Several years have passed since the occurrence of the foregoing events, and young Anderson since has married. In his nest of a home, to which I am a frequent bachelor visitor in good standing, there is prominently located a certain replica of a beautiful young female just budding into womanhood. It represents the best in the art of the Ataruipe and is regarded by the lady-of-the-house as perhaps just the least bit too naturalistic.
Among artists and archaeologists, however, it has inspired more controversy than anything else in the present century. The trend of opinion is that the figure is an extravagant but exceedingly clever bit of modern work which is being foisted on a gullible public, ever too quick to give credence to cock-and-bull stories of lost treasure such as Anderson and I relate.
They ask for the camera and photographs that Van Dusee had. We say that we did not miss them until on the boat bound for New York; that they were probably stolen from our rooms at the hotel in Rio de Janiero.
They ask us for sight of some of the marvelous jewels. We show them some of the smaller ones, but they tell us these are ordinary and may have been acquired any place; and at their insistence for a view of the big gems we are compelled to advise them that the package handed us by the clever hotel clerk was a duplicate of the one we gave him containing the select stones brought by us from the Caverns of the Ataruipe; that we learned that it contained common pebbles some time before the port officials at Rio de Janiero went through our effects, confiscating everything they could find and seeming particularly happy at discovering the package described so minutely in their search-warrant—the one the scoundrel hotel clerk made up in imitation of Bobby’s wrapping, which we had been careful to restore to its original appearance after discovering the cheat.
“Yes, but how did you save this beautiful statue if they got everything else?” is the final thrust.
And here Anderson lapses into silence, for the matter is a delicate one. It involved thrusting the small package into the arms of a handsome young lady who stood in the throng that curiously watched us come aboard the ship at the last moment under the guardianship of numbers of Brazilian officials, who hovered over us with the eagerness of flies. As she caught Anderson’s eye and got the idea that leaped from it, I am sure she giggled with delight at the ruse, for she was pure American.
Once a year each of us receives a communication from Rio de Janiero that purports to come from government officials. The letters are entirely preposterous in their content—they read like the notorious Spanish legacy letters so long the vogue of confidence men, and speak urgently, earnestly—yea, almost beseechingly—of untold wealth that awaits us if we will but come to Rio de Janiero and assist in the quest for the lost Caverns of the Ataruipe.
But we feel, young Anderson and I, that constant and continuous governmental search must be going forward for the immense treasure; and we feel, further, that in all fairness to the world at large that wonderful collection of art material should be restored to humanity; but we find it difficult indeed to see just why two Americans—even conceding that their help might be of value, which is doubtful—should assist a greedy and unjust officialdom that is absolutely guilty of the death of the best guide and friend it was ever the good fortune of either of us to have encountered.
Another story by JULIAN KILMAN will appear in the next issue of WEIRD TALES. It is called “The Well,” and it’s a “creepy” yarn, warranted to give you “goose-flesh” thrills.