Buffalo Bill's death message or, In the face of doom
jotting down the words in his notebook, “and it has a finger pointed
toward the corner of this singular room. Possibly that may indicate
something.”
Buffalo Bill was stooping again, with a lighted match, to look at the
wooden plug in the corner, to which that stone finger appeared to point.
It seemed set tightly in a hole in the stone, but when he pulled on it,
the wooden plug came easily away.
At the same time a startling thing occurred. The wooden framework in
which they stood began to sink downward into the rock, dropping as if
into a well. The thing that had seemed an elevator _was an elevator_.
This sudden drop downward into that well-like space was too startling
almost for belief. It seemed to the scout a part of what had appeared to
him in the night as a dream—a part of that impression of fiery eyes and
darkness and clutching fingers.
Bounderby uttered an exclamation of dismay and astonishment, and
Henselman flopped down with a grunt of terrified helplessness.
“_Mein Gott in himmel!_” he cried. “Vat iss? Brofessor, ve iss all dead
men!”
Nor were the other members of the party less astounded than Bounderby
and the German.
After a quick descent the rickety car stopped with a thump that almost
shook Buffalo Bill from his feet.
Henselman emitted another squawk of fear.
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CHAPTER XXI.
FURTHER SURPRISES.
As the elevator thus came to a standstill the scout and those with him
dimly saw in the gloom an open door.
As explained, the elevator was nothing but a framework of decaying wood,
hence it was plain that this door was in the wall of the elevator well.
Buffalo Bill, unhesitating, struck another match, while his companions
were variously expressing their astonishment. Its light showed that the
door opened into a small, square room, which, except for that light, was
perfectly dark. The only door it had was the one entering from the
elevator.
Not without some hesitation did the scout step forth into this room. As
the light of the match flamed higher he beheld a sight which called
another exclamation from his lips.
An Indian sat in a crouched attitude in a corner.
Lawler saw the Indian at the same instant, and Buffalo Bill heard the
clicking of the boy’s revolver.
“Don’t shoot!” was the scout’s warning, and he thrust the match down
toward the Indian. “He is dead!”
The match went out, and it was necessary to ignite another before
further examinations could be made.
Then they discovered that the Indian was not only dead, but that he was,
in fact, a mummy, but so well preserved that he was not like the
dried-up specimens of Indian mummies usually seen. He had the appearance
of an Indian who had been not long dead.
In his mouth, projecting from between his teeth, he held a queer-looking
flat stone. The scout flashed upon it the fight of the match, and saw
that the stone held written characters, or what appeared to be written
characters.
“See here, professor!” he said, and Bounderby came forward, trying hard
to suppress any manifestation of his really great excitement. “There is
something written on this stone, professor; it seems to be a message, or
a letter, or, perhaps, instructions. I should guess instructions. But
it’s in a writing I never saw before.”
Professor Bounderby gravely produced his eyeglasses, strung them across
his nose, and bent to look at the flat stone projecting from between the
lips of the mummy.
“It’s only visible in part,” he urged. “I——”
The scout took hold of the stone, and it came away easily. It was flat
and round and covered on both sides with what seemed to be figures, or
writing in hieroglyphics.
“Can you make it out, professor? It’s beyond me, I confess.”
All stared at Bounderby, and at the stone which the scout placed in his
hands.
“It’s Aztec,” Bounderby declared, when he had looked it over. The
professor was guessing, for he really did not know what it was; but as
his scholarly ability seemed to be at stake, he said “Aztec.” Perhaps he
was correct.
“It’s certainly Aztec, Cody, Aztec picture-writing; but I can’t read
it.”
Butler and Lawler were looking around.
“That image above, you know, pointed to a wooden plug, and that showed
us how to make the elevator descend. There’s another plug like it over
there—somewhat like it, anyhow.”
It was Butler who spoke. He gave this wooden pin a pull, as the scout
had done the other, with a result as startling. With a jerk and a
wheezing grind, the elevator began to ascend.
Fritz Henselman, who had lingered in the doorway, gave a squeal of
fright, and came plunging into the room, with a jump such as a bullfrog
might have made; he had come near getting squeezed by the elevator, as
it shot up past the doorway.
The match that had been flaming in the scout’s fingers went out,
plunging the room into darkness. All stood in silence, hearing that
grinding roar as the elevator ascended. They heard, also, the chugging
sound it made as it stopped. The silence that followed was oppressive.
It was broken by Henselman.
“Brofessor, ve are all dead alretty yet! Der elefator has lefd us! Vot
shall ve do?”
The elevator had left them, they were inclosed in that small room, with
their only apparent avenue of escape the elevator well.
Lieutenant Butler struck a match with hands that trembled.
“That was my fault,” he said. “I was too confident—too positive. I
thought if I pulled that plug we might descend again here; in other
words, I foolishly thought this room was also an elevator. Instead of
that, the elevator which brought us here was sent back by my act.”
The scout likewise struck a match, and Lawler did the same.
