  Quichua, the almost universal dialect which the Incas had introduced into Peru as they conquered its tribes, was quite well understood by Bill Sanders. He spent much time on their daily marches, and in camp, teaching it to John Whitley and the three chums. It was the language that the hidden city’s inhabitants would be most apt to understand, he believed. When they had learned that a “chasqui” was a runner or messenger; that Cuzco, the name of the principal city and hub of the old empire was so called because the word meant navel, the center of the body; and many other things such as that “Pelu” meant river and was thought by some to have been the word that gave the Spaniards their name for the nation—Peru!—they began to study brief sentences and after a while could hold short and simple conversations together. In return they taught Mr. Whitley and Bill the secret ways of exchanging ideas in the signals of their order. After some discussion and hesitation Bill was made a member of The Mystery Boys and although the chums debated the good sense of letting him know all their signs, they finally gave them to him—and as events proved, they were to be glad they had done so. In camp Cliff and his friends spent a great deal of time studying the rude map: because Quipu Bill had some misgivings about letting the only guide they had become damaged or lost, Tom, who was quite a draftsman, made a very good copy which they used and over which they watched jealously so that the natives would not discover what it was. The small party—not more than eight—which had been following them hung on like wolves on the flank of a buck: when Bill hurried along the others kept the same distance, when his party lagged the others dallied also. “I think it is either the Indian, or the Spaniard, or both of them,” said Bill, “They know—at least the Spaniard does—that there was a map, for he was in camp when I caught the eaglet.” But the other party kept just too far behind for them to see, even with fine glasses, just who comprised the group. Then, one afternoon, Cliff looked down from a high point and called to Bill. “Bill—get out your field glasses. I don’t see that party anywhere below.” Bill looked. John Whitley and the youths took their turns. But there was no sign of pursuit. “We must have lost them,” Nicky said. “But we have been on a straight road all day,” Mr. Whitley objected. “No. Either they have dropped too far behind for us to see them at all, or they have given it up——” “Or they have turned into some side pass, thinking that can get around us in some way,” Bill added, “But they won’t. I guess we have lost them for good.” They all felt rather glad of it. There had been some fun in the game of hare and hounds at first, but after a few days the continual watching became wearisome and perhaps worrisome. Their natives noticed it, for one thing, and they did not want the Peruvians to think their story of an engineering and educational trip was a ruse. They all breathed more freely that night as they made camp. But Cliff kept wondering why the pursuit had stopped. That night—and it was cold for they were very high up in the levels just a little below snow level—he lay rolled in his blanket, in the tent the chums shared, thinking about it. “Cliff,” Tom’s voice whispered through the dark, “Are you asleep?” “No,” Cliff answered under his breath. But he need not have been so cautious. Nicky was not asleep, either: and he declared the fact promptly. “I’m awake too. Is it to be a session of the Inner Circle?” “Maybe,” Tom replied, “I was going to ask Cliff if he noticed that Indian that Bill calls Whackey—the one whose name is Huayca?” “Notice him? Notice what about him?” Nicky demanded. “He kept dropping back from one carrier to the next one, right along the line, today.” “Yes,” Cliff said, “I saw him. He talked to each one for a few minutes, then he dropped behind and talked to the next one.” “What do you suppose it meant?” Nicky wondered. “Nothing, I guess. I have seen him do it before.” “You have?” Cliff and Tom asked it at one instant. “Certainly. But he is the boss isn’t he? He has to give orders.” “When he gives orders he yells them out so that we all hear him,” Tom objected. “In the morning,” Cliff said, “Let’s ask Mr. Whitley and Bill if they have noticed.” They agreed and discussed the curious disappearance of the trailing party for a while. Then, suddenly, Cliff hissed under his breath, “Sh-h-h-h!” They became alert, intent: they listened with straining ears. “It was only some pebbles—a little landslide,” Nicky whispered. “They do that in the mountains. I saw some pebbles slip this