“Explains what?” inquired Dick.
“How they got up there,” replied Jack. “Don’t you see? This valley was full of ice once nearly to the tops of those rocks, and when it came down and melted off, the bodies of the mammoths dropped out, and the natives gathered the tusks and stored them in the cave which they could easily reach with the glacier so near the top. Then the snow gave out somewhere in the mountains and the glacier gradually pushed its way out and melted, leaving the cave high and dry.”
“All right for you, Jack,” said Gerald. “Begorra, you’ve had that story already written, I see. But it looks like the real goods.”
“I’ve read of these things before,” replied Jack.
“That’s about what happened,” commented the guide. “Some geological sharps who were up here last year explained one of these rocky holes the same way.”
The pack horses were now brought up to the top of the ridge and unloaded, as they could not very easily be taken down the valley slope. With the greatest care the plane was removed from the two pack animals, and with ropes lowered on its own wheels down the gravelly slope. The motor and other machinery was slid down upon skids cut from the forest and placed along the bank. At the bottom, the Scouts set to work putting the machine together.
“Ah,” said the guide, with the air of a great discoverer, “I see what yer scheme is now. Ye’re goin’ up in that arrerplane, and see if ye can git a peek in that hole up there.”
“Better than that,” replied Gerald. “We’re going to get up and get into that hole.”
Delighted at finding they were nearing the goal of their hopes with so few obstacles, the Scouts worked cheerfully and earnestly upon the reassembling of the plane, and by noon had replaced the motor and tested every stay, brace and control. Then, after a dinner of caribou meat and coffee, they wheeled the plane over the gravel to the foot of the great gray granite obelisk. As they neared it they could see that the dot at the summit took more and more the shape of the ace of clubs, the mouth of the cave appearing as if cut by the hand of an artist, into gothic form. The Indians were awe-stricken spectators, scarcely able to raise a hand to work, so impressed were they with the preparations.
Some seven hundred feet of strong, but light manila rope had been attached to the lower frame of the machine, and to guard against accidents as much more had been coiled under the seat. It was Gerald’s intention to rise over the obelisk, and trail the rope over the rock between two of the pinnacles, thus affording means for the raising eventually of a block and tackle and a rope ladder by which they would be able to reach the summit. But the “best laid plans o’ mice and men” and even Boy Scouts, “gang agley,” as Burns says.