"Let's look farther, and find out," Dexter temporized.
He moved forward again, walking slowly, and keeping sharp lookout about him: and two hundred yards farther on he halted with a smothered laugh to indicate a tall, thick-trunked spruce that stood amid a clump of smaller trees. "The blaze," he said, and pointed to an indented line in the rough bark.
Again he chopped out a block of wood, and presently reached an inner ring that bore dimly scratched characters similar to those found under the bark of the fir.
"Another 'W,'" Alison said with pursed lips, as she bent closer to look. "There's something else—I can't quite make out. What does it mean?"
"Some private mark, no doubt. It probably has no especial meaning now—after fifty years. But the important fact—these are line trees—undoubtedly."
"Yes?" she asked with a puzzled frown.
The corporal strode forward without answering, and presently showed his companion a third tree, the bark of which showed the seamed mark of an ancient blaze. His smile widened with satisfaction, and this time he did not halt. "The open road," he remarked: "I wish I could thank the old timer who stuck up the street signs."
"Where will they take us?" Alison asked with a dubious glance.
"To the lost pass, I hope. Nobody would have bothered to blaze a permanent trail, unless he knew where he was going. And the only place worth going from here would be the pass."
He walked a distance farther, and then suddenly checked himself and pointed to the ground. In the dark mold by a tiny rivulet of snow water, he showed her the clearly defined imprint of a nail-studded foot. "Your brother!" he remarked. "He came down from the rock slope, as I thought he might, and has put his boots back on. And now he's ahead of us, traveling our direction."