Mystery of the Haunted Mine

11 Into the Heart of the Espectros

The water hole was a sheet of smooth pewter-colored liquid in the faint cold light of dawn.

Something splashed in the water and then came the scurrying of small feet on the hard ground and a rustling in the brush as some small animal fled from the pool. The concentric ripples spread smoothly and began to lap softly on the shore. The faint musical sound died away and the canyon was as quiet as before.

Tuck took up position as guard in the thick tangle where he could see both rims of the canyon. Gary placed Sue near the water hole and told Lobo to stay with her. Gary pushed on, scanning the wall of the eastern side. There was nothing to be seen. Two hundred yards beyond the water hole he came to a huge, tiptilted slab of rock which forced him to step down into a deep hollow. He was about to pass on when he saw the carving beneath the slab. He crouched to see it clearly. It was the familiar equilateral triangle with the curved line sprouting from the tip, pointing onward, indicating the treasure trail was around a bend or curve.

Gary stepped up out of the hole. The huge slab had obviously been moved by great brute force from its original position to lie so. He walked up the canyon in the pale watery light. Beyond him there was no indication of a curve or bend to the right, as the symbol indicated, nor was there even a bend or curve to the left. The canyon here was as straight as a mine drift. It was then that he noticed the formation of the canyon wall. It was made up of tumbled and shattered rock, bleached wood, and tangled brush. He compared it to the rock of the west wall, which was darker and smooth, almost as though it had been polished. It was quite evident then that the bend or curve indicated by the symbol no longer existed; it had been filled in by huge masses of fallen rock and earth.

He scanned the walls, both old and new, and saw no symbols. He turned and trudged back toward the water hole. He squatted at the edge of it and looked at the slightly disturbed surface of the water right where the rock wall met it. "Go get Tuck," he said to Sue. "You take guard. Don't do anything if you see anything suspicious. Let us know."

She hurried off. Tuck scrambled through the brush and squatted beside Gary. "Speak, O Leader," he said.

Gary told him of his deduction. Tuck nodded wisely. Gary dabbled a hand in the cool water. "You said it might have been possible for the land changes to have forced the water that used to run down the canyon of the arrastres into this canyon, Tuck," he said quietly. "Supposing we could trace the source of this water? Maybe it might lead us to the Lost Espectros."

"That's loco," said Tuck. He looked up at the towering canyon wall above them. "We can't get over that."

"Maybe we can go under it," said Gary. He stood up and peeled off his shirt. "I'm going for a swim."

Tuck watched him with wide eyes as he stripped to his shorts and waded into the pool. Gary walked to the wall and began to feel along it under the surface of the water. His hands probed into nothingness. He took several deep breaths, held the last one, and submerged, leaving a series of ripples that lapped at Tuck's feet. Tuck Browne closed his eyes and prayed for the first time in a long while.

Gary rose a little and his head struck solid rock. He dived down again, felt his knees scrape the rough gravel bottom, and then came cautiously upward again. When his head broke the water, he found himself in a domed cavern illuminated from some dim source ahead of him. He swam slowly to the side of the cavern and crawled out onto a narrow ledge, shivering from mingled cold and fear. He realized now that his swim had been a very short one. He could hardly be more than twenty feet from where he had started. It had seemed such a long one, but all out of proportion as when one's tongue explores a tooth cavity and magnifies it tremendously.

Gary stood up and began to explore the ledge. There was shattered driftwood scattered along it. A cheerful thought, for the water had brought it into the cavern from outside. But how far outside? He walked forward slowly and saw that the ledge petered out. He took a staff of driftwood and probed the dark water; it was about two feet deep. He waded in and followed a bend in the cavern, testing the depth all the way. Then suddenly everything seemed clear to the eye and he waded out into a narrow slot of a canyon, if one could correctly call it that, hardly more than twenty feet wide. High, high above him was the sky, now lighted with the rising of the sun. To his right was a narrow strand, littered with dead brush and driftwood. He waded to it and walked along it. He could see fairly far ahead. Gary shivered. The deep, narrow trough seemed to penetrate into the very bowels of the Espectros.

He returned to the cavern and eyed the dark and uninviting surface of the water, dreading the thought of having to enter it again. Something scuttled over his bare feet and he almost screamed in sudden panic. He saw that it was a gecko lizard scuttling toward the dark wall at the forward end of the cavern. Lizards were usually creatures of the sunlight. He walked to the place where he had seen the lizard vanish and got down on his hands and knees. He was relieved to see a faint line of light. He got down on his belly and squirmed beneath the rock. There was soft earth beneath him. He shoved some of it aside and crawled out into broad daylight to look up into the grinning face of Tucker C. Browne. "Dr. Livingstone, I presume," said that worthy.

