Ned, rather disgusted at the carelessness of the boy, walked on in silence until the two came to the smooth slopes which led up to Gatun. There they found the boys, waiting for them, eager for the story of the explosion, and wondering at their long delay.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE WATCHER IN THE THICKET.
Between Tabernilla and Gamboa, a distance of about fifteen miles, the restless Chagres river, in its old days of freedom, crossed the canal line no less than fifteen times. At Gamboa the river finds a break in the rough hills and winds off to the northeast, past Las Cruces and off into more hills and jungles.
Where the river turns the canal enters the nine-mile cut through the Cordilleras, which form the backbone of the continent. Here at the Culebra cut, the greatest amount of excavation for the waterway is being done. This cut ends at Pedro Miguel locks, which will ease the ships down into the Pacific ocean.
Where the river turns to the northeast, at Gamboa, a wild and hilly country forms both banks. The hillsides as well as the plateaux are overgrown with dense vegetation. As in all tropical lands, the fight for survival is fierce and merciless. Trees are destroyed by great creepers, great creepers are destroyed by smaller growths, and every form of life, vegetable as well as animal, has its enemy. Every living thing springs up from the dead body of another.
Sheltered and half concealed from view in this wild country between Gamboa and Las Cruces, on the day the Boy Scouts set out in their search for Jimmie and Peter, there stood a house of stone which seemed as old as the volcanic formation upon which it stood. It was said that the structure had been there, even then looking old and dismantled, when the French began their operations on the Isthmus.
This house faced the valley of the Chagres river, having its back against a hill, which was one of the steps leading up to the top of the Cordilleras. There was a great front entrance way, and many windows, but the latter seemed closed. Few signs of life were seen about the place at five o’clock that afternoon.