“You’re right, there, Harry!” Frank answered. “You stated the question before the house correctly!”
“Oh, we’ll get out some way,” Jack insisted. “We’re not going to stay in this little old hole forever. It’s too cold here.”
“Can you walk, Harry?” asked Frank.
“In a short time, probably,” was the reply. “While I’m resting, you boys chase around and see if there’s any chance of getting back to the surface of the earth again.”
Frank and Jack spent some time walking about the edge of the pool but could find nothing that looked like an exit.
“If I could turn myself into a barrel of water,” Jack stated with a whimsical smile, “I could run out!”
“Yes, and if you could change yourself into a bird,” Frank laughed, “you could fly out. But you’re not fluid, and you haven’t got wings, so I guess we’ve got to find some other way.”
“Speaking about water,” Jack mused, “how does the water get out of here? It seems to come from springs in the sides of the pool as well as from rills down the mountainside when the snow melts. If it didn’t get out in some way, the Devil’s Punch Bowl would simply be a mountain lake. Perhaps we can get through the passage made by the water.”
Following this suggestion, the boys passed around the pool a number of times always dodging the handle-like spur which shot into the basin by turning back, and finally came to a whirlpool on the east side which showed the drop in the water. The boys examined the whirl of water earnestly.
“Is the hole which makes this whirlpool clear down to the bottom?” asked Jack.