Gary dressed quickly. Tuck got Sue. The two of them listened to Gary's story. "So," concluded Gary, "the only clue left to the lost mine, at least in my opinion, is the canyon beyond the cavern."

There was a long and deathly silence from the two Brownes.

"I'm going back in," said Gary quietly.

"I'll side you," said Tuck.

"Me too," said Sue.

"No," said Tuck.

"You can't leave me here," said Sue stubbornly.

She was right. While Gary widened the entrance to the cavern, Tuck and Sue got the gear. Gary carried it into the cavern. The two Brownes came in, followed by Lobo. The dog trotted ahead along the narrow ledge. "Aladdin's Cave," said Sue. "Who's got the magic lantern?"

Lobo turned suddenly. He trotted back past the three of them and began to growl. Gary stared at him. Suddenly there was darkness beneath the wall as rock and dirt fell heavily. Gary ran forward and got down on his knees. The hole had been blocked. He pushed against the rocks and could not move them. A cold feeling of dread came over him.

"Rock fall?" said Tuck from behind Gary.

"Maybe," said Gary. He stood up and looked at his two companions.

"We can always swim under the wall," said Sue.

"You might as well face the truth," said Gary. "If that wasn't a rock fall, someone blocked that hole, and that same someone could be waiting for us to pop up out of the water."

"Like who?" asked Tuck.

"Whom!" corrected Sue.

Gary shrugged. "Someone might have been watching us all the time," he said.

"Well, if we can't get out, he can't get in," said Sue.

"Yeh," said Tuck. He shivered.

Another cold thought came to Gary. They were unable to return through the hole, but that did not mean whoever had blocked the hole could not clear it and follow them if he so desired.

Gary took his gear and waded into the water. He led the way out into the tunnel-like canyon. There was no way to scale those sheer walls. He walked on, keeping his face turned away from the others so that they might not see the fear etched upon it.

They splashed steadily onward, sometimes wading, sometimes clambering over loose detritus that had fallen from high above. The echoes of their slow passage made strange and eerie sounds as though someone, or something, was laughing at them.

Now and again they had to squeeze between the damp walls which had closed in together. If a flash flood should strike suddenly, as they often did, it would fill the narrow trough with roaring waters that would drown anything living caught in the canyon.

After an hour's slow progress they stopped to rest. Gary unwrapped the derrotero and the photograph to study them. He took out his compass and checked the direction in which they were traveling. It was almost due east. Yet the canyon they were in did not show on the derrotero or on the aerial photograph. The three of them discussed it quietly. "It's possible that the photograph might not have picked up this canyon. Sometimes at certain angles, things can be hidden," said Tuck.

Gary took out his magnifying glass and studied the photograph of the general area in which they now were. Suddenly he started. His lens had caught a very faint line, barely discernible, running along the mesa top in an easterly direction from the canyon of the water hole. He eyed it closely but he could not distinguish any features.

"This might be the canyon we are in," he said, tracing the line with his finger. "Maybe you're right, Tuck. The light or angle — or something — might not have caught the canyon quite right."

"But it's not marked on the derrotero," said Sue.

"Which means it either did not exist at the time the derrotero was made, or my great-grandfather left it out because it had no bearing on the treasure trail," said Gary. He tapped the sunburst marking with the question mark inside of the circle. "But from what I can figure, this has to be ahead of us. With luck, this canyon might just run into the canyon where the sunburst has been marked on the derrotero."

"And if it doesn't?" asked Sue.

Gary did not answer. He rolled photograph and derrotero together and replaced them in the plastic wrapping.

"Maybe this canyon doesn't lead anywhere," said Sue. "Maybe it is a dead end. What do we do then, partners?"

"Go back," said Gary shortly.

Her eyes were wide and her face was taut. "But what if…? Say he is…?"

Gary walked on, followed by Tuck. Both of them were just as concerned as Sue was, but the lure of the Lost Espectro took precedence over their concern and fright.

The morning was at mid-passage when they reached a place where the canyon widened. The right-hand side of the canyon was still that sheer wall, so steep and high it seemed to be leaning over the canyon, but the left-hand side was now lower and composed of shattered rock and great boulders stippled with long-dead trees and brush, a treacherous-looking and impassable mass. Here the canyon trended to the left and narrowed again, and on the left-hand side appeared a dark opening from which the stream emerged, much as it had back in the canyon of the water hole.

Tuck eyed the dark orifice and shivered a little. "We have to go in there now?" he said.

Gary grounded his rifle and looked farther up the narrowing canyon. "Not until we see what is up there. This is evidently the place where the stream broke through when it was blocked from the canyon of the arrastres. ¡Adelante!" He led the way to the east.

