Originally published: May 22, 1909
Genres: Adventure, Children's
Goodreads link: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/199572137-motor-matt-s-queer-find-or-the-secret-of-the-iron-chest
Gutenberg link: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/48524
Chapters: 16
Warning: This may include outdated and derogatory language and attitudes.
CHAPTER I
THE HUT BY THE BAYOU
"Lisden, vonce, you fellers! I t'ink I hear someding."
Carl Pretzel turned back from the forward rail of the Hawk, gave his chums, Motor Matt, and Dick Ferral, a warning look, and then leaned out over the side of the airship, his eyes on the earth below.
The Hawk was sweeping over the tongue of land between Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Borgne, bound for New Orleans by way of the Lower Mississippi.
The night was coming on, and the boys in the airship had been looking anxiously for a place in which to effect a landing. Interminable stretches of cypress and live oak covered the low ground beneath them, and there did not seem to be a gap anywhere in the dense growth.
"You must have bells in your ears, mate," said Dick, in response to Carl's announcement that he had heard "something." "Dowse me if I heard any noise."
"Listen, pards, both of you," called Matt from his seat among the levers. "If you can hear a voice down there, it will be a pretty sure sign that we're close to a clearing. We've done enough flying for today, and these Louisiana air currents are so changeable I don't want to do any night traveling. If you—"
"Dere it vas some more!" cried Carl excitedly. "You hear him dot time, Tick?"
"Aye, matey," answered Dick, "I heard a voice, fair enough. It was a sort of screech, as though a woman might have piped up—or a panther."
"Where away was it?" asked Matt.
"Two points off the starboard bow, Matt."
Matt shifted the rudder, thus altering the course of the Hawk; he also depressed the horizontal plane and threw the airship closer to the tree tops.
"It's getting so blooming dark, down there among the trees," observed Dick, "that it's hard to see anything, but I believe I can make out a bit of a river, and an arm of it like a bayou."
"Yah, so helup me," put in Carl, "I can see dot meinseluf, I bed you. Und dere iss a light like a fire, vich geds prighter und prighter as ve go aheadt. Vat you t'ink is dot anyvay, Tick?"
Before Dick could answer, the cry that had already claimed their attention was wafted up from below, this time so clear and distinct that there was no mistaking it.
"A moi! a moi!"
It was a screech, as Dick had said, and resembled greatly the yell of some wild animal; nevertheless, the call was plainly human, for it was broken into words.
"French lingo or I'm a Fiji!" averred Dick. "It's the same as someone calling for help. And a woman, too. No man could make a sound like that."
As if to prove Dick's words, the cry was repeated, but the words were English, now, and not French.
"Help! Help!"
"Py chiminy grickets!" gasped Carl. "Dere iss someding going on vat means drouple for der laty."
"We've got to land," declared Matt, "and see what's the matter. Can you find a place?"
Both Dick and Carl were leaning over the forward rail and staring ahead and downward.
Suddenly the treetops broke away and a heap of blazing wood could be seen. The fire had been kindled on a cleared stretch of bayou bank, and not far from it was a log hovel. But there was no one in sight, either near the fire or around the hut.
The two boys on the lookout announced their discoveries to Motor Matt.
"We'll come down on the bayou bank," said Matt. "Give me directions, Dick."
The young Canadian, watching sharply below, called their bearings to Matt, and the Hawk was safely manœuvred to the surface of the ground. The calls for aid had ceased, an ominous silence reigning in the vicinity of the fire and the hut while the boys got out their mooring ropes and secured the Hawk to nearby trees.
"Where's the woman in distress?" queried Dick, coming around the front end of the car and joining Matt and Carl. "She was making plenty of noise, a while ago, but she's quiet enough now."
"She may be in the hut," said Matt. "You stay here and watch the airship, Dick, while Carl and I take a look through the shanty."
Matt pulled a blazing pine knot from the fire, and, with this to light the way, started toward the hut. Carl dropped in at his side and they proceeded onward together. Suddenly Carl drew to a halt and laid a hand on Matt's arm.
"I tell you someding, Matt," said the Dutch boy, "und dot iss, I don'd like dis pitzness. Br-r-r! I haf some greepy feelings all droo me."
Carl could be as brave as a lion when brought company front with any danger he could understand, but he was so full of superstition that if a black cat crossed the road in front of him he was at once thrown into a panic.
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Matt. "We're here to help someone who is in trouble, and we don't want to get scared at our own shadows."
