Clive Cussler Read Online Free PDF

the airplane and raised his nose toward the sky. Then he began to circle, using his big, black nose like the needle pointing on a compass. Catching the scent, he gave off a howl and began running down the street toward the big hill beyond the town. Both Lacey and Casey gave chase.
    Though not nearly as fast as a greyhound or even a dachshund, who could run rings around a basset hound, Floopy’s short, stubby legs could carry him miles and miles without tiring. He soon left Lacey and Casey far behind.
    "Oh no," cried Lacey, "We’ve lost Floopy."
    "We'll catch him," Casey said confidently. "Look down. All we have to do is follow the tracks."
    Staring down onto the dirt road, Lacey could see Floopy's paw prints over the wheel ruts of Vin Fiz. Casey pointed to hoof marks also pressed into the soft dirt. "Whoever stole our airplane towed it away with a horse."
    They ran, following the trail until the tracks disappeared when the dirt road turned into a rock road that seemed to travel in all directions. "Oh no," Lacey cried again, searching in vain for a sign of the trail. "Now we'll never find Floopy or Vin Fiz."
    "Don't worry, Sis. Look closer."
    Lacey knelt down and studied the rock. There, before her eyes, as plain as the tips of her fingers, was a trail of black oil drops that traveled on toward the big hill outside of town. She looked up and laughed. "Vin Fiz is leaving a trail so we can find her."
    "I told you she was enchanted," Casey said, puffing out his chest with an "I told you so" expression on his face. "And when we find her, we'll find Floopy. Come on, let's hurry."
    The twins raced across the flat sea of rocks, following the trail of oil. As they got closer to the big hill, they came onto railroad tracks. These were not your ordinary wide railroad tracks with long ties and thick steel rails. This track was just a little over a foot wide from rail to rail.
    "What sort of train runs on these narrow rails?" questioned Casey.
    "Remember the train we rode on in the park when Father took us to the Castroville carnival last summer?" Lacey asked. "It had small rails too. They called it a narrow gauge."
    They followed the track until it came to a huge pile of rock that fell off down the hill. Two rusty iron cars in the shape of large buckets stood on the rails that ended at the top of the rock pile. The bucket cars were attached together by what Casey recognized as couplings and were filled with rocks.
    "They're ore carts," said Lacey.
    "How do you know?"
    "I saw them in a picture book on gold mining. They're used to haul ore dug from mines."
    Then Casey's eyes followed the twin rails into the hillside and he saw it. No more than a hundred feet away and no less than ninety feet away was the entrance to a cave whose mouth yawned menacingly.
    "The oil trail leads into that cave," he declared in a hushed voice.
    Slowly, holding hands, they walked until they had entered the cave. It widened into a cavern as big as their barn back home.
    Joyously, the children clapped their hands and shouted with glee. "Vin Fiz! There's Vin Fiz!"
    And so she was.
    The yellow airplane with the green lettering sat in the center of the cave, as good as the day she had materialized, which, of course, was that same day.
    But something was wrong. Lacey immediately realized what it was.
    "Floopy isn't here," she moaned. "I don't see him anywhere."
    Casey nodded toward an opening in one wall, where the narrow-gauge railroad entered. "He must have run in there."
    They approached what they recognized as the entrance to a mine shaft. Suddenly, three very tall men, at least they looked very tall to a pair of ten-year-olds, came near and glared down at the children. The one who stood in front of the other two was dressed like an old Western gunslinger, with his Colt revolver hung in a holster on his belt. A black hat covered an oily mange of hair and a huge walrus mustache spread across his upper lip. He wore a black shirt tucked into black pants tucked into