Show JW W ba X of i 54 by francis lyndo lynde illustrations by 0 irwin aayers lc tj by swum ciul cerind chapa CHAPTER XII continued IS 15 its an abandoned mine aban abandoned donea gl ft long ong time ago at that As aa to where it belongs on the map I 1 dont know you wont be afraid to stay alone alond for a lew few minutes will you im going to climb up and see where this bucket leads to just stay where you are until you hear bear me lift the bucket and drop it then climb in and shake the rope when you are ready for MO me to haul you up will you do that yes she agreed and with that he laid hold of the rope and began to climb up when he had wriggled out at the top of the shaft and found by groping around that it was capped with a wooden windlass he be was willing to rest for a few seconds and catch als breath before giving betty the agreed upon signal at once it was wag answered and he began to wind in a few minutes he had bad drawn the bucket and its pre precious clous freight out upon the tha windlass platform when the candle was re lighted it became apparent that they had ascended to what seemed to be nothing more than an upper layer of the rabbit warren of bewildering passages and drifts Il lavent you any idea where we are betty asked walt wait a bit said landis and then ive got itt bert canby told you about his mine the Quava pal yes well there are two Quava pals the new dew one that is being worked now and a much older one and he repeated for her Star bucks account of the ancient workings that Is about where we are he concluded burled somewhere in those old workings well keep on going while the candle 4 lasts there must be some conne connection et on between these old workings and the new youre not too tired to tramp are you im not tired at all now and we must get out if we can we been and shut up in here for nothing that was the beginning of a long period of fruitless wanderings in a naze that seemed endless it was riot not until their candle had dwindled to a half inch that the really desperate character of their situation gripped landis with the light gone they would be utterly helpless we are nearly at the end of things betty he said soberly you see how much there Is left of the candle after it is gone well be just burled buried alive 11 1 I know but im not afraid owen it it will be starvation wont it I 1 dont want to die but im not afraid lets sit here on this flits pile of rock and face it the best we can for a little while they sat in silence when he spoke it was to say im to blame for whatever happens to you betty if I 1 brought you along the devils whoever they are who you have hae left you to starve at the bottom of that shaft maybo not but you think of that now you did what you thought was best we both did do you think got wally tool too 71 ita afraid they have ir if he Is gone there Is nobody to miss us not very soon anyhow the stillings will think I 1 was invited to stay overnight with the smiths and the people at the hotel wont miss you will they no I 1 suppose nov not As he spoke the remaining bit of candle andle wick fell over to burn flicker angly for a few seconds before it went 01 out 1 after a moment in the stygian darkness that followed the extinguishing of the candle betty said wearily tm im 1 awfully tired arent you owen I no not vea very tired but I 1 know you must be put your head on my shoulder Bh and go to sleep if you can she did it and after a little he be knew e w from her regular breath broa li that she abe had really fallen asleep r F fore long he felt that he too was succumbing cum bing and after a few efforts to ft fight on off 1 the ifie lethargy of fatigue his eyes clos closed e d tn in spite of his resolve and ile be slept awoke betty was still sleeping with her head on his shoulder and sharp as was his desire to move and stretch and get the stiffness out of b hg s muscles lie he was unwilling to disturb her it was he was sitting with wide open eyes staring into the darkness that he saw or thought he saw iw a faint thinning of the Oar darkness kness at a point directly opposite he stared again and saw nothing then in a flash bash the faint thinning of the blackness came again and its hla start althis at this repetition of the phenomenon awoke betty what ahat Is a it she asked 1 I dont know look straight ahead do vou jou see anything ir why why yen its U light I 1 Is someone coming forus for us ile he rose stiffly and lifted her to her feet well see he said but he did not say it hopefully what they saw when they crossed to the mouth of one odthe of the passages leading out of the space where they heid had slept was waa a thing that landis was not remotely expecting to see the pa passage asage mouth was the entrance to a long gently inclined tunnel at the lower extremity of which was a faintly glowing electric light what does that mean betty asked whispering as it if she were were afraid the miraculous light might ds disappear if she spoke above her breath it means that my guess