Chapter X: The Lost One Found

For the merest splinter of a second, Chick was in a confusion of mentality that took no note of anything. Then, before he could realize that he was plunging to a horrible death, there was an agonizing tug at his right wrist, and he thought his hand had been taken off by some kind of saw-edged knife.

“Ugh!” he ejaculated involuntarily.

Something swept past his eyes, and just as he knew that it was the body of his foe plunging downward into the valley, he also understood that he was hanging by one arm over the awful depths!

His hand had caught in a crevice in the rock, and though his wrist was bleeding and the rough edges of the stone seemed to be cutting him to the bone, still he was hanging in comparative safety.

“Bad enough; but it might have been worse,” he muttered philosophically.

Even if he could not get up to the ledge, at least he had not yet dived to certain death on the bowlders and ridges that floored the cañon.

“Hold on, Chick!” shouted Nick Carter, at the top of his voice. “We are coming!”

Chick did not hear what his chief had said, but he knew that he must have been seen by his friends below. The only question was whether he could bear the pain and hang on where he was till they got to him.

For three minutes, which seemed to Chick like three hours, he hung there, with the edge of the rock digging deeper into his flesh, and his heart skipping beats oftener and oftener as his strength seemed to be leaving him.

“I’ll lose my senses soon,” he thought. “I can feel myself going. Well, the sooner the better!”

“Keep still, sahib!”

It was the deep voice of Jai Singh, and it seemed to be behind, as well as below, him. The sound gave Chick new courage.

“Hello, Jai Singh!” he managed to reply.

“I come up soon. We both get out!” went on Jai Singh. “Only, don’t let go. That would end it. Wait till somebody comes.”

So Jai Singh could not help him! Chick had hoped at first that the powerful Hindu was in a situation to lend him a hand.

As a matter of fact, Jai Singh had had a narrower escape than Chick. He had grasped the root of a shrub growing from a crack in the face of the rock, and thus had saved himself from going to the bottom.

If the shrub had not happened to be of a tough species, the root would have broken off under the tremendous strain put upon it by the weight and thrust of the falling Hindu.

But Jai Singh did not fear.

With the fatalistic calmness of his race, he retained his grip, and, though he felt the root giving way a little under his weight, decided that it would hold him--unless the fates had decided that his time to die had come.

In either case, there was nothing he could do except to wait and see.

Suddenly two arrows came whizzing from above. One struck close to Jai Singh, the other narrowly missed Chick.

Instantly there was the response of three shots from below, echoed by shouts from somewhere around out of sight.

“What is happening?” muttered Chick. “Are they fighting over me, and I not able to make a move for myself? If I could only get up to that ledge!”

Jai Singh said nothing. He knew perfectly well that he was an open target for the men who were sending their arrows from some safe cover above him. But, since he could not help himself, why should he give way to futile lamentations?

There were no more arrows. Instead, a chorus of shrieks and oaths in a strange tongue burst forth. Then Chick saw a white man tearing down a narrow path which wound around the face of the rock above him.

Seemingly there was nothing to prevent him diving over the edge when he should come a little farther.

Chick had just time to see the fugitive on his headlong way, and to note that two dark-skinned men who resembled the rascals they had met when the medicine man had been killed by the snake in the forest were following. Then something else seemed to leap into his vision from nothingness, although common sense told him it had been there all the time.

The something was a cleft in the rock at the edge of the precipice. It was only a few feet from that which held him by his one wrist.

“If I can reach that crack,” he murmured, “I might be able to drag myself up, and----”

Chick did not finish the sentence even to himself. Taking a firm grip of himself, so that he should not allow mere pain to swerve him from the purpose he had formed, he swung, with all his power, in the direction of the crevice he had just noticed.

As he did so, it seemed as if the wrist held in the other fissure might be torn apart. But he persisted, and, as the tips of his fingers caught the rough rock, he pulled himself up.

It was indescribable agony, because he was obliged to pull to some degree on his maimed wrist.

Nevertheless, he did not flinch. With a tremendous tug, he raised himself so that half his body lay on the rock.

“If I can pull up the rest of the way, I’ll make it yet,” he thought. “That chap above will be over if I don’t stop him.”

The young man--hatless, and with his white garments rent in all directions--still showed in his face and general aspect not only that he was a gentleman, but that he was not of a nature to be easily subdued.

“By George!” was Chick’s exclamation, as, with a last painful effort, he got to the narrow path and lay panting for breath. “It looks like----”

He got to his knees and braced himself for a shock that would mean life or death to two people.

The white stranger had lost control of himself entirely now. There had been curves in his downward path on the face of the rock that he had taken advantage of to check himself twice. The second time he had almost stopped.

Now he was on the last bit of path, and there was nothing to hold him back. Twenty steps more and he would be on the narrow ledge where Chick crouched, waiting!

