For hours they rode steadily, skirting around the mountainside, forced higher and higher up the slopes by innumerable obstacles. Sometimes they crossed narrow ledges where a single misstep would have meant a frightful plunge down rough, jagged precipices.
"Humph! Here's where we seem stumped at last," remarked Jack, as the bronchos emerged from a belt of timber.
Just ahead, a reddish pinnacle of rock, almost as straight as a cathedral tower, and rising for hundreds of feet, presented a strangely impressive spectacle.
Bob Somers looked dubiously at the slope which slanted sharply from its base.
"A risky job getting around, fellows."
"A pippin," said Dick, with a deep breath.
"Well, we can do it," asserted Tim. "Come ahead."
The boys scarcely dared to look at the depths below when the sure-footed little bronchos began cautiously treading the steeply-inclined surface, sometimes sending small landslides sweeping down the slope. All uttered sighs of relief when they again reached safer ground.
About mid-afternoon Bob raised his hand.
"Listen, fellows!"