CHAPTER XII The Badger
A short distance down Dick's gully was a great slab of stone standing on edge, which, leaning over until its upper end touched the opposite wall, formed a natural arch about as high as a church door. Through this vaulted passage Dick led the way. In about twenty steps we came out again upon the brink of the chasm, and then it was that my partner, with some natural exultation, pointed out to me the remarkable discovery he had made.
In the face of the cliff was a sort of ledge, varying in width from ten feet to about double as much, which, with a pretty steep, though pretty regular pitch, continued downward until it disappeared around the bend in the gorge. Unless the ledge should narrow very considerably we should have no trouble in getting down, for there was room in plenty not only for ourselves but for our animals also—even for old Fritz, pack and all.
"Why, Dick!" I cried. "We can easily get down here! I wonder if this wasn't the original road taken by the pack-trains."
"It was," replied Dick; "at least, I feel pretty sure it was—and it was used for a long time, too."
"Why do you think so?" I asked. "You speak as though you felt pretty certain, Dick, but for my part I don't see why."
"Don't you? Why, it's very plain. Look here! Do you see, close to the outer edge of the shelf, a sort of trough worn in the rock? Do you know what that is? If I'm not very much mistaken, it is the trail of the pack-burros. There must have been a good many of them, and they must have gone up and down for a good many years to wear such a trail; though, of course, it has been enlarged since by the rain-water running down it."
"Well, Dick," said I, "I still don't see why you should conclude that this is the trail of a pack-train. It seems to me much more likely to be due to water only. In the first place, though there is room enough and to spare on the ledge, your supposed trail is on the very outer edge, where a false step would send the burro head-first into the cañon; and in the next place, it keeps to the very edge, no matter whether the ledge is wide or narrow."
"That's exactly the point," explained Dick. "It is just that very thing which makes me feel so sure that this is the trail of a pack-train. You've never seen pack-burros at work in the mountains, have you? Well, I have lots of times: they are frequently used to carry ore down from the mines. If you had seen them, you could not have helped noticing the habit they have of walking on the outside of a ledge like this, where there is a precipice on one side and a cliff on the other. A burro may be a 'donkey,' but he understands his own business. He knows that if he touches his pack against the rock he will be knocked over the precipice, and he has learned his lesson so well that it makes no difference how wide the ledge may be—he will keep as far away from the rock as he can. As to a false step, that doesn't enter into his calculations: a burro doesn't make a false step—there is no surer-footed beast in existence, I should think, excepting, possibly, the mountain-sheep."
"I never thought of all that," said I. "Then I expect you are right, Dick, and this is an old trail after all. What is your idea? To follow it down, I suppose."
"Yes, certainly. Our animals won't make any bones about going down a wide path like this. They are all used to the mountains. So let us get them at once and start down."
Dick was right. Our horses, each led by the bridle, followed us without hesitation, while old Fritz, half a burro himself, took at once to the trail which one of his ancestors, perhaps, had helped to make.
Without trouble or mishap, we descended the steeply-pitching ledge down to the margin of the creek, crossed over to the other side, and continued on our way up stream over the slope of decomposed rock fallen from the towering cliff which rose at least a thousand feet above us—the cliff being now on our right hand and the stream on our left.
This sloping bank was scantily covered with trees, and among them we threaded our way, still following the trail, which, however, down here had lost any resemblance to a made road, and had become a mere thread, more like a disused cow-path than anything else.
Presently, we found that the cañon began to widen, and soon afterward the cliff along whose base we had been skirting, suddenly fell away to the right in a great sweeping curve, forming an immense natural amphitheatre, enclosing a good-sized stretch of grass-land, with willows and cottonwoods fringing the nearer bank of the stream.
As we sat on our horses surveying the scene, we found ourselves confronting at last the imposing north face of the mountain. Up toward its summit we could see the great semi-circular cliff which we supposed to be the upper half of an old crater, while the country below it, bare, rocky and much broken up, was exceedingly rough and precipitous.
Starting, apparently, from the neighborhood of this crater, there came down the mountain a second very narrow and very deep gorge, whose waters, when there were any, emptied into the stream we had been following; the two cañons being separated by a high, narrow rib of rock—a mere wedge. Curiously enough, however, this second cañon did not carry a stream, though we could see the shimmer of two or three pools as they caught the reflection of the sky down there in the bottom of its gloomy depths.
"Well, Dick," said I, "I don't see any sign yet of a pathway up to the top of this 'island' of yours. This basin is merely an enlargement of the cañon; the walls are just as high and just as straight-up-and-down as ever."
"Yes, I see that plainly enough," replied Dick. "Yet there must be a way up somewhere. Those pack-trains didn't come down here for nothing. We shall find a break in the wall presently—up in that gorge, there, it must be, too. So let us go on. Hark! What's that?"
We sat still and listened. The whole atmosphere seemed to vibrate with a low hum, the cause of which we could not understand. It kept on for five minutes, perhaps, and then died out again.
"What was it, Dick?" said I. "Wind?"
"I suppose it must have been," replied my companion; "though there isn't a breath stirring down here. If the sky had not been so perfectly clear all morning I should have said it was a flood coming. It must have been wind, though, I suppose."
Satisfied that this was the cause, we thought no more of it, but, taking up the trail once more, we followed it down to the mouth of the second cañon, and there at the edge of the watercourse all trace of it ceased.
"That seems to settle it," remarked Dick. "You see, Frank, the walls of this cañon are so steep and its bed is so filled with great boulders that even a burro could get no further. The copper must have been carried down to this point on men's backs, and if so, it was not carried any great distance probably. The mine must be somewhere pretty near now; we shan't have to search much further, I think, for a way up this right-hand cliff. Let us unsaddle here, where the horses can get plenty of grass, and go on up on foot."
The ascent of the chasm was no easy task, we found, but, weaving our way between the boulders which strewed its bed, up we went, until presently we came to a place where some time or another a great slice of the wall, about an eighth of a mile in length, falling down, had blocked it completely, forming an immense dam nearly a hundred feet high. It must have been many years since it fell, for its surface was well grown up with trees, though none of them were of any great size. It seemed probable, too, that the base of the dam must be composed of large fragments of rock, for, though there was no stream in the bed of the gorge, it was very plain that water did sometimes run down it. If so, however, it was equally plain that it must squeeze its way through the crevices between the foundation rocks, for there was no sign at all that it had ever run over the top.
Scrambling up this mass of earth and rocks, we went on, keeping a sharp lookout for some sign of a pathway up the cliff on our right, but still seeing nothing of the sort, when presently we reached the upper face of the dam, and there for a moment we stopped.
Beneath us lay a stretch of the ravine, forming a basin about two hundred yards long, in the bottom of which were three or four pools of clear water. At the upper end of this basin was a perpendicular cliff, barring all further advance in that direction, over which, in some seasons of the year, the water evidently poured—sometimes in considerable volume apparently, judging from the manner in which the sides of the basin had been undermined. The sides themselves continued to be just as unscalable as ever; in spite of Dick's assurance that we should find a way up, it was apparent at a glance that there was neither crack nor crevice by which one could ascend.
"Well!" cried my partner, in a tone of desperation. "This does beat me! I felt certain that the trail would lead us to some pathway up the cliff; but, as it does not, what does it come down here for at all?"
"There is only one reason that I can think of," I replied, "and that is that they must have come down here for water—there is probably none to be found up on top of the 'island.'"
"That must be it, Frank. Yes, I expect you've struck it. And in that case the pathway we have been hunting for must be down stream from the site of the old bridge after all."
"Yes. So we may as well go back to-morrow morning, I suppose, and start downward. It is rather late to go back now—and besides, there is no water up there: we had better camp here for to-night, at any rate."
"That's true. Well, as we have some hours of daylight yet—if you can call this daylight down here in this narrow crack—let us climb down the face of the dam and examine the basin before we give up and go back, so as to make quite sure that there is no way up the side."
Accordingly, having clambered down, we walked up the middle of the basin, our eyes carefully scanning the wall on our right, when, having traversed about three-quarters of its length, we suddenly heard again that humming noise which we had taken for a wind-storm among the pines. With one accord we both stopped dead and listened. The noise was decidedly louder than it had been before, and moreover it appeared to be increasing in volume every second.
"Frank!" exclaimed my companion. "I don't like the sound of it! It seems to me suspiciously like water! Let us get out of here! This is no place to be caught by a flood!"
We turned to run, but before we had gone five steps we heard a roar behind us, and casting a glance backward, we saw to our horror an immense wall of water, ten feet high, leap from the ledge at the end of the basin and fall to the bottom with a prodigious splash.
In one second the whole floor of the basin was awash. In another second our feet were knocked from under us, when, without the power of helping ourselves, we were tumbled about and swept hither and thither at the caprice of the rapidly deepening flood.
Happily for myself, for I was no swimmer, I was carried right down to the dam, where, by desperate exertions, I was able to scramble up out of reach of the water. Dick, however, less fortunate than I, was carried off to one side, and when I caught sight of him again he was being swept rapidly along under the right-hand wall—looking up stream—in whose smooth surface there was no chance of finding a hold. As I watched him, my heart in my mouth, he was carried back close to the fall, where the violence of the water, now several feet deep, tossed him about like a straw.
Half paralyzed with fear lest my companion should be drowned before my eyes, I stood there on the rocks, powerless to go to his aid, hoping only that he might be swept down near enough to enable me to catch hold of him, when, of a sudden, there occurred an event so astounding that for a moment I could hardly tell whether I ought to believe my own eyes or not.
Out from the wall on the left, up near the fall, there shot a great dark body, which, with a noiseless splash, disappeared under the water. The next moment a man's head bobbed up, a big, shaggy, bearded head, the owner of which with vigorous strokes swam toward Dick and seized him by the collar. Then, swimming with the power of a steam-tug, he bore down upon the dam, clutched a projecting rock, drew himself up, and with a strength I had never before seen in a human being, he lifted Dick out of the water with one hand—his left—and set him up on the bank.
Running to the spot, I seized hold of my partner, who, almost played out, staggered and swayed about, and helped him further up out of reach of the water. Then, turning round, I was advancing to thank his rescuer, when, for the first time, I saw that the man was almost a dwarf—in height, at least—though his astonishing strength was indicated in his magnificent chest and arms.
"The Badger!" I cried, involuntarily.
At the sound of that name the man turned short round, and without a word leaped into the water again. Sweeping back under the right-hand wall, he presently turned across the pool and struck out for the opposite side. Ten seconds later he had disappeared, having seemingly swum through the very face of the cliff itself!