[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

what
I've heard the gold should be somewhere yonder."
We worked our way around the fallen rocks and over to the spot. There were
bones
enough, all right. A mule's jaw, white and ancient, lay near a shattered rib
cage. But the skeletons weren't pulled apart, the way they often are after
wolves or coyotes have worried at them.
I could see that the canyon walls were too steep for any horse to climb, in
some
places too steep for a man. Yet the first sign of life I saw in the canyon
were
the tracks of wild horses. Several horses had come through here not long
since,
but there were older tracks, too, which were headed toward the back of the
canyon. On a hunch, I swung my horse around. "You hunt the gold," I said.
"There's something back there I've got to see."
Without waiting for a reply, I started off on the trail of those mustangs,
and
believe me, the dun was ready to move. He just didn't take to that box
canyon,
not at all.
Those wild horses headed right back up the canyon and into a mess of boulders
tumbled from the rock wall above. They wound around among the rocks and
Page 97
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
brush,
and of a sudden I found myself on a narrow trail going up a steep crack in
the
rocks, scarcely wide enough for a man on horseback. It went straight up, then
took a turn, but I had no doubt but that it topped out on the mesa above.
So there was another way out.
Suddenly I heard a faint call, and turned in the saddle to look back. I
hadn't
realized I had come so far, or so much higher. I could see Penelope back
there,
a tiny figure waving her arm at me.
When I reached them Mims was down on the ground. He was lying on his face,
which
I saw had a faint bluish tinge when I turned him over. "Let's get him out of
here," I said quickly. "If they come on us with him out "
I'd no idea what was wrong with him, but it looked as if he'd fainted from
some
cause or other, and his heart seemed a mite rapid, but was beating all right.
I
got him up in the saddle and lashed him there, then led the way down the
canyon
and out. We rode at once toward the shelter of the trees but saw no one, and
soon were back among the cottonwoods and willows along the creek.
By that time the better air outside the canyon, and maybe the movement on the
back of his horse, seemed to have done him some good. I took him down from
the
saddle, feeling uncommonly helpless, not knowing what to do for him; but
after a
moment or two he began to come around.
"You given to passing out?" I asked. "What happened back there?"
"I don't know. All of a sudden I felt myself going. I tell you one thing I
want
no more of that box canyon. There's something wrong about that place. Call it
whatever you like, I think that place is ha'nted."
After a while he sat up, but his face was uncommonly pale. When he tried to
Page 98
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
drink he couldn't keep it down.
"Whatever we do had best be done quickly," I said. There are too many others
around. They'll find the place if we waste time.
"Maybe I'd best go after the gold. I can take along one of the horses and
pack
some of it out, and I can get the rest on my horse."
Penelope stood there looking at me, and then she said, "Mr. Sackett, you must
think I am a very foolish girl, to let you go after that gold alone."
"No, ma'am. You feel up to it, you just go along by yourself maybe you'd feel
safer that way. But I figure one of us ought to stay by Mr. Mims here."
"I can get along," said Mims. "You can both go."
To tell the truth, I'd no great urge to go back there at all, and even less
so
if I went along with Penelope. She had helped me out of a fix, but she needed
my
help. I didn't figure it would be easy to get that gold out, and I wanted
nothing else to worry about especially not a girl I had to look after. I said
as
much.
"You look after yourself," she told me, speaking sharp but not what you'd
call
angry. And with that she got into the saddle and I followed.
To see us, you wouldn't figure we were going after a treasure like three
hundred
pounds of gold. We didn't act very willing, and the closer we came to the
mouth
of that canyon the slower we rode. I didn't like it, and neither did she.
Harry Mims was a tough old man, but something had put him down, and it was
nothing we could see. Maybe there was a peculiar smell, time to time. I never
mentioned it, not really knowing whether it was imagination, or something
more.
It was almost at the mouth of the canyon that we rode right into a trap.
Penelope might have had an excuse, but there wasn't anything like that for
me I
should have known better. All of a sudden, there was Sylvie, standing right
Page 99
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
out
in front of us, and when we both drew up, men started stepping out from the
rocks and brush.
They had us, all right. They had us cold. And a prettier lot of thieves you
never did see. Bishop was there, and Ralph Karnes. Hooker was there, too, his
arm in a sling. And there was Charlie Hurst and Tex Parker and Bishop's men.
"Well, Mr. Sackett," Sylvie said, "it looks as if we can pick up the chips."
"Don't figure on it."
She just smiled at me, but when she looked at Penelope she was not smiling.
"And
now I've got you," she said, and there was an ugly ring to her voice. "Right
where I've wanted you."
"Where's that canyon?" Bishop asked.
It sounded like an odd question, for from where he sat he could almost have
thrown a rock into the mouth of it, but the way it looked we were about to
ride
right past it. The reason was that you had to ride to the far side before you
could get past the big boulders at the mouth.
"Canyons all around, Noble. You take your pick." I gestured right toward the
canyon. "Like that one, for instance."
He grinned at me. "You already checked that one," he said. "We found your
tracks
coming out. If you left that canyon the gold can't be there. So you show us."
"I wish we knew. How's a man going to pick one canyon out of all these around
here?"
"You'd better find a way," Bishop said.
"Don't be a damn fool, Noble. Look, we've been up here a few days now. How
long
does it take to pick up that much gold and run? If we knew where it was, we'd
have been off and running. Nathan Hume was supposed to have hidden some gold
up
here. We know that two men got away from the massacre. Maybe some others did,
too."
Page 100
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"Two?" Sylvie spoke up. She hadn't known that. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]