The Border Boys with the Mexican Rangers

“Hope so, I’m sure,” put in Walt, “I can tell you, I’ve had quite enough excitement for one day.”

“Well, I guess that is the case with all of us,” was the rejoinder, “but amid all these natural wonders and alarms we must not forget that we came here on a definite mission, – namely to carry back with us what we can of the reputed treasure.”

“That’s right,” agreed Coyote, “and so far as I’m concerned, I’m for pushing on.”

That seemed to be in accordance with the wishes of the entire little company, so, forward it was.

They plunged into the passage that the professor had indicated and traversed it for some distance before they struck anything out of the ordinary.

It was perhaps half an hour before they began to notice that the tunnel was beginning to be irradiated by a light far stronger than that thrown by their torches, a bright piercing glare that seemed to burn like white fire. It grew very much warmer, too, and the perspiration streamed down all their faces.

“We are approaching the subterranean fires,” said the professor, “in all probability some titanic flame of natural gas. By the roaring sound I hear, I believe that to be a correct statement of the facts.”

“Sounds like a blast furnace in full swing,” said Ralph.

Suddenly the passage widened and a dazzling scene broke upon their gaze. In the midst of a rock chamber even larger, as well as they could judge, than the cave of the lake, there arose a great flame of an almost white hue. It was blue at the base like an ordinary gas flame and roared straight up with terrific force as if fed by great reservoirs of natural gas.

“In all probability it was ignited at the time that the volcano was active and has burned ever since,” opined the professor. “Young men, if we found nothing else within this cavern we have already experienced more than falls to the lot of even exceptional men in their lifetime. Such sights as these we shall never forget.”

“It’s a Flower of Flame!” exclaimed Jack poetically.

“If you could corner that light and sell it, there’d be a pile of money in it,” said the practical Ralph.

“Well, as time is precious, let us be pressing on,” said the professor, “for, speaking of money, we must recollect that we have, as yet, found no trace of the treasure.”

After converging upon the chamber of the Flower of Flame, the passage once more plunged into the innermost regions of the mountain. For a space it twisted and turned, and then, without the slightest warning, the adventurers experienced a sharp shock. They faced a blank wall.

“Well, here’s the finish,” announced Walt, holding up his torch.

“Looks like it,” agreed Jack, “yet it seems odd that those old tribes would have gone to all the trouble to drill that passage if it ends right here.”

“Just what I think, my boy,” said the professor, “and by the same token, look here!”

He indicated a big ring of some yellowish metal that hung directly in the center of the seeming blank wall.

“I’ll experiment,” he said, giving it a twist.

But nothing occurred.

Then he tried tugging it. Again no result followed.

“Look,” cried Ralph suddenly, “there’s a metal plate under your feet, professor. Perhaps if you stand on that and then tug you will have some results.”

“That sounds reasonable,” said Professor Wintergreen, doing as the boy had indicated.

This time, amid a cheer from the boys, something did happen. The door slowly swung on invisible hinges and beyond it their torch-lights fell on a scene of almost overwhelming grandeur.

It was a chamber, seemingly of gleaming white marble. Around the walls, at regular intervals, were ranged the figures of what appeared to be idols, but which they presently discovered were perfectly embalmed bodies of past rulers of the mountain dwellers. At one end of the chamber on a raised dais was a hideous figure which they readily guessed to be the deity of the forgotten race.

The face of this image was spread into a monstrous expression of malignant cruelty. But it was the eyes that startled them. They blazed in the torch-lights like two balls of fire.

“They are rubies!” cried the professor, rushing forward. As he did so, his eye fell upon a heap of golden ornaments and jeweled vessels at the foot of the huge statue. Evidently they had been left there as offerings on the day of the mysterious occurrence that had wiped out the tribe.

But as the man of science made his dart toward the pile, a strange thing happened. The gaping mouth of the statue opened wide, and from it there poured a puff of gas so baleful in odor that the boys reeled back. But the professor, upon whom the full force of the blast had concentrated itself, gave a few staggering footsteps and then plunged to the marble floor in a senseless condition.

“So that is the way those old fellows protected their treasure,” snorted Pete. “Wall, it was a good one, too, and no mistake. Come on, boys, and drag the professor out of that.”

“Isn’t there danger of our being poisoned by that gas, too?” asked Walt, still shaken by his previous experience in danger.

“Even if there was, it ’ud be our duty ter get the professor out of that,” said Pete severely, “but I noticed that the professor stepped on a particular stone as he reached for them treasures. I guess it is only that stone, behind which the stuff is piled, that works the gas consarn.”

And so it proved. By carefully avoiding the stone which was of a dark blood-color, they dragged the professor to a place of safety, and with water from the canteen and some of his own stimulant, they soon had him on his feet again.

“I should have been upon the lookout,” he said, “I ought to have known that the priests of the tribe would have taken some precautions to protect the offerings from marauders.”

“But the gas only works when you step on that particular stone,” objected Jack.

“I suppose with the ignorant folk with whom they had to deal, one lesson of that sort was quite sufficient. That is the logical stone to step upon, and having once tested it, nobody was likely to try again,” rejoined the professor.

“And now to gather up the treasure, or what we can of it,” said Jack.

Pete produced a big roll of sacking which, on being distributed, proved to consist of burlap bags, one for each member of the party.

“Here we are, on Tom Tiddler’s ground,
Picking up gold and silver!”

So sang the boys, as sacks in hand they rushed forward.

“This girdle for me!” cried Jack, holding up a belt of golden coins with great, rough rubies encrusting it.

“This goblet takes my eye,” quoth Ralph, stowing a golden vessel, likewise jewel-encrusted, into his receptacle.

Besides the wrought gold there were ingots of gold in the rough, silver articles of all sorts, and all gem-studded. The heap blazed and flashed with a hundred fires as the torches gleamed upon it. They all worked like beavers and before long the sacks were full with a burden that was quite heavy enough for any of the party to wish to carry.

“Well, this will be all for this trip,” decided the professor when their task was completed, “and now for the open air.”

With the scientist leading the way, his long legs fairly sagging under his burden, they began to retrace their footsteps, fingering the thread as they went.

“What should you estimate the value of this haul at?” Ralph asked, as they once more passed the portal.

“At a rough guess at least $500,000, apart from the value of the collection as antiquities,” said the professor. “It is without doubt the most valuable archeological collection ever stumbled upon.”

Past the Flower of Flame and past the lake of the blind, monstrous eels they retraced their steps, their hearts beating triumphantly at the magnificent conclusion of their long and adventurous quest.

But as they reached the Cave of the Stalactites the subterranean chambers were filled with a sudden terrifying sound. It seemed to drive the ear drums in with its fierce impact. The adventurers felt themselves lifted from their feet and then violently hurled to the ground again. A rush of nauseous smelling gas enveloped them, splitting their heads with its pungent fumes.

The earth shook and trembled and a reverberating roar as of the explosion of a powder magazine filled the whole atmosphere.