"Wait, and we'll soon learn," was the confident answer. "I sat there, and looked for nearly an hour. I guess I got every rock fixed on my mind."
"Well, I've had a few of the same impressed on my knees and shins," chuckled the scoutmaster, drily. "But we've no need to complain, because, considering all the things we've had to fight against, I reckon we've escaped pretty slick. See anything yet, Aleck?"
"No, I own that I don't; but then, that may come from lots of causes," the other boy replied, trying not to let his disappointment show in his manner or speech; for he knew that Thad did not believe in a display of weakness in scouts. "Perhaps, when we've pushed on a little further, we may be able to glimpse the face again."
"Wait right here," said Thad, suddenly.
"Oh! did you hear anything? Wouldn't it be too unbearably hard if we learned that some one, perhaps that cruel prospector, Colonel Kracker, had been ahead of us, and located the hidden mine? He could hurry to enter his claim, and my poor mother would not stand a ghost of a show. Was it a voice you heard, Thad?"
"I didn't hear anything to bother me," came the reply, accompanied with a low chuckle. "I was only thinking how often we strain ourselves to see something away off, when all we have to do is to turn our eyes up and look."
Aleck instantly "caught on" to what his companion meant. He bent his head back, and gave utterance to a low cry of satisfaction.
"Well, if that doesn't beat anything?" he ejaculated, apparently highly pleased; "it's the head, as sure as I live, and towering right above us, almost. No wonder I couldn't see it, looking away off, and thinking it lay further on. We've found the land-mark dad set down in his little map, Thad. And now to discover the crack in the wall, hidden by the hanging vines, where he followed a fox in, just out of curiosity, and discovered the richest silver lode he ever knew about. Oh! I'm just shaking all over with excitement. And I sure hope my mother's thinking about me right now, thinking, and praying for me to succeed!"