The Cowpuncher (6 page)

It was wild and lonely there in the shadow of the towering Twin Peaks, with the rugged battlements of the
Sangre de Cristo
Range marching majestically into the northwest. It was a land of bare black rock and rushing white water, where the scream of the eagle sounded by day and the lonely shriek of the stalking panther by night.

Streams foamed at the bottom of deep canyons and barrancas. The wind was bitter on the heights and snow lay in the crotches of the beeches and on the shaded sides of rocks.

The ground was hard-frozen and the rustle of dead leaves and the creak of the mesquite thorns accentuated the harshness of the winter landscape.

And yet it had not been a too-arduous trek for Huck and his companions. They followed the water-level route, by way of the river at first, to the terrain encompassed by the old priest’s map; then turned sharply to thread the winding course of Dominguez Creek.

Lank Mason exclaimed from time to time as familiar landmarks compared accurately to those pricked out in blood on the scrap of yellowed linen.

“That old feller had oughta been a surveyor,” he
declared. “Takin’ the Peaks and Carson for his anchor stones, he lined the trail perfect. Right ahaid now is Dominguez Creek Canyon or I’m a packrat!”

Lank was right. They came out on a mesa and, several miles distant, was the dark mouth of the gorge with the turbulent stream tumbling from it.

“Don’t hardly ever anybody come inta this section,” observed Lank. “Badlands and hole-in-the-wall country from here on. Mighty nigh impossible to get out any way ‘cept the way we come in. Nothin’ here, so far as anybody knows, and one glim at them hills and rocks to the west and nawth is ‘nough to head prospectors or anybody else back the way they come. Reckon that’s the reason nobody ain’t ever tumbled onto what we’re lookin’ for.”

“That is, if we’re really looking for
something,
” Brannon said, with a grin.

“You wait and see,” Lank declared stubbornly. “I’m plumb sartain the oldtimer here has got somethin’.”

Huck grinned again, and said no more. And it was his keen eyes that discovered the first tangible proof of the authenticity of map and legend.

They were approaching the mouth of the canyon, threading their way with difficulty through the dense growth that choked the banks of the stream, when Huck’s attention was caught by a gleam of white.

At first he thought it was only a rain-washed stone, but a second look told him what it really was—a skull, bleached and dried but still intact
in outline despite the weathering of more than half a century.

He picked it up, with the others crowding close to stare at the dread symbol of man’s mortality. Huck’s eyes narrowed as he examined the hollow bone.

“Not an Indian’s,” he said bluntly.

With added interest he began poking about among the growth. Soon they found other skulls, and other fragments of skeletons. Some of the skulls were plainly Indian, but the majority, Huck was convinced, were of white men.

With an exclamation, Lank Mason suddenly plucked something from beside the gnarled trunk of a giant mesquite. He held it up, a length of rusty steel, worn thin and narrow by the ravages of the elements. It was a section of a rusty sword.

“Busted off ‘bout half way up,” said the miner.

“And here’s somethin’ what looks like a old tin pot half buried in this crack,” Old Tom called.

“What’s left of a steel helmet,” Huck told him, his gray eyes glowing with excitement. “Gents, it seems as if there’d been a pretty hefty scrap here a long time back.”

“The ruckus when the Injuns wiped out the Spaniards,” Old Tom insisted.

“Looks like it, all right,” the cowpuncher admitted. “And it begins to look like there’s something to this yarn of yours, after all.”

“I told you so!” Lank Mason crowed. But it was Lank who was due to voice pessimism before a second sun had set.

Straight to the mouth of the canyon the faded
line on the map pointed, and then to its further end. So they made their way there, and paused to stare at the foaming rush of water where Dominguez Creek leaped over the end wall of the box canyon, the crest of which was nearly a hundred feet above the gorge floor.

“This don’t look so good.” growled Lank. “Map p’ints right up to here, but there ain’t no mine here, and no place for one to be.”

“The stuff’s prob’ly buried some place ‘round here, that’s what I been thinkin’ all the time,” Old Tom remarked cheerfully.

It wasn’t. By evening of the following day, all three were firmly convinced of that. They had covered every foot of the ground in the canyon, and found nothing to substantiate even remotely Gaylord’s belief. The crumbling remains of some rickety cabins along the west wall of the canyon were the only indication that anybody had ever entered the gorge.

“And the chances are they was used by trappers and hunters back in the days when skins was wuth more than they are now,” Lank grumbled as he gloomily prepared supper.

But Huck, formerly the most skeptical member of the trio, stubbornly refused to be discouraged.

“I’m getting more and more convinced that there really is something here,” he declared. “The fact that we don’t find it right off the bat doesn’t prove the thing just a wild yarn. Anything of real value
would
be carefully hidden. As Lank says, there used to be lots of hunters and trappers in these hills—lots more than there are now—and
whoever had anything to hide would take that into account and not lay it on top of a rock or out in the sun where anybody happening along would stumble onto it.”

“We’ve follered the map to right where it shows,” Lank pointed out. “Here at the head of the canyon is where the line peters out.”

“Tom, let’s see that map again,” Huck said.

Old Tom brought forth the yellowed linen and Huck studied it earnestly, the concentration furrow deepening between his black brows. At length he exclaimed sharply.

“I see it now,” he declared. “Part of this map is gone. We haven’t got the whole thing.”

Their heads bent eagerly forward to scan the dingy linen.

“What you mean—how you figger?” asked Old Tom.

Huck pointed to the diagonal edge of the cloth.

“See,” he said, “all the rest of the edges show they were torn loose from a bigger piece. This edge here wasn’t torn. See how regular it is, and unraveled. Once this thing was just about square. This slantwise edge was cut clean with a knife.”

“And s’posin’ it was—what does that mean?” asked Lank. “You can see plain we got all the map tracin’ here—the line of the trail begins and ends before it gets to the edges.”

“Yes,” replied Huck, “but what we haven’t got, or I’m mistaken, is the part on which the old padre wrote instructions how to locate the stuff after you get to the head of the canyon. For some reason or other, that’s been cut away.”

“And s’posin’ that’s so, what we gonna do ‘bout it?”

“For one thing, tomorrow, we’re going up on top of these canyon walls and see if we can run onto anything interesting. I’ve got a hunch the key to this thing is up there somewhere. Anyway, I figure it’s worth trying.”

Nobody objected and they ate supper in a more cheerful frame of mind.

And while the partners put away their chuck, washing it down with cups of steaming coffee, beady black eyes watched their every move from the canyon wall and thin lips moved back from yellowed teeth in a humorless grin…

“I reckon we’ll hafta troop clean back to the mouth of this damn hole-in-the-wall ‘fore we can get up topside the walls,” Lank complained the following morning.

“Unless we can find some way up the sides,” Huck agreed.

They found such a way, and at no great distance below their camp. It was a deep ravine, or dry watercourse rather, scored in the canyon wall. Not an easy ascent, and Lank was puffing hard when he finally crawled over the ragged lip. Huck stared about with interest, his steady eyes narrowed and intent.

The ravine ended in a comparatively narrow depression, very deep for its width, its sloping sides choked by growth. They could see it winding away to the north, diagonaling toward the course of Dominguez Creek.

“Must have been a lot of water coming down
here one time,” Huck observed. “Why, I wonder—and why doesn’t it come this way now?”

“Mebbe the crick run this way onct,” suggested Gaylord.

“The creek is flowing through what is actually slightly higher ground,” Huck pointed out. “Water doesn’t run uphill. That is, unless somebody helps it,” he added, his dark brows drawing closer together.

Lank looked bewildered, but Old Tom cocked a speculative eye at the cowboy. “You found out somethin’?” he asked.

“Wait,” Huck said.

They followed the depression, Huck leading the way. Lank and Old Tom scrutinized the growth-covered sides for some signs of shaft or tunnel or significant mound; but Huck’s attention was centered on the course of the peculiar gully. He appeared impatient of delay and forged ahead of his companions.

The grade rose sharply as they progressed northward, and the sound of the waters of Dominguez Creek grew steadily louder. Soon the bed of the depression was very nearly on a level with that of the creek.

