"No, I do nothing mean. But I proclaim at Los Angeles that gold has been discovered in the Californias, and in six days the hills will swarm, and the priest in his cell will gnash his teeth."
"Ay!" exclaimed Adan. "Do you feel that?"
An icy blast swept down the tunnel, roughening skin and shortening breath. A few moments later the low rhythm as of distant water came to their ears. Roldan and Adan recognised that familiar music, and set their teeth.
"And I prayed that I might never see another redwood," muttered Adan, crossing himself.
The tunnel stopped abruptly. They stood before a mass of brushwood, piled thickly to keep out wild beasts and delude the searching eye of hostile Indians. Beyond, seen in patches, was a dazzle of white.
"Snow, of course," said Adan, with a groan.
The boys pulled the branches apart without much difficulty: the priests had studied facility of egress and had raised the barrier from within. In a few moments the boys stood in the sunlight; and the mountains hemmed them in.
Adan stamped his foot savagely on the hard snow. "We are where we started a week ago," he said. "No more, no less."
"No," said Roldan, who also had felt demoralised for a moment. "The priests were too clever for that. They would want to get into the shelter of the mountains, no more. I believe that from the top of that point above the tunnel we can see the valley."
"Well, we can at least look," said Rafael, who was bitterly weary and hungry, but determined not to be outdone by these hardened adventurers.