Forbidden Cargoes

By
ROY J. SNELL

The Reilly & Lee Co.
Chicago New York

Printed in the United States of America

Copyright, 1927
by
The Reilly & Lee Co.
All Rights Reserved

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I A Strange Message 9

II An Underground Sea 29

III A Strange Dark Room 47

IV Johnny Thompson in Jail 58

V Tottering Walls 68

VI An Earthquake Within a Cave 74

VII Johnny Wins a Friend 85

VIII An Ancient Castle in Ruins 96

IX Creeping Shadows 108

X Camp Smoke 117

XI Battling Against Odds 131

XII Destruction 152

XIII A Thousand Pearls 166

XIV Hope Springs Eternal 179

XV Unseen Foes 192

XVI In Battle Array 201

XVII Pant’s Problem Increases 214

XVIII Two Blade Johnny 221

XIX The Unwilling Guest 230

XX Hail and Farewell 247

XXI On the Trail of the Pearls 254

XXII A Startling Revelation 263

XXIII Treasure at Last 274

Forbidden Cargoes

CHAPTER I
A STRANGE MESSAGE

In a plain board shack with a palm thatched roof which had the Caribbean Sea at its front and the Central American jungle at its back, a slim, stooping sort of boy, with eyes that gleamed out of the dark corners exactly like a tiger’s, paced back and forth the length of a long, low room. His every motion suggested a jaguar’s stealth.

It was Panther Eye, a boy who was endowed with a cat’s ability to see in the dark, and who spent much of his young life in India and other tropical lands. He also found himself quite at home in Central America. Nevertheless, at this moment he was in deep trouble.

The palm thatched shack boasted but one room. As the boy paced the mahogany floor of this room he passed a desk of roughly hewn rosewood. A small steel safe stood in one corner, the door slightly ajar. Before it on the floor lay a litter of papers, a few bundles of letters and a sizeable roll of currency. The boy paused to consider this litter.

“It was the map they wanted,” he told himself. “Easy enough to see that. They didn’t even look at the money, nearly a thousand dollars. The map! They knew we could do nothing without the map. The dirty dogs! If only Johnny Thompson were here!” Again he paced the floor.

What was to be done? His thoughts were in a tangle. The thieves who had broken into the safe were now well away in the jungle. There was no time to be lost. He’d catch them, he was sure of that. A jaguar couldn’t escape him, much less a man. Yet the map might be destroyed. Without it nothing could be accomplished. Thousands were at stake, the treasure of a lifetime. And some one dearer to Pant than life itself was scheduled to lose. All day in that stuffy office he had waited for Johnny. Now evening was near.

“If only Johnny would come!” he repeated.

Had he but known it, his good pal, Johnny Thompson, was some three hundred miles away. What was more, he was behind iron bars in a stout stone jail. But this Pant could not know, so he continued to pace the floor.

As the first long shadow of a palm darkened the window he suddenly sprang into action. Throwing up the lid of a rough chest, he tossed out a miscellaneous assortment of articles, some small oilcloth wrapped packages, a black box, some fibre trays, a few articles of clothing and a curious instrument of iron. These he packed carefully in a kit bag, then closed the chest.

Seating himself at the desk in the corner, he began pecking at a small portable typewriter. He destroyed four half written sheets before he did one to suit him. The following is what appeared on the one he at last weighted down upon the desk: