“I was going to say,” remarked Ned with a smile, “that you were coming it rather strong on the school-book stuff.”
“Oh, it’s all plainly written down there,” and Tom waved toward the magazine at which Ned was looking. “As you’ll see, if you take the trouble to go through it, as I did, Copan is, or maybe was, for all I know, one of the most important centers of the Mayan civilization.”
“What’s Mayan?” asked Ned. “You see I’m going to imbibe my information by the deductive rather than the excavative process,” he added with a laugh.
“I see,” laughed Tom. “Well, Mayan refers to the Mayas, an aboriginal people of Yucatan.
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The Mayas had a peculiar civilization of their own, thousands of years ago, and their calendar system was so involved — — ”
“Never mind about dates,” again interrupted Ned. “Get down to brass tacks. I’m willing to take your word for it that there’s a Copan valley in Honduras. But what has your friend Professor Bumper to do with it?”
“This. He has come across some old manuscripts, or ancient document records, referring to this valley, and they state, according to this article he has written for the magazine, that somewhere in the valley is a wonderful city, traces of which have been found twenty to forty feet below the surface, on which great trees are growing, showing that the city was covered hundreds, if not thousands, of years ago.”
“But where does the idol of gold come in?”
“I’m coming to that,” said Tom. “Though, if Professor Bumper has his way, the idol will be coming out instead of coming in.”