The sun was at its zenith when they reached a place where their narrow passageway joined yet another canyon, and despite the light of the sun, this was a gloomy place, for the walls leaned inward, forming a rough bottle shape, with the mouth of the great bottle high overhead. There was a strange brooding quality about this place that repelled Gary. Lobo growled low in his throat and pressed his muscular body hard against Gary's leg.

"I'd almost rather go into that water cave back there," said Tuck. "This place is downright creepy."

Once again Gary checked derrotero and aerial photograph against each other. This time he was quite sure that the sunburst with the question mark inscribed inside of it must be quite close, but there was no indication on the aerial photograph that such a canyon as the one that loomed before them existed at all. If the sunburst was in that canyon, it was an indication that his greatgrandfather had in all likelihood penetrated in there, but the question mark within the circle of the sunburst clearly indicated that either he had not believed that the symbol was true, or that he had not been able to find further clues to the lost mine. "I know one thing, kid," Jerry Black had said cryptically. "If you ever find that old derrotero your great-grandfather made, you just might get a lead on the Lost Espectro."

Gary rolled the derrotero within the photograph and replaced them in his pack. He started down the slope to the floor of the gloomy canyon. Lobo stood still, then turned slowly and looked back along the way they had just traveled. He growled low and flattened his ears. The three explorers looked back. There was nothing to be seen. Lobo growled again.

Gary motioned to his two friends to take cover. He sank down behind a boulder and peered down the quiet canyon.

"What do you think it is?" hissed Tuck.

Gary wet his lips and felt for the field glasses. He focused them on the canyon and slowly swept every foot of it with the glasses. Nothing was to be seen, at least nothing that would threaten them.

"If that wasn't a rockfall that blocked us from getting back through that hole, and someone did block it, then mightn't they have waited until we left the cavern, then removed the blockage and followed us?" said Sue quietly.

Gary shrugged. He looked at Tuck. "You stay here with Sue and watch," he said. He handed Tuck his rifle and took the shotgun. "Don't do any wild shooting!"

Gary trudged down the slope, followed by Lobo. The dog kept looking back. Gary forced his way through a tangle of brush and then walked alongside the dry watercourse of the canyon. To either side, below the overhanging walls, were slopes of talus formed from the loose hanging rock that seemed ready to drop if one were to raise his voice in that echoing place. Thick and thorny brush had laced itself through the jumble. A snake would have had a hard time finding a way through the entanglements.

He rounded a curve and was a good half mile beyond the place where he had left his friends when the canyon widened. Here it was a mass of rock and brush through which the dry watercourse crept, almost turning completely back on itself at times. Sweat broke out on him as he forced his way through, grunting in pain as thorns pierced his clothing and flesh. He was finally forced to stop. He sat down on a flat rock and reached for his canteen. It was then that he saw the faint symbol carved into the opposite wall. He was on his feet in an instant, forcing his way across the tangle despite his weariness. He stopped on the treacherous slope below the symbol and stared at it. It was not familiar to him, although he lashed his flagging memory until his head ached. He then saw that the upper left and center part of the place where the symbol had been cut had flaked off through weathering. He half closed his eyes and then the realization came to him. The left-hand part of the symbol, as he faced it, should have been a reversed numeral 3, although in the case of this particular symbol they were not numerals, but rather brackets on each side of a word which was now incomplete. The complete symbol meant to stop and change direction.

Gary plunged down the slope, heedless of the thorny brush. He followed the rough bed of the old watercourse back along the canyon, studying each foot of the walls as he went along. He was almost back at the canyon junction before he knew it, and he had seen no further symbols.

Sue came down to him. "We haven't seen anything," she said.

"Forget about that!" said Gary. "Get Tuck!"

"Here," said the lean one as he came toward them. He eyed Gary. "You look excited, amigo. You see Asesino?"

Gary told them of his find. "We'll have to work to the other end of this canyon for more clues."

"What about him?" asked Tuck, jerking a thumb over his shoulder toward the canyon through which they had just traveled.

Gary whistled sharply for Lobo. He pointed to the narrow canyon. "Go, boy," he said. The dog trotted up the slope and vanished in the brush.

"No one will get past him," added Gary. "At least he'll let us know if anyone is around."

Gary led the way. They had walked a quarter of a mile when they turned a bend to find themselves looking at a thoroughly blocked canyon, filled with masses of rock and earth. There was no way under, around, through, or over that blockage.

"Crazy," said Tuck. "From what I figure, the canyon of the arrastres must be somewhere beyond that blockage. No wonder we couldn't find a way from there into here."

Sue was poking about with a stick. "Hey," she said. She picked up a rusted mule shoe, one of the type with the flared ends. "I wish this thing could talk."

"We'll have to work back," said Gary.