The bed itself interested Huck. It was mostly naked rock, shelving somewhat, its surface worn smooth by the action of water, although now not even a trickle could be detected. Tufts of grass sprouted from the cracks, and here and there a clump of brush strove for a footing in a patch of shallow soil.

Once, however, rooted in a deep and wide cleft, a sturdy blue spruce shot up its silver and pale blue cone to whisper softly in the wind.

The cowpuncher halted and regarded the tree with quickened interest. “How old you figger this feller to be?”

“Forty-fifty years, mebbe more; why?” replied Mason.

“Pine trees don’t grow in the water,” Huck answered.

“Not so’s I ever noticed,” admitted Lank.

“Which means that there hasn’t been any water in this gully for a mighty long time.”

“Uh-huh.”

“And the signs show that there was a lot here at one time. What’s the answer?”

“The answer, I’d say,” replied Lank, “is that onct ‘pon a time, years ago, Dominguez Crick ran down here ‘stead of up where it is.”

“Exactly,” Huck replied, adding ironically: “And then she turned ‘round and ran up hill for a change. C’mon, let’s go.”

A few minutes later he turned abruptly and began climbing the steep bank. He topped it and less than fifty yards distant, he could see the rushing waters of Dominguez Creek. A couple of hundred yards upstream, the creek bank and the dry wash joined to form a V; the bed of the dry wash was considerably higher than that of the creek.

Huck pointed this out to the others and then silently indicated the precise banks of the stream downward from the point of contact to the lip of the falls, more than half a mile distant.

“From here to the falls, the creek follows a course never intended by nature,” he said quietly. “They dug a channel, strengthening the sides with boulders and broken stone, and turned the creek into it. Below here the old creek bed is at a lower level than the new, but from here up it’s higher.”

“After they had the new channel constructed, it was simple to blow the bank at this point and turn the water into it, sending it over the end canyon wall instead of over the side wall nearly a mile farther down by way of the course the stream originally followed.”

“But why did they do that?” Lank demanded.

“That’s what we’re going to find out,” Huck told him quietly. “They didn’t do it for fun, that’s sure. We’re going to gamble a few charges of blasting powder to get the answer. Let’s get back to camp for tools and cartridges.”

“You figger they hid the stuff in the crick?” Old Tom panted, wild with excitement, as they hurried back down the wash.

Huck shook his head. “No, I figure they hid the mouth of the mine with the creek,” he replied. “Where does the trail as mapped out by the old padre end? Right at the head of the canyon. And what’s at the head of the canyon? The waterfall made by the creek following the built channel. What we’re looking for is back of that falls, and I’m willing to bet my last peso on it.”

“And I wouldn’t risk a plugged dime bettin’ ‘gainst you!” boomed Lank Mason. “C’mon, you mud turtles. Get a move on!”

They scrambled down the wash to the canyon floor and hurried toward the camp, with Huck in the lead.

Suddenly the cowboy’s hand streaked to the butt of the big gun he had kicked from Cale Coleman’s hand. But before he could line sights on the flickering shadow fleeing the site of the camp, it had dived into the growth and vanished.

Huck raced to the straggle of chapparal, weaving and ducking to provide as difficult a target as possible. But there was no need of caution. Nothing moved in the growth and his sharp eyes could find no evidence of recently broken brush.

“Wolverine, the chances are,” said Lank. “Damn pests are allus rootin’ ‘round camps and tearin’ things up.”

Huck was examining the ground around the camp, which on the side next the chaparral was moist because of the overflow of a small spring. He pointed to a print in the partially frozen mud.

“Wolverines don’t wear moccasins,” he observed.

Lank and Old Tom examined the print.

“Injun,” Lank decided. “A snoopin’ buck from a mine camp or somewhere. Wonder he didn’t steal ev’thin’ that was loose. Reckon he woulda if he’d had time.”

Huck indicated the seepage of water into the print. It was delicately filmed with ice.

“He was here quite a spell back, from the looks of that,” he told the others. “See if anything is missing.”

Nothing was, but one of the packs showed slight but unmistakable signs of meticulous search.

