“It is, but I think it will be a good plan to see if we can learn anything about it before we go too far down the river. It may be that there is no such place as Snake Island. Or, it may be that, even in our airship, it is impossible to get to it. We want to find out all about it before we go too far.”
“Well, what’s your idea?” asked Ned.
“I think we ought to——”
“Dinner’s ready,” interrupted Bob, and they went out to the table, the professor carrying with him a book, carefully marking the place where he had been reading by putting his finger between the pages. The airship was moving at slow speed, and had been set to steer herself automatically. So the boys had nothing to interrupt their talk of the best plan to follow.
Eventually they decided to travel on until they reached Grand View, the point where Berry Trail led down into the canyon to the banks of the rushing river. They would make their inquiries there, regarding the possible existence of Snake Island.
It was night when they reached Grand View, and, in order that they might be among other tourists, who had come to visit the canyon, the boys and the professor put up at a hotel almost on the verge of the great chasm, storing the airship in a big open shed, sometimes used for autos.
“Snake Island!” exclaimed the clerk, when Jerry asked him about it. “Never heard of the place. Don’t believe there’s an island in the whole stretch of the river. But there are some guides around here. You might ask them.”
Which Jerry and his chums did, but with little satisfaction, for it developed that few of the guides had been farther than the regularly traveled routes taken by tourists, and this had not brought them to the more inaccessible parts of the mighty river.
“Snake Island?” repeated one grizzled guide, when Jerry had put the question to him. “If anybody knows whether or not there is such a place, it’s old Hance Stamford. Hance give up guidin’ long ago, but in his prime there wasn’t a better one at it. He’s gone in places no one else dared, and if there’s a Snake Island he’ll know about it.”
The boys sought out Hance the next day. He lived in a little cabin, not far from the hotel, being cared for by his son, who was employed as a waiter. Hance was indeed old, being past eighty. Yet his dull eyes opened quickly when Jerry put to him the question that meant so much to the motor boys.