The Aztec Treasure-House 38 – Janvier · Verses Across
Literature · Historical Fiction
The Aztec Treasure-House 38Through Darkness to Light
18
Literature · Historical Fiction
The Aztec Treasure-House 38
Through Darkness to Light
JanvierEnglish
"I guess we're solid now, as far as bein' bothered by those sacred devils goes," Young said, as we stepped down from the ledge of rock on which we had been standing; "but this ain't no time t' take no chances, an' th' sooner we see what show we've got for gettin' anywhere through that cave, th' better it'll be. An' we've got t' look after Rayburn. He's closter t' handin' in his checks t'-day than he's been at all. Just think o' him keepin' still through all that row, an lettin' himself be yanked around like a bag o' meal without takin' any notice of it! But there's just a squeal of a chance for him if we do get clear away. Knowin' that he's safe 'll do him more good, even, than fresh air an' sunshine--an' oh Lord! how good fresh air an' sunshine 'll be, if ever we do strike 'em again!"
When we descended the stair-way again to the little hollow in the rock where Rayburn was lying, we found that he still remained in his dull stupor and took no notice of our coming. Close beside were Pablo and El Sabio, huddled together for mutual support in this very trying passage of their lives. El Sabio, indeed, was a most melancholy and dejected creature, for his short commons and his long confinement had taken the spirit out of him pretty thoroughly; but for our purposes just then, when his tractability was very necessary to us, it was a piece of good-fortune that he had fallen into so low a way. As for Pablo, the boy was in so dazed a condition that I feared greatly he would wholly lose his wits.
There was only a faint suggestion of light in that deeply hidden place, and Young struck a match that he might see to begin his explorations. "Well, I'll be shot," he exclaimed, as the wax-taper shed its clear light around us, "if here ain't a conductor's lantern hangin' up all ready for us, an' a can o' kerosene oil!" As he lighted the lantern, and the letters F. C. C. showed clearly on the glass, he added, in a tone of still greater amazement: "Ferro-Carril Central! Why, it b'longs t' one o' th' boys on th' Central!--but how th' dickens did it ever get here? An' here's a lot of old clothes--th' sort o' rags th' low-down Greasers wear. An' I'm blest," he went on, as he picked up a scrap of paper from the floor, "if this ain't a Mexican Central ticket from Leon to Silao! It's dated last June, an' it's only punched once, so 't couldn't 'a' been used all the way. I say, Professor, am I asleep or awake?"
As I examined the several articles which we had come upon so strangely in this incongruous plate, a flood of light was let in upon my mind, and with this came also the glad certainty that the way before us to freedom was open and assured. My belief that the Priest Captain had been in communication with the outside world no longer admitted of a doubt, for here was absolute proof of it: the clothes which he wore when making his expeditions into the nineteenth century; the lantern that he had stolen in order the more easily to find his way through the cave; the railway ticket that he had but lately used. In an instant I had connected all this with what the guardian of the archives had told me concerning the Priest Captain's habit of retiring for long periods of time to one of the chambers in which we had been imprisoned, and the whole matter was as plain to me as day; and I knew now, that in order to guard against discovery, he, or one of his predecessors, to whom this secret way must also have been known, had caused to be set in place the fastening by which the grating could be secured upon its inner side; which fastening, within that very hour, had been the means of saving our lives.
"Well," said Young, dryly, when I had briefly explained these several matters, "I guess he won't pull th' wool over nobody's eyes any more! An' now you an' me 'll do some prospectin'. We must go back upstairs, before we pull out for good, an' bag what there is there that's worth carryin' off; but th' first thing t' do is t' get Rayburn where he'll be comfortable an' safe. Until that's attended to we've got t' be careful an' go slow; so we'll rouse up this fool of a Pablo, an' get it into his head that if he hears anybody comin' he's t' knock th' plug from under Mullins an' let him down, an' then chock him fast with a rock underneath. It's not likely that anybody will come, an' even if they do, I don't think that they'll know th' trick about Mullins' tippin', for that's a point that I'll bet a whole kag o' beer th' Priest Captain didn't give away t' nobody. I tell you, Professor, there wasn't any flies on that old man, now was there? He was a wicked old devil, an' I'm glad I did for him; but he was just an everlastin' keen one, an' a rustler from th' word go!"