afternoon.” Nevertheless Cliff gently crawled out of his blanket and his head came in rather vigorous contact with Tom’s cranium for he was doing the same thing. They forgot the bump in the excitement for more pebbles were clattering at a little distance. Cliff and Tom unhooked their tent flap and without widening its opening much, looked into the dim, starlit night. Nicky pushed his face between them. Each felt that the others were tense, Nicky was trembling a little. They stared and listened. From a greater distance came the crackle of a broken twig. Without a word Cliff pushed into the open and stared around. Then he saw figures, silent, drifting like spectres through the night, shadows with lumpy heads. At first he almost cried out at a touch on his arm but in the instant that he controlled his impulse he realized that it came from Nicky’s grip on his arm. “It’s Indians!” Nicky gasped. “Yes,” said Tom, at his side; then he added in a puzzled way, “But they are going away from us.” “It’s our Indians——” Cliff said, “They’re running away. Hey!” he shouted, then, poised to race after them, he called to his comrades to waken Bill and Mr. Whitley; but they were already awake and emerging dazedly from their tent as Cliff thrust the ground behind him with racing feet, in hot pursuit of figures now making no effort to be quiet as they galloped away. It was a hazardous pursuit in the dark and on a strange mountain path; but Cliff had observed, as was his habit, while they climbed earlier in the day: he knew when to swerve to avoid a heavy boulder, he seemed to avoid by instinct the more pebbled and slippery parts. While Nicky and Tom, after shouting the news, pounded in pursuit he overtook the hindmost runner. “Stop—you!” he shouted. The man swerved. Cliff made a tackle. The man tripped, was down. Instantly Cliff was erect again and racing on while Tom caught up with the man already scrambling to his feet and held him until Nicky arrived. Then, from behind them, Bill, in the dialect, yelled a call to halt to the natives. Cliff reached his second man and put a hand on his arm. From behind came the flash of Quipu Bill’s rifle, fired into the air over the runners’ heads. They stopped, uncertainly, and Cliff, racing down the path, took advantage of the interval to get to a point where he could at least try to “bluff” and hold the men. The natives clustered in a little knot. They had bundles on their heads—probably most of the camp food and supplies. Cliff shouted to them to stand while Mr. Whitley and Bill made a scrambling, awkward, but rapid approach. “Running out at night with our grub, eh?” Bill snapped, “You hombres about face and back to camp!” He translated into dialect and they sullenly obeyed for he still carried his rifle. “All of ’em here?” he asked Mr. Whitley, “it’s so dark——” “The fellow you call Whackey isn’t!” Cliff cried. Then a queer misgiving assailed him. He rushed to Bill and whispered. Bill, bent to hear, stiffened. “Glory-gosh!” he gasped, “Go and see. In my coat pocket!” They herded their morose captives back to camp while Cliff made his hasty retreat and a thorough but equally hurried examination in certain places. He met Bill, approaching anxiously with John Whitley. “It’s gone—the map’s gone!” he gasped. “So that’s why the other party stopped following. That’s why Whackey isn’t around!” exclaimed the chief of the party. “I saw him, today,” Nicky cried, and explained, “Tom did, too.” “Planned to cut away during the night,” Bill snapped, “Guess he planned deeper, too: I think he expected these natives to make enough noise to be caught—that gave him a chance to get the map. I wondered why he watched me so closely, last couple of days.” “Well, never mind,” Mr. Whitley counseled, “He and the others he went to join cannot get there ahead of us. Bill knows the passes.” “All but one place after we get back to the snowy pass,” Bill objected, “Cliff’s pa only drew it rough and indicated the one right way—the way he took; but I know there’s a regular slather of cross cuts and paths between the cliffs up there. It’s all torn up by some earthquake long ago. I’d need the map there!” “Well, we have the copy Tom made—” but Mr. Whitley stopped, arrested by Cliff’s clutch on his arm. Flashlights trained, the five, with a solemn warning to the natives, who seemed not to know what to do and so were for the time in no danger of mischief, hurried into Cliff’s tent. They flicked their lights around but Cliff, catching one from Nicky, trained it on the ground cloth. Tiny fragments of paper, too fine ever to match together, littered the cloth under Tom’s little writing case! |
|
