“That’s just what I was thinking.” Frank scooped up a handful of the papers and sat down on a bunk. He began to sort them over. The magazines he flung to one side as worthless. Some of the sheets of paper contained nothing but crude attempts at drawing or penciled lists of figures presumably done by some of the outlaws while idling away their time in the cabin.
One or two of the letters, Frank put to one side, as liable to give some clue to the identity of members of the gang. When he had looked through the first handful of papers he picked up some more.
Suddenly he gave an exclamation of satisfaction.
“Find something?” asked Joe.
“This may be valuable.” Frank held up a small black notebook and began flipping the pages. On the inside of the cover he read:
“Black Pepper—his book.”
“This is the captain’s own little record book. There should be some information here.”
Frank began studying the book carefully. The first few pages gave him little satisfaction, the writing consisting largely of cryptic abbreviations evidently in an improvised code known only to the outlaw himself. There were the names of several men written on another page, and among them he recognized the names of Slim, Shorty and Jack, the trio who had captured them at the abandoned mine working. Across from their names had been marked various sums of money, evidently their shares of the gang’s takings in some robbery.
Then, on the next page, he found a crude map.
He studied it curiously. It looked something like the ground floor plan of an extremely crude house. There was one large chamber with two passages leading from it. One of these passages was marked with an X, and each passage led to a small chamber. From one of these led still another passage which branched into a tiny room, in one corner of which was inscribed a small circle.
“That’s the funniest plan of a house I ever saw!” said Joe, looking over his brother’s shoulder.
Frank studied the plan for a few moments and then looked up.
“Why, it isn’t a house at all. It’s a mine!” he declared. “This is the plan of a mine. This big room is the main working at the bottom of the shaft, and these passages are tunnels leading out of it.”
“Perhaps it’s the mine where the gold is hidden!” cried Joe, in excitement.
“There may be something about it on another page.” Frank turned the leaf of the notebook. There he found what he was so eagerly seeking.
At the top of the page was written, in a scrawling, unformed hand: “Lone Tree Mine.” Beneath that he found the following:
“Follow passage X to second cave, then down tunnel to blue room. Gold at circle.”
Frank looked up at his brother.
“This is what we wanted,” he said jubilantly. “They’ve had the gold hidden there all the time. All we have to do now is find the Lone Tree Mine and we’ll recover the stuff in no time.”
“Unless the outlaws have taken it away by now,” pointed out Joe.
“That’s right, too. I hadn’t thought of that. They may have taken it away right after they abandoned this camp. Well, we’ve just got to take our chances on that. If they’ve left it in the mine this long they may think it’s safe enough there a while longer.” Frank got up from the bunk and stuffed the notebook into his pocket. His eyes were sparkling with excitement. “Joe, I believe we’re on the right track! We know just where the stuff has been hidden and I’ve a hunch it’s there yet. We haven’t any time to lose. Let’s start right now, before those rascals get ahead of us, and hunt for the Lone Tree Mine.”
“Why, I’ll bet I know where that is!” declared Joe. “Don’t you remember an old mine working near where they caught us the other day? There was a big pine right by the top of the shaft, standing all by itself.”
“I’ll bet that’s the place! Come on! We’ll try it, anyway!”
Hastily, they left the little cabin. They were sure now that they were on the trail of the hidden gold. Frank remembered the lone pine tree that Joe had mentioned; it seemed to identify the abandoned working as the place they sought.
It was snowing heavily as they started down the trail but the boys scarcely noticed it in their excitement. They even forgot that they had not had their lunch.
“If the outlaws haven’t beaten us to it,” declared Frank, “we’ll have that gold before the day is out!”
XVIII
The Blizzard
The Hardy boys set off down the trail at a good pace. The wind howled down from the crags and whistled through the trees. The entire mountain was veiled in a great mist of swirling snow and, as the wind rose, the snow stung their faces and slashed against them.
“Storm coming up,” said Frank, burying his chin deeper into his coat collar.
“I hope it doesn’t get any worse. We’ll never find the place.”
“We won’t give up now. If we wait until tomorrow it may be too late.”
The storm grew rapidly worse. The snowfall was so heavy that it obscured even the tops of the great masses of rock and it quickly drifted over the trail so that the boys were forced to follow the path by memory. This was difficult, as in some places the trail had wound about through tumbled masses of boulders and when it was hidden by snow they had to guess at its intricate windings. Several times Frank lost it altogether, but he was always able to pick up the trail again in some place that was sheltered from the storm.
The boys struggled on in silence. The wind was increasing in volume and the snow was so heavy that Joe could scarcely see the dim form of his brother but a few yards ahead. Suddenly he saw
