It was finally found, and, with their wheels on their backs, they labored to the top. Getting down on the other side was even more difficult, but they succeeded.
Then Frank led Harry a wild chase, till Rattleton was pretty well played out. His head had ceased to bleed, and he had removed the handkerchief, but he could feel that the blow had taken not a little of the stamina out of him.
“How long are you going to keep this up, Merry?” he asked.
“We must be somewhere near that cave,” declared Frank. “It is getting toward night. I hoped to be fortunate and find it before dark.”
“If we don’t——”
“There’s another day coming. We have hard bread and smoked beef in the carriers, and we can find water here. We’re not nearly as bad off as we were on the Utah desert.”
“That’s right. That was a bad fix, but we pulled out of it all right. If our clothes were somewhat drier I could regard the approach of night with greater complaisance.”
“Our clothes are nearly dry, and they will be much more so in two hours.”
They continued the restless search, Frank seeming utterly tireless. Rattleton admired him for his resistless energy and unwavering determination and confidence.
Fortune must have smiled on them, for, as they were making their way along a narrow cut, they turned a short corner and beheld the dark mouth of a cave just ahead of them.