridge had been washed away by the rising waters of the creek and he was tearing at top speed for the steep banks.
It was a moment for lightning thinking. Right ahead loomed a black pit which he knew marked the water course.
Suddenly it flashed into Jack's mind that in former times, before the bridge had been built, there had been a ford at the point.
The banks, steep elsewhere, almost wall-like in fact, were still graded at the place where the old crossing spot had been.
He jerked over the steering wheel with a suddenness that threatened to overturn the Wondership. The auto-craft plunged wildly to one side and then rushed downward.
Before he realized it, Jack had steered her into the rushing waters of the swollen creek.
"All the power you've got," he cried to Tom, as the Wondership careened and tipped madly and then recovered an even keel. Jack headed her up stream while Tom, who hardly knew what had happened, blindly obeyed orders.
Jack's chief fear was that the rush of the torrential water would carry him too far down to make a landing on the opposite side of the old ford. In that case they would be in a bad fix, for the creek ran for some distance between steep walls of limestone rock.
It was a hard struggle. The twin propellers beat the air furiously, clawing the Wondership up stream, while the water hissed and roared all about her, and the engine labored with a noise like that of a giant locust.
And then, almost before he knew it, and before either Tom or the doctor realized in the least what had happened, they found themselves safe on the other side. They had gained the opposite slope of the ford with hardly an inch to spare, but that was enough.
The Wondership sped up the bank as if glad to be free of the battle with the swollen creek, and not half an hour afterward they rolled up to High Towers.
Dr. Mays was met almost tearfully by Mrs. Bagley.
"How is he?" was his first question.
"He seems to be better, doctor, but something is worrying him," said the worthy woman.
"I'll go up to him at once. You boys had better stay here," said the doctor.
The physician was upstairs a long time. When he came down he looked grave.
"Is dad any better?" asked Jack anxiously.
"He is suffering from a nervous breakdown due to overwork," said the doctor. "The cut on his head is a mere flesh wound. But he appears to have something on his mind. Do you know what it is?"
Then, and not till then, for in the rush of events he had completely forgotten it, Jack remembered the letter from the brokers.
"Dr. Mays," he said, "you are an old friend?"
"I hope so, my boy. You may confide in me freely if you know any reason for your father's disquiet."
"If you will read this, doctor, you will understand," and Jack handed him the letter.
Dr. Mays read it with knitted brows.
"So this explains it," he said as he returned it to Jack. "Your father kept muttering about foolish speculations and ruin, but would not tell me what he meant. Now it is all clear. Poor Chadwick, I'm afraid from what he said that his fortune, all but a small amount, is wiped out."
"But will he get better, doctor?" asked Jack anxiously, disregarding the monetary aspect of the affair.
"That all depends," said the doctor seriously, "on his freedom from anxiety."
"You mean that he must not worry over money matters?"
"Precisely; but, as that letter states he is ruined, it will be hard to set his mind at rest. If there were only some way of meeting the situation!"
In the crucible of that moment an idea was borne to Jack that was destined to lead him into strange paths.
"I think I know of a way," he said quietly, "that is, if the brokers' message is not exaggerated."
But it was not. The next day confirmatory reports arrived of the wreck of Mr. Chadwick's fortunes. In his room, attended constantly by Dr. Mays, his friend as well as physician, the inventor raved of his losses.
"We have got to think of some way of easing his mind," said Dr. Mays, who had placed his regular practice in the hands of another doctor so that he might be with Mr. Chadwick. "If only his fortune could be won back."
"I think I know of a way," said Jack quietly.
The doctor stared at him as if he thought the boy had taken leave of his senses.
"You know of a way?" he questioned incredulously.
"Yes, sir. At least if the information Tom and I have on the subject is correct."
"I don't follow you," said the puzzled doctor. "Your father has lost thousands."
Jack nodded.
"I know all that," he said.
"And yet you are prepared to get it back?"
"I said I thought there was a possibility," was Jack's quiet reply.
"And what may that be?"
"Did you ever hear of Z.2.X., doctor?" was the entirely unexpected question.
"Z.2.X."
"Z.2.X.? Well, such things are rather out of my line, but I have heard of it—yes," replied the doctor, looking more puzzled than ever. "But what do you know about it?"
"Till two days ago—nothing," replied Jack, "but now I believe that I know where there is a trainload of it."
