“It’s all of that.” The fisherman’s blue eyes were frank and kind. “But I thought I’d ought to tell you, just in case you don’t know, there’s someone waiting for you up there.”
“No.” The girl spoke quickly. “No, there is no one at all. We are going by ourselves, just Greta and I. We sent no one ahead.”
“I believe you,” Swen replied. “All the same, there’s someone up there. I’ll tell you how I know.”
As if to collect his thoughts, he had paused, looking away at Greenstone Ridge. Florence recalled that now.
It was worth looking at, that ridge. In truth, every little corner of this large island was worth looking at.
Just then the setting sun had transformed the far-away green of spruce and balsam into a crown of green and gold.
“I’ll tell you why I know there’s someone up there,” Swen went on presently. “I’ve got a little store down by the end of the harbor. Four times that store has been entered. Things have been taken. Not stolen; just taken and the money left to pay for them. The first three times it was food they took. The last time it was a grinding stone for polishing greenstone. Cost me five dollars. The five was there. Can you beat that?”
“But your store is on the other side of the island,” Florence had protested. “That’s another place entirely. We’re not going there.”
“It’s all the same ridge,” Swen explained, patiently. “When you come to the tip-top of the ridge and if you go far enough toward the center of the island—not so far, either—you can look down on Duncan’s Bay on your side and upon our harbor on the other.
“And up there somewhere,” he added with conviction, “there’s someone. I know it! He took things from our store.”
Florence had thought of Greta’s phantom. Could it be that there truly was someone living on this ridge? And would they discover that person?
“He pays for things he takes. He is honest,” she argued to herself. “He loves music. No true musician could be unkind or brutal.”
“But, after all,” she had insisted, turning her face to Swen, “after all, there is no one. A boat came along at night. The people in the boat took the things from your store.”
“Came in a boat, that’s what I thought at first.” The light of mystery shone in the fisherman’s eye. “But the last time, that time he took the grinding wheel and left the five dollars in gold, there was a storm on old Superior, a terrible nor-easter. No one could have lived in that sea. And there wasn’t so much as a rowboat in the harbor.
“And that person don’t live on the shore, either,” he went on after a moment. “Know every boat of the shore, I do. Naturally, then, they’re up there on Greenstone Ridge somewhere, someone is, that’s certain.”
“How—how long ago?” The words had stuck in Florence’s throat.
“First time was all of a year ago. Last time, early this spring.”
“Then—then perhaps he’s gone. This is August, you know.”
“Maybe, miss. Somehow I don’t think so.”
“Why would anyone stay a whole year in such a place? Think what it would mean!” Her eyes had opened wide. “No companions! No food except what you have taken up. All alone!”
“You’re assuming there’s only one. I don’t know. There might be more. Articles have been found missing from cottages closed for the winter, food and clothing. Always paid for, though. One fisherman, who was very poor, found the price of three pairs of boots left for one pair; well-worn ones they were, too.
“But why do they stay up there?” he went on. “It’s your question. Perhaps you will find the answer.”
“Wh—why haven’t you been up there to see?” Florence asked.
“Me? See here, miss, I’m a fisherman—belong to the water. No land lubberin’ for mine! And besides, I’ve a father and mother to look after. I got my money for the things he took, didn’t I? Then what call do I have looking into places like that?”
Once again the girl had looked away to the place where the ridge must be. It was gone, swallowed up in the night. Not a light had shone up there. Not a campfire gleamed.
“There is no one up there,” she had whispered to herself as she stood alone on the deck of the wrecked ship, straining her eyes for even a very small gleam against the sky. “There can’t be. They’d have a lamp of some sort, even if it were only a pine knot torch.”
Then of a sudden she had thought of the curious green light Greta had seen at a distance on that very ridge.
“What could have caused that light?” she had asked herself.
She asked it all over again as she trudged away over the moose trail.
“Of course,” she thought, “there’s the head hunter. But he’s out. Such men don’t climb ridges unless they’re obliged to—too lazy for that! And they don’t make divine music nor light green lamps at night.
“I suppose,” she whispered to herself after a time, “suppose I should have told Greta what Swen said, but—”
Well, she just hadn’t wanted to, that was all. Perhaps she had been selfish, she had wanted this trip so much. She had wanted company too. And too much talk about the secrets of Greenstone Ridge might have frightened Greta out altogether.
“Do you know why they call this Greenstone Ridge?” she said aloud to Greta.
