Before they approached the San Blas island colonies, Tom spoke of a matter that had been worrying him a great deal.
“We ought to have a plan,” he suggested. “If we go and ask about a girl—my sister—they won’t tell us, especially if they have kept her a prisoner.”
“I think you’re right,” Cliff acknowledged. “We could say we are traders, couldn’t we?”
“That would not help us to get to the inland tribes, if she is not on the islands,” Bill objected.
“We could pretend we are looking for gold,” Nicky contributed.
Mr. Gray shook his head. They were all, except Andy at the engine and the colored pilot, Bob, at the wheel, seated in the little cabin eating dinner.
“No,” Mr. Gray said with his headshake. “The San Blas Indians are not much interested in gold. There is another tribe, the Chucunaque Indians, living on the mainland, and in the interior, who are really a part of the same original stock as the San Blas people, and they are very decidedly antagonistic to white people for the very reason that Nicky has suggested. These Indians think that white men are all trying to find gold, and the Indians say, according to the information I have, that gold is what has destroyed the Indians.”
“I don’t see how,” Nicky declared.
“They argue somewhat to this effect: the white man wants gold. He comes among the Indians to look for it. He bribes them with his fiery liquors and he fights them and degrades them.”
“That’s so, too,” Cliff nodded. “Whenever you see Indians after white men have been in their country, you see a decayed race. Look at our own ‘Redskins’—they have lost their country and live on reservations and only since the Government saw what was happening and did something to protect them have they been able to protect themselves and try to get back some of their self-respect.”