was right weve been lost in the old workings of the Quava pal and that light la Is in one of the new workings I 1 now that we know where we are we can get out cant we we can try mighty hard anyway well go down and see tit at the bottom of this flits approaching the lower end of the inclined passage they could see that the light bulb was suspended from the roof of a much larger drift through which ran a miniature railroad track landis asked betty to stay behind in concealment while he went on to investigate vesti gate she consented merely urging him to be careful dont worry about me ill hurry back after I 1 find out whereabouts we are and the way out reaching the larger tunnel he found it empty though the working tunnel was lighted it was driven on a curve which limited the view in either direction since there was nothing to determine a choice landis bandla turned to the left before he had gone very far he heard the rumble of a car on the ralls rails behind him and hastily crowded himself into a niche in the tunnel wall when the car came cama to in sight he saw that it was by a single man A slight upgrade in the drift made the man put his head down and brace to his work so he saw nothing as he passed La landels hiding place watching the car landis had a curious shock when just before it disappeared the squeaky rumbling of the wheels stopped abruptly the car moved as silently as if the wheels and the rails upon which they were running were shod with velvet convinced instantly that there could be but one reason for the sudden silence landis crept forward the tunnel straightened itself and the scene he was more than halt half expecting to see was revealed in the tunnel heading a number of men were at work two of them manipulating two big air drills which were visibly churning away at the rock faced face of the heading but instead of the raucous clamor which this should have raised there was a silence as profound as that of the grave I 1 fully aware now of the use to which his stolen invention was being put landis made a quick search for the hiding place of the black box he had little difficulty in discovering it it was half concealed in a shelf like niche of the tunnel wall close at hand the electric current for its operation being taken from the light wires overhead landis saw that his time for action was short in a few minutes or perhaps seconds the car would be coming out reaching beaching up quickly he opened a slide in the black box and did that which was needful to paralyze it its delicate and intricate mechanism then as the deafening earsplitting ear splitting clamor of the chattering drills burst out in the file heading he leaped for a branching side drift the effect of the suddenly released din upon the men in the heading was astonishing they had evidently become so well used to the abnormal conditions that the sudden resumption of the natural order of things precipitated a wild panic while two of the men hastened to shut off the air pressure from the drills the remainder came stumbling out some with their fingers in their ears and so on out of the picture A moment later the two who had run to stop the drills came albang but they were not bur hurrying when they came under the re prest light bulb landis recognized them at once as two of the three he and markham had seen in the lobby at the cocab hotel two of the trio who had driven westward from hopah to disappear so unaccountably and mysteriously what the b h 1 do you suppose went wrong with the machine one was saying as they passed it got me for a second said the other 1 I looking for it it think it gave the snap away it if it did therell be merry h 1 to v the captain III 11 want to kill some y j toda today Y Is the day when the big deal Is to be pulled ulle d off this was all that landis heard and when he looked out he saw that they had taken the black box from its niche and were trying to make it function presently one said its no good ashes gone out blink burnt herself up inside somehow iguess I 1 guess then landis saw him open the ilie slide in the side aide of the box and direct the beam of a pock pocket ef flash into the interior saw him do this and heard his low whistle punctuated by the single word 11 ir what for queried his companion smashed all to the devil said eald the investigator replacing the box on its shelf bayl I 1 the captain give orders that one of us ng was waa to keep a strict watch on that box every minute of the day or night it was in here and that the worst of it do you know who smashed it itt tf it you dont I 1 do dd d d well I 1 it was the fellow who made it the fellow welock we locked eI up in the old indian mine loat last nighter night I 1 youre crazy that chute ta a good two miles from the place where we ve locked that fellows fellow up and allowing that chehad he had a light which he hed get lost a million times before be hp could find the way over here 11 1 I dont care hes the only there there were two empty dynamite boxes byj lying