“Hot tamales!” Johnny exclaimed as a great mahogany tray of tamales was set before them.
“Mm-m!” murmured Jean as she tasted hers. “Wild turkey tamale. How delicious!”
“They should understand the making of them,” said Johnny as he took a generous mouthful. “Unless I am mistaken the Mayas invented them. They probably served them on plates of gold before Columbus discovered America; yes, or even Solomon found his mines.”
“How—how picturesque! How romantic!” murmured the girl.
Johnny agreed with her, but in his mind many questions were constantly bobbing up demanding an answer.
That night as he lay alone on a comfortable bed of mats with a heavy home woven blanket for protection from the night chill of this higher altitude, he thought of many things.
As he heard the steady pat-pat of a sentry’s feet as he paced before the door of that long, low house, he realized that they were virtually prisoners. They were being treated very well, and would be in the future, he hoped. But would the Mayas allow them to return home? He doubted it. The trails to this hidden city of the wild Mayas—it was truly a city and already Johnny had seen thousands of the little brown people—were secret trails. How Roderick had come to stumble upon the trail they had followed, he could not tell. Well enough the native chief knew that to allow these uninvited guests to depart was to throw away the key to his castle and city.
What, then, would happen? Would they be detained there indefinitely, be given the privilege of becoming members of the tribe, of learning the secrets of their ceremonies and initiated into hidden mysteries?
“And in the end perhaps marry the princess,” Johnny chuckled. “Grand little old fairy story, this.”
Strangely enough, at this moment he felt the call of the red lure as never before. As he closed his eyes he could see great trees come crashing down, see little tractors dragging massive logs through the bush, see those logs splash into the water to form a raft to at last go drifting silently down the river. This was to have been his great venture. He was to have tapped a primeval forest of priceless wood. That wood was to have been brought to enrich the world. The richest lady of the land might not disdain to have her boudoir furnished with rich appointments made from this wood. A king or president might be proud to lay his most important documents upon its shiny surface. There was to have come from this success, riches, and a consciousness of fine achievement.