“‘Pears he
was
lookin’ for somethin’,” said Gaylord. “Now what in blazes—”

“Appears somebody is taking an interest in what we’re doing,” Huck supplemented a trifle grimly. “I’ve a notion it won’t hurt to keep our eyes peeled from now on. Well, let’s get those tools together and do this job ‘fore dark.”

Huck’s knowledge of engineering, slight though it was, proved invaluable when combined with native shrewdness and his cattleman’s instinct for topographical features. Lank, of course, knew all there was to know about planting powder charges.

From a safe distance they saw huge stones and masses of earth burst through the fluff of smoke as the echoes rolled backward and forward between the mountain walls. For an instant the waters of the creek seemed to poise, hesitate; then, with a thunder that drowned the echoes of the explosion, they went rushing and foaming down the dry wash which had been their course for untold ages before man appeared on the scene.

The falls thinned as if by magic, dwindled to a trickle that went crawling down the black and glistening wall of rock and soon ceased altogether. Along the bed was left only dark pools that marked scoured-out places in the floor of the manmade channel.

Huck and his friends, however, gave scant attention to the drained channel. They were hurrying toward the distant mouth of the canyon, their path down the dry wash of course being blocked by the rush of the water which now used it as a way to the canyon floor. The end wall overhung and made descent there impossible.

The winter sun was lying low in the west and pouring a flood of reddish light into the gloomy canyon when they reached the site of their camp. They burst through the final fringe of growth and stood staring.

Where there had been a down-rush of foamflecked water was now only glistening rock, filming with ice which reflected the reddish light until the whole wall seemed to flow with sluggish blood. At the base of the wall was a black opening from which trickled a steady stream of water.

The opening was regular in outline, arched at the top, sufficiently wide and high for the passage of several mules abreast.

“There she is,” Huck Brannon said quietly. “There’s
La Mina del Padre!
”

Old Tom’s eyes were bright and shining. Lank breathed heavily.

“The Lost Padre Mine,” he repeated. “Well, gents, it looks like all we got to do is walk in and collect.”

If any of them had had any inkling of the suffering, destruction and death that they would collect in these black depths beyond the gloomy portal framed in bloody light, possibly not one of them would have taken another step in its direction.

But perhaps some dim premonition of what was to come did cause them to hesitate upon the threshold. Even Huck Brannon, although he would have been unable to name his reason, was reluctant to lead the way into that frowning opening in the blood-streaked cliff.

Old Tom gave voice to the general uneasiness.

“It’s late,” he said, “and we’ve had a mighty hard day. S’pose we get us a mess o’ chuck and eat. Then it’ll be time for a little shuteye. We’ll need to fix up somethin’ to take ‘long with us, incidentally—no tellin’ how long we may hafta prowl ‘round in that diggin’ ‘fore we hit onto what we’re lookin’ for. What say, fellers?”

They nodded agreement; and so it was the morning sun, flooding the canyon with brilliance and turning the withered leaves into flakes of dead gold, that saw them approach the dark gap in the
cliff face. There was a frosty bite to the air and the film of ice glittered cheerfully. The little stream trickling from the mouth of the old mine chuckled to itself as it hurried along the former channel to join Dominguez Creek farther down the canyon.

They had brought Davey lamps and Huck carefully adjusted the flames inside their covering of protective gauze. And before they had advanced a hundred yards along the ancient tunnel, he congratulated himself on his choice of safety lamps. For Lank Mason was wrinkling his nose like a rabbit and his sniffs echoed loudly against the side walls.

“Gas o’ some kind,” he declared. “I can smell it strong. Don’t do any lightin’ up of smokes, gents, till we’re plumb shore what it is. Might be explosive.”

Huck nodded and pointed to the lamps. The protective gauze showed slightly pinkish, a sure sign of inflammable gas in the air.

“Funny,” mused the cowboy. “What’s that sort of gas doing in a silver mine?”

“Never can tell,” replied Lank. “Why, over to some of the diggin’s ‘round Trinidad, you’re allus sniffin’ some bad smellin’ stuff.”