In the dazed condition in which he then was, we scarcely should have ventured to place Pablo in a position of such grave responsibility had there been any likelihood of his being called upon to perform the duty with which we charged him; but we were well satisfied that to the Priest Captain alone had been known the secret of the sliding door, and that, consequently, the need for closing the passage leading upward into the treasure-chamber would not arise. Without any fear for Rayburn's safety; therefore, we left him lying in the little room at the foot of the stair-way, and thence went forth through a cleft in the rock--that seemed to be a natural crevice, where the mountain was split apart--and so came into a natural cave of such great size that the light of the lantern was not sufficient to enable us to see its roof nor its farther wall. Save that the well-defined path that we followed was continuously steep, we did not find walking difficult, for the fragments of rock with which the floor of the cave everywhere was strewn had been lifted aside carefully, so as to make a smooth and easy way. And only in one place--where for a short distance the path skirted the edge of a black gulf, in the depths of which we could hear the rush of water--was any part of it dangerous.
For near an hour we went onward, all the while steadily ascending; and then, as we turned a corner, we saw a long way before us a faintly luminous haze. It was so very faint that only by holding the lantern behind us, and then closing our eyes for a moment, could we assure ourselves that what we saw really was light at all; but when we turned another corner, presently, the light, though still faint, was unmistakable; whereat Young gave a whoop of joy, and we quickened our steps in our eager longing to behold the sunshine that we knew could not be far away. Suddenly the path dipped downward, and then another turn brought us into light so strong that the lantern no longer was needed to show us where to tread; and by a common impulse we gave a great glad shout together and went onward at a run; and so, running and shouting like the crazy creatures that truly for the time being we were, we made one turn more, and then beheld before us, reaching away broadly and openly in a fashion to give one a sense of most glorious freedom, a vastly wide plain, over which everywhere the blessed sunshine blazed full and strong. As we stood together in the mouth of the cave for a moment in silence--for no words seemed strong enough to express the bursting gladness that was in our hearts--two short blasts of a whistle, wafted upward on the light breeze that was blowing towards us from the plain, sounded very faintly but clearly in our ears. Young started as he heard this sound, and as he turned towards me he held out his hand and said, in a voice that was husky and tremulous, "Professor, that's a locomotive whistle, an' th' d----n fool is--is whistlin' 'down brakes'!" And in these curiously chosen, yet not unmeaning words, did we celebrate our deliverance.
When we returned to Rayburn--and as we now knew the way, and as almost the whole of it was downhill, our return was accomplished rapidly--some of the joyous strength that we had gained seemed to be imparted to him. He opened his eyes as we stooped over him, and there seemed to be more life in them than there had been through all that day.
"Rouse up, old man!" Young cried cheerily. "We've struck th' trail out o' this cussed hole at last, an' we're goin' t' hike you right along to where you'll get some of God's sunshine again, an' some air that's fit for a white man t' breathe;" which words brought still more light into Rayburn's eyes, and a little color came into his pale cheeks as we told him of the open way that we had found to light and life.
"Where's the Padre?" he asked, as we together raised the stretcher, while Pablo, holding the lantern and leading El Sabio, went on ahead of us. Fortunately Rayburn could not see Young's face as he answered: "Th' Padre's--well, th' Padre's just gone on up th' line. You've got t' hold your jaw, Rayburn. You ain't fit t' talk; an' while we're packin' you along we can't talk either. Come on, Professor; and you, Pablo," he added, in his jerky Spanish. "Be careful with that lamp or I'll break the head of you!"
