Here we halted for a few minutes in a stony solitude, where there was not the faintest sound to be heard; and then Mr Raydon’s deep voice whispered “Forward!” and we began to descend cautiously, for the way down to the stream was so perilous that it was only by using the greatest care that we reached the bottom in safety, and began to follow the torrent downward.
“No chance for them to escape by us this way,” said Mr Raydon to me with a grim smile, looking back as we descended the chasm in single file, gradually going as it were into twilight, and then almost into darkness, with perpendicular walls of rock on either hand, and the moist air filled with the echoing roar and rush of water.
Here Mr Raydon took the lead, the man who had been in advance letting us both pass him, and then following behind, me.
“I have been up this stream to this point before,” said Mr Raydon to me. “You never thought to see such places as this, Gordon,” he continued, “when you left London.”
“No,” I said eagerly, for it was pleasant to hear him make some advances towards me; but he said no more, relapsing into complete silence as he strode on or leaped from rock to rock, till by degrees, and repeating our morning’s experience in the reverse way, we began to find the narrow gorge widen and grow less dark; then we came to places where the sunshine gleamed down, and there were ferns; then lower down to more light, and where bushes were plentiful, but still with the valley so narrow that we had to keep in single file.
At last, the perpendicular walls were further back, the valley grew V-shaped, and patches of dwarf forest grew visible high up. Bigger trees appeared, and soon after the place became park-like, and a man stepped out to right and left, so that in front we were three abreast; and half an hour later we were amongst the thickly-growing pines—a line of eight men abreast with Mr Raydon in the middle, and I and the other behind.
“Halt!” said Mr Raydon, in a whisper. “Join up.”
The men from right and left drew in, and he said in quite a whisper—
“The forest grows more and more dense here for miles away to the river. I propose now going on for another half-hour, to where there is a sudden narrowing in of the valley to about thirty yards. If we do not meet the enemy before this, I shall halt there, and keep that pass, waiting till they are driven up to us. But we may have them upon us at any moment now.”
“They could not have got by us, sir?” I ventured to say.