Dorothy looked from her lover to her father, back to her lover again. And her voice was grave and fearless.
"I say," she said quietly, "you are the two finest men who ever lived. But you're not fooling me for a moment. I know very well why we must explore this cave. And I say, let's start!" There came swift lightness and heart-warming humor to her tone. "After all, if a gal has to keep house in a place like this, she ought to know how many rooms it has!"
Tim looked at her long and gravely. And then,
"You," he said, "are swell. Once I called you wonderful. I didn't really know—then."
"Wonderful?" snorted Captain Lane. "Of course she is! She's my daughter, isn't she? Well, come along!"
Grinning, Tim fell in behind him. And into Stygian darkness, preceded by a yellow circle from the flashlight of the Orestes' skipper, moved the marooned trio.
The main cave opened out as they picked their path forward; the walls pressed back, the ceiling lofted, until they were standing in a huge, arched chamber almost two hundred feet wide and half as high. This amphitheater debouched into a half dozen or more smaller corridors or openings; for a moment Captain Lane stood considering these silently, then he nodded toward that on their extreme left.
"Might as well go at it in orderly fashion. We'll try that one first. No, wait a minute!" He halted Tim, who had pressed obediently toward the corridor-mouth. "Try not to be a groundhog all your life, Mallory! You should know better than to stroll aimlessly around a place like this. A confounded labyrinth, that's what it is! If we got lost down here, we might spend the rest of our natural lives trying to find a way out."
He slipped his needle-gun from his bulger belt, let its scorching ray play for an instant on the rocky floor of the cavern. Hot rock bubbled, and a fresh, new groove shone sharply in the shape of an arrow.