“And you want to find out how the glyptodon evolved into the armadillo?” Tony asked.
“Yes,” Rose replied.
A man carrying a rifle joined the party. He was over six feet tall, slim, and quiet.
“This is Frank Pendleton,” Rose said, “our jungle guide. He knows everything about this area.”
“I should after twenty years,” Pendleton said, smiling.
“I take it you hunt, too?” Tony said with a glance at the man’s rifle.
“No. The gun is strictly for self-defense against the dangerous animals of Yucatán and the jungles south of Brazil. I’ve seen them all.”
“You mean jaguars?” Biff asked.
“That, and big snakes—boa constrictors, for instance.”
Chet grimaced. “I hope I don’t meet one.”
“You never can tell what you may meet in the jungle,” the guide responded. “I—”
“Time for chow,” Weiss interrupted.
Melville Courtney slapped his swagger stick against his boot again. “Dinner is indeed served, such as it is,” he said in his high-pitched voice. “K rations and coffee. Really!”
“However you say it,” Weiss laughed, “we’re all ready to eat.” He invited the Bayporters to share their fare, and they sat in a circle on the ground.
After a while Frank asked, “Has anybody here seen a private plane marked ‘Mexico City’? We’re trying to find it.”
No one had.
Joe put the next question to the group. “Have you ever met a man named Pedro Zemog?”
Again, everyone said no.
“Rumble Murphy?”
As the men shook their heads, Rose said, “Why are you looking for these people?”
“Because we’re trying to solve the mystery of a gold theft,” Joe replied. He told the group about the Wakefield heist and the theft of the ancient horse from the Scythian collection.
Courtney coughed. “Mr. Zemog and Mr. Murphy are obviously not gentlemen,” he stated. “I would not care to associate with them.”
“But they’re part of our mystery,” Joe pointed out.
“I don’t think you’ll solve your mystery here,” Weiss said. “There’s no reason for these gold thieves to bring their loot down here. They’d stick to Mexico City.”
Rose lowered her coffee cup. “It looks as if you boys have come a long way for nothing.”
Chet grinned. “Not me. I want to look at the Mayan gold you found, because I’m adept in gold artifacts.”
“What in the world is that?” Rose asked.
Chet explained his correspondence-course diploma.
Courtney gave him a supercilious look. “That is not like a degree from Hawkins,” he stated.
Chet looked hurt.
“Well, it’s an interesting title,” Steve Weiss interjected to make Chet feel better. “Sure, you can see our gold. The Mayas buried it to keep the Spaniards from getting it. Palango was once a thriving Mayan city. It was subordinate to Chichén Itzá, which you passed through to get here. You must have seen the temple-pyramid there.”
“Yes, we did,” Frank said.
“Well,” the archaeologist continued, “Chichén Itzá also had its Temple of the Warriors, its Court of the Thousand Columns, and its Observatory.”
“Observatory?” Tony asked. “Did those people study astronomy?”
“Oh, sure, and in a big way. They kept records of the stars and planets so they could be sure their Mayan calendar was accurate. They needed to know which days of the year to hold their religious festivals and other ceremonies.”
“Palango was minor compared to Chichén Itzá,” Pendleton put in. “But it did have a pyramid—the lost pyramid.”
“Boy, how can you lose a pyramid?” Biff quipped. “Kind of careless.”
Rose laughed. “The fact is that jungle growth covers everything in a few years.”
Weiss nodded. “And the jungle’s had almost five hundred years to cover the pyramid. When the trees, moss, vines, and creepers have done their work, you can walk within yards of a Mayan building and never spot it.”
Pendleton continued. “We know the lost pyramid is about twenty miles from here because a hunter spotted it fifty years ago. But he didn’t give the location. Even if we knew that, it would be very hard to hack our way through the jungle. There’s the vegetation, the heat, and the insects. As things are, every attempt to find the pyramid has failed because it’s like looking for a minnow in the Gulf of Mexico.”
“We may never discover it,” Rose added, “but we expect to run into a lot of armadillos. The jungle here must be loaded with them.”
“It is,” Pendleton assured her. “We’ll go out after armadillo tomorrow. Like to go along with us, fellows? You can help capture one.”
Biff spoke for them all. “That would be great!”
Weiss dug into the camp stores for more tents. Frank and Joe pitched the one they would share on the edge of the clearing near the Mayan temple. Branches of large trees, which surrounded the ancient building, were festooned with trailing moss, giving the scene an eerie look.
The Hardys said good night to their friends and were sound asleep when they were awakened by a terrified shout from Biff’s tent. It woke up others in the camp and brought footsteps pounding in his direction.
Joe snapped on his pocket flashlight and opened the flap of his friend’s shelter.
“Biff, what’s wrong?” he asked.
“On the ground!” Biff cried.
Joe trained the beam of his light lower. A long sinuous form was coiled just inside the door of Biff’s tent. The reptile raised its head in a menacing stare and started to hiss.
“It’s a boa constrictor!” Chet bellowed. “That thing will squeeze him to death!”
CHAPTER XI
A Mysterious Shot
BIFF crouched at the rear of his tent and eyed the big snake apprehensively. His friends formed a semicircle at the open flap of the canvas, not daring to get too close. The boa constrictor Nicked its tongue menacingly.
“What’ll we do?” Chet wailed.
“Step aside!” a woman ordered. Rose Renda walked into the tent. She was carrying a large burlap bag, the mouth of which she opened by releasing a draw-string. Just then three Mexican workmen, alerted by Pendleton because of their experience in handling snakes, joined the group.
The jungle guide teased the boa constrictor with a stick until it struck ferociously. As its head hit the ground, Pendleton’s hand flashed out and closed on the neck just behind the head.
Two of the other men grabbed the reptile around the body, while the third seized the lashing tail. The four lifted the boa off the ground and dropped it, tail first, into the open burlap bag that Rose was holding. Then they crammed in the sinuous body, and finally Pendleton shoved the head, instantly pulling his hand away. Rose drew the mouth of the bag taut.
“This will make a fine addition to the Mexico City Zoo,” she commented.
“The zoo can have it,” Biff muttered.
Pendleton told everybody to go back to sleep and stop worrying. “It’s almost unheard of for a snake of this size to invade an archaeological dig,” he told them.
“This one,” said Frank, “must have lost its way.”
“Poor, crazy mixed-up snake,” Joe said with a grin.
That broke up the tension and all the boys went back to their tents. In the morning, they joined Rose, Pendleton, and Courtney on a trek into the jungle in search of an armadillo. Pendleton wore the rough clothes and floppy hat of an experienced jungle guide. Courtney appeared in spotless white ducks, wearing his pith helmet and carrying his swagger stick.
“Melville, you’d better leave your helmet behind,” Pendleton urged.
“It’s part of one’s dress in hot climates,” was the reply. “I wish to dress correctly.”
“That’s when you’re out in the sun. We’ll be under the trees and you’ll need air. You’ll be too hot with a helmet on.”
Courtney insisted on wearing his helmet, however, so the guide shrugged and dropped the subject.
The party started their trek into the steaming jungle. Frank and Joe decided to say nothing but to keep their eyes open for a plane flying overhead. They might spot the one they suspected!
Soon they found themselves under a dense canopy of greenery. Branches, vines, moss, and creepers blotted out the sun. Much of the time the trekkers had to hack their way through with machetes. Birds and monkeys screamed at them from the trees, and weasels and other small creatures fled through the underbrush at their approach.
Insects stung them and sweat poured down their faces. As Pendleton had predicted, Courtney felt the heat worst of all because of his helmet.
“Ditch it!” the guide advised.
“A Hawkins man never gives up,” Courtney replied.
“Have it your way, but we have quite a distance to go before we reach armadillo country.”
They slogged forward, taking regular breaks since it was so difficult to advance. Late in the afternoon, the guide suggested, “Let’s call it a day.” The others willingly agreed. They opened crackers and tinned meat, and ate dinner.
Then Rose gave a talk on armadillos. “They’re rarely found together,” she stated. “When we spot an armadillo, we’ll run him to earth. He’ll try to reach the security of his burrow before you get there. If you head him off, he’ll roll up into a ball and stay put.”
“Why does he do that?” Tony queried.
Rose smiled. “He hopes that whoever is bothering him will get tired of waiting for him to uncurl and go away.”
“What are the chances of finding one tomorrow?” Chet asked.
“Pretty good. Yucatán has been the home of the armadillo for thousands of years. According to a Mayan myth vultures turn into armadillos when they grow old. There are plenty left here.”
In the morning, the march resumed. Insects swarmed around the hunters and Frank swatted a mosquito. “They’re as big as robins,” he complained.
“Big as crows,” Joe corrected him, knocking one off his cheek.
After hours of pushing through the jungle, Rose noticed an anthill that had been broken open. “An armadillo did that,” she said, excited. “Ants are number one on his menu.”
Pendleton told the group to split up. “Look under bushes and in burrows. If you flush an armadillo, sing out. The rest of us will come on the run.”
Courtney slapped his swagger stick against a tree. “I will direct the capture,” he offered.
“I’ll bet he will,” Frank whispered to Joe. “He’s not about to touch an armadillo.”
They separated to look for their quarry. Rose tried to pick up a trail at the ravaged anthill. Pendleton continued straight ahead in the direction they had been taking. Courtney stabbed into the bushes with his swagger stick, looking as if he hoped never to see an armadillo in his life.
Chet, Biff, and Tony moved beyond Courtney into the jungle. Frank and Joe went to the left. “There’s one thing we won’t find in here,” Frank remarked.
“What’s that?”
“The Mexico City plane. You couldn’t fit even a helicopter into this jungle with a shoehorn.”
“That’s right. Well, let’s concentrate on the armadillo.”
They split up. Frank vanished among some moss-laden trees. Joe took a route over a carpet of jungle vegetation. The undergrowth slowed him considerably. Vines caught his clothing, and creepers tripped him. A green parrot fluttered down onto a bush and squawked at him angrily, but he laughed as a hare stood upright on its hind legs, twitching its nose as he passed.
Presently Joe found an armadillo burrow, which he probed with a branch. It was empty. He went on, but after a while his legs were tired. He paused beside a tree in an open space of the jungle to rest. Wham! A rock slammed into the tree, inches from his head! It bounced off and caromed into a thicket.
Joe hit the ground in a headlong dive. He crawled over a tangle of creepers and pulled himself into a crouching position behind another tree. Gingerly he peered around the trunk. No one was in sight.
A sharp report cut through the stillness of the jungle. A shot! It had come from behind him! Joe dodged into the underbrush and stealthily moved in an arc toward the spot where the shot had been fired. He saw no one.
His companions had heard the shot, and ran up to see what had happened.
“Somebody used me for a clay pigeon,” Joe told them. “He fired right at me!”
Frank turned to Pendleton. “You’re the only one carrying a weapon. Did you fire at Joe?”
“Of course not.” The jungle guide strenuously denied the charge. He opened the breech of his rifle. “Look for yourself. It hasn’t been fired.”
“Who could it be, then?” Biff wondered.
Tony sighed. “We’re obviously not the only ones here in the wilderness.”
“Maybe it was a Mayan hunter after armadillo,” Pendleton suggested. “Mayas love armadillo steaks.”
“Or the guy who dug the hole and tried to conk us with a tree,” Frank said to Joe in a low voice. “Matter of fact, that’s more likely.”
“That would mean we’re being watched constantly,” Joe said in alarm.
Frank nodded. “It is a possibility.”
The searchers began beating the undergrowth. An armadillo, evidently startled, bolted from behind a rock. It was about three feet long, with a pointed snout, long ears, and a long tail. The armor fitted over its back like a half shell.
The animal hit Biff a hard blow on the ankles, knocking him off his feet, then raced past. Everybody chased the armadillo, careening and stumbling through the jungle undergrowth.
