A week passed.  Professor Bumper was able to be about, and Tom and Ned noticed that there was an anxious look on his face.  Was he, too, beginning to despair?

“Well, this isn’t hunting for golden idols very fast,” said Mr. Damon, the morning of the eighth day after their desertion by the faithless Jacinto.  “What do you say, Professor Bumper; ought we not to start off on our own account?”

“We had better if Tolpec does not return today,” was the answer.

They had eaten breakfast, had put their camp in order, and were about to have a consultation on what was best to do, when Tom suddenly called to Ned, who was whistling: 

“Hark!”

Through the jungle came a faint sound of singing —­not a harmonious air, but the somewhat barbaric chant of the natives.

“It is Tolpec coming back!” cried Mr. Damon.  “Hurray!  Now our troubles are over t Bless my meal ticket!  Now we can start!”

“It may be Jacinto,” suggested Ned.

“Nonsense! you old cold-water pitcher!” cried Tom.  “It’s Tolpec!  I can see him!  He’s a good scout all right!”

And then, walking at the head of a band of Indians who were weirdly chanting while behind them came a train of mules, was Tolpec, a cheerful grin covering his honest, if homely, dark face.

“Me come back!” he exclaimed in gutteral English, using about half of his foreign vocabulary.

“I see you did,” answered Professor Bumper in the man’s own tongue.  “Glad to see you.  Is everything all right?”

“All right,” was the answer.  “These Indians will take you where you want to go, and will not leave you as Jacinto did.”

“We’ll start in the morning!” exclaimed the savant his own cheerful self again, now that there was a prospect of going further into the interior.  “Tell the men to get something to eat, Tolpec.  There is plenty for all.”

“Good!” grunted the new guide and soon the hungry Indians, who had come far, were satisfying their hunger.

As they ate Tolpec explained to Professor Bumper, who repeated it to the youths and Mr. Damon, that it had been necessary to go farther than he had intended to get the porters and mules.  But the Indians were a friendly tribe, of which he was a member, and could be depended on.

There was a feast and a sort of celebration in camp that night.  Tom and Ned shot two deer, and these formed the main part of the feast and the Indians made merry about the fire until nearly midnight.  They did not seem to mind in the least the swarms of mosquitoes and other bugs that flew about, attracted by the light.  As for Tom Swift and his friends, their nets protected them.

An early start was made the following morning.  Such packages of goods and supplies as could not well be carried by the Indians in their head straps, were loaded on the backs of the pack-mules.  Tolpec explained that on reaching the Indian village, where he had secured the porters, they could get some ox-carts which would be a convenience in traveling into the interior toward the Copan valley.