With these matches burning, the room was plainly revealed. The door
opened into the elevator well, but when this was inspected it was seen
how impossible it was to climb out of it without ropes. The elevator
worked up and down in a rough wooden frame, but this frame could not be
ascended. Apparently the party was immured in that room of stone under
the ground.
“Some one may use the elevator and come down here,” suggested young
Lawler. “If that should happen, we’d make him take us out of this.”
Lieutenant Butler continued to inspect the well of the elevator, still
hoping it could be ascended, while Buffalo Bill was looking around the
room in which they were imprisoned. Bounderby was beginning to show the
terror he had so long and successfully concealed. His face was white and
drawn, and his form trembled. As for Fritz Henselman, he had never made
any pretense of bravery, and had now given way to a great fright.
“Brofessor, ve iss all dead men!” he continued to declare, with much
monotony.
Professor Bounderby began again to study the stone taken from the mouth
of the mummy. He was hoping to guess from the looks of the characters on
it what it said; for he, as well as the scout, was convinced that the
stone held the secret.
Staring at the stone, and then at the dark face of the mummy, the
professor, perhaps to bolster up his courage, and certainly to make the
others think him courageous, began to apostrophize the mummy.
“Thou lump of human clay, lifeless these hundreds of years, tell us the
meaning of this! What secret dost thou hold in that heart of dust? What
words of life and freedom are concealed behind those cracking lips? Out
with it! Spell us the message on this page of stone!”
Buffalo Bill had made a round of the small room, without the discovery
of anything that gave hope. There was no other wooden pin, no suggestive
projection, nothing that hinted of a way out.
“Yield up thy secret!” the professor adjured the stony-faced mummy.
“Perhaps there is something hidden in the rags of raiment which clothe
him,” the scout ventured.
There was a tattered blanket of Indian weave, some coarse-fibered
mummy-cloth, together with a sort of cape of matting laid over the
mummy’s shoulders.
Buffalo Bill stooped to lift this matting, and, in doing so,
unintentionally drew the mummy toward him. It pitched forward on its
face, and behind it was a hole.
It will be recalled that it sat in a crouching attitude in a corner of
the room. In that corner was a niche which it had filled, and that
niche, or hole, was undoubtedly a door.
Bounderby’s mouth dropped open, so great was his astonishment. He was
for the moment so surprised that he had not a word he could say; which
was remarkable, as he usually had altogether too many words for every
occasion. The scout uttered an exclamation of amazement.
“What is it?” cried Lawler and Lieutenant Butler in a breath.
“A way out!” said the scout, his voice shaking with the tremendous
significance of his discovery.
Both Lawler and Butler rushed to see, and stared into that black hole.
The scout pitched his flaming match down into it. He thought he was to
be forced to regret this, for a flame shot upward, and this flame licked
into the little room, which began to fill with smoke. But the flame
began to die down almost at once. Then the excited discoverers found
that the match had fallen upon some mummy-cloth, which had dropped from
the back of the mummy into the open space that lay behind that little
nichelike door.
“There is a good draft here,” said the scout, as he watched the smoke.
“And that proves one thing. Air comes through that little hole, feeding
the fire, and goes up the elevator shaft, as up a chimney. That shows
there is a way out, or, at least, a way for the air to get in.”
Henselman staggered to his feet.
“Dere iss a vay oudt?” he screeched.
“I think so; we’re hoping so.”
Henselman pushed the scout aside, and poked his head into the small
hole. But the fire flamed up again, scorching his face and hair, and he
tumbled back.
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CHAPTER XXII.
MORE DISCOVERIES.
Buffalo Bill stooped and looked down into the hole, as soon as the fire
had ceased and the smoke no longer rose in a way to suffocate him. He
struck another match, which he held in his hand instead of tossing it
down. Its light showed a narrow, cramped gallery leading off into the
darkness. He announced his discovery to those behind him.
“Of course,” said Bounderby, in his superior tone, “an elevator
descending can be expected to descend to a place where the passengers
can get out. Strange we did not think of that before!”
“We thought of it, professor,” Butler corrected, “but we couldn’t find
that way out. But here it is, Cody has found it.”
Henselman came to his feet again. “Brofessor, de hant pag iss gone!” he
announced, with a wail.
“It was in your charge, Henselman! What has become of it?”
“Der elefator took id. Ven der elefator went oop de hant pag also id
went oop. Yaw! Vat iss?”
Butler and Lawler, not heeding this, were crowding in back of Buffalo
Bill, trying to look into the tunnel he had discovered. Professor
Bounderby took off his hat and scratched his bald head in a puzzled way.
“Henselman, when we get back to civilization, I shall discharge you for
this bit of carelessness!” he announced with severity. “That hand bag
contains the ore specimens I have labored so hard to get, it represents
the work of nearly three weeks of dangerous toil. And now it is gone!”
“Yaw! Id iss gone!” The rotund German waddled to the elevator well and
looked up. “But, brofessor,” he said, and his voice changed as the
thought came to him, “uff you hat peen combelled to carry dose hant pag
like me, you voult rechoice dot id is gone alretty yet. Nein?”
The excited talk of Buffalo Bill and those with him made the professor