"Good heavens, boy, you don't know what you're talking about. Why, the stuff is as valuable—as valuable as radium. Possibly it is worth more."
"Then even a small quantity would restore my father's fortune and his health?" asked Jack, persisting in his line of inquiry.
"Undoubtedly it would restore his fortune, and in my belief his health, which he is unlikely to gain otherwise."
"Then I'll do it," said Jack, speaking for himself and Tom, for the two lads had discussed the idea the night before. "Those dividends from our share of the hydroaëroplane plant will fit out an expedition, and if we fail—well, we can still sell out our interest and help dad get on his feet again."
The telephone bell jangled. Jack answered it. The voice that came over the wire was that of Professor Jenks. His tones trembled with excitement as he spoke to the boy.
"I have analyzed that sample from the Colorado River," he said.
"Well, what is your verdict?" asked Jack, with a painfully beating heart.
"That when all the expenses of reduction and refining and transportation and digging are deducted that it will be worth at least $100 an ounce," was the reply. "It would bring an even higher price, for the placing of a large amount on the market will probably have the effect of lowering it."
"Great Scott!" breathed Jack, "and there's a whole island of it there for the taking."
"Yes; but how are yow going to get it? The cliffs are unscalable, the river unnavigable. It might as well be in Mars for all the good it does anyone," objected the professor.
Jack's next words were direct, to say the least.
"I've figured out all that," he said. "We can get it, if it's there to be got. I've a reason now for going out there if it's possible to come to some arrangement with Zeb Cummings. Can you meet me at the hospital this afternoon to talk over the matter?"
"Are you serious?" gasped the professor.
"Perfectly," Jack assured him. "If we can't get at it by earth or water we can reach it from the air, can't we?"
"Heaven bless my soul, I never thought of that," choked out the professor. "I—Melissa's calling me. I'll meet you at the hospital this afternoon."
"Tom and I will be there," said Jack, but the professor, at the imperious bidding of Melissa, had hung up the receiver.
The result of the conference held that afternoon at the bedside of Zeb Cummings was the formation of the Z.2.X. Exploration Company, the members being Jack, Tom, Zeb Cummings and the professor. The capital was to be furnished in equal amounts by the professor and the boys, and Zeb Cummings was to be an equal partner in the enterprise, he having furnished the information on which Jack hoped to rehabilitate his father's fortunes.
As for the professor, he did not so much regard the pecuniary side of the expedition as the opportunity he would have to write an epoch-making book and confound his scientific rivals. In their enthusiasm, the adventurers did not take into consideration the fact that the map might be wrong, or that the strange metals be just visionary deposits. The boys' enthusiasm drowned all doubts in their minds; Zeb and the professor never were as optimistic.
Dr. Mays, when he had been placed in full possession of the facts and considered them, decided that under the circumstances the boys could go and undertook to quiet any apprehensions Mr. Chadwick might have concerning the trip. It was found that enough had been saved from the wreck of the inventor's fortunes to enable him to live comfortably while the boys were away, besides which he had royalties from several inventions coming in. Still, the bulk of his fortunes had vanished and the radio telephone was not yet a practicable instrument to put upon the market.
But with Z.2.X. the boys hoped to make it a perfect transmitter of speech over great distances.
Of course, Jack's plan was to utilize the Wondership on the enterprise of finding Rattlesnake Island and its treasures. After long consultations with Zeb, who was now convalescent, it was decided to ship the craft, in sections, to Yuma on the Colorado River and make the start secretly from some point below there.
It was in the midst of these plans, and while the boys' workshed was littered with lists of provisions and equipment that Dick Donovan injected himself into the situation. The red-headed young reporter descended upon them one day when they were busily packing the Wondership away in big crates, which were labeled in various ways so as to give no inkling of the contents.
Of course Dick, being in a way a member of the firm, had to be told what was going on, and the result was that after a lot of hard pleading the boys consented to allow him to come along.
"He's got red hair," said Zeb, "and that ought to make him good on the trail, same as a buckskin cayuse."
The boys didn't quite see the logic of this, but they knew from former experiences that the young reporter was a good campmate, and they were, on the whole, glad that they had included him. But when young Donovan came to High Towers, he was not aware that he was followed by Bill Masterson, who, as we know, was the son of the proprietor of theBoston Moon, on which paper young Masterson also worked as a reporter.
