Mr. Ponder grew angry. It was an impudent trick, a defiance of himself and the Guild, such as no true Carib would be guilty of. Foreign travel had demoralised Sam. Those honest fellows, his partners, would be not less indignant, if the shameful proceeding could be laid before them. But all had gone up the river—to their gold-field, of course—and no one knew where that might be. Mr. Ponder got more and more warm as he revolved the insult. Business was slack. He decided to follow, and sent out forthwith to engage a crew of Indians; gold-diggers do not mind the intrusion of Indians so much, for when these savages have obtained a very little dust, they withdraw to turn it into drink. And they never chatter. Moreover he had to find the Caribs’ camp, and they are sleuth-hounds.
The search was not so hopeless as it might seem. Carefully reviewing the circumstances, Mr. Ponder felt sure that his Caribs had discovered their placer whilst collecting the felled trees—not before; that is, in the rainy season. Men would not wander far into the bush at that time. Probably, therefore, the scene lay pretty close to one or other of the spots where they had found mahogany. Of those spots he had a minute description.
The reasoning proved to be quite correct, but luck interposed before it had been severely tested. On arrival at one of the stations to be explored—after a week or ten days’ voyaging, as I imagine—he saw a canoe just pushing out from beneath the wooded bank with two of the missing Caribs therein, going to Belize on some errand. Their astonishment was loud, but not angry; they had no quarrel with Mr. Ponder. After a very little hesitation they consented to lead him to the camp, the Indians remaining in their boat.
It was not a long walk, nor uncomfortable. A broad path had been cut to the top of the ridge, for hauling down the trunks, and the rollers had smoothed it like a highway; but not so broad that the great trees on either hand failed to overshadow it. Mr. Ponder questioned his guides laughingly. Was it a real good placer, with nuggets in it?—how much had they pouched, and was the game likely to last? They grinned and patted their waist-scarves, which, as he now remarked, were round and plump as monster sausages.
‘Oh, I know that trick,’ laughed Mr. Ponder. ‘You’ve filled them with maize-flour for your journey.’
They whooped and roared with triumph. ‘Say, Mis’r George, you tell nobody—honour bright?-not nobody?’ One of them turned down the edge of his scarf, with no small effort—for it was twisted very tightly and secured. Presently the contents glimmered into sight—little golden figures, mostly flat, carved or moulded, one to three inches long. ‘Our placer all nuggets, Mis’r George!’
Any child in those seas would have understood. The Caribs had discovered not a washing nor a mine, but a burial-ground of the old Indians, called in those parts a ‘huaco.’ There are men who make it their sole business to look for such treasure-heaps. Since they bear, in general, no outward indication whatsoever at the present time, one would think that the hunt must be desperate; but these men, like other gamblers, have their ‘system.’ Possibly they have noted some rules which guided the antique people in their choice of a cemetery. And if they find one in a lifetime—provided they can keep the secret—that suffices.
Mostly, perhaps, huacos are discovered by accident. So it was in the memorable instance on Chiriqui lagoon, where many thousand people dug for months and many brought away a fortune—for them. And so it was here. The Caribs told their story gleefully. From the crest of the ridge the land sloped gently down towards a stream. When they reached this place to secure the timber, now dry, the rains were very heavy. But Sam and another, heaven-directed, roamed down the slope. A big tree had fallen, and among its roots Sam’s lynx eyes marked a number of the little figures, washed clean, sparkling in the sun-rays. These good fellows have no secrets of the sort among themselves. They dug around, assured themselves that it was indubitably a huaco; then returned, like honest Caribs, to float the trunks down to Belize, and fulfil their contract, before attending to personal interests.
They had cleared a space and built a hut of boughs, a ‘ramada.’ There Mr. Ponder found them assembled, smoking and sleeping after the mid-day meal. Warned by the guide’s cheery shout they welcomed Mis’r George heartily—all but Sam; unanimously they asked, however, what on earth he wanted there, so far from home? Mr. Ponder told his complaint.
The gang resolved itself into a sort of court-martial forthwith, the eldest seating himself upon a stump and the others grouping round. There was a moment’s silence for thought; then the president, gravely: