"Go on—run!" cried Joe, for the Indian did not seem to understand. Then the meaning and need of haste occurred to him.
"Si, señor, I go—pronto!" he exclaimed, and he was off on a run.
Fortunately for Blake and Mr. Alcando, the worst of the slide seemed to be over. A big mass of the hill below them, and off to their right, had slid down into the Canal. It was the outer edge of this that had engulfed Joe and his camera. Had he been directly in the path of the avalanche, nothing could have saved him. As it was, Blake felt a deadly fear gripping at his heart that, after all, it might be impossible to rescue his chum.
"But I'll get him! I'll get him!" he said fiercely to himself, over and over again. "I'll get him!"
Slipping, sliding, now being buried up to their knees in the soft mud and sand, again finding some harder ground, or shelf of shale, that offered good footing, Blake and the Spaniard struggled on through the rain. It was still coming down, but not as hard as before.
"Here's the place!" cried Blake, coming to a halt in front of where several stones formed a rough circle. "He's under here."
"No, farther on, I think," said the Spaniard.
Blake looked about him. His mind was in a turmoil. He could not be certain as to the exact spot where Joe had been engulfed in the slide, and yet he must know to a certainty. There was no time to dig in many places, one after the other, to find his chum. Every second was vital.
"Don't you think it's here?" Blake asked, "Try to think!"
"I am!" the Spaniard replied. "And it seems to me that it was farther on. If there was only some way we could tell—"