"King Obani, he home," said the negro boy, nodding across the river. "Three year ago English too 'm. No find gold."
"I know where I am now," whispered Gifford, excitedly. "This river is the Mmymbi; that is Obani's chief town. Willoughby and the rangers took it three years ago, and were fooled in getting the loot, don't you remember. Eh? the idiots!"
"Well, what are we to do?" asked Mr. McFee.
"Thirty-five miles below is an English trading-station," Gifford said, eagerly. "We must get a boat of some kind."
Tho black had waded knee-deep into the stream. He bent over with his face close to the water, and then struck out silently.
"Come back here, you black rascal," hissed Gifford, raising his rifle.
But the boy's reply caused him to lower it.
"He says there's a boat tied to the branches of yonder tree," he murmured.
Now by bending over all could see it plainly. The negro slid over the side, and soon came back paddling it silently along the shore; the others crawled in, and now, keeping well in the deep shadow of the trees, they drifted down the stream; the cries and lights of the Bangwali village grew fainter and fainter in the distance. When around the bend of the river Gifford picked up a paddle, and they struck out at full speed. Three hours' paddling and they were beyond King Obani's jurisdiction, and by daylight they saw the clearing of the English trader.
For some reason they chose not to tell their story, and the next morning as they sat at breakfast a canoe shot down the stream. Some natives landed.
"Hullo, here's news," said the trader's clerk as he approached the house after meeting the native boat. "King Obani is dead."
"Then the mystery of his treasure dies with him," said the trader, for the story was well known.
"Humph," observed Gifford, lighting his pipe.
"Mal, my boy, we'll return for the rest of it some day," whispered Mr. McFee.
But he never did. Adventure seemed to be killed within him, and he and Malcolm composed the firm McFee & Son, general merchants, at K----. And here is where the story comes from.
AUTHOR OF "SNOW-SHOES AND SLEDGES," "THE FUR-SEAL'S TOOTH," "THE 'MATE' SERIES," "FLAMINGO FEATHER," ETC.
The month of September was drawing to its close, and the gang of loggers belonging to Camp No. 10 of the Northwest Lumber Company, which operated in the vast timber belt clothing the northern flanks of Mount Rainier, were about to knock off work. From earliest morning the stately forest, sweet-scented with the odors of resin, freshly cut cedar, and crushed ferns, had resounded with their shouts and laughter, the ring of their axes, the steady swish of saws, and the crash of falling trees. To one familiar only with Eastern logging, where summer is a time of idleness, and everything depends on the snows of winter, followed by the high waters of spring, the different methods of these Northwestern woodsmen would be matters of constant surprise. Their work goes on without a pause from year's end to year's end. There is no hauling on sleds, no vast accumulations of logs on the ice of rivers or lakes, no river driving, no mighty jams to be cleared at imminent risk of life and limb--nothing that is customary in the East. Even the mode of cutting down trees is different.