San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1895-12-29
CHAPTER ~.
THE LEGEND OF THE HEART

4
windings of the ore body.
| Along this tunnel we went for thirty
or forty PAGES, creeping over the fallen
! powders and twisting ourselves be-
] twscl the brown stalac.itcs shat in the
course of ages had formed upon the
roof and floor, till presently we reached
an obstacle that barred our further
progress, huge mass of rock, which at
/ some time or other had fallen from the
roof of the tunnel and blocked it.
looked at it and said:
Now, senior, think that we shall
have to go back. You remember the
writing tells us that this mine, al
though so rich, was unsafe because of
| the rottenness of the rock. Doubtless
they propped it in the old days, but
the timbers have decayed long ago"
Eyes, "he answered, 1--WE can do moth
ing here without help, and, Ignatio,
don't like the look of the roof; it is full
! of cracks"
AS these last words left his lips a
piece of stone, the size of child's
head, fell from above almost at his
feet.
"Speak SOFTLY" l whispered, "the
ring of your voice is bringing down
the roof"
Then stopped to pick up the fallen
stone, thinking that it might show ore,
and, as l did so, my hand touched
something sharp, which l lifted and
held to the candle. 1t was the jaw
bone of a man, yellow with age and de-
cayed by damp. | showed it to the
senior, and, kneeling down, we ex-
amined the bed of the tunnel together,
and not uselessly, for there we found
] he, ind Of hA e1r,,n
fragments of an arm-bone, but the rest
of the skeleton lay under the great
bowlder in front of us.
"He was coming out Of the mine
when the rock fell upon him, pool. fell
low," whispered the senior. Look
here" and he pointed to a little heap of
something that CLEANED in the CANDLE
light.
1t was free gold, six or seven ounces
Of it, almost pure, and for the most
part in small nuggets that once were
contained in bag which had long since
rotted away.
Doubtless, after the mine was closed,
some Aztec, who knew its secret, bad
made practice of working there for
his own benefit, till one day as he was
coming out the rock fell upon him and
crushed him, leaving his spirit to haunt
the place forever.
"There is no doubt about the mine
being rich, whispered the senior; "but,
all the same, l think that we had bet
ter get out of it. hear odd noises and
rumblings which frighten me. Come,
Ignatio," and he turned to lead the way
towards the opening.
Two PAGES further saw him strike
his shin against piece of rock that
stood up six or eight inches from the
floor bed of the tunnel, and the pain of
the blow was SO sharp that, forgetting
where he was, he called out loudly.
Next instant there was curious
sound above me as of something being
torn, and lol lay upon my face on
the rock, and upon me rested huge
mass of stone.
/ say that it rested upon me, but this
is not altogether true, for, had it been
so, that stone would have killed me at
once as beetle is killed be-
meath the foot of man, instead of TAX
ing more than two-and-twenty years to
do it. The greater part of its weight
was borne by the piece of rock against
which the senior had struck his leg, a
point of the fallen bowlder only press
ing into my back and grinding me
against the ground. Now we were in
darkness, for the senior had been
knocked down also and his candle ex-
tinguished, and, in The midst of my tor
lures, it came into my mind that l must
be dead.
Presently, however, l heard his voice,
saying: "Ignatio, do you live, Ignatio?''
Now 1 thought for moment, and
even in my pain / remembered that
more of the roof would surely give
ere long, and that If my friend stayed
here he must die with me. Nothing
could save me; was doomed to slow
death beneath the stone; and yet if l
told him this knew that he would not
go. Therefore / answered as strongly
as / could.
ely, senior, am safe, and do but
stay to light a candle. / will follow
YOU"
"You are lying to me-" he answered;
your voice comes from the level of the
floor" And as he spoke l heard the
scratching sound of match.
So soon as he fonnd his candle and
lit it, he l1nelt down and looked at me.
Then he looked at the roof above, and
following his glance with difficulty /
saw that next to the hole whence the
bowlder had fallen hung huge block
of stone, that trembled like a leaf
whenever he moved or spoke, sur
rounded by great cracks from which
water dropped.
"For the love of God, hyl' whis-
pered. "In few hours it will be over
with me, and you cannot help me, am
a dead man; do not stop here to share
my fate"
For a moment he seemed to hesitate;
then his courage came back to him, and
he answered hoarsely:
''We entered this place together,
friend, and we will go out together, OF
not at all. You must be fixed by the
rock and not crushed, or you would
not speak of living for hours. Let me
look" and he lay upon his breast and
examined the fallen rock by the light
of the candle. THANK Godl there is
hope" he said at last, 'the bowlder
rests upon the ground and upon the
stone against which struck my leg,
for only one point of it is fixed in your
back. Do you think that anything is
broken, Ignatio?"
81 cannot say, senior, my pain isgreat
and am being slowly crushed to death;