Panther Eye Part 13

"Orientals?" The man looked puzzled. "Orientals? Oh, you mean the natives; the Chukches. Why, I was studying them. Getting their language, taking pictures, getting phonographic records, and--"

Suddenly the man's face went white.

"Where--where are we?" he stammered through tight-set lips. The balloon, caught in a pocket of thin air, had caused the car to lurch.

"Taking a little trip," said Dave rea.s.suringly. "You're all right. We'll land after a bit."

"Land? So we are on a s.h.i.+p? I've been sick? We're going home. It is well.

Life with the Chukches was rotten, positively rotten--positive--"

His voice trailing off into nothingness. He was asleep again.

Dave stared at him. Here was a new mystery. Was this man lying? Had he been in collusion with the Orientals, and was he trying to hide that fact; or had the rap on his head caused a lapse of memory, which blotted out all recollections of the affair in the case and mine?

"Look, Dave!" exclaimed Jarvis suddenly, "as I live it's the City of Gold!"

In the east the sun was just peeping over the horizon. But Jarvis was not looking in that direction. He was looking west. There, catching the sun's first golden glow, some object had cast it back, creating a veritable conflagration of red and gold.

Dave, remembering to have viewed such a sight in other days, and in what must have been something of the same location, stared in silence for a full minute before he spoke:

"If it is," he said slowly, "there's only one salvation for us. We've got to get down out of the clouds. The last time I saw that riot of color it was on the sh.o.r.e of the ocean, or very near it, and to drift over the Arctic Ocean in this crazy craft is to invite death."

He sprang for the door which led to the narrow plank-way about the cabin and to the rigging where the valve-cord must hang suspended.

CHAPTER XI

DANGLING IN MID AIR

Before dawn, the morning after his interview with Mazie, Johnny was away for the camp of the Mongols. There was a moist freshness in the air which told of approaching spring, yet winter lingered.

It was a fair-sized cavalcade that accompanied him; eight burly Russians on horseback and six in a sled drawn by two stout horses. For himself he had secured a single horse and a rude sort of cutter. He was not alone in the cutter. Beside him sat a small brown person. This person was an Oriental. There could be no mistake about that. Mazie had told him only that here was his interpreter through whom all his dealings with the Mongols would be done.

He wondered much about the interpreter. He had met with some fine characters among the brown people. There had been Hanada, his school friend, and Cio-Cio-San, that wonder-girl who had traveled with him. He had met with some bad ones too, and that not so long ago. His experiences at the mines had made him, perhaps, unduly suspicious.

He did not like it at all when he found, after a long day of travel and two hours of supper and pitching camp, with half the journey yet to go, that this little yellow person proposed to share his skin tent for the night. At first he was inclined to object. Yet, when he remembered the feeling that existed between these people and the Russians, he realized at once that he could scarcely avoid having the interpreter for a tent-mate.

Nothing was said as the two, with a candle flickering and flaring between them, prepared to slip into their sleeping-bags for the night.

When, at last, the candle was snuffed out, Johnny found that he could not sleep. The cold air of the long journey had pried his eyes wide open; they would not go shut. He could think only of perils from small yellow people.

He was, indeed, in a position to invite treachery, since he carried on his person many pounds of gold. He, himself, did not know its exact value; certainly it was thousands of dollars. He had taken that which the doctor had carried, and had left the doctor to do what he could for the sufferers, and to a.s.sist Mazie in her preparations of the great kitchens and dining-room where thousands were to be fed.

For a long time, he thought of treachery, of dark perils, reaching a b.l.o.o.d.y hand out of the dark. But presently a new and soothing sensation came to him. He dreamed of other days. He was once more on the long journey north, the one he had taken the year previous. Cio-Cio-San was sleeping near him. They were on a great white expanse, alone. There was no peril; all was peace.

So great was the illusion that he scratched a match and gazed at the sleeping face near him.

He gave a little start at the revelation it brought. Certainly, there was a striking resemblance here to the face of Cio-Cio-San. Yet, he told himself, it could not be. This person was a man. And, besides, Cio-Cio-San was now rich. She was in her own country living in luxury and comfort, a lady bountiful among her own people.

He told himself all this, and yet so much of the illusion remained that he fell asleep and slept soundly until the rattle of harness and the shout of hors.e.m.e.n told him that morning was upon them and they must be off.

He looked for his companion. He was gone. When Johnny had dressed, he found the interpreter busily a.s.sisting with the morning repast.

"Just like Cio-Cio-San," he muttered to himself, as he dipped his hands into icy water for a morning splash.

After his escape from the two Bolsheviki in the machine shed, Pant sat by the entrance to his mine in breathless expectancy. The two Russians certainly had not seen him enter the mine, but others might have done so, and, more than that, there was grave danger that they would track him to his place of hiding.

He was not surprised when his alert ear caught a sound from without, close at hand. He only crowded a little further back into the corner, that the light from the broken-in entrance, providing it was discovered and crushed, should not fall upon him.

His heart thumped loudly. His hand gripped his automatic. He expected immediate action from without. His hopes of reaching the mother-lode of this mine vanished. He thought now only of escape.

But action was delayed. Now and then there came sounds as of footsteps and now a scratching noise reached his ear. The crust of the snow was hard.

Perhaps they were attempting to tear it away with some crude implement, a stick or board.

As he listened, he heard the whine of a dog. So this was it? One of their hounds had tracked him down. They were probably afraid of him and would wait for him to come out.

"In that case," he whispered to himself, "they will wait a long, long time."

He did not desert his post. To be caught in the far end of the mine meant almost certain torture and death.

As he listened, he heard the dog's whine again and again, and it was always accompanied by the scratching sound. What could that mean? A hound which has found the lair of its prey does not whine. He bays his message, telling out to all the world that he has cornered his prey.

The more the boy thought of it, the more certain he became that this was not one of the Russian hounds. But if not, then what dog was it? Perhaps one of Johnny Thompson's which had escaped. If it were, he would be a friend.

Of one thing Pant became more and more positive: there were no men with the dog. From this conclusion he came to a decision on a definite course of action. If the dog was alone, whether friend or foe, he would eventually attract attention and that would bring disaster. The logical thing to do would be to pull out the snow-cake door and admit the beast.

If he were one of the Russians wolf-hounds--Pant drew a short-bladed knife from his belt; an enemy's dog would be silenced with that.

With trembling fingers he gripped the white door and drew it quickly away.

The next instant a furry monster leaped toward him.

It was a tense moment. In the flash of a second, he could not determine the character of the dog. His knife gleamed in his hand. To delay was dangerous. The beast might, in a twinkle, be at his throat.

He did not strike. With a supple motion he sprang to one side as the dog shot past him. By the time he had turned back toward the entrance, Pant recognized him as a white man's dog.

"Well, howdy, old sport," he exclaimed, as the dog leaped upon him, ready to pull him to pieces out of pure joy.

"Down, down, sir!"

The dog dropped at his feet. In another minute the snow-door was in its place again.

"Well, old chap," said Pant, peering at the dog through his goggles. "You came to share fortunes with me, did you? The little yellow men had a tiger; I've got a dog. That's better. A tiger'd leave you; a dog never.

Besides, old top, you'll tell me when there's danger lurking 'round, won't you? But tell me one thing now: did anyone see you come in here?"

The dog beat the damp floor with his tail.