Fully a couple of hours must have passed since the wild hunt in which he had been the quarry; but there it all was now, as the pony stopped suddenly, lowered its head, and began to crop steadily with the sounds so familiar to the hearer, at the soft grass down to which Chris now sprang, to stand looking about him.
“Of course,” he said. “We must have climbed up here to what father called the tableland, and somewhere farther on, I suppose, we should come to the edge of the cliff and look down into the valley with the openings facing one.
“But not now,” he said, with a shudder, as he thought of the perpendicular character of the cliff-faces.
“Yes, that’s all clear now; the Indians must have come along here while I was going along the gulch, and soon after I had passed they got down and turned the other way, making for the valley, and getting in perhaps before my people had secured all the stores and things. Oh, what have I done?” he cried bitterly. “Failed—horribly failed! Now how am I to find out what has happened since? Has there been a terrible fight? Can I go down now and see?
“No—no—no,” came three dreary answers. “Part of the Indians may be down there by the built-up cliffs; the others will be coming back soon; and what could I do in this darkness, with it far darker in the valley?
“If I only knew what has happened since!” he said, with a groan full of despair, as, dropping down upon the soft turf, half-sitting, half-kneeling, he gazed in the direction where he supposed the great hollow to be, listened to the crop—crop—crop of the grazing beast, and wondered how long it would be before the daylight came.
It was long—a long and weary time, for there was no sleepy sensation now. Chris had had his first taste of a very real danger. He could not hide from himself the knowledge that he had been quite near the end of all his bright, hopeful aspirations. The chase after him had been so savage that he had no faith in being made a well-treated prisoner. The Indians had been too ready and too fierce in their onslaught to show mercy, and there was a sickening feeling at his heart respecting what might have happened during his long absence. Perhaps they had attacked his friends directly after reaching the valley, and if so they had probably received such a lesson as explained their savage demonstration upon seeing him.
“It will all be made clear,” thought the boy, “as soon as the day comes.” But all the same he did not feel at all confident about what he asserted, neither did he feel at all happy about himself.
“How am I to get back to the valley?” he said. “I suppose it would be easy enough to go down that steep slope into the gulch, but I should be sure to find some of the savages waiting for me there, and even if there were none I don’t suppose they all came after me. There were sure to be some left in their camp.
“What can I do?” he muttered. “There is no other way into the valley, and what can I do alone?”