CHAPTER XXV

A VISIT IN THE NIGHT

Excitement regarding the discovery of that ancient pottery was all over when, at a rather late hour that night, Jeanne crept beneath the blankets in the chilly little room under the rafters in the fisherman’s cabin on Isle Royale.

As she lay there in the darkness and silence that night brings, she thought again of the startling news Vivian had wanted to flash out over her tiny radio station to all the world, the word that the airplane D.X.123 had been found.

“Vivian will not send it until I say ‘Yes,’” she assured herself. “She is the kind of girl who can keep a secret—a really true friend. And yet, I wonder if I have the right to ask her to remain silent?”

As she closed her eyes, she saw again the wistful, almost mournful look on the face of June Travis. Then she fell asleep.

She did not sleep long. She was wakened by loud banging on the cabin door.

“Let us in!” a voice called huskily.

A light appeared, reflected on the roof above Jeanne’s head. She heard the fisherman say, “Who are you?”

She caught the answer clear and plain: “I am John Travis.”

Ten minutes later Jeanne was listening to the strange, all but unbelievable story of John Travis, who was, in very truth, the father of her friend June.

Relying upon the word of a dying veteran prospector, John Travis and a friend, who was an air pilot, had flown far into the north of Canada in quest of gold.

They had discovered gold, but had disabled their plane. The story of the years that followed was one of hardships, failure and final success.

“There we were,” the voice of John Travis went on, “with our plane wrecked in the heart of a frozen wilderness.” He stared at the glowing hearth as if he would see again that great white emptiness, hear again the wail of those rushing northern gales.

“We had food for a year. But where were we? We could not tell. We began exploring. Little by little, we widened our circle until one day I came upon a low falls where the water ran so swiftly that even in winter it was not frozen over. And at the edge of that falls, where a low eddy had deposited it, was a handful of sand.” He took a long breath. “In that sand there was a gleam of gold.

“He who has not felt it—” he spoke slowly. “He who has not lived in the North can tell nothing of what the call of the North is, nor the grip the search for gold gets upon your very soul.

“Why did we not come back sooner? How could one leave one’s own people so long, desert an only child? Gold!” He clenched his knotty hands tight. “Gold! We had found gold. At first it was only a little. As days, months passed, we found more and more. And always, always—” The gleam of a gambler shone in his eyes as he spread his hands wide. “Always, just before us, like a mirage on the desert, was the motherlode, the pocket of gold where nuggets were piled in one great heap. We would find it tomorrow—tomorrow.

“Gold,” he repeated softly. “Gold. It’s all there in the cabin of that plane at the bottom of that little lost lake. We’ll lift the plane and the gold when the spring thaw comes. And then, my child, my June shall be rich. And you, my friends—” his eyes swept the little circle, “you shall not go unrewarded.”

“But think of the peril to June,” Jeanne said in a low, serious tone.

“I left her in good hands.”

“But now she is a young lady, sixteen. Her birthday—is it the twenty-first? That must be very soon. Then she gets her money. And money means danger.”

“Money—danger?” The man brushed his hand before his eyes.

“But let me finish. Indians came, fine bronze-faced fellows we could trust. We gave them gold, bound them to secrecy by an oath known only to their tribe, and hired them to bring us food.

“So the years passed until, one day, a plane came zooming in from the south. And at the sight of men of our own race, somehow our blood got on fire. As they talked of cities, of bright lights and music, of pictures, dancing and song, of autos and airplanes and all our great country’s progress, my heart seemed ready to burst with the desire to become a part of it all again.

“Well,” he sighed once more, “they flew away to return a little later with parts for our plane. We paid them with our gold mine, what there is left of it. We sailed away into the blue with our gold. We were headed for Chicago and would have made it, too, if fog hadn’t caught us. It did catch us, as you know. We tried to land on ice. We were successful. We were saved. But the ice gave way, the plane sank!

“But now—” he sprang to his feet. “Now we are safe again. And soon, please God, I shall be with my child again. And this time I am ready to swear it on the open Bible, I shall never again leave her alone!

“Until now,” he ended, “we did not know where we were.”

“But now you know!” Jeanne exclaimed. “Soon all the world shall know. Vivian! Sandy! The radio! We are to be the bearers of good tidings, of great joy!”