“No. Why?”
“Because there is a kind of quartz embedded in some of the rocks. They call these greenstones. They are about the seventh most valuable stone in the world.”
“Shall we find some?” Greta’s tone was eager.
“We’ll hope so.” Florence shifted her pack. “They make grand settings for rings, things like that. You chip them from the rocks with a chisel or hatchet.”
“Green stones,” Greta whispered to herself. “Green stone and a green light on this very ridge. Of course, there’s no connection; but then, it’s sort of strange.”
CHAPTER XV
A LEAP IN THE DARK
Jeanne’s row from the Ship of Joy to the small dock before the ancient lighthouse was a short one. Her boat tied up, she hurried along the dock, then over the winding path leading up the gentle slope.
Darkness was falling. Even now, from the schooner’s cabin she caught a yellow gleam of light. She cast a hurried glance toward the tall stone tower.
“They live up there somewhere,” she murmured. “But there’s no light.”
She quickened her step. “Soon be dark.”
Hesitating before a door, she took a grip on herself, then seized the doorknob and gave it a quick turn. The door flew open. Silence, the faint smell of smoked fish and half darkness greeted her. She was at the foot of a winding stairway. She sprang forward and up. At the top of that stairway was a second door. It stood ajar. She rapped on it. No answer. A louder rap. Still no answer.
“Just make sure.” She pushed the door open. “Yes,” she told herself, “someone lives here, some old people who love comfort, chairs and soft, home-made cushions and all that. Dear old people they must be. And there, there’s a rag doll! Must be children, too. Swen never spoke of them. Perhaps—”
She was beginning to think she had come to the wrong lighthouse when a sound from the stairs caused her to start violently.
“Who—who’s there?” Her voice shook ever so slightly.
There came no answer. Instinctively the girl sprang toward the center of this tower room.
Perhaps this movement saved her. As she whirled about she saw to her horror that there, standing in the doorway, was the head hunter. She had not seen him before, but from Florence’s description she knew she could not be mistaken. There was the same short, stout body, the dark, evil face, the blood-shot eyes. That he recognized her as Florence’s friend she could not doubt. There was a look of savage glee in his eyes. His yellow teeth showed like fangs.
For a space of seconds the little French girl stood paralyzed with fear. Then as her eyes circled the room they caught sight of a second door. She sprang toward this.
The door swung open and banged shut. Like a flash she was away up a second flight of stairs.
“This leads to the top of the tower,” she told herself. “And when I’m out there?”
A bat, frightened from the beams, flashed by her, another, and still another. She hated and feared bats. But a greater terror lay behind. There came the sound of heavy steps.
Darkness lay before her. “A trap door.” Her frightened mind recorded these words. “What if it is locked?”
It was not locked. She was through it. It slammed behind her. There was no lock on that side. What was to be done?
Two heavy stones on the ledge beside her seemed loose. They were loose. Pushing more than lifting, she banged one down upon the door, then the other. She caught the sound of muttered curses as the second stone banged down.
Safe for the moment, she considered her next move. That the man would, in time, be able to wreck that door she did not doubt. “Sure to be an axe down there,” she told herself.
Wildly her eyes searched the circular platform. In an obscure spot she saw a coil of rope.
“Stout,” she told herself, “but too short. Never reach the ground.” Dizzily she surveyed the scene below. Beneath her for the most part were rocks. Between these were narrow patches of grass. “Nice place to land!” she grumbled.
To the right and some twenty feet from the tower was a huge fir tree. In her distress she fancied that its branches reached out to her, offering aid.
“If only I could!” she murmured.
Seizing the rope, she tied one end to a beam, then leaning far out, watched the other end drop as it unfolded coil by coil. This came to an end at last. “Still thirty feet,” she thought with fresh panic. “Be killed sure.”
Standing quite still, she listened. There came no sound. “Gone down. May not come back.” She uttered a low prayer.
She was thinking now, wondering how this man had come here, all the way across the ridge from Duncan’s Bay. “Probably someone was after him. Should be,” she told herself. “Came here to escape. He—”
Breaking in upon her thoughts came a terrific crash. A blow had been aimed at the trap door.
“Got an axe. Door won’t last.” She was half way over the ledge. Ten seconds later, bracing her feet against the wall, she was going down the rope hand over hand.
The end? She reached that soon enough. Still thirty feet above the earth, she clung there motionless.