Ever since Dick Donovan had written for his paper, theBoston Evening Eagle, the wonderful story of the boys' adventures on the trail of the giant sloth of Brazil, other Boston reporters had regarded him as worth watching. In some way, young Masterson learned of Dick's frequent visits to High Towers while the preparations for the Colorado trip were going forward.
"It's my idea," he told his father, "that those Boy Inventors are planning another big stunt and that Dick Donovan is to go along and write the story. Do we want to get beaten again?"
"We do not," said his father, a heavily-set, dictatorial man, perpetually at war with theEvening Eagle. "That last beat of Donovan's on the Brazil story jumped theEagle'scirculation sky high."
"Well, why not let me trail along after them and find out what I can?" said young Masterson. "No use letting theMoonget soaked again, and besides, I want to get even on those young fellows, anyhow, for the mean trick they played in having me arrested, even if it didn't come to anything, and the case was dropped.
"Jove!" he cried suddenly, as a new train of thought was suggested to him. "I'll bet I've got it. This trip, or whatever it is, they are planning has something to do with that miner, Zeb Cummings, the chap I ran down."
"Well, it's worth keeping a weather eye on, anyway," decided his father. "I guess you'll get the assignment."
"And I'll run it down, too," declared young Masterson boastfully. "I owe that red-headed, chesty Donovan a grudge anyhow."
That evening young Masterson met by appointment the two youths who had been with him in the automobile the day that Zeb was run down. They were both sons of wealthy men, and had more money than was good for them. Masterson found that both Sam Higgins and Eph Compton were willing to do all they could to harm the boys who had been responsible for their arrests, and so it came about that Jupe, on his way to the village to post some letters, was enticed into talk one night, and while he was chatting and accepting the good cigars three amiable young men pressed upon him, the mail was abstracted from his pocket.
There were two letters, one from Dick to his city editor telling him of the progress made and informing him of the day for the start, and the other from Jack to his father, who was a guest of Dr. Mays. Jack gave full details of their plans and other information concerning the trip, so that the three plotters, a few days before the expedition set out, knew as much about it as the boys themselves.
Armed with this information, Masterson, Higgins and Compton had no difficulty in getting money from their parents, all of whom would have described themselves as "keen business men." As for Jupe, he was too badly scared to say anything about the loss of the letters, and as Masterson, after steaming them open and abstracting what he wanted of their contents, posted them to their proper destinations, the boys started out on their long journey west without the slightest idea that anyone but themselves and one or two others knew of their plans.
The professor's going was not unaccompanied by difficulties. Miss Melissa had insisted that if he was to accompany the expedition, she was going along, too. This being manifestly impossible, the man of science was driven to the subterfuge of placing a bag of fossils in his bed to represent him. On the night of the start, Miss Melissa looked into his room every few minutes to make sure he had not escaped.
It was not till morning that she discovered that the man of science had effected his escape through his bedroom window, climbing down a latticework to the ground. At first she was half inclined to pursue him, but thought the better of it when she read the note the professor had left behind.
"Well," said Miss Melissa to her little maid, "there's one good thing—he won't be cluttering up the house with old stones and rocks for some time to come."
"What shall I do with them fossils what he put in his bed to make believe it was him, miss?" asked the maid.
"You may throw them into the creek at the back of the house, Mary," said Miss Melissa, and went placidly about her dusting and sweeping and "setting to rights."
But of all this, the professor, on the train speeding westward, was blissfully unconscious. Perhaps even if he had known it, he would not have cared much, for even his scientific mind was warmed and thrilled by the prospect of the aërial search for the mineral treasures of Rattlesnake Island.
ON THE BORDER LINE.
The long train of gray-coated coaches, filmed with the arid dust of the desert, rolled into Yuma, the little town at the junction of the Gila and Colorado River, popularly supposed to be the hottest place in America. The boys, glad that their long journey had come to an end, felt that it was living up to its reputation as they alighted and stood in the blistering heat while their personal baggage was thrown off.
The professor, however, was quite oblivious to the scorching rays of the afternoon sun. He darted about seeking specimens, and he had soon gathered up quite a collection of small rocks. In the meantime Zeb Cummings, who was quite in his element, had helped the boys get their things together and see them loaded on a mule wagon which rattled them off to a small hotel, for they did not want to make themselves any more conspicuous than was necessary.
