A TERRIBLE EXPERIENCE
That evening as we sat on the bank above we talked over our experience of the day. Then I bethought myself of the piece of folded bark and pulled it out of my pocket.
"Here's something that I picked up in the rock hollow," I remarked.
Jim seized it eagerly and Juarez watched its unfolding with the keenest interest. The word "bark" is only a rough term to describe it. The document was really made of some sort of pulp, whether of wood or cacti I could not say.
When it was spread out, the paper was 12x12 inches. There was a curious drawing in the center with words written in Spanish, and in one corner was the representation of a mountain.
"That's a diagram," commented Jim, "but I cannot make much out of it, can you, Juarez?"
"I see somethings," announced Juarez. "That mountain is in Mexico. But the lines I do not understand, but we shall see when we go down there."
"It is the key to the whereabouts of the treasure box," announced Tom, "that drawing is. Only we have got to get someone who reads Spanish to translate it. Let me keep it?"
"No," said Jim, decisively. "Jo found it and he can take care of it."
"Hold on," suggested Tom. "Let's make a copy of it for each one of us."
"That's the idea," I acceded. "Who is the best artist?"
"Let Juarez try his hand at it," said Jim, "he's the one."
So Juarez went steadily to work, and he justified Jim's choice, for it was splendidly copied. His trained eyes and hand were evident in the drawing.
The next morning we started on the last part of our journey.
"Heave ho, my hearties," cried Jim as we pulled up our stone anchors. "All ashore who are going ashore," and we swung out into the easy current.
"This is what I like," cried Jim. "Give me the boat every time."
"You teach me how to steer, Jim?" said Juarez.
"You bet I will," replied the commodore.
Juarez was an apt pupil and he soon learned to use his lithe strength to the best advantage. It was of the greatest assistance to us, for it gave either Jim or Juarez a chance to take the other oar on the side back of me.
This threw Tom out of a job, but he did not mind, as his bruised leg bothered him. Jim found him a position, however, for he stationed him back of us to keep a sharp lookout ahead for rocks and other dangers.
He was really a pilot and his keen eyes were of great help. By a wave of a hand he indicated the direction to Juarez in which to steer, and to Jim and me he would call port or starboard.
Tom liked this. He was quick of decision and was not afraid to take the responsibility. In an easy stretch he would lean against the cabin and shout out his orders in a clarion voice, but in rough water he stood braced on deck, looking keenly ahead.
"Starboard your helm," he would yell. Then we dashed safely by a great rock.
"Now let her r-r-run," he commanded (slurring his r's) as we came to a clear section of the river.
Tom assumed considerable style under the impulse of his new authority, and we had to take it out of him at regular intervals.
It really was a fine plan, for we could give our whole attention to the oars. Then, too, Jim and I were much stronger than Tom, and with Juarez or Jim at the steering oar, we managed "The Captain" as though she were a skiff. We had need of our skill, too, in the great canyons that were ahead of us.
For a week or more we had easy work, as the Temple canyon was wide and the rapids not so severe. But it was easy only by comparison with what we had been through. To a fresh voyager it would have seemed terrific.
The weather was mostly clear and sunshiny, but one afternoon we ran into a heavy storm almost like a water spout.
The roar of the thunder in the narrow gorge that we were going through was terrific and the lightning streaks lit the gloom of the canyon with weird intensity, flashing a strange glare on the red and turbulent river.
It was exceedingly dangerous and wonderfully exciting. I do not know how we would have managed if Tom had not been free to watch the river ahead.
It was so dark in the chasm that we could see only a short distance ahead. And the roar of the river and of the thunder was something terrible.
No landing could be made and we dashed blindly down. It was marvelously exciting, and we were keyed to the highest pitch of efficiency.
The white line of foam would be the first warning we would have of a rock ahead, then we would bend all our strength and sometimes our boat would tilt on the current that ran off from the rock. It was close.
If we had struck head on we would have been in a most critical situation. The lightning was of no real help, only serving to blind us. Tom closed his eyes for the second of the flash so that he would not be blinded.
Fortunately the storm was brief and we saw a beautiful sight when the clouds cleared. On both sides of the canyon, from the cliffs twelve hundred feet in height, sprang numerous little water falls.
Some amber, others tinged with red or glittering with the silver of the sun. The largest in volume were four or five feet across, but before they reached the river below, they feathered out in spray. These cascades were beautiful indeed.
Several days after the thunder storm we had an overwhelming experience. It came on us suddenly and without sufficient warning to enable us to reach the shore.
It was a clear day and there had been no storm in our vicinity. We were going swiftly down the current, in the midst of a canyon, with towering walls over three thousand feet in height.
Suddenly my ear caught the sound of a louder roar than the usual tone of the river. I glanced back and in my dismay I could give no word of warning.
But the other boys had heard the ominous, thunderous roar filling the narrow depth of the canyon. Jim sprang to the steering oar, and without a word Juarez leapt to Jim's vacant place.
A great flood wave was charging down the canyon, filling it from side to side, the center of it bulging and boiling forward in foam. It was a terrific sight.
"Roll the stern anchor forward," yelled Jim.
The wave was a quarter of a mile away, coming down upon us with devouring fury.
"Defy the dragon, will you?" it seemed to roar. "You are caught in its jaws now. No escape."
Jim looked at it with a sneer of set teeth.
"We'll show you," he yelled. "You can't beat us, curse you!"
"Draw in the oars," he commanded, "into the bows; use the poles."
It was almost upon us. The stern began to lift upwards.
"Stand by to repel boarders." These were the last words we could hear. Then we were swallowed up in a tumult of roaring, foaming water, whirled downward like a straw in the furious onset of the flood.
By throwing all the weight to the bow we had kept from being swamped. Our high, strong sides saved us for the moment. If anything could stand the fury of that charge "The Captain" could. Powerful, braced like an ironclad, unsinkable.
We rose out of the jaws into the back of the dragon, and were surrounded by a chaos of rushing drift and some big logs and timber.
This mass held the waves down, and our powerful little craft, wedged in for the moment, was carried along at bewildering speed. It was like going down a cataract.
Then came a veritable battle of the logs. They tried to ram our boat. We fought them off with poles as best we could. Occasionally we received a blow that jarred "The Captain" from stem to stern.
One log bent a board back by a heavy, glancing blow. In a minute I had it braced back to its old place. Without a second's cessation we fought desperately but not wildly.
It was like a prize fighter tearing into a powerful opponent with flying, flaying fists to forestall a knockout. The next moment a jam of logs threatened to overwhelm us. It seemed viciously determined to thrust us against the wall of the canyon.
Something had to be done immediately. Juarez was the man. Before we could say a word, yea or nay, he leapt from the boat and on to the back of the jam. Prying with his pole against the key log of the combination he broke it and the freed logs swept down the current.
Nothing but his marvelous quickness and Indian litheness saved him. Just as it broke he sprang, with the nimbleness of a panther from the log that swirled back under the impulse of his leap, to the boat.