CHAPTER VI
THE INCENDIARIES
The red glow of the sun on the snow-clad peaks of the main ridge hadbegun glinting through the smoke gloom when voices seemed to echo fromwithin the very rock against which they were leaning. The boys crept tolook behind it. Then their eyes rounded in astonishment. As Ted wouldhave spoken, Pedro clapped his hand over his mouth with a look that badesilence. Crouched motionless at the side of the cave mouth,--for a deepcave it now disclosed itself,--the two boys peered at the spectacle thatgreeted their eyes.
Three Mexicans, aglitter with the silver buttons of their native costume,appeared suddenly from some black depth, carrying torches.
With these one of their number kindled a bon-fire, whose flame revealed acouple of burros standing patiently under their packs, tied to a mammothstalagmite. For the red flare behind the three figures of the Mexicans,showed a cave roofed with amber-tinted icicles of smoke-stained rock,beneath which up-rose for each a pyramid of the same formation.
The Mexicans might have been father and son and old servant, from theirgeneral appearance and from the fact that most of the work ofsupper-getting was performed by the shabby, white-haired one, while thefat middle-aged one struck the younger a blow that was not reciprocated.They were talking in a tongue that Ted could not translate, though fromthe peppery tone of it, he judged they were quarreling. Pedro assured himlater they were not. (He knew Mexican.) They were merely regretting thattheir horse had been burned.
The fat one, evidently too fagged to move, was demanding that one of theothers go see for sure, while they argued that it was no use, the animalcould not have survived. They must have been exhausted, lame, besides, tojudge from the creaky way they moved. The fat one poured some verbalvitriol on their heads for not having brought the horse inside, while thewhite haired one deprecated that they had not intended to be gone so long.
"It's the fat one's, and now he'll have to hoof it like the others; he'dsure break the back of a burro," translated Pedro in huge enjoyment, tohis mystified companion. "Wonder if they're the fire bugs Rosa saw?"
"Let's listen and find out," said Ted.
As the blaze by which they dried their mysteriously muddy feet died downto red coals, from the pack of one of the burros the old peon extractedsome ready-made tamales and proceeded to add the heat of cooking to thehotter peppers within their enwrapping corn husks. This fiery mixturethey quenched from a round-bellied bottle passed from lip to lip, thoughthe fat one took his first and longest.
"They're the fire bugs, all right," said Pedro softly into Ted's ear. Andit was agreed that they might safely creep in along the shadows tillPedro could hear more plainly.
Sanchez was the name of the fat leader, and his son and his servant theothers proved to be. They had, it developed, a grouch against the lumbercompany down on the Kawa, (in which, as it happened, Ace's father had aninterest). They had been fired from the crew, and no punishment was toogreat for a company that would do that to a workman who merely asked hisaccustomed afternoon siesta.
"_Detestablemente!_" (And other remarks that sounded like fireworks.)The pigs of _Americanoes!_ Pedro convulsed Ted with his recital when theyhad crept back to the cave mouth, despite the seriousness of thesituation.
That they would start more fires at their first opportunity had also beenestablished by their conversation.
"We can't let 'em go," argued the ranch boy.
"We can't capture them," the Castilian was as positive. "We are unarmed,and they have their daggers."
Ted pondered, peered out at the still, smoking ground, soothed thenervous horse, then came to a conclusion, which he unfolded to hiscomrade.
He must go for help. He would ride that horse, find Norris, get Ace towireless Radcliffe, and summon help. But--he eyed Pedro doubtfully,knowing his uncourageous bearing at the rodeo.
"But what?" insisted the Spanish boy. But had he not guessed it! Ofcourse he would remain behind to keep track of the desperadoes.
But how could Ted start with the ground so hot? He would have to waitawhile, then make up for lost time by break-neck riding.
So be it. They were hungry now, and ate the ration of tinned corned beefand hardtack from their pockets. Ted also fed the horse some hardtack,and brought him several hatfuls of water from the spring,--scorching hissoles as he crossed the charred ground.
Pedro propped his tired body in a sitting posture with one ear cocked forthe conversation within. Ted flung himself flat on his back in the smokygloom, which obscured even the light of the moon. He was mentallyexploring that cave,--remembering what Norris had once told them of theregion and wondering into what limed recesses the Mexicans were likely toretire when capture threatened. That the cave had its depths he feltassured by their having so suddenly appeared with their torches. And whatcould Pedro do if they tried to leave before help came?--My, but he mustride! Three such incendiaries loose in those dry forests, and there wouldbe no end to the harm they could do!
The limestone of which these caves were formed,--sediment of the shellsof myriads of sea creatures,--had been deposited in the primeval oceanthat once flowed over that whole region from the Gulf of California.Uplifted by contractions of the earth crust, it had been cut as thesurrounding granite could not have been by the percolating rains andstreams, flowing along the cracks of the uplift.
This cave was probably a network of water-worn passageways extending notelling how far underneath the ridge. There were reputed to be cavesalmost as large as Mammoth in these unexplored recesses of the SouthernSierras. Could this be one of them, or was it just a two- or three-cavernaffair, he wondered? On that depended a very great deal of their successin the coming capture, for once entrenched within these labyrinthiancaves, the Mexicans could hold them at bay until they had made good theirget-away. It had been so, he had been told by military men, in chasingMexicans over the border.
Perhaps there were other caves in the region. Where, indeed, had thesemen secreted themselves while the fire had raged in a semi-circle aboutthem? In a cave, the air would be damp and cool, no matter what was goingon outside, and they could have been genuinely comfortable with theinferno raging over their very heads. Unless, of course, the smokesuffocated them! That would all depend on the air passages that fed theirparticular cavern. Some of those caves across the Mexican border weremiles in extent, and had exits galore.
Pondering the pendant stalactites that had gleamed like onyx in thefirelight, he pictured the water percolating drop by drop through thelimestone crevices, dissolving the lime and forming the stalactites adrop at a time through the years. How wonderful it was! He wished he toomight study. Perhaps, if he could make a go of his mother's fruitranch?--He was half asleep. He roused himself by trying to recall what itwas that Norris had told them about stalactites.
The rain water, charged with the carbonic acid gas of the atmosphere,seeps in from the surface and falls drop by drop. Each slow drop remainslong enough upon the ceiling to deposit some of its dissolved lime in aring to which the next succeeding drop adds another layer.
In time this ring lengthens into a pipe-stem of soft lime. It fills andcrystallizes, thickens and elongates, as the constant drip, evaporatingfrom the outside, deposits more and more of the lime. Thus these stoneicicles are formed, sometimes an inch a year.
At the same time the drops that fall to the floor, solidifying one at atime, build up a slender pyramid beneath,--a stalagmite,--which reacheshigher and higher as its stalactite hangs lower and lower. In time thesetwo formations meet in a slender pillar, the pillar thickens through thesame slow process and if the pillars stand close enough together,--aswhere the drip follows a long rock fissure,--the pillars will eventuallyjoin in a solid partition.
This _dripstone_, as the material of the formation is termed, began assoft carbonate of lime; it hardens into _gypsum_ or, sometimes,alabaster, or calcite.
The boy peered once more into the carved gallery, waiting till anup-flare of the dying fire again illumined the fantastic ceiling
, whosefairy architecture gleamed opalescent in the orange glow. He thought ofthe old fairy tales of gnomes hammering on their golden anvils in theirjeweled caves in the hearts of the mountains, and wondered if such lorehad not arisen from the fact of just such cave formations, coupled withthe echoes the slightest sound set to reverberating. After all, most folktales had some foundation.
Once these Mexicans were captured and the forest fire brought undercontrol, he meant to ask Norris if their camping expedition might notinclude an exploration of some of the caves he had assured themhoneycombed this part of the Sierra.
He little dreamed in what fantastic fashion his wish was to come about,as he lay there waiting till he could start his ride for help!
Nor did Pedro, drowsing, exhausted, beside him, dream of the test thatwas to be made of his courage while he remained behind. He seemed sofagged that Ted did not even wake him, when at last he deemed it time tosally forth.
Ted loved nothing better than a good horse.
The plainsman, he used to argue, may have his twin six, the airman hisship, but for the outdoor man, give him the comrade who can take themountain trails, the needle carpeted forest floor, the unbridged streams,the glacier polished slopes.
The black horse wore the high Visalia saddle, against which his ridercould rest on steep grades. It would be more dangerous, should the animalthrow him, though of course the high horn would help him to pull leathershould need arise. He had lengthened the stirrups, Western fashion, tillhis long legs dangled easily and he could have raised himself scarce aninch above the saddle by standing in his stirrups. His long, lean legswould give him a good hold where the going was rough, and if he had onlya quirt, or even a pair of drop-shank spurs, he would have felt confidentof making time. (For he knew how to use the spurs so that they would nottorture his animal.) He regretted that the mysterious owner had notfitted the poor brute with the old spade bit, for should the horse fall,on the uneven ground, it would be likely to cut his mouth badly. He hadonce seen an animal bleed to death from such a hurt. Well, they must notfall!
Mechanically he opened the reins, as was his habit:--His own horse hadbeen trained to hitch to the ground, and all he had to do when hedismounted in a hurry was to drop rein. He was glad to find that thesaddle was rim fire, (or double-rigged), as it would stay in place, nomatter what acrobatics they might be forced to perform. So far, so good!
With right hand on the saddle horn, left grasping rein and mane, he swungup, and before ever he touched leather, they were off.
Would his mount prove broncho? Had his probably Mexican owner uglied hisdisposition? That remained to be discovered. And on that detail woulddepend much of the success of his race for help. For with Norris at thefar end of the ridge, there would be several hours of tough going, hesurmised.
"Yes, sir, you shore gotta _slope_ some!" he told the mustang, inimitation of the cowmen. "Or those Greasers will just naturally fade outof the landscape."
As the night wind blew the smoke down canyon, he could very nearly tellhis way, and the time as well, by the stars. Being early in July, he knewthat in the constellation of Hercules, almost directly above, the hero'shead pointed South. It was something Norris had told them one night whenthey had to travel late to find a fit camping spot. The crest of theridge lay South, and along the crest he should find more open going. Hewould then have to veer to the West. As Venus rose brilliantly in theEast, he knew he had now about two hours and a half till sunrise.
Breasting the wind, he headed around the twisting stems of unyieldingmanzanita, then up, straight South, over slide rock and fallen treetrunks, turning aside for only the larger bowlders. The mountain-bredhorse was lithe as a greyhound, as he alternately climbed and slid, ormade wide leaps over the uneven slope.
The ridge attained, however, he found it harder going than he hadimagined, by reason of the broken shale, weathered by the frost ofunnumbered winters. But just on the other side,--that furthest from thefire zone,--stretched a smooth granite slope, where the going would beunobstructed. But these smooth slopes, bed of that prehistoric river ofice, slanted slowly but surely to the cascading mountain stream whoseroar now assailed his ears. One slip on that smooth surface and his horsewould never stop till he had reached the rapids! The boy wondered if theanimal were sufficiently sure-footed. The answer would mean, at the veryleast, the difference between a broken leg and a sound one, for the boyspeeding to secure help in the capture of the fire bugs. But there seemeda fighting chance, and he would take it.
At intervals the granite was blocked out by cracks, and he found theslight unevenness of a crack lent his mount a surer footing. At times itwas fairly level and he ventured a gallop; again it was precarious evenat a walk.
Suddenly a monotonous "chick-chick-chick" buzzed beneath their feet. Thehorse leapt violently to one side,--just in time to evade the coiledspring of four feet of green-black rattlesnake, on whose sinister form hehad all but trod. By that instant leap he had avoided the speedy death ofthe injected virus of the stroke. Ted's heart was in his mouth.
On--on--on he urged the black. It became mechanical; he ceased to think.Exhausted alike by his long vigil and the strain he had been under, henow sat his horse in a daze, just keeping his nose generally Westward,while he skirted the crest of the ridge. He felt half numb as he roundedthe end of the crest where Norris was to have been stationed. To hisstupefaction, the fire fighters had completed their trench and gone!
Where could they be? Probably back at the camp, which he had skirted bythis detour, never dreaming he would find any one but Rosa there.Well,--he was "outa luck!" Back he went the way he had come, till hethought it time to climb the ridge. A flare of cook-fire through thegraying dawn showed him where to head, and the huge sun was just slippingblood-red through the smoke gloom as he took the last log at a leap anddropped off beside the moving figures.
The men were all there,--as was Ranger Radcliffe, whom the DeHaviland hadevidently returned with fresh supplies. It took but few words to acquaintthem with the situation.
By the time Ted had drank a quart of coffee with his breakfast, he wasable to pull himself together again and lead the posse to the hiddencave mouth. The Ranger would have to be the one to go, to make thearrest, and he deputized Ace to help him. That meant leaving Norris tohead the firemen. (It never occurred to any of them that they would notbe right back with Pedro and the Mexicans. The foam-flecked horse Tedleft to Rosa's care.)