Slowly and carefully they scanned the walls until they reached the place where the narrow canyon joined the one they were in. Lobo dozed on a rock. "Well," said Gary, "that shows he didn't find anyone."

"Or whoever was in there went back," said Tuck.

They all looked at each other. The threat from the unknown was being far overshadowed by the thoughts that the mine must be somewhere close to them. "¡Adelante!" said Gary.

More than an hour passed. It was Tuck who made the next discovery, a rather curious symbol on a flat rock, almost completely covered by brush and a litter of gravel. The symbol was a stylized snake with the head pointing across to the western side of the canyon. There wasn't any doubt that the rock upon which it had been carved had been in that particular position a long time. They crossed the dry watercourse, for the symbol was plain enough. "Treasure on opposite side," it seemed to hiss.

The western side was a terrible jumble of rock with labyrinthine passages, some of them thoroughly choked with brush, weaving through the mass. The three of them examined every open rock face, then began to poke through the brush to examine others. Time drifted past and there were no new discoveries. Nothing but naked rock and cruel brush.

Tuck climbed a sloping rock ledge, then jumped down on the far side. There was a crashing sound and the hoarse voice of Tuck mouthing imprecations.

Gary grinned. He walked up the slope and looked down. All he could see was Tuck's head, the rest of his body was concealed by the ever-present brush.

"Anything down there?" asked Gary.

Tuck was still muttering. "Nothing but black dirt," he growled.

"Black dirt? In there?"

Tuck held up his hands. They were mottled black. "Well anyway, it's charcoal or something," he said.

Gary dropped on his belly. "Kick around a bit," he said.

Tuck's head vanished. In a few minutes it appeared like the head of a busy gopher. "Charcoal, all right," he said. "Seems like someone had a big fire in here."

"Gary!" called Sue from the other side of the ledge. "There's another hole here and the bottom is black too. Charcoal, I think."

"Eureka!" said Gary. His eyes widened.

"You loco or something?" asked Tuck.

"Charcoal, you dope! Charcoal pits were used by the old Spanish and Mexican miners to heat their drills so they could temper them! Man, we're close! We're so close!"

"There's another charcoal pit over here," said Sue. She paused. "Something else too! Another one of those snakes! Pointing right up this slope, Gary!" She popped out of the hole and pointed up the almost impassable slope toward the masses of rock clogging the western side of the canyon.

"We're almost right on top of it," said Gary in a hushed voice. "Up the slope! ¡Adelante!"

They wasted no time, tired as they were, for the fever was now upon them — the treasure-hunting fever that begins slowly and then steadily and ever increasingly takes over the mind and the body until it reaches the raging heat that sometimes consumes those who harbor the insidious disease.

"There's one of those crazy mule shoes," said Sue, pointing to a symbol carved on a squat boulder.

Gary looked at it. It did look like a mule shoe except for the three dots within the shoe. "It's not a mule shoe," he said slowly and quietly. "That symbol means a flight of steps, indicating that the treasure is down in a shaft or a cave."

"But where?" said Sue. She looked at the wild and forbidding area about them and then dropped her hands helplessly by her sides.

"Fifty varas away," said Gary in a faraway voice. He walked to the upper end of the squat boulder and pointed to an odd-looking symbol carved there.

"Varas?" questioned Sue.

"A vara is thirty-three and one-third inches," said Gary.

"Which way?" asked Sue.

"Will that help?" said Tuck. He pointed beyond the boulder to yet another symbol, a horizontal cross. The long part of the upright pointed directly up the slope.

"About forty-six paces," said Sue, "figuring on a three-foot pace, or thereabouts. There should be something else in that area to show us the rest of the way."

"How confident she is," said Tuck.

Gary began his pacing, but it was almost impossible to keep to a standard pace because of the terrain. When he reached the end of his pacing he stood in an area where openings of all sizes and shapes, some of them in the ground, others against the side of the canyon, showed like the unseeing eyes of the blind. There must have been at least two dozen of them.

In and out of the holes they popped like busy ground squirrels, but found nothing to indicate that the holes were anything but works of nature. Gary looked along the slope. "There are other holes along there," he said wearily.

"Too far from the symbol," said Sue.

Gary nodded. He shoved back his hat. He leaned back against a flat slab of rock upon which Tuck Browne stood like a gaunt statue eying the jumbled slope. The flat slab was almost against the canyon wall. Tuck moved his feet. Gary's mouth dropped open. He leaned forward and shoved Tuck's left foot over. "Say!" said the lean one. His jaw dropped too as he saw Gary pointing to a carved sign where Tuck had been standing. "Treasure in a tunnel, directly beneath this sign," said Gary.

An intense, brooding quiet seemed to shroud the canyon. Then the faint, far-off muttering of thunder sounded over it.