“I tell you it’s there,” declared Lieutenant Hazen decisively. “It may not be a civilized city, but it’s no Indian village or native town. It’s big—at least a thousand houses—and they’re built of stone or something like it and not of thatch.”
“You’ve been dreaming, Hazen,” laughed Fenton. “Or else you’re just trying to jolly us.”
“Do you think I’d hand in an official report of a dream?” retorted the Lieutenant testily. “And it’s gospel truth I’ve been telling you.”
“Never mind Fenton,” I put in. “He’s a born pessimist and skeptic anyhow. How much did you actually see?”
We were seated on the veranda of the Hotel Washington in Colon and the aviator had been relating how, while making a reconnoissance flight over the unexplored and unknown jungles of Darien, he had sighted an isolated, flat topped mountain upon whose summit was a large city—of a thousand houses or more—and without visible pass, road or stream leading to it.
“It was rotten air,” Hazen explained in reply to my question. “And I couldn’t get lower than 5,000 feet. So I can’t say what the people were like. But I could see ’em running about first time I went over and they were looking mightily excited. Then I flew back for a second look and not a soul was in sight—took to cover I expect. But I’ll swear the buildings were stone or ’dobe and not palm or thatch.”
“Why didn’t you land and get acquainted?” enquired Fenton sarcastically.
“There was one spot that looked like a pretty fair landing,” replied the aviator. “But the air was bad and the risk too big. How did I know the people weren’t hostile? It was right in the Kuna Indian country and even if they were peaceable they might have smashed the plane or I mightn’t have been able to take off. I was alone too.”
“You say you made an official report of your discovery,” I said. “What did the Colonel think about it?”
“Snorted and said he didn’t see why in blazes I bothered reporting an Indian village.”