"Let us go down, brothers," said Tawannears.
"Ja," squeaked Corlaer. "Here I hafe shifers in my back."
I had been leader on the ascent, but when we came to rope ourselves together Tawannears insisted upon going first.
"Tawannears brought you into this peril, brothers," he declared. "It is for Tawannears to lead you out."
So 'twas he who headed us as we scrambled down the outer side of the crater rim. I came next, and Corlaer, puffing lustily, was third. At the beginning our task was simple. We had only to follow the foot-holes we had chopped in the snow-ramp under the crest, and we made this initial stage at a rapid rate. Below the snow-ramp was a rock-ledge, and we negotiated this with equally swift success; but Tawannears was confused by the swirling gray fog and missed the chain of foot-prints that started from the lower edge of the rocks across the next snow-bank.
We blundered around for a time trying to find them, and finally, in desperation, launched out upon the dim white expanse of the snow-field, here so level that we did not need to chop foot-holds. When we started we had been able to see perhaps a dozen feet ahead. Tawannears, in advance, was a ghostly figure in my eyes, no more than a voice in the mist to Corlaer. But in the middle of this level snow-field the fog suddenly thickened to a soupy consistency, and we all three disappeared, one from another. I could not see the hand I held in front of my face. The clouds were so dense as to seem stifling.
"What shall we do, brothers?" called Tawannears in a voice that was muffled and bodiless.
"Oof!" grunted Corlaer behind me. "We choke to death here, eh?"
"Bide, and give the mirk time to weaken," I advised.
We sat and waited until our garments were so saturated with moisture as to weigh heavy upon us, and our clicking teeth warned us of the danger of inaction. The Seneca rose abruptly.