The boys wore gray flannel shirts, khaki trousers, stout high boots and broad-brimmed hats, and had fastened red handkerchiefs round their throats to keep off the sun from the back of their necks. Zeb had a similar outfit.
The professor, however, still wore his baggy black garments, his only concession to the heat being a big green umbrella, which looked like a gigantic verdant mushroom. As they drove off in a rickety sort of bus, having with difficulty persuaded the professor to leave off specimen hunting for a while, the boys did not notice that from the opposite side of the train three young men had alighted who, from a point of vantage behind a water tower, watched their movements.
The trio were Bill Masterson and his two cronies, Sam Higgins and Eph Compton.
"Well, here we are, Eph," said Bill, as they watched the boys drive off.
"Yes, and here they are, too," grunted Eph.
"I'm glad we've got here at last, though. Keeping out of sight on that train was beginning to get on my nerves."
"Same here," said Sam Higgins, stretching himself. "But I guess we succeeded in keeping ourselves hidden all right."
"Sure," rejoined Masterson. "They haven't a notion we are here."
In the meantime the lads found accommodations till the next day at the small hotel on a back street where Zeb had insisted on their coming so as to escape observation. Yuma is full of prospectors and miners, and every stranger in town is suspected of having some sort of a scheme, he explained, and as a consequence is closely watched.
Zeb's first care, therefore, was to circulate a story that the professor, a noted savant and geologist, was going into the desert with his party to collect specimens. This appeared to satisfy the landlord, who was at first inclined to be curious.
The professor had hardly been shown his room before he was out again with his hammer and satchel and his attention was almost at once attracted by a big stone that held up one corner of the barn at the back of the hotel. The boys knew nothing of what he was doing till they heard a loud, angry voice crying:
"Hey, you in ther preacher's suit! Quit tryin' ter pull thet thar barn down, will yer?"
"But, my dear sir," came the professor's voice, in mild expostulation, "are you aware that you have built your barn on the top of a splendid specimen of primordial rock?"
"Don't know nuthin' about a prime order of rock," came back the other voice.
The boys looked out of the window. They saw the landlord of the hotel, a surly-looking fellow, with a big black mustache and tanned cheeks, striding across the yard to the professor, who had blissfully resumed his chipping.
The landlord reached out one brawny hand to grab his guest, when something happened that made him temporarily cease hostilities. A big chunk of rock suddenly flaked off under the professor's assault. It flew in the air and the next instant a yell of pain apprised them that the landlord had got it right in the eye.
The professor looked round as the man emitted a bellow of rage.
"Bless me, where did that bit of rock go? Ah, there it is! Right at your feet, sir," and he darted forward with a smile of satisfaction and, picking up the chunk of rock that had struck the indignant landlord, placed it in his satchel.
"Thank you very much for stopping it, sir," he said, with a bow, and then, before the thunderstruck landlord could say anything, the scientist strolled off under his umbrella in search of more specimens. The boys fairly choked with laughter.
But the landlord was too dumfounded even to speak for a minute. His face grew as purple as a plum. He appeared to be about to burst.
"He's locoed," he burst forth at last, "locoed as a horn toad, by the 'tarnal hills."
Then, holding a hand to his eye, he reëntered the hotel and could be heard shouting for hot water to bathe his injury.
Zeb, who had been out looking for a trustworthy man to take their effects out to a spot along the river where they could put the Wondership together without exciting undue curiosity, returned shortly before supper with news that he had been successful in his search, an old, wrinkled prospector named Pete McGee, who had learned the secret of silence during the long years he had spent on the desert.
After the evening meal old McGee put in an appearance and a bargain was struck. But if he was, as Zeb put it, "close-mouthed" on some subjects, he was not on others.
"So yer are a'goin' out inter the desert, hey?" he asked the boys.
"That's our intention," said Dick.
The old man shook his head.
"The desert's a tough place," he said. "A mighty tough place. Reckon it's likely yer are er goin' prospectin', maybe?"
The boys returned an evasive answer. But old McGee rambled on with the crisscross wrinkles forming and fading round his washed-out blue eyes.
"Wa'al, I had my share on it, ain't I, Zeb?" said the old man to Zeb, who had just strolled up, smoking a short, black pipe. The professor, after adjusting his difficulties with the landlord, was sorting and labeling specimens in his room.