The creature veered into Chet’s path. As he lunged for it, his foot caught in a creeper, and he fell with a crash. The Hardys, too close behind him to stop, piled on top of the stout boy in a tangle of arms and legs. Frantically they scrambled to their feet and resumed the chase.
The armadillo did an about-face and raced between them. It plowed into Courtney, bowling the Hawkins man over. His pith helmet rolled into the underbrush. He got to his feet slowly, retrieved the helmet, brushed it with his sleeve, and placed it on his head, looking embarrassed.
“I shan’t associate with any armadillo,” he declared, seating himself on a stump and rapping it with his swagger stick. “I will wait here.”
The animal reached its burrow, but Pendleton, too quick for it, seized the armadillo and pulled it out, kicking and squealing. The creature resisted briefly before quieting down in the guide’s arms.
The other searchers arrived. The boys stroked the armor, which was composed of hide with a series of plates around the body, giving it flexibility.
“So that’s an armadillo!” Tony marveled.
“Yes indeed,” Rose answered. She scratched its ears with her fingertips.
“Isn’t that dangerous?” Chet asked apprehensively. “You might lose a finger.”
Rose shook her head. “Armadillos have few or no front teeth, so they can’t bite.” She held the animal while Pendleton took a collapsible wire cage from his pack. They eased their captive into it and the jungle guide pulled the straps over his shoulders. The cage rode easily on his back.
“Mission accomplished,” Pendleton said.
“Right-o!” Courtney exclaimed. “We may now leave this jungle, of which I have had quite enough.”
Frank spoke. “I’d like to scout around here a bit longer.”
Joe and his friends agreed enthusiastically, but Pendleton objected. “We’ll have to get back to the dig. Do you want to stay here alone?”
“Is there any reason why we shouldn’t?”
“Not really. We’re on an elevation where the mosquitoes aren’t bad. I don’t think you’ll see any dangerous animals, either. Can you find your way back to camp?”
“Sure,” Frank said. “We’ll go by the compass. Since we came from a northeasterly direction, we’ll return that way.”
“Good enough,” Pen
dleton replied. “You stay then, and we’ll be on our way.”
Courtney doffed his pith helmet. “Adios,” he said solemnly, and Rose waved good-by.
As the three explorers disappeared into the jungle, their footsteps died away in the distance.
The boys walked in the opposite direction, noting the jungle flowers and animals as they went.
“There are a million monkeys here,” Biff judged.
“And a billion parrots,” Tony added.
“What do we do if we meet any Mayas?” Joe asked.
“Talk Mayan to them,” Frank quipped.
By nightfall the boys were extremely tired. Making a hasty meal of their rations, they set up camp beneath towering trees.
Frank could not sleep. He kept thinking about the strange events that had taken Joe and him to Switzerland, then to the jungles of Yucatán. It appeared that they were finally onto a clue—the plane marked “Mexico City.” But where was it?
He sat up and turned his head. Everything was pitch black. Suddenly through the darkness he saw a light. It moved in a circle and went out. Frank rubbed his eyes.
The light flashed once more, swaying back and forth for a few minutes, then went out again. In a moment the signal was repeated a third time.
Now fully awake, Frank reached over and shook his brother.
Joe yawned. “What is it, Frank?”
“A light out there! Look!”
The beam remained stationary for a few seconds. Then it started moving once more, vanished, and reappeared a moment later.
Frank jumped up. “Hurry, Joe, we’ll have to find out what this means!” He grabbed his compass and the two slipped through the jungle, guiding themselves by the mysterious light. After about half a mile, they reached a clearing.
The full moon revealed a weird sight. A stone building covered with jungle vegetation towered toward the sky. The vines and creepers spreading up the uncanny edifice from base to summit seemed like writhing serpents and disguised the building completely. The mysterious beam came from the summit.
“That’s a flashlight!” Joe said in a low voice. “Somebody’s up there. What’s he doing, Frank?”
“Joe, I believe he’s signaling a pal. But why?”
The Jungle Pyramid Page 7