The cave mouth accomplished, Radcliffe entered first, with revolvercocked, though Ace almost trod on his heels. Ted staggered after with aflaming pine knot flickering in his almost nerveless hand.
The cavern was absolutely empty!
To Pedro, left in the cave mouth to watch the Mexicans, the night hadbeen the crucial test.
He had been asleep when Ted departed, while the Mexicans had slept withinthe cave. He awoke to find the three dark visages bending over him, theirverbal fireworks hissing about his ears. At first "caballo" was all hecould make of it,--(the horse). Then as Sanchez the stout, soaredrhetorically above the others, he gathered that they dared not leave himand they could not carry him. "El Diablo!" How much simpler to thrust adagger between his ribs. "Muerte!--Presto!" But no, wait! For the timebeing he would walk between them carrying two extra torches. There mustbe another exit to the cave, but could the burros make it with the packs?Try it they must, for this way their choice lay between the fire fightersand the flames. The doomed forest still glowed red and black down canyon,and with the morning light, the wind veered till the smoke assailed themchokingly. There was no time to be lost.
Never for an instant dreaming that Pedro understood, they gave him thetorches he was to bear, and started into the depths of the cavern. Andthe boy? Too frightened at first to have spoken had he tried to, he hadthe wit to see that protest would be useless. They were three to one,armed, and desperate, and they counted him a likely witness to theirincendiarism.
Besides, now that the wind had changed, he could not have gone ten paceswithou
t having been blinded by the smoke till he could not see where hewas heading. This side of the canyon was going to go like tinder, too.Besides,--this came later,--how could he allow the fire bugs to get away?His job was to keep tabs on them, and that he would now have anexceptional opportunity to do, he cheered himself.
At first the flare of the torches revealed merely the cavern of onyxstalactites he had seen the night before. This formation wound in anarrowing labyrinth until they made a sharp turn to the left. Presentlythey came to a pit of inky water, around which they had to skirt on asloping shelf. The burros could not make it and they left them there.Either, Pedro argued, they meant to return that way or else they hadother supplies awaiting them. But now they could no longer smell thesmoke. From somewhere came pure air, damp and refreshingly chilly. Thesounds of the outer world were cut off completely. On and on theywandered as in a dream. Pedro began surreptitiously pinching himself tomake sure he was not having some weird nightmare.
They came to a grotto that might have been brown marble, whose curiouscarvings he had no time to study. From this they had to crawl on handsand knees through an opening into another twisting passageway, flooredwith muddy water and barely high enough for them to stand erect. Theirvoices echoed and reechoed. Then came arches of stalactites almostmeeting the stalagmites beneath them, through which they edged their wayas through a frozen forest.
This opened into a vast cavern hung as with icicles of alabaster, whichtheir torch light warmed to onyx.
"If these fellows weren't so free with their knives," Pedro told himself,"it would be an adventure worth having. But they certainly have too muchdynamite in their dispositions to suit me,"--for the Mexicans were nowquarreling among themselves. The boy and the old man were for turningback before they lost themselves,--for at every turn there were branchingways.
But Sanchez, the heavy-handed, was for going on,--and on they went,shivering in the unaccustomed chill.
Pedro wondered what the rescue party would do when they found them gone.If only he could leave some sign of his whereabouts! Could he drop hishandkerchief at one turning of the ways, his hat at another, withoutdetection? Or was it already too late? Why had he not thought of thatbefore?--Tucking one torch into the crook of the other elbow for amoment, he dropped his bandanna as again they took the left-hand of twoturns.
But now their little flare of light revealed a blind passageway. Thewater-worn rock had been hollowed out by some eddying pool, no doubt,while the main stream had flown on past. How he wished he knew more ofcave formations! Should he find opportunity to escape, how would he everfind his way out again?
Retracing their steps, they took the right hand turn. Here was anotherhigh roofed vault,--he could not see how high, he could only guess fromthe reverberation of their voices,--whose stalactites had become greatpillars that gleamed yellowly. The floor sloped toward them till they hadstiff climbing. On one wall was a limestone formation like a frozencataract. And thrust into the wall beside it he saw a torch stick. Whohad left it there, and what ages ago, he wondered? In this cavern some ofthe stalactites hung as huge as tree trunks, and had not Sanchez bade theothers keep an extra eye on him, the lad might easily have hid behind one.
