Part 1 (2/2)
”Quite soon, I hope,” replied Talborn. ”For the present, my chief concern is the s.h.i.+pment of the Mayan relics which Professor Hedwin has uncovered. Senor Cuzana is making such arrangements so that the usual red tape can be avoided.”
Taking the remark as an invitation to leave, Allard shook hands with the others. Cuzana politely conducted him out to the front door, where a car was waiting. There, Cuzana remarked on the fact that Allard had earlier noted: the clarity of the night air in Mexico City.
”Sometimes,” said Cuzana, ”you can almost imagine that you hear the beat of distant Aztec drums.”
Allard's keen ears did hear such throbs. They were coming from the south, the direction of Cuicuilco. Alone in the rear of the limousine to which Cuzana conducted him, Allard smiled as he rode away. Then, from his lips, came a strange, low whisper, a sinister laugh, which carried antic.i.p.ation, not disappointment. Allard's business in Mexico City was simply an excuse for his presence.
The laugh marked him as The Shadow - the strange master who hunted down crime, no matter where it might be. His mirth told that The Shadow was on the trail of evil, and had learned its location.
Cuicuilco, close by the town of Tlalpan, had become The Shadow's immediate objective. There, near the very mountains that could be seen by day from Mexico City, The Shadow was to solve the riddle of the Aztec drums!
CHAPTER II. STRIFE BY NIGHT.
PROFESSOR DARIUS HEDWIN stood in the glow of a powerful electric lantern, directing a small crew of swarthy men who were hacking deep into a stony pa.s.sage that was cemented with volcanic lava.
Frail of build, with a face as wrinkled as a mummy's, the professor might have been a Mayan G.o.d himself.
He looked something like a golliwog, for his dried-up face was topped by a ma.s.s of shocky white hair.
Near the professor stood his chief a.s.sistant, Andrew Ames. He was young, but his square-jawed face and broad shoulders carried the build of experience. So did his manner as he watched the slaving workers. But his face showed disapproval, which Professor Hedwin noticed.
”Come, Andy!” wheezed the professor. ”Drop your moping and take an interest. I am sure that we are about to uncover new relics of Xitli, the forgotten fire G.o.d.”
”Good enough,” returned Andy, ”but why can't you do the excavating by day and spend the nights in Mexico City?”
”So civilization lures you, Andy!”
”Not at all, professor. I'm speaking from the standpoint of common sense.”
Hedwin gave a head-shake.
”You are wrong, Andy,” he said. ”These workers prefer to work at night. They sleep in the daytime.
That's when they take their siestas.”
”Siestas by day,” returned Andy, ”and fiestas by night. It's one and the same, professor. They won't work unless you drive them, and that goes for either day or night.”
The professor told the workers to rest. He drew Andy aside and began to wag a scrawny forefinger.
Andy braced himself for what was coming. He could see the strange gleam in the old professor's eyes.
Hedwin was going to confide the same facts that he had spoken a dozen times before.
”Many have found relics of the fire G.o.d,” whispered Hedwin, ”and have believed that a strange cult wors.h.i.+pped that mysterious deity - a cult that began with the Mayas and survived among the Aztecs, even to this day.
”But only I” - the professor drew himself up proudly - ”have learned the name of the unknown fire G.o.d. I have identified him with Xitli, the volcano which disgorged its ma.s.s of lava to cover and preserve the ruins of Cuicuilco.” Andy nodded. It was always wise to humor the professor. Hedwin did not take the nod as a criticism, for he knew that Andy understood the history of Cuicuilco.
By day the two had roamed over the pedregal, the fifteen-mile ”stony place” of rough volcanic lava, broken with deep cracks and yawning cisterns. The pedregal, site of the Cuicuilco ruins, told its own story of a volcanic overflow in Mayan times, and would naturally have been attributed to the fire G.o.d.
Since the name of Xitli belonged to the volcano, which had become extinct, Andy was quite willing to agree that the fire G.o.d bore the same t.i.tle and that the eruption had been regarded as proof of Xitli's wrath. But he still didn't agree with the professor on the matter of making excavations at night.
”Listen, professor,” argued Andy. ”When we left Yucatan we had a tough road ahead of us. I'll admit it wouldn't have been safe to hit the jungle without Panchez and his guards. But now that we've reached Cuicuilco we don't need them. While we're digging for relics of Xitli, Panchez and his mestizos are roaming the pedregal, up to their old game.”
”Their old game, Andy?”
”Sure! They've been hunting for treasure all along, professor. They know that when the Spaniards put Montezuma in a tight spot, the Aztecs buried their gold and jade near the temples of the ancient G.o.ds, hoping that it would mean protection. I'll admit that Panchez and his crowd cleared the jungle for us, but only because the faster we went the more loot they could find.”
Professor Hedwin shook his head.
”When Carland was in charge,” he said, ”he hired Panchez. When Talborn took Carland's place as financier of the expedition, he said that everything could continue as before. So I kept Panchez -”
”Of course,” interrupted Andy. ”Good enough, while we were in the jungle. But right now, Panchez and his bunch might as well be in Mexico City looking at a double feature. We're not going to run into hostile tribes of Indians around here.”
”You think not?” Hedwin c.o.c.ked his head wisely. ”Haven't you heard the beat of Aztec drums?”
”Yes,” agreed Andy. ”But what do they mean? Nothing but an old ritual carried on by a lot of Indians who don't do anything more dangerous than weave baskets!”
PROFESSOR HEDWIN turned away. He felt that he had won his point. He ordered the workers to chop deeper into the lava, and his manner told that he intended to ignore Andy entirely. It did not hurt Andy's pride; instead, it was the very thing that he had been hoping for.
Using his flashlight, Andy walked a few hundred yards to the deserted tents that made the headquarters for the expedition. As he expected, he found no sign of Panchez nor any of the mestizo guards. They had all gone to the pedregal again, which explained why some of the professor's workers talked of lights that had danced above Cuicuilco on previous nights.
Such lights, according to tradition, meant places where treasure lay buried under the protection of unknown deities like Xitli. But Andy Ames took a reverse view of the phenomenon. To him, the lights meant Panchez and the mestizo crew. If treasure figured, it would only come into the case should Panchez Co. uncover it.
In his tent, Andy put fresh batteries in his flashlight and picked up a supply of .38 cartridges to supplement the loaded revolver that he always carried. Then, keeping his light close to the ground, he started for the pedregal in search of Panchez. Andy hoped to find the mestizo leader engaged in excavating of his own. Such a discovery might convince old Professor Hedwin that Andy's ideas were right.
There was one job that Panchez and his men handled very well: the s.h.i.+pment of all the motley curios and relics, such as the broken pottery and baked clay idols that Professor Hedwin uncovered. The willingness with which the mestizos plowed the jungle with such burdens simply convinced Andy that they also carried baggage that they considered valuable to themselves.
Lights were dancing above Cuicuilco. Andy located them, more than a mile distant, along the rough-surfaced pedregal. He watched the peculiar way in which they dipped and reappeared.
Gun in one hand, flashlight in the other, Andy crept closer to the lights. All the while he could hear the throb of Aztec drums, louder, closer than The Shadow had heard them in Mexico City.
The lights showed the stooping figures of men, but Andy could not see their faces. Some were pus.h.i.+ng heavy sacks out from a cistern hole in the lava. The pit could not have been open when they discovered it, for Andy saw a great, chunky slab lying by the hole.
Four men were straining, as if prepared to push the slab back in place at an order from their leader, who was probably Panchez; but four were not enough. More were coming over to help them.
This was Andy's time for action. Springing forward, he suddenly emerged into the lights, brandis.h.i.+ng his gun as he poured an order in Spanish for the prowlers to stop their task.
Like the snap of a whip came a countermanding order from a man back in the darkness. With one accord, the stooping men quit their task and surged toward Andy.
His first shots, delivered in the air did not halt them. Finding the warning useless, Andy fired point blank, then hurled his revolver at faces that he could not see. Knives were flas.h.i.+ng toward him, and Andy's only weapons were his fists, good enough against mestizos if he could use them quicker than the slas.h.i.+ng blades.
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