"But we have found the river," she said. "See the current pushing out toward us from the island? And the color of the water is different, grayer."
"You're right," cried Masson exultantly. He picked up his paddle and sent the canoe probing forward into the thick murk of the cloudy wall ahead.
Three, or perhaps four miles the men from Earth paddled upstream along a mile-wide channel that carried the steady surge of the river seaward. They came at last to the first waterfall, a low rocky shelf that lifted but five feet above the green floor of swampy thidin vines and the grayish ooze that floored them.
The firmness of rock was welcome underfoot. The slow darkness of the Venusian night was falling and so they made their camp on a level shelf of rock a few hundred feet back from the waterfall's muted roar.
And with morning they pushed onward up the river.
The stream forked a mile above the first waterfall. They chose the larger stream on the right and paddled between low sullen black cliffs of basalt for perhaps another three miles. Here a lake spread outward fanwise from three giant cataracts that boomed and frothed as they poured over a sheer hundred-foot precipice.
"Power," said Masson. "Power enough for a dozen Pittsburghs. Power to light all the cities of Earth."
"This is a large island," Ellis nodded. "Such a volume of water requires an enormous watershed." He smiled confidently. "There will be metal here. This will be the home of our children."
Masson found his hand had unconsciously clasped that of Irene. He pressed the velvety softness of the webbed fingers and the woman's eyes lifted curiously to his own. A steady, intense glow burned far back in their depths. Her lips parted, unsmiling.