He shot out and disappeared in a huge splash close to Wabi. Rod stood transfixed, filled with a fear that was growing in him at every breath he drew. He saw the convulsions of the water made by the two Indians, who were groping about below the surface. Wabigoon came up again for breath, then Mukoki. It seemed to him that an age had pa.s.sed, and he felt no hope. John Ball was dead!

Not for a moment now did he doubt the ident.i.ty of the mad hunter. The strange, wistful light that had replaced the glare in the old man's eyes when he heard his own name called to him had spoken more than words. It was John Ball! And he was dead! For a third time, a fourth, and a fifth Mukoki and Wabigoon came up for air, and the fifth time they dragged themselves out upon the rocks that edged the pool. Mukoki spoke no word but ran back to the camp and threw a great armful of dry fuel upon the fire. Wabigoon still remained at the edge of the pool, dripping and shivering. His hands were clenched, and Rod could see that they were filled with sand and gravel. Mechanically the Indian opened his fingers and looked at what he had unconsciously brought up from under the fall.

For a moment he stared, then with his gasping breath there came a low, thrilling cry.

He held out his hands to Rod.

Gleaming richly among the pebbles which he held was a nugget of pure gold, a nugget so large that Rod gave a wild yell, and in that one moment forgot that John Ball, the mad hunter, was dead or dying beneath the fall!

CHAPTER XVI

JOHN BALL AND THE MYSTERY OF THE GOLD

Mukoki, hearing Rod's cry, hurried to the pool, but before he reached the spot where the white youth was standing with the yellow nugget in his hand Wabigoon had again plunged beneath the surface. For several minutes he remained in the water, and when he once more crawled out upon the rocks there was something so strange in his face and eyes that for a moment Rod believed he had found the dead body of the madman.

"He isn't--in--the--pool!" he panted. Mukoki shrugged his shoulders and shivered.

"Dead!" he grunted

"He isn't in the pool!"

Wabigoon's black eyes gleamed in uncanny emphasis of his words.

"He isn't in the pool!"

The others understood what he meant. Mukoki's eyes wandered to where the water of the pool gushed between the rocks into the broader channel of the chasm stream. It was not more than knee deep!

"He no go out there!"

"No!"

"Then--where?"

He shrugged his shoulders suggestively again, and pointed into the pool.

"Body slip under rock. He there!"

"Try it!" said Wabigoon tersely.

He hurried to the fire, and Rod went with him to gather more fuel while the young Indian warmed his chilled body. They heard the old pathfinder leap into the water under the fall as they ran.

Ten minutes later Mukoki joined them.

"Gone! Bad-dog man no there!"

He stretched out one of his dripping arms.

"Gol' bullet!" he grunted.

In the palm of his hand lay another yellow nugget, as large as a hazelnut!

"I told you," said Wabi softly, "that John Ball was coming back to his gold. And he has done so! The treasure is in the pool!"

But where was John Ball?

Dead or alive, where could he have disappeared?

Under other conditions the chasm would have rung with the wild rejoicing of the gold seekers. But there was something now that stilled the enthusiasm in them. At last the ancient map had given up its secret, and riches were within their grasp. But no one of the three shouted out his triumph. Somehow it seemed that John Ball had died for them, and the thought clutched at their hearts that if they had not cut down the stub he would still be alive. Indirectly they had brought about the death of the poor creature who for nearly half a century had lived alone with the beasts in these solitudes. And that one glimpse of the old man on the rock, the prayerful entreaty in his wailing voice, the despair which he sobbed forth when he found his tree gone, had livened in them something that was more than sympathy.

At this moment the three adventurers would willingly have given up all hopes of gold could sacrifice have brought back that sad, lonely old man who had looked down upon them from the wall of the upper chasm.

"I am sorry we cut down the stub," said Rod.

They were the first words spoken.

"So am I," replied Wabi simply, beginning to strip off his wet clothes. "But--" He stopped, and shrugged his shoulders.

"What?"

"Well, we're taking it for granted that John Ball is dead. If he is dead why isn't he in the pool? By George, I should think that Mukoki's old superst.i.tion would be getting the best of him!"

"I believe he is in the pool!" declared Rod.

Wabi turned upon him and repeated the words he had spoken to the old warrior half an hour before.

"Try it!"

After the attempts of the two Indians, who could dive like otter, Rod had no inclination to follow Wabi's invitation. Mukoki, who had hung up a half of his clothes near the fire, was fitting one of the pans to the end of a long pole which he had cut from a sapling, and it was obvious that his intention was to begin at once the dredging of the pool for gold. Rod joined him, and once more the excitement of treasure hunting stirred in his veins. When the pan was on securely Wabi left the fire to join his companions, and the three returned to the pool. With a long sweep of his improvised dredge Mukoki scooped up two quarts or more of sand and gravel and emptied it upon one of the flat rocks, and the two boys pounced upon it eagerly, raking it out with their fingers and wiping the mud and sand from every suspicious looking pebble.

"The quickest way is to wash it!" said Rod, as Mukoki dumped another load upon the rock. "I'll get some water!"

He ran to the camp for the remaining pans and when he turned back he saw Wabi leaping in a grotesque dance about the rock while Mukoki stood on the edge of the pool, his dredge poised over it, silent and grinning.

"What do you think of that?" cried the young Indian as Rod hurried to him. "What do you think of that?"

He held out his hand, and in it there gleamed a third yellow nugget, fully twice as large as the one discovered by Mukoki!

Rod fairly gasped. "The pool must be full of 'em!"

He half-filled his pan with the sand and gravel and ran knee-deep out into the running stream. In his eagerness he splashed over a part of his material with the wash, but he, excused himself by thinking that this was his first pan, and that with the rest he would be more careful. He began to notice now that all of the sand was not washing out, and when he saw that it persisted in lying heavy and thick among the pebbles his heart leaped into his mouth. One more dip, and he held his pan to the light coming through the rift in the chasm. A thousand tiny, glittering particles met his eyes! In the center of the pan there gleamed dully a nugget of pure gold as big as a pea! At last they had struck it rich, so rich that he trembled as he stared down into the pan, and the cry that had welled up in his throat was choked back by the swift, excited beating of his heart. In that moment's glance down into his treasure-laden pan he saw all of his hopes and all of his ambitions achieved. He was rich! In those gleaming particles he saw freedom for his mother and himself. No longer a bitter struggle for existence in the city, no more pinching and striving and sacrifice that they might keep the little home in which his father had died! When he turned toward Wabigoon his face was filled with the ecstasy of those visions. He waded ash.o.r.e and held his pan under the other's eyes.

"Another nugget!" exclaimed Wabi excitedly.

"Yes. But it isn't the nugget. It's the--" He moved the pan until the thousand little particles glittered and swam before the Indian's eyes.

"It's the dust. The sand is full of gold!"