Then of a sudden, taking a strong grip on the rope, she began working her way back, round the tower. When she had gone as far as she dared, she gave a quick, strong push and set herself swinging wide.
With a sort of pumping motion, aided by an occasional kick at the wall, she was able to get herself into a wide swing. Then of a sudden, with a quick intake of breath, she let go.
She fell, as she had hoped to do, squarely into the arms of the friendly fir tree. She caught at its branches, swayed forward, held her grip, shifted her feet, then sank to a deep, dark corner where, for the moment, she might rest and gain control of her wildly beating heart.
Ten seconds later there came a low swish. That was the falling rope. The head hunter had cut it. At thought of what might have happened, the girl all but lost her balance.
A moment later, after a hasty scramble, she reached earth and went swiftly away.
With hands scratched, dress torn and heart beating wildly, she reached the dock, raced along on tip-toe, dragged the tie rope free, dropped into her boat, then rowed rapidly and silently away.
Arrived at the side of the Ship of Joy, she drew her boat into its protective shadows to sit there watching, listening, waiting motionless.
From the shore there came a sound. It was strange. She could not interpret it. In time it died away.
“Perhaps I should tell Bihari all about it,” she thought soberly. Still she did not move. She respected and loved the gallant gypsy chief; but most of all she feared his terrible anger.
“This,” she thought with a shudder, “is no time for battle and bloodshed.” Her eyes were fixed upon the dark masses of Greenstone Ridge. The moon in all its golden glory had just risen over that ridge.
On that ridge at this moment, had she but known it, sat two silent watchers, Florence and Greta. Had they been possessed of a powerful searchlight and an equally powerful telescope, they might have looked down from their lofty throne upon the little French girl seated there in the boat.
As Jeanne sat there a curious sound struck her ear. “Like someone swimming,” she told herself. “Surely that terrible man would not think of attempting that! He knows Bihari’s power.”
She sat motionless, listening, ready to spring up and flee, while the sound grew louder. Then of a sudden she gave vent to a low laugh.
“The bear!” she exclaimed in a whisper.
“The bear.” Her tone was suddenly sober. “He has been on shore. What has he seen? What has he done?
“Well!” She rose as, without seeing her, the bear tumbled clumsily over the schooner’s rail. “Whatever he knows, he never will tell. That’s where a bear makes one fine friend.”
CHAPTER XVI
GRETA’S SECRET
That night the dark-eyed Greta found herself in the midst of a nature lover’s paradise. Yet she was not at that moment thinking of any paradise. She was listening with all her ears, listening to the sounds of the night, waiting, too, for some other sound that she hoped might come.
“Will it play tonight,” she whispered to herself, “the phantom violin?”
That her ear might catch the faintest sound, she was sitting up in bed. And such a sweet-scented bed as it was! Blankets spread over nature’s thick mattress of dry moss and balsam tips.
“Why can’t I forget and fall asleep,” she asked herself.
Once again she leaned forward to listen. “How sweet!” she murmured as she caught the night call of some small bird, a single long-drawn note. “Just a call in the night.”
And then, muscles tense, ears strained, she sat erect.
“There it is again!”
No bird this time, no single note, but many notes. Yet it was all so indistinct.
“The phantom violin!” Her lips trembled. “Like the singing of angels!” she told herself.
“There, now it has faded away.” Regret was registered in her tone.
Once again she crept under the blankets to the warm spot at Florence’s side.
They had come far that day, with pack on back over rough moose trails. The stalwart Florence had carried the heaviest load. Now, oblivious to all about her, she slept the deep sleep of one possessed of a clear head and a healthy body.
The spot they had chosen for their night camp was down from the very crest of Greenstone Ridge but a dozen paces.
Greta was very weary. They had traveled farther that day than had been their intention. There were no fit camping places along the moose trail. At last, just as shadows were falling, they had decided to climb to the crest, a hard task for the day’s end. They had made it, for all that. And on the far side of that ridge they had discovered the very spot. A flat rock, some twenty feet across, offered support for an improvised hearth of stones. A mossy bed above this invited them to sleep.
“Plenty of wind. No rain tonight,” had been Florence’s prophecy. “We’ll just make our bed beneath the stars.”
And so, here they were, and here was Greta, sitting up, wide awake, dreaming in the night.