ng beside afe railroad track and landis looking on and listening ning in ats covert saw one of the men suddenly push the speaker to a seat on one of them planting himself quickly on the other and saying as he be did so cut out the chin music I 1 here comes the captain with his goldfisher goldfishes gold fishes t we want to let him fled find us keeping watch on that bixl landis craned his neck to enable him to see farther down the tunnel A group of four mencas men was approaching the one in the lead carrying a flashlight As the four passed he saw that the light carrier was canby but the three men who were picking their way in candys wake were strangers As the four came up cauby canby stopped and spoke to one of the workmen air quit on you did it jim its all right I 1 was just about to send in to tell you to knock off a bit until I 1 could bring these gentlemen in and show them what weve got 11 landis reasoned instantly that this was said for the benent of the three strangers stran gerSi canby must have learned from the panic stricken miners the true cause for the stoppage of course you yol cant tell much about a gold mine by merely looking at it landis landals heard the speaker say to the three as they stood tn in the heading the assays essays tell the true story of th the values and as you know we have given your examiners a tree free rein you have done everything you agreed to said one of the three there Js a only one thing that puzzles us a bit and that Is why you are willing to let go of so good a thing as this mine seems to be canby laughed easily 1 I can give you the reason in four words mr fleming im no mining man A year ago I 1 thought I 1 was and I 1 let a bunch of scamps scalps stick me for the old Quava pal I 1 found out pretty SOO soon a that id been done but the extent of the old ivor workings kings was sufficient lelent proof that the mine had once been a producer so I 1 sent some good money after the bad developing one of the old veins here Is the result but good as it Is it made a mining man out of me my interests now are all in the east and I 1 cant ride two horses horse at once there was more talk after a time one of the three said well I 1 guess we have seen all we need to and I 1 think we are pretty well satisfied I 1 guess we may as well adjourn to brewster Brewst erand 1 and have hav dour our lawyers draw up the papers what do you say fleming and you cantrell there was no dissenting voice and a moment later the group of four was passing the mouth of the shallow drift on its way out for perhaps five minutes after the sound of the footsteps of the retreating quartette quartet fe had died away in the dis tant reaches of the tunnel the two men who were barring the way for landis made no move and his impatience to get back to detty betty became a maddening obsession then one got upon his feet and began where he had left of when the interruption had come im telling you that the fellow we locked up the fellow that made that back action loudspeaker loud speaker sneaker over there Is the one that turned h 1 loose on us a little while ago and ill make a toone one bet hes hiding in that old chute right now levs lets go back and get him then to landis came the thought of what they would find in the inclined chute betty waiting bewildered and dismayed his groping hand reached backward and fell upon a miners shovel and with only this for a weapon he leaped up and darted out berserk mad to fall upon the retreating pair fortunately for him the two men had their backs turned when he made his silent charge upon them and before they heard him he hal had hit one a smashing blow over the head with his shovel knocking him across the rails of the mine track sut but before he could swing the shovel a second time the other man had whirled drawn his colt ind and fired it was merely a lucky chance that the heavy bullet struck the shovel blade and glanced aside to flatten harmlessly against the tunnel wall but the chance summed before he could squeeze the trigger again landis was waa upon him flailing at him with the shovel mad with the madness that makes the fighting maniac invincible v In cIble driven back by the furious attack the man tried to cover his face A chopping blow of the shovel made him birn drop his pistol at this be sought to ti close with the maniac but landis lowered tits his clumsy weapon from cutting to thrusting and the sharp blade of the digging tool caught the charging enemy just above the belt ile he gave a grunt and bent double over the thrusting shovel but in falling he ha got his hands upon hla his lighter antagonist and dragged him down dropping the shovel landis tore fiercely at the gripping hands like grim death hla his opponent held on struggling desperately for the breath the savage stomach ich thrust had deprived him of it came at last and when it did landis knew that the light was lost the man had him down while he groped coped with the other hand for the dropped pistol TO I 1 BID BB CONTINUED |