Chapter XIX - Page 2

"Is it the mountains again?" he asked. "If it is, then I, for one, prefer the priest."

"The mountains never scared you half as badly as the priest did," said Roldan, cruelly. "And to say nothing of the fact that we need never get lost in the mountains again, the embrace of a grizzly would be no harder and more death-sure than one in the great arms of that fiend that wears a cassock."

"True. You are always right. But promise that whatever happens you will not lead us into the Sierras."

"I promise," said Roldan, much flattered by this unconscious tribute to his leadership.

"Do you think that priest is really a devil?" asked Rafael, in an awestruck voice.

"When a man has insulted you, you do not know what you think of him," said Roldan, flushing hotly. "If he only were not a priest I'd fight him, big as he is. But at least I can outwit him. It consoles me to think of his fury when he goes to the cave and finds us gone."

"We'd better get out of this tunnel before we talk about having the best of the priest," said Adan. "Suppose he returns to kill us himself--"

"He will not return until to-morrow. Then he will have repented. He will promise to let us go free if we keep his secret. But he will not have that satisfaction, my friends. Yesterday he had a friend in Roldan Castanada; I would have done anything for him, gladly kept his secret. But to-day he has an enemy that he will do well to fear. A Spaniard never forgets an insult."

"What shall you do?" asked Rafael, eagerly. "Expose him?"

"No, I do nothing mean. But I proclaim at Los Angeles that gold has been discovered in the Californias, and in six days the hills will swarm, and the priest in his cell will gnash his teeth."

"Ay!" exclaimed Adan. "Do you feel that?"

An icy blast swept down the tunnel, roughening skin and shortening breath. A few moments later the low rhythm as of distant water came to their ears. Roldan and Adan recognised that familiar music, and set their teeth.

"And I prayed that I might never see another redwood," muttered Adan, crossing himself.

The tunnel stopped abruptly. They stood before a mass of brushwood, piled thickly to keep out wild beasts and delude the searching eye of hostile Indians. Beyond, seen in patches, was a dazzle of white.

"Snow, of course," said Adan, with a groan.

The boys pulled the branches apart without much difficulty: the priests had studied facility of egress and had raised the barrier from within. In a few moments the boys stood in the sunlight; and the mountains hemmed them in.

Adan stamped his foot savagely on the hard snow. "We are where we started a week ago," he said. "No