Florence had known Greta for only a short time. The true nature of this dark-eyed girl was for the most part as yet to her a veiled secret. She did not know that the nature of these slender, black-eyed ones often drives them unflinching into places of great peril, that roused by anger or intrigued by mystery they will dare all without one backward look.
The story Swen had told Florence could not have frightened Greta from taking a part in this great adventure. Truth was, she knew it all, and more. She treasured a secret all her own, did this dark-eyed girl. She was thinking of it now.
“He called them white flares,” she murmured low. “Said if we were in grave danger or needed help in any way, to light one of them. He would see the white light against the sky and come. Vincent Stearns said that.”
She had met Vincent Stearns, a sturdy, sun-tanned young man, a famous newspaper camera man, at Tobin’s Harbor only two days before. Swen had taken her to the Harbor in his fishing boat. On the way he had told her of the mysterious someone who, he was sure, lived on Greenstone Ridge. She had repeated the story to Vincent Stearns.
“Yes,” the photographer had said, “I’ve heard the story myself. So you are going up there on a camping trip—just two girls?” He had arched his brows.
“Oh, but you should see Florence!” Greta had exclaimed. “She’s big as a man and strong! You can’t know how strong she is.”
“All the same,” he had insisted, “you may find yourself in need of help. Take these. They are white flares. If you need help, set one on a flat rock atop the ridge and set it off. I use ’em for taking pictures of moose at night. It can be seen for miles, that white light.
“I’m going to be hunting moose with a camera on the lakes near the far end of Rock Harbor. Wherever you are, if I see that flare I’ll come.”
Greta had accepted the white flares. They were in her kit bag now. “Not that we’ll need them. But then, you never can tell.”
After listening a long time for the return of the bewitching phantom music, she cuddled down and fell asleep.
* * * * * * * *
It was at about this same hour that Jeanne, looking from her porthole in the Ship of Joy, watching the brown old lighthouse tower that stood all dark in the moonlight, saw at one of the windows a wavering light. This was followed by a steady yellow gleam.
“Who is it?” she asked herself. “Is that truly Swen’s home? And has he returned? Or is that the head hunter making himself comfortable for the night?”
One more problem returned to her before she fell asleep. The bear had been to the mainland. Doubtless he had missed her and had followed by swimming. He had not, however, returned for some time. What had he done there on land?
“Probably nothing,” she told herself. She could not be sure, however.
In the morning she was to learn much and wonder still more.
* * * * * * * *
Greta had not slept long before she found herself once more wide awake, staring up at the fleeing clouds. “Something must have disturbed my dreams,” she murmured. “What can it have been?”
Then, as minds have a way of doing, her mind took up an old, old problem and thought it all through again. This problem had to do with her future. A very rich woman had heard her playing the violin in a very small concert. She had, as she had expressed it, been “charmed, charmed indeed,” by Greta’s modest efforts. She had offered to become her good angel, had this very rich and rather pompous lady. “You shall study at my expense, under the very great masters,” she had said. “No expense shall be spared. And in time—” her bulging eyes had glowed. “In time you shall have the world at your feet!”
Greta had not said “I will do it.” Instead, she had replied, “I must talk it over with my mother. I will see.”
She was still “seeing.” This was one of the problems yet to be solved. She did long to study under great masters. And yet, she loved her own family. She wished that they might do for her all that was grand and glorious. “To invite a rich stranger into one’s life,” some wise person had said to her, “is often to shut one’s humble friends out.”
“The world at my feet,” she repeated, then laughed softly to herself. Beneath them, rolling away like billows of the sea, was the glorious green of that primeval forest; and beyond that, black and mysterious in the night, lay the waters of Lake Huron.
“The world at my feet! I have that tonight!” she murmured. “I—”
She sat straight up to listen. The wind had changed. It was rising. The right side of their tent was sagging. Borne in on this wind, the sound that had puzzled her before came sweeping in like the notes of some long forgotten song.
“Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana!” Her astonishment knew no bounds. Surely there was someone on Greenstone Ridge! Someone who played the violin divinely.
“And yet,” she thought more soberly, “in this still air sound carries far. May be on some boat out there on the black waters.”
Peering into the night she strained her eyes in a vain attempt to discover a light on the lake. There was no light.
She had just snuggled down in her warm corner once more when every muscle of her supple form stiffened in terror. She sprang to her feet. From some distant spot, yet startling in its distinctness, had come one wild, piercing scream.
“Wha—what could that have been?”
