Harry Gordon

“ During a dark moment he heard the bunt, felt the jar, of a prow against the side of the Rambler. He sat still and listened, his only motion being that of an arm to bring his automatic revolver into position for use.
Presently the light boat tipped a trifle to the east, as if some heavy body or bodies were keeling her over by clinging to the railing which ran around the deck. Whispered words in Spanish followed, and then the soft pad of a naked foot on the planks. ”

“ The Brazilian night was dark, and there was a whisper of wind in the trees. The water lapped the shores and the sides of the boat unceasingly, as if uttering a warning to them to be up and away. It was almost unbearably hot, too, for they were nearly under the equator.
“I think I know what the kid is thinking about when he talks of a cargo,” Alex said, presently. “He has often talked to me about gathering Brazil nuts and taking a load out to some shipping point. They bring good prices in New York.”
“Do you mean these three-cornered nuts?” asked Jule. ”

“ For two days the boys sat under an awning which had been spread over the hot forward deck and feasted their city-bred eyes on the luxuriance of the tropical forest. It was all new and strange to them. In some places the boughs of the great trees met over their heads, making a green bower of the bayou through which they were passing.
Now and then a native Indian glided past them in a canoe made of some light wood. These natives are dark as negroes, but their hair is long and straight. They are not at all warlike. ”

“ Taken all in all, the life the boys lived there on the mighty river, under the equator, was ideal from a boy’s viewpoint.
There were, besides many birds well known at the North, kingfishers, green and blue tree-creepers, purple-headed tanagers, and humming birds. Butterflies were everywhere, of every size and color. And there were the cicadas, at home in every tree, sending out their jarring, reedy notes. The forests were alive with sound, and the lads realized that even the roar of Chicago would sometimes be small beside the constant ring of wild life. ”

“ There was no one in sight. Even what could be seen of the thoroughfare under the lamp, and this was not much, seemed deserted. Rainy, windy nights are not popular with pedestrians in Chicago any more than elsewhere.
Even the occupants of vessels tied up at piers above and below the motor boat were silent in cabins or asleep in their bunks. A dull, heavy roar came out of the city, telling of activities in the noisy loop district, but there was little more than the dash of the rain on the deck where the boys stood listening and waiting. ”

“ CHAPTER X.—A CAMPFIRE IN THE JUNGLE “What do you mean by something worth while?” demanded Alex, busy with pancakes at the electric stove.
“It probably isn’t a dog!” laughed Jule.
“You let Captain Joe alone,” commanded Alex, “or I’ll instruct him to make a supper of you. He’s some dog!”
“Where can any cargo procured here be disposed of?” asked Clay, hopefully, remembering the empty purse.
“There’s a little town up the river where vessels bound for Europe take on cargoes,” Frank explained, with a knowing smile, “and we may find something we can get rid of if we tell them we need the money.” ”

“ The fellow’s eyes “hung out like a hat pin,” as Case afterwards expressed it, and his mouth dropped agape, as if there were no strength in the fellow to control the action of his jaws.
“For the love of Madge!” cried Frank. “What does the man see?”
“I’m not going to stop to answer that question!” Case replied. “It’s me for the Rambler!”
Ugly did not even notice the lads as they started away. He stood perfectly still for an instant, then turned and ran, diving head first into the thicket as a swimmer dives into an oncoming breaker. ”

“ So, while Frank and Case were waiting in the keenest anxiety at the point from which Jule had entered the water, while Clay and Alex were in the bushes not far away, watching with all the eyes in their heads for a shot at their enemies, and while the two Englishmen were trying to mature some plan for getting into the boat without running the risk of passing under the light, Jule made his way along the bottom of the creek, rising to breathe only at rare intervals, and finally came up, without being discovered, at the rear of the boat. ”

“ Someone said that the only place from which to view a South American forest in all its glory is from the top of a mountain, or from an aeroplane.”
“There isn’t much magnificence down here,” Alex answered. “Here, Jule, what you got in your clothes that smells like matches, and what you sneaking off there alone for?”
“Never you mind!” Jule replied. “You just stick to your guesses and let me alone. I’m going to give those boys the scare of their lives. I’ll teach them to go off and stay like this!”
“You stay here!” commanded Clay, but the mischievous boy was already gone. ”

“ Frank stood as if still unconvinced.
“Quit!” Jule remonstrated, as Case lifted him to his feet. “You let me go! Don’t you know any more than to take a fellow by the hair of his head. “Quit, I tell you!”
Case released the boy, whose face and hands were still shining with the sulphur which he had rubbed from old-fashioned matches, and pushed him away as he arose to his feet.
“You smell like a match factory!” he said.
Jule leaned against the bole of the tree and laughed until the woods rang again, while Frank stood looking on with wonder in his eyes. ”

“ There was never anything profane or coarse about his lapses into the dialect of the street, but by common consent all slang had been barred. Now he was glad that Clay was not near to hear this new outburst.
The dog began sniffing at the window on the inside. He would have recognized Jule, doubtless, in a moment only for the odor of sulphur with which his clothes, even though they were wet, was permeated.
“Lie down, dog!” Jule whispered. ”

“ Alex was too excited to talk for a time. He just danced up and down and shook the fluttering ends of the banknotes in the faces of his chums whenever he came in contact with him. In the meantime the Spaniard had arisen to his feet, and now, the Rambler having stopped, stood beckoning to the men in the row-boat to come on.
“Where’s your bill?” asked Case, approaching the gesticulating merchant. “We’re going to cash up. Here, Alex, bring me that money!” ”

“ The arrows are expelled with such force that the sound of their exit from the muzzle is something like that made by a popgun. They are frequently tipped with the fatal urari poison.
One night, under the brilliant light of the moon, the boys saw a black tiger or jaguar drinking at the edge of the little creek in which their boat lay. They were anxious to take the fellow’s hide as a souvenir of the trip, and so Clay and Alex cautiously left the boat and struck into the forest back of the spot where the tiger was quenching his thirst. ”

“ Case ventured. “Just fake stones, like the glad-hand men carry. They couldn’t be real diamonds, hustled about in the rain like this!”
“But they are real diamonds,” insisted Clay. “If I ever saw the real thing this is it.”
He untied the brown leather bag, pressed open the mouth with his fingers, and poured a gleaming current of diamonds on the table, where they rolled about like sparks of fire caught and held in captivity. Alex and Case stood dumbly regarding their chum, moving their eyes, presently, from his inscrutable face to the gems on the table. ”

“ During the absence of the boys and the dog Frank moved restlessly about the hot little cabin and the crowded forward deck. It was plain to both Clay and Case that he anticipated something important as a result of the trip ashore.
Alex and Jule were reckless and full of pranks, but he knew them to be courageous, resourceful and tenacious of any purpose undertaken. He thought they would have little difficulty in finding the man they sought. The only question in his mind was as to whether they would not, by some prankish trick, get themselves into trouble with the people of the town. ”

“ The lads went ashore in the boat while Captain Joe stood on the prow and threw glances of sorrow and reproach at them. When they reached the shore, however, Alex gave out a long, shrill whistle and the next moment Captain Joe was in the river, swimming to his feet!
“Go it!” Case stormed. “He’ll get you into a fight, and we’ll have to come and get you out. Go it, and have all the fun you want to, but lookout for squalls.”
“That is the first evil forecast I have heard from you in a long time,” laughed Clay. ”

“ Off in the forest they could hear the call of a jaguar, probably the mate of the one that had been killed by the ant-eater.
A great chattering in the trees told of the presence of monkeys, but the boys did not molest them. The alligators, too, were immune from the guns of the party. The only thing the lads killed relentlessly, at all times and under all circumstances, was the snake.
“I move,” Clay began, as they all sat under the wire netting, looking out on the attractive and unfamiliar scene, “that we go on to Cloud island in the morning and do our exploring when we come down. ”

“ Jule urged the dog on by pointing as he spoke. Captain Joe licked his chops, as if anxious to sample the intruder, but he was stuck fast, and the boarder was now half out of the water.
“Get him, Joe! Get him!”
The boy gave a yank at the dog’s head as he gave the command, and then something happened. The dog slipped out of the window opening, passed through Jule’s arms like a white flash of light and launched himself on the man who was almost on the platform. ”

“ Frank resumed, “the cavern where the gold is, is not a cavern at all! There was once a cavern there, but it was filled with gold and the wash of the mountains, so it now presents a level surface to the eye of one entering the crater.” ”

“ Shortly before noon the next day the Rambler passed out of the narrow bayou she had been following and speeded out on the Amazon, the river of their dreams! It is needless to say that the boys opened their eyes wide at sight of the famous stream, which is dotted with islands at that point, looking more like a lake than a river. It is so wide that the shores are only dimly seen from the center of the current.
In the afternoon they reached the little harbor where they were to buy gasoline. When, after some haggling and unnecessary delay, the motors were started again, Clay looked very sober. ”

“ I guess this wouldn’t be much of a boat club if it wasn’t for Clay.”
“Why, boys, there’s nothing else to do in this case,” Clay said, a flush of pleasure at such an endorsement. “We can’t lie down before every little hill that looms up before us! We can’t give up this trip, and leave Jule to die in this beastly climate. Now, can we?”
“Not in a thousand years!” cried Alex.
“That will do for you!” Case suggested, turning to Alex with a grin.
“Never said it!” insisted Alex. “We all agreed not to talk slang, so slang’s cut out!”
“Slang is cheap,” Clay remarked, to no one in particular. ”

“ Suppose you let me try?”
“Not in a hundred years!” chuckled Jule. “I guess you don’t know I’m the champion under-water swimmer of Chicago! I’ll be inside the boat in no time, and then there will be doings. I’ll show my devil face to the bushmen and let the dog out, and there won’t be anything to it. Perhaps I’d better make a devil dog out of Captain Joe!”
“Try it, and he’ll eat you up!” cried Case. “Don’t be foolish.”
“The sulphur will wash off,” warned Frank.
“Water will only make it all the brighter,” insisted Jule. “Now watch me go to it! When I get in, you boys come. Will you? All right! ”

“ Another shot came from farther down, and the barking of the dog became fierce and incessant.
“Captain Joe will be eating up that cabin next,” Jule volunteered. “I wish I could tell him what to say!”
“Why don’t they go into the cabin and let him out?” asked Frank.
“Because neither side can get into the boat,” replied Case, grasping the situation at once. “Anyone showing himself under that prow light would be shot to death in a second. The only way the ruffians can get to the Rambler is to shoot out the light.” ”

“ As the boy spoke a boat put out from a pier on the south shore and proceeded swiftly toward the steamer with the yellow and green stack. It was not light enough out on the river to enable the boys to recognize any of the faces in the craft, but Case put his hand on Clay’s arm, warning him to remain silent until the rowers came under the prow light of the steamer.
“That’s the man!” he said presently, as a light from the deck of the steamer struck fairly in the faces of those in the boat.
“Yes; that is the man!” ”

“ When you get up to the top of some of the mountains, you can’t get any higher in this world, without going up in an aeroplane, and then you wouldn’t be in the world at all, but out of it and above it.”
“Well, we aren’t very near it yet,” Case replied.
“But we will be nearer it, physically, to-morrow night at this time,” Alex kept on. “Think of it! Through the drainage canal like an arrow in this good little motor boat, down the Mississippi with a rush, into the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean sea and out again, and then along the coast to the mouth of the Amazon! ”

“ Frank made no reply, but walked back to his old place on the rear platform, which he reached by creeping over the low roof of the cabin.
“Perhaps there is gold on this Cloud island,” suggested Jule.
“There is something there worth fighting for,” Case argued. “Then, where did the kid get all that gold? He brought it out with him, you know, and hid it in a tree!”
“Ho, ho!” laughed Jule, “there are no twenty-dollar gold pieces down in the mines of Peru. All that gold he brought out saw the little old U. S. long before it saw Peru!” ”