is wuss’n rattlesnakes,” Utah greeted him. Nevada’s gray eyes encompassed this highest tower room. Control boards with dials on them covered most of the available wall space. Here, he realized was the real pulse of this strange old castle the Aztecs had built. Here was proof, if they needed it, that they had stumbled onto something a lot bigger than themselves. It made him feel humble suddenly, and then he jerked himself back to the realities of the moment.
“That law-dog is in the other tower,” he said to Utah. “Mebbyso we can climb across the roof from here tuh there.”
McClatchey wiped his brow. “We can try!” he grunted.
Nevada Jim had already moved to one of the modern windows that had been set into the walls of this control room. Pushing it open, he stepped through. The roof covering this section of the castle, was flat, with a built-up parapet, pueblo style.
Utah followed him, but as he slipped from the window a howl from the flagstoned plaza told that they had been discovered. Instantly, lead started chipping stone from the parapet at their side as they dropped to their knees.
“A man ain’t got no privacy around this place, Jim,” Utah grumbled.
Nevada grinned as he led the way along the flat roof on all fours. Utah was enjoying himself, or he wouldn’t complain so much. They had been in some tight spots during their lives, but nothing such as this where every loophole of escape appeared closed.
Voices lifted from the courtyard again, as the Penitentes and foreigners there saw Nevada Jim’s lathy figure lift and smash open a window of the Commandante’s office with the butt of his six-gun. Like a jack-in-a-box he popped through the opening before the guns below could fire. McClatchey dove after him, struck the floor on hands and knees.
“This is more sport than dodgin’ posses,” he drawled. “How’s the law-dog?” he added as he scrambled to his feet and with the old gleam of destruction in his eye, started behind the biggest, shiniest desk he had ever seen. There was a row of buttons along one edge of the desk. Utah reached out a hand for them.
“The law-dog is all right,” the blue-eyed stranger answered, “but he won’t be if you press those buttons. One of them will electrocute me. The rest will just make this seat uncomfortably hot!” He was strapped in a big metal chair in front of the desk.
Nevada had already started to unbuckle the straps holding him. “Feller,” he drawled. “I’m goin’ to feel like lettin’ you set here if you don’t tell us what you know about this place, pronto!”
“My name,” the steely-eyed man answered, “is Dick Tarrant. I am an Inspector for the United States, Federal Bureau of Investigation.”
Utah looked up from behind the desk. “I mighta knowed it,” he growled. “Yo’re one of these here watchdogs of de-mock-cracy, I’ve heerd so much about.”
Tarrant nodded, smiling through lips that had been beaten almost to a pulp. “Yes,” he said, “and you boys may not know it, but you’re better watchdogs than I am!”
“How so, amigo?” Nevada Jim asked quietly. “This is the headquarters of a Fifth Columnist organization whose aim may sound fantastic to you, but I assure you it isn’t. Their plan is to foment unrest here in Mexico, and in the U. S. with the idea of making an undercover attempt to invade and capture the Western States!”
“Phew—” Nevada Jim James sounded like a teakettle about to boil over. “I’d a-guessed most anything but that.”
Tarrant stopped him with a quick gesture. “I want to finish,” he explained swiftly, “while there’s time. The only name anyone knows the leader of this organization by is The Commandante. It is known, however, that he is one of the most dangerous men alive. A genius at organizing coups such as they are planning here. He has participated in the downfall of other great nations lately. We had lost track of him until I come across you boys out at Dan Conover’s mine in the Chiricuahuas, and you gave me the lead I needed by mentioning Tres Cruces. Incidentally, I went there that night to supervise the loading of the gold Dan had in his possession, and your friend the Tucson sheriff and his deputies were coming to guard it on the return journey to Tombstone.”
“But these here danged Fifth Columnists beat us to the punch and stole it!” McClatchey raved from behind the desk, where he was busily engaged. “Why the lowdown, ornery pups!”
Dick Tarrant’s blue eyes sparkled mischievously. “But you were planning on stealing it yourselves,” he pointed out.
“Hell,” Nevada cut in, “that’s different!”
“That money,” Tarrant rapped, “plus one other thing, means more than you boys may realize.” His face looked strained suddenly. “The theft, and the presence of The Commandante, means they are just about set to start their uprising. One of us has got to escape and carry word to loyal Mexican troops and their air force of the plot, or God knows what will happen.”
“We got about as much chance of doin’ that,” Utah groaned mournfully, “as we have to crawlin’ backwards through a knothole.”
And as though to prove the prophesy of his words, a voice winged up to them from the base of the tower. A voice filled with imperious authority. “This is The Commandante speaking! If you two American outlaws will deliver the Government man you have with you into my hands, unharmed, I will guarantee the two of you safe passage to the border.”
McClatchey was leaping for the window, old gun upraised, even as Tarrant caught him by the arm. “Don’t do that,” he said hoarsely. “The Commandante will be surrounded by at least a half dozen men who look exactly like him. You’d never get the right man. It’s been tried before!”
“The thing to do,” he went on earnestly, “is give me up. You’ll be able to carry word to the Tucson sheriff. He’ll know how to set the wheels in action.”
Nevada Jim grinned. “Yeah,” he drawled, “he shore will. He’ll slap us behind bars so fast it’d make your head swim. Mebbe you’re forgettin’ we’re wanted in every danged State this side o’ the Rockies. Not to mention,” he added dryly, “that this here Commandante would have us shot in the back soon as he got his hands on you. Nope, gents, we got to think of something else.” He fell silent as he stepped to one of the tall windows that let light into the tower.
Looking down, Nevada studied the teeming courtyard below. In the darkness, men were eddying about the plaza like ships in a whirlpool. A handful of the black-clad Mexican guardsmen, some armed with rifles, and others with those wicked, small, machine guns moved about the crowd of white-clad Penitentes. They were keeping the crowd back from seven men who stood in a group near the base of the tower. Nevada had to admit this Commandante was a clever jasper. Through the gloom, those seven Oriental faces peering upward looked exactly alike. Each of the men was wearing a black uniform with gold buttons, and a gold belt he’d heard called a Sam Browne. One of those seven was all set to tear hell out of the greatest nation in the world!
“They ain’t goin’ to git away with it!” Nevada said fiercely. Then he fell silent again, studying the eddying throng with a keen attentiveness.
The Penitentes, he knew, were a queer bunch of hombres. They would cut themselves to ribbons with a cactus whip, crucify their own people, practice all sorts of torture rites in parts of this grim old castle. A proud, mysterious sect, they would do all this to themselves, but to a man they would rise and kill an outsider who mistreated one of their strange
