He had no idea where the trail was going to lead him, but he knew enough about the Bad Lands to be quite well aware that to be lost in them meant simply death.
Even the Indians avoid these dreary wastes. For a hundred miles east and twice as much west Doctor Dan had told him that there was not a ranch or a house of any kind and it was just as bad if he went north, as he seemed to be going now.
“If it wasn’t for Miss Eglinton I would go straight down the mountain and try to get back to camp by the trail we followed,” thought Dick, “yet I can’t run away and leave the poor girl in the hands of those scoundrels. What in the world shall I do, anyhow? I’m blest if I know.”
He pushed on for a short distance further, passing into a dark canyon where the cliffs towered on either side of him.
There was nothing to be seen or heard of the horses here, either. They seemed to have utterly vanished. With many windings the canyon led off up the mountain; it was broken by cross canyons, dark, narrow passages opening off every few yards.
Dick soon saw that the case was absolutely hopeless, for the horses might have taken to any of these canyons.
He came to the conclusion that Martin Mudd and Tony must have had horses concealed near by and had mounted them when they started away from the scene of the fight.
“This won’t do,” exclaimed Dick, stopping short at last. “I must go back. I must go straight down to the foot of the mountain and try to get back to camp and rely upon Doctor Dan to help me find that girl.”
This was a wise resolve, no doubt, but Dick soon found that it was one thing to come to it and quite another to carry it out.
He calculated that he was about three hundred yards away from the entrance of the canyon and he expected to spend five or ten minutes getting back, but, after he had walked twenty, he still found himself between those towering walls of rock, the dark canyon still winding on.