The Golden Skull: A Rick Brant Science-Adventure Story

"For religious reasons. Nangolat is a religious fanatic. I saw that quite clearly during the time I was his captive. He does not want the artifacts dug up – or he didn't. Remember the legend? If they're dug up, drought and earthquakes will follow. By killing me aboard ship, the expedition would never take place. That must have been how he reasoned."

Rick was beginning to see light. "Angel, was Nangolat supposed to be a Christian?"

Angel shook his head. "No. He was a pagan. Once he went to church with me, but that was only to see how Christians worship. He worshiped the Ifugao gods which were in the museum at the university."

Rick commented, "I imagine his studies with Okola, and especially the work he did tracking down the legends of the golden skull, made him even more religious. I won't say superstitious."

"You're right," Tony said approvingly. "This is not superstition. Nangolat is as firmly convinced of the correctness of his religious beliefs as any Christian martyr. I'm sure he considered the object of our expedition as pure sacrilege."

"I'm with you up to a point," Scotty remarked. "But why didn't he kill the lot of us as soon as we landed? He could have gotten Rick and me the night we met you for dinner. We walked in a lot of dark places, and we weren't particularly on guard."

"He tried," Tony reminded them. "We surprised him in my room at the Manila Hotel. Probably he was examining my effects to see if I had maps or charts. Then he waited in the walled city and tried to pick you two off with rifle fire."

Chahda spoke up. "Not so easy to find chances to kill, even in city like Manila. With gang, yes. Alone, no."

"He's right," Tony agreed. "Then, somewhere along the line, Nangolat had a change of heart. I don't know why. Perhaps his research told him that the drought and earthquakes would follow the digging up of the golden skull only if it should be done by unbelievers like us. Perhaps if the faithful do the uncovering, the Ifugao gods will smile. I don't know. But Nangolat decided he wanted the expedition to help him find the artifacts."

"The old competitive spirit got him," Scotty murmured. "Wanted his side to win."

"Maybe," Tony said with a grin. "Anyway, he got away with the earth scanner; he had it when Nast turned me over to him. Of course he couldn't use it. So he must have planned to capture one or all of us. He could have waited until the expedition got here, but things would then be complicated by our hiring diggers and camp helpers, which he knew we intended to do. Also, we intended to contact the road commissioner at Bontoc, a man who represents law and order – such as it is. So Nangolat, apparently, decided to stake everything on capturing us, forcing us to find the cache, then removing our heads. By the time the law got around to looking for us, the artifacts would be well hidden by the Ifugaos, and so would our bodies. Our skulls would be aging gracefully in some hidden place. And no Ifugao would know a single thing about it when questioned. It was a good scheme."

"Except for one thing," Rick corrected. "The terraces cover miles. We could spend weeks searching."

"There's one bit of evidence you don't have, boys. Remember that there is a major clue to the whereabouts of the cache? A dragon. Well, Nangolat knows – and has always known without knowing its significance until now – where the dragon is located."

Tony smiled at the interested faces around him. "And that's not all. I know where it is, too!"

CHAPTER XIV

Sign of the Dragon

The convoy formed at dawn. One jeep was left with Pilipil, who had learned to drive while working for the United States Air Force. The other jeep, with Tony, Chahda, and Rick, went ahead as advance guard. The truck, with Scotty, Angel, Balaban, and Dog Meat, carried the equipment.

The earth scanner had been checked. It worked fine. Picks and shovels were ready, as were Tony's cleaning brushes, knives, and other tools. When electronic science had located the treasure, old-fashioned digging methods would have to unearth it.

Rifles, carbines, and the single shotgun were loaded and ready. Hunting knives hung at belts.

Rick, driving the lead jeep, followed the twisting road up into the clouds that always seemed to hover at the top of the divide. It was bitter cold, but they were warmly dressed in clothing from their camp supplies. They kept a sharp lookout for Ifugao guards, but the road was deserted.

As the road descended into the Ifugao country, Tony kept watching for the first rice terrace. Soon he motioned to Rick. "Around this turn, I think. Slow."

Rick rounded the turn and emerged on a natural terrace overlooking Banaue Valley. The sun, just risen, was a golden ball veiled by mist. It gave the valley a warm, subdued light that reflected from the green rice, and from the sheen of water in some terraces.

It was a scene of indescribable beauty. For long moments the occupants of truck and jeep just looked and said nothing. Then Dog Meat and Balaban slipped from the truck and went down the road to take up guard positions.

Rick and Tony went to the truck and took the earth scanner from Scotty. They carried it to the edge of the natural terrace and set it up. The others joined them, weapons in hand.

Chahda watched with special interest as the covers were taken from the portable boxes. He had never seen the earth scanner in operation.

"Plenty magic, I bet. You scientists make poor native boy scared with this machine."

Rick snorted. "Come on and be useful, poor native boy. Connect these leads for me. They go into the Fahnestock clips on those A batteries."

Chahda made the connection with the ease of one who has worked with electronic apparatus before, but he kept muttering about how the poor native boy was "plenty snowed" by wonderful scientists. Rick just grinned and went ahead with connecting up the scanner. Tony didn't quite know what to make of Chahda at first, but soon the Hindu boy's dexterity convinced him that Chahda was pulling his leg.

Scotty threatened Chahda with the butt end of his rifle. "I'd offer you to the Ifugaos, if I didn't know they can't use empty heads."

"You let that poor native boy alone," Rick said with false concern. He lifted the probe from its foam rubber-lined receptacle and plugged its cord into the control panel. The earth scanner was ready to operate.

Its appearance was not unusual. There was a power pack, consisting of batteries and a dynamotor, an amplifier, and a control panel. In the control panel was an oscilloscope. The probe looked like an aluminum pipe but was really a special tube built like a segment of coaxial cable. The sensing unit was in an inner core, surrounded by an atmosphere of pressurized helium. At the tip of the probe was the sensing element which looked very much like the Geiger tube of a radiation detector surrounded by a helical coil.

"Come on, you poor native, and I'll show you how it works," Rick invited.

"You not expect to find stuff here. You just testing?" Chahda asked.

"We want to get a standard pattern," Rick said. He pointed to the valley. "The terrace soil and rocks should be no different than those right here. So we'll get the typical response of these, and when we get to our location we won't have to take time – which could be important if we have Ifugao spear throwers shooting at us."

"What's typical response?" Chahda asked.

Rick showed him the helical coil at the end of the probe. "This coil is an antenna. It's shooting out electro-magnetic waves of very high frequency. When those waves hit anything, some are reflected. The reflected waves are picked up by the tube inside the coil. You with me?"

"Way ahead of you," Chahda said. "Not all things reflect these waves the same, huh? Maybe the more dense, the better reflect. So loose earth not reflect too good, rocks little better, metal very good, and stuff like crystals best of all."

"Poor native boy," Tony said chidingly. "You knew how it worked all along."

Rick shook his head. "He's never seen it before, Tony. It's just that he's pretty quick on the uptake for a poor native boy."

Chahda grinned. "Okay, chums, I'll drop the gag. Go ahead, Rick, I not know everything yet. Why you testing here?"

"The minerals that make up the rocks and soil here will show a pattern. We'll mark the pattern on this plastic screen." Rick indicated a circle of white plastic, scaled like the face of the oscilloscope. "Then, when we go hunting, we'll be looking for deviations from the pattern. For instance, there probably is no metal in the ground here. We're looking for metal. When we find it, the blip on the scope will stand out very plainly. Got it?"

"Think so. Sounds easy. Let's see it work."

Rick held the tip of the probe at waist level. Tony adjusted the controls until the scope flickered bright green. A vertical line on the face of the scope was a much lighter green, nearly white. Then, as Tony switched the activation circuit, the vertical line formed a pattern that varied in width from top to bottom. Here and there a blip, a clear horizontal line, thrust out both ways from the center.

The present pattern was not unlike that of a stylized Christmas tree, with broad blips representing branches at the base, and increasingly narrower ones representing the branches at the top. Rick quickly sketched the pattern on the plastic circle.

"Now watch," he said, and put his rifle on the ground under the probe.

The Christmas tree pattern developed a new element that ruined the design. It was a strong blip, thrusting out from center, about halfway up the pattern.

"Steel," Rick said. "Other metals with good reflection qualities would show blips slightly higher or lower on the scale."

"Some gadget," Chahda said admiringly. "What else you need know?"

"That's all." Tony was already closing the cover to the control panel. "We're ready to move. Rick, suppose we just set this stuff in the back of the jeep instead of disconnecting it? Chahda could carry the probe."

"Good idea. Then it will be ready for use."