Gripping at her heart to still its mad beating, she sank back in her place.
“Boo! How cold!” She drew the blankets about her.
Her mind was in a turmoil. Who had screamed? That it was a person, not some wild creature, she could not doubt. But who?
Should she waken Florence? Her hand was on the big girl’s shoulder. “But why?” she asked herself. “We are two girls. What can we do in the night on a ridge we do not know? Fall into a crevice. No help to anyone.”
Once again she crawled down beneath the blankets. Once more she caught the notes of that mysterious music. It had not stopped. Plainly that person was not associated in any way with the scream.
The wind began whispering in the pines. The sound blended with that strange music. Together they became the accompaniment to a dream. She slept. And still at her feet lay the glorious little world that is Isle Royale.
CHAPTER XVII
THE CAVERN OF FIRE
Not until her courage had been strengthened by a steaming cup of coffee brewed over a fire before the tent was Greta ready to tell her companion of the mysterious sounds in the night.
“Only a crazy old loon,” was Florence’s prompt solution.
“A loon may be a bright bird,” Greta said laughingly, with the light of day terror had vanished, “but I’ve never known a loon that can play the Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana.”
“You know what I mean.” Florence threatened her mockingly with her sheath knife. “It was a loon that screamed. They’re very human at times.”
“Not as human as that cry in the night,” the slender girl affirmed with conviction. “I’ll never rest until I’ve solved the mystery of that cry.”
Florence scrambled to her feet. “In that case, we’d better get at its solving at once.”
“Florence!” Greta’s tone was sober. “What would be your reply if right out of the blue a very rich woman would say to you: ‘You have a wonderful future. I will help you, give you money, all you need. You shall study under the great masters. In time you shall be greater than them all.’ What would you say?”
“Why—I—I’d probably say ‘Yes.’”
“But suppose you felt that accepting such an offer would put you in her power. Supposing you had always wanted to be free—free as a bird?”
“I don’t know.” Florence spoke slowly. “Of course in a way I know what you mean. I am just a physical director. All day I put boys and girls through their exercises, teach them to play basketball and handball, instruct them in swimming and all that. Very useful. Makes ’em strong. But not quite like music, don’t you see? Perhaps a musician truly must be free.”
“Yes, I see. We must think our problems through for ourselves, I guess.”
“Guess that’s right. But come on! We’re off in search of a scream.” Seizing a stout walking stick, Florence prepared to lead the way into the great unknown.
“You said there are greenstones to be found right up here in the rocks.” Greta studied a massive boulder of greenish hue.
“Yes.” Florence produced a chisel and a small hammer. “Swen gave me these. They chisel the stones right out of the rocks. I saw one a lady down at Tobin’s Harbor had set in a cameo ring, a beauty. Worth quite a lot, I guess. Well, I hope to find a number as good as that. What grand Christmas presents they’d make!”
“Florence!” Greta came to a sudden halt. “Swen said someone took an emery wheel for grinding greenstones from his store. Do you suppose someone is up here hunting greenstones? And do you think he could have fallen off into a chasm or something last night? Was it his scream I heard?”
“So Swen told you all about that?” Florence exclaimed. “And yet you wanted to come!”
“I—wanted to come?” Greta stared at her. “Surely! Why not? More than ever!”
“Brave little girl!” Florence put a hand on her shoulder. “But that idea of yours about the scream seems a bit fantastic. You never can tell, though. But if he did fall in a crevice, we’d never find him, not up here.
“Look at that ledge!” She pointed away to the right. “Hundred feet high, half a mile long.
“And look down there.” Her gaze swept the tangled forests that lay below the narrow plateau on which they stood. “Just look! Trees have been fighting for their lives there a thousand years. Twisted, tangled, fallen, grown over with bushes and vines. How is one to conduct a search in such a place? Might as well forget it.”
“Guess you’re right.” Greta sighed. Nevertheless, she did not forget.
“Do you know,” she said a moment later, “I believe I’d rather sit by our campfire and think than to go prowling round this ridge today.”
“You’re not afraid? Afraid of meeting some—someone?”
“Of course not! Just footsore and weary after yesterday.”
“Yes, I suppose you are. Sorry.” Florence’s tone changed. “As for me, I’m used to it. If you don’t mind, I’m going on. I don’t admit the possibility of anyone ever having been here before us. I mean to be an explorer. Were there any celebrated women explorers?”
“Not many, I’m afraid. There’s one in Chicago who goes across Africa once in a while.”
“Well, I’m going to explore. You watch me!” Florence laughed as she marched away into the bush. Soon enough she was to discover that her statement that no one had been here before them was not well founded. A rough and ready manner of discovery it was to be, too.
Left to herself, Greta wandered back to camp, found a few live coals which she fanned into flame, added fresh fuel, brewed herself a cup of black tea, then sat down to think.
“‘I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills,’” she repeated reverently, “‘from whence cometh my help.’”
What was to come of this venture? Would she, like the prophets of old, find strength and inspiration by her sojourn in the hills?
The morning had been chilly. A cold wind swept in from black waters. But now the sun was up. Gentle breezes, like fairies’ wings, brushed her cheeks. On a level space beneath her, thimbleberry blossoms lay like a blanket of snow. Away to the right a rocky slope flamed all golden with wild tiger lilies.
“It—it’s like a fire,” she told herself, gazing into her own half burned out campfire.
There was something about an open fire that takes us back and back to days we have never truly known at all, the days of our pioneer ancestors.
To this slender girl on this particular morning the crackle of the fire seemed a call from some long-forgotten past.
Their camp lay within the shadow of a great rock. The fire whispered of good fellowship and cheer. The day before had been a long one. Her muscles were still stiff from that long tramp. As she sat there gazing into the narrow fiery chasm made by half burned logs, she fell into a state of mind that might be called a trance or half a dream.
As her eyes narrowed it seemed to her that the fiery chasm expanded until at last it was so high she might step inside if she willed to do so.
“So warm! So bright! So cheery!” she whispered. “One might—”
But what was this? With a startled scream she sprang to her feet.
“Florence! It was Florence!” she cried aloud.
Then, coming into full possession of her faculties, she stood and stared.
At that moment, as if the show were ended, the bits of burning wood crumbled into a heap. The chasm of fire was no more.
But what had she seen there? It was strange. She had seen quite plainly there at the center of the fiery circle the form of her companion, Florence.
“Florence.” She said the word softly. “Of course she was not there, not even her image was there. And yet—
“I wonder if it is truly possible to hear another think when she is far away? There are cases on record when this has seemed to be true. Mental telepathy they call it.
“I wonder if that vision could have been a warning?
“This place—” she shuddered. “It haunts me. Let me get out into the sunlight!
“Surely,” she told herself soberly, “if we may not listen to our friends’ thoughts when they are far away, at least God can whisper them in our ear. With Him all things are possible. I must try to find Florence.”
With that she walked some distance along the slope to at last vanish down a narrow moose trail that passed between two black old spruce trees.
* * * * * * * *
Bihari and his band, with Petite Jeanne in their midst, were having their breakfast coffee on deck that morning, when a white-haired youth came rowing alongside in a roughly made fishing boat. Two small children rode in the stern.
“Swen!” Jeanne cried joyously. “So that is your lighthouse! That is your home!”
“Yes.” Swen grinned broadly. “Anyway, I thought it was. Since—”
“But Swen!” Jeanne broke in, “you never told me you were married. What beautiful children!”
The children beamed up at her. But not Swen. He was blushing from ear to ear.
“Children!” he exclaimed. “My children! I am but eighteen. What could you think? They are not my children. They are my brother’s. Their home is in the cabin by the lighthouse. And my home—” He hesitated, looking from face to face as if trying to read something there. “The lighthouse, it is my home. But someone, it seems, wants to tear it up. What can I think?
“When I came home last night,” he rushed on, “all is strange. The doorstep is broken. My bench by the door, it is tipped over. There are bits of cloth everywhere. And my axe, it is thrown on the ground. In the tower it is no better. The trap door, it is broken, stones are thrown down and my rope, it is gone.”
For fully a moment, when he had finished, Jeanne stared at him. Then, as in a dream, she murmured, “It was the bear.”
“No,” said Swen, “it was not the bear.”
“Come up and have a cup of coffee,” said Jeanne. She had recovered some of her composure. “Bring those beautiful children. We will have a romp with the bear. And then, then I will help you solve your riddle.” She laughed a merry laugh.
CHAPTER XVIII
AT THE BOTTOM OF THE ANCIENT MINE
And what of Florence? For one thing, she had made a marvelous discovery.