Although a good third of his flesh had wasted away, Rayburn would have been a heavy load for us to carry over level ground, even had we been hale and strong. Worn as we then were by our prison-life, we found carrying him up that long steep path in the heart of the mountain a weary work that only the hope and joy that strengthened us enabled us to accomplish. As it was, we went so slowly, and made so many halts for rest, that the sun had sunk almost to the level of the distant mountains, wherewith that great plain was bordered to the westward, when at last our toilsome journey was at an end. But we thought nothing of the heaviness of our labor as we saw the glad look that came into his face when he gazed out over that broad expanse of sunlit landscape, and snuffed eagerly the sweet fresh air, and so felt his soul grow light within him as he realized that he once more was safe and free.
In the mouth of the cave--within its shelter, yet where he could see out freely, and so have constantly in his mind the comforting thought of his deliverance--we made a bed for him of soft pine-branches, which some near-by trees gave us; and we took care that this couch should be so thick and so evenly laid that he would lie easily upon it; for we knew that many days, perhaps even weeks, must pass before we could venture to put so heavy a strain upon his strength as would come when we carried him down that rough mountain-side, and so began our journey towards home.
Fortunately, a little spring came out from the rock, clear and cool, just inside the cave; and game was so abundant on that mountain-side that Young came back presently from a foraging expedition with half a dozen codornices, that he had come so close to as to shoot with his revolver, and a jack-rabbit that he actually had caught with his hands as it jumped up almost beneath his feet; which excellent fare made a most satisfying supper for all of us; and eating it so added to Rayburn's strength--as we could tell by the fuller tones of his voice, and by his being able to move a little on his bed without our helping him--as to rouse in us a warm hope that the death that seemed so near to him might yet be thrust away. Our chief concern, lest the shock that would come to him of knowing it should fairly kill him, was to hide from him for the present the knowledge that Fray Antonio was dead; and to compass this end we plumply told him the flat-footed lie that the monk had gone on in search of some town whence he might bring back horses and supplies; and so, for a time, we laid at rest his doubts.
In his own original way, also, Young tried to put heart into him. "You see, old man," he said, "you've just got t' pull through. Think how d----d ashamed o' yourself you'd feel after you was dead when you had t' tell all th' folks in heaven that you was killed by nothin' better'n a mis'rable chump of an Injun! That was what bothered poor old Steve Hollis when he was handin' in his checks--'t least it was th' same general sort of idea. I guess you never knew Steve, did you, Rayburn? He was an old railroader--had been a-workin' on th' Old Colony one way and another for more'n twenty years. When I knowed him he used t' run th' steamboat express from Boston t' Fall River--their boss train on that blasted old road. Steve owned a house clost t' th' line just a little way out o' Braintree; an' when 't was his day off he'd mostly slide down from Fall River on No. 2, an' walk out home from Braintree along th' track. Nobody ever know'd just how 't happened--Steve was th' soberest man I ever knowed; never drunk a drop o' nothin'--but one day, as he was walkin' out home, No. 15, that was th' slow freight from Boston t' Newport, ketched him an' got in its work on him--an' that was th' end o' Steve. It didn't kill him right smack off, an' I went down t' see him; for I did think th' world of old Steve. He was a-layin' in his bed, an' I could see that he was a-most gone when I got there; but he chippered up a little for a minute as I shook hands with him and ast him how he was. He said he was poorly; an' then he kep' quiet for a while. Then he kind o' ketched his breath an' seemed t' want t' say somethin'. So I bent over him, an' he said, in a kind of a whisperin' groan: 'Jus' think of it, Seth, what did it was th' slow freight! That's what cuts me; that's what cuts me the worst kind. I wouldn't a-minded if 't had been th' express--them things will happen, an' they've got t' come. But here I've been a-railroadin' for more'n twenty year, an' t' think o' me bein' busted by that d----n slow freight!' An' then he turned over, an' give a sort of a grunt, an' died."
I am not sure that I myself should have selected this particular story to tell to Rayburn just then; but the moral that it contained unquestionably was a sound one, and, in a way, was calculated to impress upon him strongly the conviction that his duty was to get well.
