-88-

or impending evil about the place. Every-one who was brave enough to venture near the place left as quickly as he had come. Pat also stated that there were some who claimed to have seen two phantoms who haunt the place -- one by day, and the other by night. The one by day was a woman, and the one by night was a headless man. I found this a strange story indeed, and being as curious as I was, and also seeing in this the prospects of a good newspaper story, I decided to go to this mound and see for myself. I rose at dawn the next morning, gathered together the few things I planned to take along and set out for the Mound. I arrived just as the sun began to tint the east with a faint glow. I took my small spade out of my pack and began to dig. It wasn't long before I had unearthed a silver cylinder containing some papers written in Spanish (Luckily I could read that language... I took the papers out of the cylinder and began to read.)

   “It was written by one of Coronado's men when he had crossed Oklahoma in search of the Seven Cities of Gold. Alfonso was his name.

   "He and three others had wandered off on their own, and got lost from the main unit of Coronado's men. After wandering off on their own, seemingly going around in circles for several days, and running short of food, they came upon a large cave. Being young and adventurous, they lit a couple of candles and entered. The passageway was very winding, and there were many side passages, and as they wandered farther and farther into the dark they realized that they were hopelessly lost and their two meager candles were burning quite low. Soon they would be in total darkness.

   “There was nothing to do but to walk on -- and on, -- and on, hoping they would at least find drinking water. After a while, which seemed like an eternity to them, they began to sense the passage beginning to