After leaving her companion, she had wandered for two hours along Greenstone Ridge. Here she paused to examine the surface of a greenish wall of rock. There she drew a chisel and small hammer from her knickers’ pocket to drill away on a spot of green. And now, with no thought of rock or greenstone treasure, head down, deep in meditation, she wandered along some moose trail.
On Isle Royale moose trails are everywhere, so too are wild moose. Protected by law from murderous hunters, they wander at will from shore to shore.
This girl, who appeared so much a part of this rugged island, knew she might meet a moose at any turn, yet she was not afraid.
It was during one of these periods of deep thought that she struck her foot against some solid object and all but fell forward on her face.
“What—what was that?” She turned about. “Only a rock. And—and yet—”
She bent over to look more closely. An exclamation of joy escaped her lips.
“A hammer! An Indian hammer!”
At once she was down on her knees tearing away at the thick moss that on Isle Royale hides many a secret.
That the history of this interesting island goes far back of the time when the first white trader saw it, she knew right well.
Back in the dim past Indian tribes fought many a bloody battle over the copper of this strange island. Here, as we have said before, copper in solid masses might be found close to the surface. Rich indeed was the tribe that possessed copper for knives, beads, spear points and arrow heads.
“I’ll find something more,” she told herself.
As she looked at the surface she had bared she stared in surprise. She had uncovered a mass of charcoal.
“And yet there can have been no forest fire.” She looked at the great two-foot-thick trunk of a spruce tree.
“An Indian mine!” she exclaimed. “They built a fire on the surface, then dragged it away to break hot rock with these stone hammers.”
She scraped away the charcoal with a sharp stick. As she did so something gave forth a low clink.
“No, not a coin, but a knife,” she whispered. “An ancient copper knife! How perfect!” It was indeed a far more perfect specimen than the one she had found on the camping ground. She held the thin blade to the light. Dating back beyond the days of the white man, it held for her an indescribable charm.
“The whole island is a treasure house. I’ll find another.” Once more she prodded away at the moss and charcoal. Not a second knife, but a spear point greeted her excited vision.
She widened her search. Prying away at a deep bed of moss, she tore it away in a yard-square chunk. And there beneath it, grinning and horrible, was a skull.
At that instant something stirred in the brush above her. With a startled scream she whirled about, took one step backward, lost her balance and plunged downward.
She had gone over the ridge. For an instant her heart was in her mouth; the next she realized that the slope, which was not too steep, ended in a second narrow plateau.
Struggling to break her downward plunge, she grasped at a branch. The branch snapped off. A trailing vine served her no better.
“Yet,” she smiled, “the end will come soon.”
Sooner than she thought. Just when she was waiting the final bump that should announce her arrival at the bottom, she dropped a surprising distance straight down, glanced to the right, slid some twenty feet, then dropped again to land with such a rude shock that for a full moment she lay there utterly oblivious to her strange surroundings.
When at last she came to, and strove to discover what had happened, she found herself in a place of almost complete darkness. Only straight above her, at what seemed an incredible distance, a narrow crack of light shone.
She rose stiffly to feel of her bruises. “None fatal, I guess.” She tried to face the situation with a smile.
“Don’t know where I am, but I’ll not stay long.”
Had she believed in imps she might have fancied one saying: “Oh, won’t you?”
As she stretched her hands above her head to feel for some means of drawing herself up, she found nothing.
“Solid rock.” For the first time she was truly startled. Where was she? How was she to escape?
Thrusting a hand in her pocket, she drew out a box of safety matches. Having lighted one, she looked about her. By the yellow light she discovered several facts. This place had been made by men. Holes had been drilled in the rock. The rock had been blasted away. At her feet were bits of greenish rock. This, she found, was not rock, but pure copper.
“An abandoned copper mine! A white man’s mine!” Her heart sank. Not one of these mines had been worked for forty years.
“Got to get out of here some way.”
She studied the rocky surface about her. “Might get a good foothold here and—”
The match flared out. She lit another. “Could get a handhold there, and there!”
She doubted her ability to make this perilous ascent. She had been fortunate to escape with no broken bones. Next time she might fare badly.
“Might scream. No harm in that.”
She screamed at the top of her voice and at once felt better.
When, however, after a half hour’s attempt at scaling the rocky wall, she found herself at the bottom with only fresh bruises to show for her trouble, she was near to despair.
Then a curious thing happened. Some object came bumping down the wall, which at the upper end was not steep.