A bit nearer the standing pinnacle of rock, they were evident again.
With one accord they turned and looked down the cañon to where that thin line sprayed the face. A close shot, such as would be necessary in the darkness of the cut. Albright and Compos both stepped to the rock and stood looking with those narrowed, concentrated eyes.
Suddenly Albright, looking back across his shoulders, moved like a cat and picked up something from ten feet away.
He held it on his palm––an empty shell, such as fitted a .44 Smith and Wesson.
He scanned it minutely, turned it over this way and that, looked at it fore and aft.
“Firin’ pin’s nicked,” he said, “an’ a leetle off centre.”
For ten minutes the thing went from hand to hand.
Then Kenset gave it to the coroner.
“There’s your clew, Mr. Banner,” he said. “Now we can begin. Let us be going back to Corvan.”
And so it was that Old Pete, the snow-packer, went back in state to the Golden Cloud, by relays 204 on men’s shoulders down the sounding passes, through the dead cut, by pack-horse across the levels, lashed stiffly to the saddle, a pitiful burden.