"Der blace itseluf iss enough to make my shkin ged oop und valk all ofer me mit coldt feet; and den, for vy don'd we hear dat foice some more?"
There was a sort of weirdness about the place and no mistake. The great live oaks, uncannily festooned with Spanish moss, completely inclosed the little clearing, bending about it in a half circle and coming down to the very edge of the bayou. The fact that there was a fire, of course, proved that human beings had been in the clearing, even if they were not there now. But there was something ghostly about the fire, and while it threw flickering shadows across the clearing it seemed only to make the darkness deeper in the depths of the wood.
"It may be, Carl," said Matt, "that the woman who was calling for help has become unconscious. That makes it all the more necessary for us to find her as quick as we can. Come on!"
Waving his torch, Matt hurried along toward the hut. The door was open, and the torch glare struck whitely against some object suspended over it.
"Vatt iss dot ofer der door, eh?" asked Carl excitedly. "Py shinks, it iss some pones! It iss a skeleton oof someding! Whoosh! Dis iss gedding on my nerfs like anyding."
The young motorist whirled on his Dutch chum.
"You go back to the airship, Carl," said he, "and send Dick here. Your nerves are troubling you so much that you're not of much help."
Carl was only too ready to go back to the Hawk. With a mumbled apology for himself, he turned and hurried away. When Dick came up, a moment later, Matt was looking at the object over the door of the hovel.
"What is it, matey?" queried Dick.
"It looks like the skull of a cat, or a dog," answered Matt.
"Then I suppose it was put up there to bring luck. People around here must be a jolly lot."
"We'll see what's inside," and Matt, holding his torch high, passed through the door.
The hut contained but one room. There was a fireplace in one end, and over a bed of coals, a kettle was hanging. A "shake-down" on the floor, in one corner, was covered with ragged blankets. But the strangest feature of the place was this: The whole under part of the thatched roof, and every crevice of the walls, was hung with rags, feathers, bones of cats, alligator teeth, and a thousand other objects, equally curious.
"Well, strike me lucky!" mumbled Dick. "This is a rummy old place we've got into. Between you and me and the mainmast, old ship, I'd just about as soon give it a good offing. But where's the woman that wanted help?"
The question was hardly out of Dick's mouth before it was answered by another screeching, "A moi! a moi!"
The call did not come from anywhere about the hut, but from outside and somewhere in the timber.
"This way, Dick!" shouted Matt, and rushed out of the hut.
"A moi! a moi!"
The call was again repeated, and the two boys, guiding themselves by the call, flung up the slight slope and darted in among the trees.
"Careful, matey!" panted Dick, from close behind his comrade. "There's no telling what sort of a jolly mess we're running into. Better dowse that light—it'll be safer; besides, I can see the gleam of a lantern ahead, there, through the trees."
"I just caught a sight of that myself, Dick," answered Matt, in a low voice. "Your suggestion about the torch is good," and Matt dropped the blazing stick and crushed out the fire with his foot. "Now, then," he finished, "we'll go on, and go quietly."
A dozen yards, perhaps, brought the boys to a spot from which they could behold a scene that caused their pulses to leap.
An old crone was bound to a cypress stump, and beside her stood a man with a lithe switch.
The hag was swarthy, and her kinky hair was white. Evidently, she was of mixed ancestry. The man at her side was white. The moment Matt's eyes rested on him, the young motorist gripped Dick's arm with tense fingers.
"That man!" whispered Matt excitedly; "do you recognize him, Dick?"
"Whistler or I'm a Hottentot!" gasped Dick.
For a moment, blank amazement held the two boys spellbound. Then, as Whistler lifted the switch and brought it viciously down on the old woman's shoulders, the spell was broken and the two boys started forward.
"Will you tell?" demanded Whistler, pausing after the blow.
"A moi! a moi!" screeched the woman.
"You can call till you're blue in the face," went on Whistler savagely, "and you'll not bring anybody. I'll find out from you what I want to know, Yamousa, or I'll flay you alive. Will you tell?"
At that moment, Matt and Dick broke into the lantern light. The lantern was suspended from the broken limb of a tree, and the glow was so faint that the boys had not been seen until they were close to the man and the woman.
Whistler, with an oath of consternation, jumped backward. The next moment, he whirled his gad and brought it down on the lantern. A crash followed, and Stygian blackness shrouded the spot. A sound of running feet, fading away in the timber, came to the boys' ears.
"Never mind Whistler, Dick," said Matt; "let's look after the woman."
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