"Reckon you have, Pete," responded the yellow-bearded miner. "You didn't never find that thar lost Peg-leg Smith mine, did yer?"
"No; but I will some day," declared the old man, a fanatic gleam shining in his faded optics. "I'll find it some day, Zeb. I never got to it, but I come mighty close—yes, sir, ole Pete he come mighty close."
"Tell the boys about Peg-leg Smith's lost mine," suggested Zeb.
"Give me the fillin's, then, an' I will," said old Pete, holding out a blackened and empty corncob, "though I'm surprised they ain't never heard on it. Thought everybody had heard of Peg-leg's mine."
"Wa'al, you see they come frum ther East," explained Zeb apologetically.
"Ah, that accounts fer it," said old Pete indulgently. "You couldn't 'spec Easterners ter know nuthin' 'bout it. 'Wa'al, young sirs, somewheres out on the desert ter the east uv here thar is three buttes a stickin' up, and right thar is Peg-leg Smith's lost mine whar they say the very sands is uv gold.
"Who was Peg-leg? Wa'al, that's in a way not very well known. Anyhow, his name was Smith, and he was shy an off leg, and so he gets his name. Back in 1836 Peg-leg he blows inter Yuma with a party of trappers that hed worked down ther Colorado.
"They decides to quit trapping and go ter gold huntin', and makes their way up the Gila River and then cuts off inter ther desert. Frum Yuma they goes southeast and kep' on fer four days across the desert. At ther end of the fourth day they 'lows that ther water ain' a-goin' ter hold out a turrible lot longer, and they decides to look fer a water-hole in a canyon at ther end uv which stands three lone buttes sticking up, like sentinels against ther sky.
"Wa'al, they hunts ther canyon through but nary a drop of water. In time they reaches ther buttes. They climbs to ther top ter see what might lay beyond, but they see nuthin' but ther same God-forgotten country.
"But Peg-leg, who fer all he was minus a limb, could travel with any of 'em, he finds at the top of the southernmost butte a lot of chunks of black rock lying round promiscous, an' some of them has specks an' chunks of yaller as bright as Zeb's beard on 'em. Peg-leg he opines ther yaller is nuthin' but copper, or maybe fool's gold.
"That night they camps, feelin' considerable blue, fer ther's mighty little water left an' they've come too far ter go back. But in ther distance thar's a big mountain and they make up their minds they'll find water thar or bust and wither on the desert.
"Ther next evening, more dead than alive, they reaches the mountain and finds a little spring. It was ther finest thing they'd seen fer a long time, and in honor of Peg-leg, who suggested going to ther mountain, they calls it Smith Mountain, and that's its name to this day. In time they worked round to San Bernardino and then Smith he hunts up a mineral sharp who tells him that what he had found was gold.
"Wa'al, Smith was a curious feller, frum all accounts, and it was not till '49 when ther big gold rush came that he thought much more about those three buttes with the gold lying round loose as dirt on 'em. Then he got ther gold fever. He went to 'Frisco and gets up an expedition to find them three buttes.
"They got down inter ther desert country all right and locates Smith Mountain. But the dern Indians they had with 'em as guides cleaned out the camp one fine night, and they had a hard time getting back to civilization alive. Well, that's where Peg-leg Smith goes out of the story."
"Wasn't he ever heard of again?" asked Jack.
"No, siree, not hide nor hair on him. Nobody never knows what became of him arter they got back to San Bernardino. Some says that he went back alone lookin' fer the three buttes and was lost in the desert and that his bones is out thar some'eres to-day, an' others says that he got so plum disgusted he went back home to St. Louis. But nobody rightly knows.
"The next heard of ther three buttes was many years later when an Indian, who worked on Governor Downey's ranch, not far from Smith Mountain, developed a habit of goin' away fer a few days and then comin' back with bits of black rock chock full of gold which he traded fer firewater and such. He didn't seem ter care if he got full value or not.
"'Plenty more where those came from,' he'd say.
"Wa'al, they set a watch on him and found that he always headed off inter ther desert by way of Smith Mountain, which would be the nat'ul way of gettin' ter ther three buttes that Peg-leg had described.
"Guv'ner Downey he come to hear about this in course of time, and he come down frum Sacramento to question ther Injun. But in ther meantime ther pesky coyote had gone and got himself killed in a quarrel over cards and so there they was up agains' a blank wall ag'in."
The old prospector paused to fill his pipe.