Part 7 (1/2)
CHAPTER VIII.
THE MESSAGE.
Frank Bird could restrain his curiosity no longer.
”What is it, Andy?” he asked, as he laid an affectionate arm across the shoulders of his cousin.
The other turned his eyes upon Frank, and there was something in their depths that stirred the other tremendously.
”Is it about your father, Andy?” he demanded, eagerness plainly showing in his whole manner; for he understood what a hold the subject had on his chum.
Andy nodded, and as soon as he could command his quivering voice, said:
”Yes, nothing more than a letter from the grave, I fear! See, Frank, written in his own dear hand. Oh! to think of it, that at least three months ago he was alive, even though a prisoner, the sport of fate.”
”A prisoner!” echoed Frank, astonished. ”Whatever can you mean? Did he fall into the hands of some of those strange Indians we have been reading about, who have their homes around the headwaters of the Orinoco River in Venezuela?”
This time Andy shook his head in the negative.
”It is stranger than that--almost beyond belief!” he replied. ”My poor father has for months been imprisoned in a great valley, surrounded by impa.s.sable cliffs. Don't you remember something of the sort occurred in one of Captain Mayne Reid's books, where the young plant hunters found themselves prisoners in that way? But here, Frank, look for yourself.”
”Where does the letter come from, in the beginning?” asked the other, quietly, wis.h.i.+ng to advance by slow degrees, so that he could understand everything.
”A town in Columbia, called Barranquila,” replied Andy, readily enough. ”I'm not sure, but I think it lies at the mouth of the big Magdalena River, and is upon the coast. You know I've just devoured the map of that region for months, and every name is familiar to me.”
”Besides this queer communication, which you say is from your father,”
Frank went on, ”there seems to be another letter?”
”That is from Senor Jose Almirez. Read it, Frank, and you will begin to understand.”
The letter was in a crabbed hand, apparently unused to writing in English, though grammatically correct. And this was what Frank saw:
”To Senor Andrew Bird:
”I received the enclosed from a correspondent and customer, one Carlos Mendoza, located in the vicinity of Manangue, a town about one hundred and fifty miles up-river.
”He is a grower of cocoa in the rich valley. I do not enclose his letter, because it is written in Spanish. But it simply says that he found the written communication close to his plantation house one morning in April of this year. At first he could not understand how it came there. Then, upon having the writing translated, he noticed that the missive was attached to what seemed to be a little parachute, or balloon, made up of a fragment of silk belonging to a balloon. Knowing that I had spent several years in Was.h.i.+ngton, in the service of my country, he finally concluded to send the same to me. I have the honor to transmit it to the address given in the communication.
”With respect, and expressing a willingness to help you all I may, Senor Andrew Bird, believe me to be most sincerely yours,
”Jose Costilena Almirez.”
Frank read this amazing communication, and then turned to stare at his cousin.
”No, don't stop yet!” exclaimed the trembling Andy. ”Read the other, the missive that Carlos Mendoza picked up on his cocoa plantation, in the valley of the Magdalena River.”
And so Frank again turned his attention to the enclosure that had been sent on by the friendly merchant of Columbia.
It seemed to be a sheet of thin but pliable bark from a tree, and in some respects reminded Frank of birch bark, which he had often used in lieu of paper, when in the woods. The juice of some berry had afforded ink; and doubtless the college professor had easily made a pen from a bird's quill. And this was what Frank read, a small portion of the communication being missing, as though it had received rough usage somewhere, en route: