“Don’t see that it’ll bear thinking about,” replied Esau. “Going back now, ain’t we?”
“Going back? I thought you were making for Fort Elk.”
“Yes, but that ain’t the way,” said Esau. “Nobody couldn’t go along a place like that.”
“We shall have to climb up the side, and go round somehow, shall we not?” I said to Gunson.
“That seems to be the most sensible way, my lad,” he replied; “but how are we to get up the side? We might perhaps manage if we were across the river, but this wall of rock is so nearly perpendicular that it would puzzle an engineer. We could not scale that without ladders, ropes, and spikes.”
Both Esau and I stared up at the precipice which towered above our heads, and my companion took off his cap and rubbed his curly hair again.
“We couldn’t get up there?” he said, looking at me. “I’ll try if you do.”
“Oh, impossible,” I cried. “We shall have to go on along the side just above the river.”
“What? In there!” cried Esau.
“Yes.”