periodically renewed your supply of hydrogen. I really believe,"
continued Ned, "that I ought to know more about what you are
planning to accomplish."

Again the white-mustached man was silent a few moments, and then he
told without reserve the great secret. He began with an account of
himself. Until three years before he had been an officer in the
United States cavalry, stationed in the southwest. Then the
President had assigned him to ethnological work. His special work
was in the ruins of the Sedentary Pueblos. While scaling a cliff in
this work he fell and permanently injured his left knee.

Resigning from the army, he traveled for a year and then went to
visit an old friend, Senor Pedro Oje, whose immense sheep herds in
Southwestern Colorado had made their owner a millionaire.

While here, hearing of an ancient nearby pueblo, just south of the
Mesa Verde, Major Honeywell and his friend drove to the settlement.
To Major Honeywell's surprise he found an old friend in Totontenac,
the chief. As the two white men were about to leave, old Totontenac
presented to his soldier friend an ancient funeral urn.

Major Honeywell was almost paralyzed with astonishment when he saw
that the vessel was sealed and that it bore on its side, instead of
the conventional Aztec design, this inscription in black: "Miguel
Vasquez, 1545."

"What was in it?" asked Ned quickly when the Major came to this part
of his narrative.