“Done! Well, now let's see.”
For the better part of the morning they explored the face of the palisade. Its height, they estimated, ranged from two to three hundred feet, shelving down in rough terraces to the rocky débris through and beyond which foamed the strong current of New Hope River, a stream averaging about two hundred yards in width.
Up-current a broader pool gave promise of excellent fishing. It overflowed into violent rapids, with swift, white waters noisily cascading.
“There, incidentally,” Stern remarked, with the practical perception of the engineer, “there's power enough, when properly harnessed, to light a city and to turn machinery ad libitum. I don't see how we could better this site, do you?”
“Not if you think there are good chances for cave-dwellings,” she made answer.
“From what we've seen already, it looks promising. Of course, there'll be a deal of work to do; but there are excellent possibilities here. First rate.”
Fortune seemed bent on favoring them. The limestone cliff, fantastically eroded, offered a score of shelters, some shallow and needing to be walled up in front, others deep and tortuous. All was in utter confusion.
Stern saw that the terraces would have to be blasted and leveled, roads and stairs built along the face of the rock and down to the river, stalactites and stalagmites cut away, chambers fashioned, and a vast deal of labor done; but the rough framework of a cliff colony undeniably existed here. He doubted whether it would be possible to find a more favorable site without long and tedious travels.
“I guess we'll take the apartments and sign the lease,” he decided toward noon, after they had clambered, pried, explored with improvised torches, and penetrated far into some of the grottoes. “The main thing to consider is that we can find darkness and humidity for the Folk by day. They mustn't be let out at first except in the night. It may be weeks or months before they can stand the direct sunlight. But that, too, will come. Patience, girl--patience and time--and all will yet be done.”
Yet, even as he spoke, a strange anxiety, a prescience of tremendous difficulties, brooded in his soul. These were not cattle that he had to deal with, but men.