“But it may take us a long time to get through, and we don’t want to be caught in a place like that at night.”
“Right, Gordon,” said Gunson. “Dean, you are in the minority. We must either start as soon as we can or wait till morning.”
“That is the best,” said Esau, uneasily. “I don’t want to show no white feathers, but I ask any one—Is that a nice place to tackle after being walking all the morning with a load?”
“No; I grant that,” said Gunson. “But come along, Gordon, and lot’s explore it a little way.”
He led off and I willingly followed him, to descend close to the rushing waters, and then climb up again, looking in every direction for something in the way of a track, but without avail. On every hand were piled-up rocks, and though we climbed on one after another and stood looking into the gorge, there was nothing to be seen. As far as we could make out the place had never been trodden by the foot of man.
We had penetrated about a hundred yards, and stood upon a flat-topped rock, looking down at the roaring, swishing water, while before us everything appeared of a dark forbidding grey, in strange contrast to the bright slit of mossy green we could see when we looked back, in the midst of which rose up a column of smoke, and beside it the dark figure of Esau with his hand over his eyes, evidently peering in after us.
“The puzzle is difficult to make out, my lad,” said Gunson. “It’s hard work making your way through a country that has not been thoroughly mapped. Can’t get along here, eh?”
“No,” I said, rather despondently, and then I started, for Esau hailed us to come back, and we could see him shouting with his hands to his mouth, evidently in a great state of excitement.
We waited till the echoes of his voice had died away, and then I shouted back, and a curious creeping sensation ran through me at the sound of my voice.
It was impossible to hurry back, for there were too many impediments in the way, but we made all the haste we could, for there was evidently something wrong, though what that might be was invisible to us, as we descended and climbed, and wound our way in and out in places that Gunson confessed were “ticklish,” as he called it, and where he always paused in his firm, quiet way to offer me his help.