Page:Amazing Stories Volume 01 Number 12.djvu/19

Rh “I know all about it,” he said and grinned in spite of himself.

The men stared. Pablo Pasca paused in his journeys to and from the kitchen tent to stare at the boy and the gold.

“Know all about what?” cut in Pethwick jumpily.

“The gold or the mystery?”

“Both.”

Suddenly Pablo cried—

“I told you, señores, wealth lies where danger is so great!”

“Have you found a gold mine?” asked M. Demetriovich.

“No, I sold one of my books.”

“Whom to—when—where—my Lord; who was the sucker?”-Pethwick's questions almost exploded out of him.

“I had no idea my book had such a reputation,” beamed the author.

“Youngster, if you'll cut the literary twaddle——” quavered Pethwick on edge.

“Well, I had a hunch there must be some very simple explanation of all this skull and cross-bone stuff you fellows were trying to pull. You know that doesn't go on in real life. It's only fiction, that resort of the mentally muddled——”

“Standifer! Spill it—if you know anything!”

“Go on, tell it your own way,” encouraged Demetriovich. “You were saying ‘mentally muddled.’”

“Sure—yes, well, nothing to it, you know. This life is very simple, once you get the key.”

“Lord, doesn't that sound like 'Reindeer in Iceland'!” groaned the engineer.

“What was the light we saw just then, Mr. Standifer?” inquired the savant, who saw that the secretary would never get anywhere unaided.

“A new sort of portable furnace, sir, that extracts and reduces ores on the spot.”

“Who runs it?”

“Indians.”

“Have you seen any of them?”

“Saw one not three hours ago. Sold him a copy of ‘Reindeer in Iceland.’”

Pethwick interrupted the catechism.

“Gave you that much gold for a copy of 'Reindeer in Iceland'! for the whole edition of ‘Reindeer in Iceland’!”

“Did you enquire about Cesare?” proceeded M. Demetriovich.

“Yes, he's working for them.”

“Did you think to ask about the chlorophyll?”

“That's used in a secret process of extracting gold.”

“You say the men engaged in such a method of mining are Indians?”

“The man I saw was an Indian.”

“Did you talk to him in English, Spanish, Quicha? What language?”

The secretary hesitated.

“Well—in English, but I had to explain the language to him. I think he knew it once but had forgotten it.”

“A lot of South Americans are educated in the States,” observed Pethwick, who by now was listening intently.

“Tell us what happened, Mr. Standifer,” requested the Rumanian.

ELL, today I was about twelve miles down the valley. I had sat down to eat my lunch when I saw an Indian behind a rock staring at me as if his eyes would pop out of his head. I don't mind admitting it grave me a turn, after the way things have been happening around here. On second glance I thought it was Cesare. I was about to yell and ask when the fellow himself yelled at me—

“‘Hey, Cesare, is that you?’

“Well, it nearly bowled me over. But I got a grip on my nerves and shouted back, ‘No, I'm not Cesare!’ And I was about to ask who the fellow was when he took it right out of my mouth and shouted to me, ‘Who are you?’

“I told him my name and address, that I was an author and secretary of the De Long Geographical Expedition; then I asked him to come out and let's have a talk.

“The fellow came out all right, walking up to me, looking hard at me. He was an ordinary Indian with a big head and had on clothes about like Cesare's. In fact, you know it is hard to tell Indians apart. As he came up he asked me the very question I had in mind—

“‘Do you know Cesare?’

“I said, ‘Yes; where is he?’

“He stood looking at me and shook his head.

“I said, ‘You don't know,’ and he touched his mouth and laughed. Then I guessed that he didn't understand English very well, so I began explaining the language to him.

“He would point at something and say, ‘Is that a bird? Is that a stone? Is that a river?’ In each case he got it right, but there was always a hesitation, of about a second, perhaps, as if he were thinking like this: ‘is that a—river?’”

Both the older men were staring intently at the boy as if they were trying to read something behind his words. Pethwick nodded impatiently.

“I am sure,” continued Standifer, “the fellow once knew English and it was coming back to him.”

“Undoubtedly,” from Pethwick.

“Then he saw the corner of my book in my haversack, for I—I sometimes carry my book around to read when I'm lonely, and he said, 'What is that —‘Reindeer in Iceland’?”

“That joggled me so, I said, ‘Yes, how the deuce did you know that?’

“Well, at that he almost laughed himself to death and finally he said just about what was in my mind; ‘That has a wider reputation than you imagine,’ and he added, ‘What is it for?’

“ ‘What is what for?’ says I.

“ ‘Reindeer in Iceland,’ says he.

“ ‘To read,’ says I. ‘It contains facts,’ says I. ‘It's not like the rotten fiction you pick up.’ And with that my whole spiel that I used to put up to the farmers in New York State when I sold my books from door to door came back to me. I thought what a lark it would be to try to sell a copy to an Indian in the Rio Infiernillo. ‘If I do that,’ I thought to myself, ‘I'll be the star book-agent of both the Americas.’ So I began:

“ ‘It's not like the rotten fiction you buy,’ says I. ‘This volume gives you the truth about reindeer in Iceland; it tells you their food, their strength, their endurance, their value in all the different moneys