Some of these huge pillars were cracked with age, and again the thoughtoccurred to him that if only he might insert himself into one of thecracks,--a few were all of a foot in width,--he could easily escapedetection in that uncertain light. But now he was under surveillanceevery instant. Besides, (tardy thought), was he not pledged to keep aneye on the villains? He smiled through his fears at the recollection thatthey, not he, were captive.
Meantime Ace and Radcliffe, (leaving Ted to sleep off his exhaustion inthe cave mouth), were examining the onyx cavern and the ground outsidefor some sign as to what had happened, and which way Pedro and theMexicans had gone. Radcliffe had his electric flash, and at the turn ofthe winding passageway discovered scratches on the sandstone floor wherethe burros had left hoof marks. But had they taken the turn to the rightor that to the left? There were hoof prints both going and coming, ineach passageway. Which had been made the more recently? They could nottell.
Ace hoped that the Ranger would propose each following a differentdirection, but instead, Radcliffe remarked that they ought to havebrought a ball of twine to unwind as they went, as people had been knownto get lost in unknown caves, and stay lost for days. The bestalternative was to make a rough map of their turnings in his note-book.
They advanced along the right hand passageway, whose breath seemed likethat of another world from that of the parched mountain side,--cool andmoist and wonderfully exhilarating. Had it not been for his uneasiness asto Pedro's whereabouts, Ace would have enjoyed this expedition into theunexplored. His was a nature that craved the tang of adventure, even morethan most. It was one of the things that had led him to take up geology,for in the U. S. Geological Survey his life would lead him, likely, tofar places.
He wished, though, that Ted were with them. A good pal certainly doublesone's enjoyments.
They had gone what seemed like miles, (though cave miles are deceptive,so completely is one cut off from space and time), bearing always to theright, when Radcliffe's light suddenly burned out, leaving them inprimeval darkness. At first breath they tried to laugh at theirpredicament, then the utter blackness seemed to press upon them till itsuffocated, and Ace suppressed a sudden desire to scream. His panicmoment was dissipated by Radcliffe's discovery of a bit of candle. Acehad, of course, that most important part of a camper's equipment, awaterproof match-box, linked to his belt, and in it a few matches. Buteven then it meant going back the way they had come, for without a goodlight they could do nothing. Perhaps it was just as well, for they werebound on no hour's adventure, and should have brought food as well. HowRadcliffe wished he had his acetylene lamp!
To their surprise they found Norris at the cave mouth trying to arrangehis coat under the sleeping Ted. And around him lay the coiled lariat hehad taken from the saddle-horn of Ted's recent mount, also threecanteens, some cooked food, and a supply of hard candles from the firecrew supplies. There were also the boys' sweaters,--Radcliffe, of course,had his woolen uniform,--and to cap the climax, a ball of twine and theRanger's pet lamp, with its tin of carbide powder.
To their amazed query Norris explained that he had explored dozens ofcaves in his time, including some hundreds of miles of that honeycombformation that underlies a portion of Kentucky, to say nothing of thecaverns of the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, the Black Hills of SouthDakota, and the Ozarks. Of the caves of California, however, he as yetknew nothing.
Had he not been needed to head the fire crew, he would have loved nothingbetter than to have gone with them.
"I knew this was a cave region," he told them as they ate and refreshedthemselves before going back into the black depths--for they had beengone several hours, it seemed. "Fissured limestone--I noticed ityesterday when we were down here trying to back-fire. Then what feeds theKawa? Not these little flood creeks that dry up almost before the springfloods are over. Where does all that snow water go to? Some undergroundpassageway, of course. It seeps through the porous rock to subterraneanchannels. By the way, I see there are tracks of muddy feet inside here,and _your_ feet are dry! The mud must have been left by the Mexicans."
"That's a fact!" exclaimed Radcliffe. "Ace, did you notice any mud alongthat passageway? Then we surely took the wrong turn."
"Not necessarily," said Norris. "They might have _come_ from some muddycavern, but gone back another way. However, I was going to give you alittle idea of the probable layout of a cave. This one, if--as Isuspect--it feeds the Kawa--likely descends to other levels, till thelowest one is very nearly on that of the river. Seeping through, here andthere, the rains and melting snows probably collect into a stream."
"Wish you could go with us, old chap," said the Ranger. "But----"
"You'll get along all right, with these things," sighed Norris, "and ifyou don't show up again within a few hours, we'll follow yo
ur twine," andhe tied one end of the cord ball to a manzanita bush, handing the ball toAce. At that moment Ted awoke and insisted that he join them. Norrisreluctantly returned to the fire crew.