The Golden Skull: A Rick Brant Science-Adventure Story

by Harold L. Goodwin

  CHAPTER XIII

  The Peaceful Profession

  The Spindrift campfire blazed high, and its warmth was welcome in thecold mountain night. Balaban and Dog Meat were out on patrol, althoughit was unlikely that any Ifugao had followed the invaders over themountain.

  Camp had been pitched in a grove of trees on the Igorot side of thedivide. The boys and Tony had taken suitable clothing from theirsupplies and were now equipped with sturdy trail clothes and warmleather jackets. Chahda, similarly dressed in spare clothes, nowresembled an Igorot only because of his haircut.

  Tony sipped steaming coffee from a battered mug. He grinned at the facesaround the fire: Rick, Scotty, Angel Manotok, Chahda, and Pilipil, whosewounded leg had been treated with supplies from the first-aid kit.

  "Archaeologist at work," Tony commented. "Digs in musty old tombs allday, and now and then gets excited about a clay jug or something else heuncovers. The archaeologist has nothing but old jugs or beetles or stufflike that to get excited about. It's a peaceful profession, boys. That'swhy I like it. Calm, quiet, orderly."

  Pilipil didn't get the irony in Tony's voice, but the others laughed.

  Scotty nodded agreement. "That's the popular idea of an archaeologist,all right! Sounds like a recruiting ad, doesn't it? Be peaceful andquiet. Live to a ripe old age. Be an archaeologist. Reminds me of therecruiting poster that hooked me once. Join the Marines, it said. Seethe world. Learn a trade. I joined. Saw the world while snaking on mybelly through the South Pacific. Learned a trade, too. How to fire arifle. Very few peacetime riflemen needed, however."

  "We'll combine our trades," Tony said. "You might say we did, earliertonight."

  As Rick put more wood on the fire he said, "We're together, for thefirst time. Before, either Tony or Chahda was missing. Now what do wedo?"

  Tony considered. "I must admit I was not giving much thought to thepurpose of the expedition when you came after me. I spent most of mytime imagining how my skull would look on the knick-knack shelf in thehut."

  "What knick-knack shelf?" Chahda asked.

  "You wouldn't have noticed," Tony told them. "It was high in the rear ofthe hut, above the opening you made. A shelf full of skulls. I kepttrying to flatter myself that surely my head would be prettier thanthose. But I didn't really believe it."

  "Do you really believe the Ifugaos would have taken your head?" Rickasked.

  "You bet I do! You should have seen Nangolat. He shed civilization withhis clothes. He got down to a breechcloth and he was all primitive. He'sgot a bad case of bats in the belfry, believe me. I'd say he was a truefanatic."

  "Yes," Angel Manotok said positively. "You remember I tell you aboutthose eyes of his? The doctor is right. Nangolat is crazy. He is akiller."

  Rick remembered the crazed, distorted face of Nangolat rushing for thejeep with spear extended. "I vote Nangolat for nuts, too. Insane anddangerous."

  "This being Mountain Province, Philippines, I don't think it would domuch good to call the men in white coats to bring a strait jacket,"Scotty observed. "So, what do we do? We can ignore him, avoid him, orshoot him. The first is hard, since he carries a sharp spear. The secondmay be possible. The third I reject as being un-scientific and unkind,not to mention illegal."

  "One more possibility," Chahda offered. "Catch him, tie him up, haveScotty talk him into stupor."

  Rick chuckled. "You may have an idea there, Chahda. Seriously, Nangolatis guilty of kidnaping. That makes him a criminal. Surely it isn't wrongto catch an escaped criminal and turn him over to justice."

  "Not wrong," Tony said, "but maybe just a little bit impractical."

  Rick pressed the point. "Why? If we thought faster, we could have pickedhim up tonight. You knocked him colder than a penguin's pocketbook. Wecould have tossed him into the back of the jeep like a sack of bones."

  "Yes, Rick. But chances like that don't come twice. Catching him nowwould mean making a definite attempt. It would mean an expedition. Idoubt that he'd stay around to be caught."

  "Guess you're right," Rick admitted. "Then, to get back to Scotty'squestion, what do we do now? Apparently Nangolat has his people up inarms against us. There's no law enforcement worthy of the name up here,so we can't call for help. So what next?"

  Tony poured himself another mug of coffee from the steaming pot. "Wecontinue after the cache of artifacts."

  The boys stared. Chahda shook hands with the scientist. "Now I see whyRick and Scotty call you Tony. Number One regular guy. Why let littlething like whole nation of head-hunters scare you off?"

  "Archaeology is certainly a peaceful profession," Rick said admiringly."Scotty and I don't scare easily, but it didn't occur to me that weshould proceed as though nothing had happened."

  "You're getting the wrong impression," Tony said mildly. "Let's considerthe situation. There's Nangolat, the principal troublemaker. What is hisreason for behaving as he does?"

  "Well," Scotty began, "he certainly was the one who tried to kill you onthe boat."

  "I think he was. He would have known all about the expedition fromOkola. He would have known what ship we were on, and a phone call to theagent of the line would have told him our arrival time, from which hecould easily have figured what time we would enter Manila Bay. He wouldalso have known that I was the archaeologist for the expedition. Afterall, I signed the correspondence we had with Okola, and he was Okola'sassistant."

  "But why would he want to kill you?" Rick asked.

  "For religious reasons. Nangolat is a religious fanatic. I saw thatquite clearly during the time I was his captive. He does not want theartifacts dug up--or he didn't. Remember the legend? If they're dug up,drought and earthquakes will follow. By killing me aboard ship, theexpedition would never take place. That must have been how he reasoned."

  Rick was beginning to see light. "Angel, was Nangolat supposed to be aChristian?"

  Angel shook his head. "No. He was a pagan. Once he went to church withme, but that was only to see how Christians worship. He worshiped theIfugao gods which were in the museum at the university."

  Rick commented, "I imagine his studies with Okola, and especially thework he did tracking down the legends of the golden skull, made him evenmore religious. I won't say superstitious."

  "You're right," Tony said approvingly. "This is not superstition.Nangolat is as firmly convinced of the correctness of his religiousbeliefs as any Christian martyr. I'm sure he considered the object ofour expedition as pure sacrilege."

  "I'm with you up to a point," Scotty remarked. "But why didn't he killthe lot of us as soon as we landed? He could have gotten Rick and me thenight we met you for dinner. We walked in a lot of dark places, and weweren't particularly on guard."

  "He tried," Tony reminded them. "We surprised him in my room at theManila Hotel. Probably he was examining my effects to see if I had mapsor charts. Then he waited in the walled city and tried to pick you twooff with rifle fire."

  Chahda spoke up. "Not so easy to find chances to kill, even in city likeManila. With gang, yes. Alone, no."

  "He's right," Tony agreed. "Then, somewhere along the line, Nangolat hada change of heart. I don't know why. Perhaps his research told him thatthe drought and earthquakes would follow the digging up of the goldenskull only if it should be done by unbelievers like us. Perhaps if thefaithful do the uncovering, the Ifugao gods will smile. I don't know.But Nangolat decided he wanted the expedition to help _him_ find theartifacts."

  "The old competitive spirit got him," Scotty murmured. "Wanted his sideto win."

  "Maybe," Tony said with a grin. "Anyway, he got away with the earthscanner; he had it when Nast turned me over to him. Of course hecouldn't use it. So he must have planned to capture one or all of us. Hecould have waited until the expedition got here, but things would thenbe complicated by our hiring diggers and camp helpers, which he knew weintended to do. Also, we intended to contact the road commissioner atBontoc, a man who represents law and order--such as it is. So Nangolat,apparently, decided to stake e
verything on capturing us, forcing us tofind the cache, then removing our heads. By the time the law got aroundto looking for us, the artifacts would be well hidden by the Ifugaos,and so would our bodies. Our skulls would be aging gracefully in somehidden place. And no Ifugao would know a single thing about it whenquestioned. It was a good scheme."

  "Except for one thing," Rick corrected. "The terraces cover miles. Wecould spend weeks searching."

  "There's one bit of evidence you don't have, boys. Remember that thereis a major clue to the whereabouts of the cache? A dragon. Well,Nangolat knows--and has always known without knowing its significanceuntil now--where the dragon is located."

  Tony smiled at the interested faces around him. "And that's not all. Iknow where it is, too!"