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

anything.
    They gave way respectfully before him. And Benson got to the low, flat rock. He stood on it, a little above the heads of the men.
    The Avenger didn’t treat the matter as a joke. He knew how grave it was to these workmen, still under the spell of the Indian’s words.
    “You have been told,” he said quietly, but with his vibrant voice heard distinctly by everyone there, “that tunneling into his mountain is to displease an Indian spirit called the Rain God. You have been told that he can strike with lightning, and that three men found dead near here were so struck. You have been told that others will die if the work goes on.”
    “Yes—yes!” came the answers.
    “You have also been told that if the Rain God is challenged he will answer that challenge with some stroke that all may recognize as a direct reply.”
    “That’s right,” said the squat man with fear on his face.
    “I think,” said The Avenger in his quiet but compelling voice, “that such a challenge should be made. And I shall volunteer to make it—now! Then we shall see what answer is made by this powerful spirit.”
    Mac stirred restlessly and whispered up at Smitty’s ear:
    “ ’Tis not like the chief. It is a tr-r-rap of some kind, and he’s fallin’ right into it.”
    “He doesn’t fall into traps,” replied Smitty stoutly. “He walks into ’em, open-eyed, and comes out with results—always.”
    But there was trouble in the giant’s eyes. He was suddenly more afraid for Benson than he ever had been before. After all, three men had been struck dead near here by lightning coming from no man knew where.
    The Avenger spoke.
    “Draw back from me, men. I’ll be alone in this, with no chance of a mishap to any of you.”
    The men drew back, breathless, watching. It wasn’t necessary, Benson was sure. But, master of psychology, he felt that it was good to use theatricals. It would rivet their attention on him even more firmly.
    With a thirty-foot circle clear around the low rock on which he stood, Benson stood straight and taut as a figure of metal. Wearing gray, as he usually did, and with his snow-white hair and his dead, pale face and flaming eyes, he looked like a man of gray steel rather than of flesh to the workmen.
    He raised his hand in a sort of salute to the heavens. He stared upward.
    “Rain God of the Pawnees,” he said, “if you can hear, listen. We shall defy you by going ahead with this work into the glass mountain where your soul is supposed to reside. We shall pierce the mountain in spite of you. This is a challenge, and I am the challenger.”
    No man there knew quite what he had expected. A bolt from the cloudless heaven? A bolt that no one could see, suddenly laying this indomitable figure low before them? Some other strange and awful phenomenon?
    But none of these happened. At least, not to Benson.

    From around the jutting basalt bastion cutting Josh off from sight of the men came a cracked shout of agony and fear. There was death in that cry.
    Everyone whirled, and from his rock, Benson stared, too. There was grim apprehension in his eyes. He had meant to risk only his own life, not that of another. But it seemed that the challenge had been accepted and hurled back—on the head of Josh Newton.
    “Quick! Help him!” snapped Benson, leading a rush around the jutting rock toward the spot where he had left the Negro.
    All saw it as they rounded the natural bastion.
    There were faint wisps of greenish vapor, fading even as they first set eyes on it, but plainly the remnants of a compact pillar of mist. And under the fog shreds lay Josh.
    He lay very still, body twisted in an unnatural fashion on the rough ground. There was no need of a closer approach to tell that he was dead!

CHAPTER V

Out of the Tomb
    Richard Benson had defied the Rain God and the Rain God had struck one of his men dead in instant answer. That was the conclusion in every white face in the crew.
    But it wasn’t what The Avenger was