It was out of the question that the flying man could stop there. He must keep on! Then--the leap to death!

“What can I do?” thought Chick.

It was not in a despairing tone that Chick asked himself this question. He put it to himself seriously, and with the object of finding an answer.

Of course, he had not the time to go into it in detail. This was only his general idea.

Fortunately, Chick was in the habit, in an emergency, of taking action instinctively, and generally such action turned out to be wise and effective.

So now, as he saw the white stranger coming toward him at frantic speed and utterly beyond self-control, Chick curled himself up in the path, planted his two feet firmly against some slight equalities of rock near him, and prepared for a tremendous concussion.

He got it. Hardly had he taken the position in which he hoped to be able to stop the helpless man, when the latter plunged down the last few feet.

“Throw yourself flat!” yelled Chick. “Come at me headfirst! Come on! I can hold you! Right down!”

Before Chick had finished shouting his instructions, the man had obeyed the first one.

He let himself go like a ball player sliding to first base. Flat on his stomach he hurled himself, and into the diaphragm of Chick went his head.

The shock was tremendous. Chick had braced himself to receive the charge, so that not all the breath was knocked out of him.

He had not much left, but what he had he utilized in warning the man he had saved to hold on for dear life.

“Lie still!” he shouted. “You’re all right! Don’t stand up! They’re after you!”

Chick had seen that three of the pursuing natives were dashing down the mountainside.

Each of them carried a spear, and there was no reason to doubt that he could hurl it with the precision of Jai Singh himself.

The only reason they did not send their weapons ahead of them now seemed to be that they had not time.

At least, that was Chick’s first reading of it. Then he changed his mind, as he saw that the spears were fastened to them by a cord that passed around their neck and over one shoulder.

The cords had become entangled in some way, and all three of the men were trying desperately to get them loose.

Down they came! Then--just as they were going to throw themselves upon Chick and the young man he had saved, and neither of whom had had time to get to his feet--there was a bang, and the foremost of the three rascals threw up his hands, whirled around, and went over the precipice!

“Get the other two!” roared the familiar voice of Patsy Garvan, as his good-tempered face appeared above the edge of the rocks at the back.

He was seen to be hurrying along to get to the narrow ledge, and his rifle was ready to send another shot at the companions of the fellow he had shot.

“Hold on!” roared Jefferson Arnold. “Don’t shoot! You might hit my son!”

“Your son?” cried Patsy.

“Yes,” replied Jefferson. Then darting forward until he was close to the young fellow who had come tearing down the rocks, he held out both hands, as, in sob-choked tones, he cried:

“My boy!”

It was Nick Carter who saved Jefferson Arnold from pitching over the precipice, by throwing both his arms around the millionaire as he leaped forward to grasp the hands of his son.

“What? Is this Leslie Arnold?” shouted Chick, bewildered.

It was not necessary to repeat this question, for the two Arnolds, father and son, had dropped each other’s hands, and Leslie now had his arms around his father’s shoulders.

“Look out!” roared Patsy. “Here they come, twenty of them!”

He pointed up the way the scoundrels had followed Leslie Arnold, and by which they had suddenly retreated.

It was apparent why the two men had gone back, although Nick Carter was the first to see it.

“Take cover! Quick!” he thundered. “Those two are bringing the whole pack about our ears.”

Everybody rushed behind rocks, rifle in hand, except Nick. He was looking over into the chasm.

“Chief!” cried Chick anxiously. “What’s the matter? What are you doing out there? They’ll fill you full of arrows and poison. Come back here!”

Nick Carter waved his hand to silence his terrified assistant. Then he flung himself flat upon the narrow path, with one of his long, sinewy, capable arms stretched down over the precipice.

There was a momentary strain, a quickening of the great detective’s breath. Then--a tall, dark, lean figure, in scanty white clothing, topped by a large white turban with a jewel in the center, leaped lightly upon the narrow path.

“Thank you, sahib!” said Jai Singh calmly, as, taking Nick Carter’s hand, he dragged him to the safety of the overhanging rock.

It was not Jai Singh’s way to offer effusive thanks, even for the saving of his life. But the detective knew that, even if he could not have depended on Jai Singh to the last drop of his blood before, he certainly could command it now.

“How many of those men are there, Mr. Arnold?” asked Nick of Leslie. “I mean, of those fellows from the other side of the mountains.”

“About twenty here,” was the reply. “In the whole country where they worship the Golden Scarab, many thousands.”

“I don’t care about the thousands,” answered Nick Carter. “What we have to attend to is the twenty or more who followed you.”

He put his head a little away out from the rock. A dozen of the peculiarly fashioned arrows rattled around him.

“Poor marksmen, those people,” remarked the great detective, with a smile, as he drew back his head.