"Yes, I fancy we are not far off now, sir. I can feel that we are rising more sharply, and there is a rise in the last hundred yards or so before we reach the place where the road forks. We had better go a little more slowly now, sir."
Another five minutes there was a stumble and a fall in front of Ralph.
"Halt!" he exclaimed sharply. "What is it, Mr. Fitzgibbon?"
"I have fallen over the pile of stones," the officer said, "and hurt myself confoundedly."
"Don't you think we had better halt till daylight?"
"I think we can keep on, sir. The nearer we get there the better; and if we should miss the path we can halt then and wait till daybreak."
"Well, we can do that," Ralph agreed.
"I will go on ahead, sir, twenty or thirty yards at a time and then speak, and you can bring the men on to me, then I will go on again. It will be slow work, but I can keep the path better if I go at my own pace."
Ralph agreed, and they proceeded in this manner for some time.
"I don't think we are on the track now," Ralph said at last.