“It’ll be dark soon,” spoke up Ned. “We simply must get out of this before night or we are lost.”
“You forget about the length of the days up here at this time of the year,” reminded Tad with a faint smile.
“That’s so,” agreed Rector.
“You know it doesn’t get really dark until 74about eleven o’clock to-night. So you see we have plenty of time in which to get that pack and reach a camping place before the night gets too dark for us to see what we are about.”
Tad stepped to the edge of the trail and looked over the dead mule and the pack lashed to him. He saw that the pack already had slipped dangerously, and that a sudden jolt might send it hurtling into the chasm. The lad measured the distance to the pack, with his eyes, and also saw that he could not lean over far enough to accomplish anything. Then an idea occurred to him.
“Have you fellows got back your nerve so that you can help me?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” answered Chunky promptly. “Anything but jumping over. Don’t ask me to do that, please, or I shall be under the necessity of returning a polite refusal.”
“I shan’t ask you,” answered Tad shortly. “How about you, Ned?”
“I think I have got over my panic.”
“Good. Pass over two strong ropes here. We’ll have that pack in no time.”