The Avenger 8 - The Glass Mountain Read Online Free PDF Page A

he had worked out his own conception of the curve the track should take.
    The present location of the surveyor’s peg, wedged in the mountain’s flank for the tunnel mouth, was a little over eighty yards to the left of a big dead tree. So Josh was ambling in the direction of the tree, looking sleepy and slow-witted and harmless.
    While he was on his way to a spot not far from a queer rock outcropping that looked like a giant duck, Benson checked the original right-of-way.
    And he found that, as marked, it hit the mountain side nearly three hundred yards to the right of the dead tree. So that the original survey had been wrong not only from the standpoint of a practical railroad curve, but also even in the matter of landmarks.
    There was a glitter in his pale eyes as he found that out. Because he knew, as Nissen had remarked, that such a thing is practically impossible in surveying. Particularly in such a short distance.
    You simply can’t make a mistake of three hundred yards. Yet one had been made here in the matter of landmarks.
    Josh was near the dead tree now. Benson, having checked as much as he needed to, without Josh’s aid, was about to call on him to take up his station where the tunnel site should be—far to the right, several hundred yards from the site cleared. Then The Avenger saw that there was some kind of commotion where the workmen were.

    The commotion was another visit of the ancient Indian who insisted he was Chief Yellow Moccasins, in spite of the fact that the claim, if true, would make him out to be close to two hundred years old.
    The Indian had appeared out of nowhere and talked to the men again.
    Smitty was busy with the electrical apparatus, seeing to it that the power generators and motors for the drills were all in order; so he hadn’t seen the Indian’s approach or heard him sound off.
    Mac had, but Mac didn’t seem able to counteract the ancient’s croaking speech.
    “You are going ahead with your work in spite of all warnings,” the Indian said balefully, looking impressive in spite of his patched overalls and great age. “That means that more will be killed.”
    “We want none of ye and yer predictions, mon,” MacMurdie shouted in his Scotch brogue.
    The old Indian faced him squarely.
    “You are a murderer’s tool, paleface,” he said. “Oh, I know you. You and the Negro and the big man who came in from the sky yesterday are all tools of the murderer.”
    “Hey—who’re ye callin’ mur-r-r-r-derer-r-r?” burred Mac, eyes flashing blue flame.
    Back came the answer.
    “The man who is young but has white hair. The man whose face is dead and never moves. The man whose eyes are like spots of no color, in which death dwells. He is the murderer. He has killed. One of the simple folk in this countryside has fallen under his murdering hands.”
    Mac considered knocking what few teeth the old man had down his throat. But he couldn’t hit a bag of bones that skinny and ancient.
    “Ye’re plain loony, mon,” he said.
    The Indian turned to the men, who had started to mutter again. There was something about that old, old redskin to shake the stoutest nerve.
    “The man with the white face and pale eyes would lead you to your deaths,” he said, almost chanting it. “He would lead you once more against the Rain God, whom none can withstand. I tell you to rise and strike him down. Kill the man with the white hair and the lying voice, lest you be killed yourselves.”
    “Let’s get to work, men,” said Mac. “There’s profit to no one in listenin’ to this fool.”
    But the men were listening, and they kept right on listening.
    “Here is what you shall do,” said the old man. “See for yourselves if the Rain God is to be cowed by this man with the white eyes. Make the man challenge the Rain God openly, defy the god to make his answer known. By the result of that shall you know whether to follow the man any more or kill him and leave the mountain.”
    A squat man with long