by Roy J. Snell
CHAPTER XVI DOWN THE MINE SHAFT
The next three days were busy ones for the girls. Miss Prudence hadbought scores of yards of gay-colored cretonnes and other materials, andshe now set all three to work making couch and pillow covers anddraperies.
"I've got to have draperies to hide the iron bars at the bedroomwindows," she had said. "I don't like to see those iron bars. They makeme feel as if I'm in prison."
When she escorted the girls to her bedroom and showed them the heaps ofmaterials, Jo Ann remarked with a whimsical smile, "I didn't realize whatI was getting us into when I suggested brightening up this house withdraperies and cushions. It looks as if we'll be running the sewingmachine instead of Jitters for the next week or two."
Florence and Peggy both laughed. They knew Jo Ann did not like any taskthat kept her in the house, and especially one of the sitting-still kind,like sewing.
"'Outdoor action and plenty of it,' is Jo Ann's slogan," Peggy explaineda moment later for Miss Prudence's benefit. "She says sitting still andsewing make all her muscles feel cramped and her head ache and her mindtired."
"Well, it does," Jo Ann defended. "I feel as if I'm getting petrified.I'd rather climb mountains any time."
"I'll let you run the machine, then," Miss Prudence spoke up briskly."That'll keep your feet moving up and down as if you're climbing."
"A poor substitute," Jo Ann returned, smiling.
"Before you begin sewing, I'll give you an active job that'll bring intouse more of your muscles--measuring windows. Be sure to get the exactlength. Nothing looks worse than draperies that're too short."
After Jo Ann had finished measuring windows, she set to work basting andstitching the hems in the draperies. By this time her thoughts hadwandered from sewing to the mystery man and the smugglers. Was thatsmuggler still lurking around the mine and had the other one reached theborder without being caught? And was the mystery man still safe andsound? She must get word someway to him when the smugglers were to maketheir next trip, so he could follow them. If only he could catch thoseringleaders and break up that gang!
So engrossed was she in these thoughts that she did not heed Peggy'ssudden outburst of laughter several minutes later till Florence calledout a merry, "Jo! Will you look what you've done! You've hemmed all yourdraperies upside down, so that the parrots or parrakeets--or whateverkind of birds they are in the design--are all standing on their heads."
"They'll look comical with their tails perpetually in the air," giggledPeggy. "I'm getting dizzy already even at the thought of those poor birdshanging head downward that way."
"Oh dear!" groaned the discomfited Jo Ann on viewing her mistake. "NowI've got to rip out every hem. Oh, woe is me!"
"I'll help you," Florence offered, taking one of the draperies from her.
"Next time concentrate on your sewing instead of on the mystery man andthose----" Peggy stopped talking abruptly on seeing Miss Prudence enterthe room.
As soon as Jose came to the house that evening, Jo Ann slipped to thekitchen to ask him if he had seen the smuggler hanging around the mine.
At his reply that he had not, Jo Ann felt relieved till the next moment,when he added, "We have much trouble at the mine today. No get out muchore." He went on to explain that the tram-car wrecked the previous dayhad torn up the track badly and that there had been trouble with some ofthe mine machinery.
"Have they found out who wrecked the car?" she asked.
"No. One man told me he saw Luis, a bad workman _El Senor_ dischargedlast week, near the track before the wreck." Jose shrugged his shoulders."I do not know who did it. Maybe it was Luis--maybe it was the strangeman you saw."
"Why did Mr. Eldridge discharge this Luis?"
"He steal ore."
As Miss Prudence entered the kitchen just then and sat down, Jo Ann couldnot question Jose further. She left the room wondering if after all shehad not been wrong in her surmise about the smuggler's having wrecked thecar. He might have become alarmed after she and Florence had seen him andhave left immediately. She certainly hoped that was the case.
By the time the girls had finished sewing, Jo Ann was thoroughly weary ofstaying in the house. "If I don't get outside for a long horseback rideor a climb up the mountains today, I'll go raving crazy," she said.
Peggy laughed at this exaggerated speech, and Florence remarkedsmilingly, "Well, by all means let's get out and explore the country thisafternoon. I'm fed up with staying inside, too."
"To tell you the truth," Peggy put in, "I've been rather glad to stayinside. Ever since I heard about that smuggler's hanging around here, thehouse looks good to me."
"Oh, he's gone away by now, surely," Jo Ann answered. "Jose says no oneelse has said a word about having seen a stranger around, and in a smallcamp like this a stranger surely couldn't escape being noticed. I feelsure he's gone back to join the other man. If that man returns for thepottery the same time that he did last week, he'll be back at the villageFriday. I've got to get word to the mystery man what day they're startingfor the border."
"The woman promised me to save some of the pottery for me, but I want toselect the best designs from the entire lot before she sells any ofthem," Florence put in.
"That means we'll have to go and get the pottery before those men come,"Jo Ann remarked. "That suits me to a T. You've already written to yourfriend in St. Louis that you're sending the pottery in a few days,haven't you?"
"Yes."
"Well, that settles it. We'll go to the village to get the potteryThursday morning and take it to the city and ship it from there. That'llgive me a fine chance to find out from the woman when the smugglers'recoming and to see the mystery man and tell him when to look out forthem."
"I see where you're headed for more trouble," Peggy spoke up. "You'dbetter keep your fingers out of this whole affair. You're tooadventuresome."
Jo Ann half smiled. "Oh, skip it--the lecture, I mean. Let's get thehorses and go for a ride now."
"There's one thing I'd like better than to go for a long ride, and that'sto go through the mine," Florence said. "Mr. Eldridge promised me he'dtake us through it while I'm here this time. When he comes in to lunch,let's beg him to take us down into it this afternoon."
"Fine!" approved Jo Ann. "I've been eager to see how the _malacate_ worksnow that it's run by electricity."
"What's a _malacate_, and what does it do?" Peggy asked curiously.
"It's a windlass arrangement that draws the ore up out of the mine. Arawhide bag is tied to the end of a long cable and let down into theshaft. Using electricity is a vast improvement over the old way."
"Did the peons have to work the windlass--wind it by hand?" Peggy asked,puzzled.
"No, burros were used for that purpose. But before they used a windlass,back in primitive times, they made the Indians carry the ore up in bags,and they had to climb all the way up out of the mine on dangerous notchedlogs for ladders. Many and many of those Indians have fallen into thedeep shafts, to their death."
There was silence for a moment; then Florence spoke up: "I have my doubtsif Mr. Eldridge'll take us into the mine in the daytime. The miners arevery superstitious about women going into the mine, he said. They thinkevery time a woman goes in, something terrible always happens--an awfulexplosion or a cave-in, killing one or more of the miners."
Jo Ann nodded understandingly. "That's so. I'd forgotten about that.We'll ask him to take us tonight, then."
As soon as Mr. Eldridge came in to lunch, all three girls greeted himwith requests to show them through the mine that night.
"We-ell, I don't know quite what to say to that," he replied slowly."There've been two peculiar accidents lately that make me somewhatreluctant to take you down into the mine. Those accidents haven't beenaccounted for to my satisfaction yet."
"But they were both outside the mine, weren't they?" asked Jo Ann.
"Yes."
"And two days have passed by without any more trouble,
" Florence added.
Mr. Eldridge smiled. "Well, I might as well say you may go. When threegirls pounce upon one poor defenseless man, he has to agree to theirplans. There's no night shift working tonight, so this'll be a good time.Be ready by eight o'clock."
"All right," the girls chorused in reply.
That afternoon the three, accompanied by Carlitos and Miss Prudence, tooka long horseback ride over a beautiful mountain trail.
Miss Prudence refused, however, to go with them on their trip to inspectthe mine that night or to let Carlitos go. "Carlitos is tired and sleepyfrom the long ride, and bed's the best place for him," she said. "Ishould think you girls would've had enough exercise, too."
By a quarter of eight the girls were ready and waiting. Knowing that themine was damp and cold, they had put on their sweaters and heaviestoxfords, and Jo Ann and Peggy had prepared themselves for darkness aswell, as they had their flashlights.
When Mr. Eldridge and they reached the shaft, he switched on theelectricity to work the _malacate_ so they could go down into the mine.
No sooner had the machinery started running than the Mexican nightwatchman came running to investigate, an alarmed expression on his face."Ah, it is you!" he exclaimed in a relieved tone on seeing Mr. Eldridge.
Mr. Eldridge smiled. "You are a good watchman, Manuel. I am taking thesenoritas down to show them how we mine the ore. Do not tell anyone thesenoritas have been in the mine. _Sabe?_"
"_Si._ I _sabe_," Manuel replied quickly, knowing at once why _El Senor_had given this order.
"Don't turn off the _malacate_. See that nobody comes near it. Stay closeby."
Manuel nodded assent. "I stay here."
"Manuel is the best watchman we've ever had," Mr. Eldridge told thegirls. "I can trust him not to go to sleep."
When Jo Ann found herself in the rawhide bag tied at the end of the longcable and being dropped down into the shaft's eerie darkness, she felt aqueer sinking sensation at the pit of her stomach, as if she were fallingthrough bottomless space. "It's breath-taking--scary," she thought.
It was with a gasp of relief that she stepped out of the bag and onto therocky bottom of the shaft. She knew exactly how Peggy felt when shescrambled out of the bag a little later and exclaimed, "Wh-ew! My heart'sup here!" She was clutching her throat dramatically.
Together they waited for Florence's descent. By their flashlights' gleamthey could see that her eyes were dilated and her lips tightly closed.
"It scared you speechless," grinned Peggy after waiting a moment for herto speak.
Florence nodded and managed a "Took my breath!"
It seemed to all three that of all the cold, damp, terrifying places towork, a silver mine was the worst. Mr. Eldridge led them through lownarrow tunnels and into several black, cavernous recesses opening fromthese passageways and showed them the different mining processes.
Peggy became decidedly nervous on learning that the ore was dynamiteddown. "There might be some dynamite around here now, and it might explodeand blow us into smithereens," she whispered to Jo Ann.
A few minutes later she bumped into something against the wall that madeher leap back in haste. When Mr. Eldridge told her it was a dynamite box,her heart began leaping faster than ever.
"He means an empty dynamite box," Jo Ann explained hastily as herflashlight's beam showed her the ghastly pallor of Peggy's face. "Someminers are using it as an altar," she added comfortingly. "See, there's apicture of the Virgin inside."
"I believe I'm ready to leave this murky gloom and get back up into thegood fresh air," Peggy said, her voice still shaky.
"Well, I believe you've seen all the most interesting things." Mr.Eldridge smiled. "We'll go on up."
When they came back to the shaft, to Mr. Eldridge's amazement, the_malacate_ was not working. "Now what's the matter!" he exclaimed,annoyed. "I told Manuel to keep the _malacate_ running so we could getback."
For several minutes they stood waiting in vain for the cable and bag toappear.
Finally, in an exasperated tone Mr. Eldridge remarked, "Never hadanything like this happen before. Can't imagine what's the matter.Manuel's always been so dependable. We may have to walk all that longdistance to the entrance of the workings. And you're all so tiredalready."
Just then there sounded an excited cry that reverberated uncannilythrough the shaft.
"Why, that's Jose's voice!" Jo Ann exclaimed. "What's----"
The next instant the words, "Manuel's--killed!" echoed down to them.
A moment's stunned silence fell; then Mr. Eldridge gasped,"Manuel--killed! Start the _malacate_ at once, so we can get up there!"
"No can--the wires all broke," came back the wailing answer.
"Wires broken--and Manuel killed and----" Mr. Eldridge's voice trailedoff into silence.
Jo Ann cut in, "Jose's so excitable! Manuel may have only fainted or beenshocked unconscious."
"That's true. All the more reason I must get up there at once. It'll takeus so long to walk to the entrance."
"Can't Jose attach burros to the _malacate_ and pull us up that way?" putin Jo Ann.
"Yes, he could. That'd take lots less time." Mr. Eldridge calledimmediately to Jose to attach the burros to the _malacate_ and start itworking, ending with the usual, "_Sabe?_"
"_Si_," Jose called back. "I go now."
While they were anxiously awaiting for Jose to start the _malacate_, Mr.Eldridge remarked that he had better go up first to see about Manuel. "Ihate to go ahead of you, though."
"Don't worry about us," Jo Ann said, more confidently than she felt."There's nothing here to harm us."
"Nothing at all," agreed Florence in a voice that quiveredunconvincingly.
Just then Peggy's hand clutched Jo Ann's convulsively. "Poor Peg's scaredstiff at the idea of his leaving us," thought Jo Ann as she grasped thecold hand in a comforting pressure. Her mind, however, flew back toManuel. Surely he couldn't have been killed. He must've fainted. But hewas so strong-looking. What could have happened in that short time? Ifonly Jose would hurry faster and let down that cable. "Oh, surely Manuelcan't be dead!" she kept repeating to herself.
