CHAPTER XVIII.
FACING GRIM DEATH.
Of what occurred then, neither boy had in the retrospect any clearidea. Over and over they were rolled in a vortex of white water, eachclinging for dear life to his log. Then came a plunge into a breathlessabyss and, after what appeared to be an eternity of submergence, theyrose to the surface, half-choked and blinded by their immersion. Therefollowed a fierce fight with the boiling, foaming water at the base ofthe fall, and then both boys found themselves almost side by side inthe quieter outer eddies of the maelstrom.
“Are--you--hurt?” gasped out Harry.
“N-n-n-n-no. Are--you?”
“Not a bit. But--what--sort--of--a--place is--this--anyhow?”
“Don’t know. It’s--awful--wet--though.”
In spite of his peril, Harry could not help smiling at Persimmons’whimsical rejoinder.
Dashing the water from his eyes he resumed swimming, pushing the logbefore him, for in some mysterious way throughout the awful buffetingthey had received in their tumble through the water, both boys hadretained their hold on their logs.
It was a rather difficult task to reach the shore, for their wetclothing hampered them sadly and they were greatly fatigued. At lasttheir feet encountered solid ground. Like two drowned creatures theydragged themselves up the bank of the pool beneath the fall and spreadthemselves panting, on the grass, incapable for the moment of eitherthought or speech.
“Woof!” panted Percy Simmons at length, gazing back and upward at thefall, “do you mean to say that we came down that and are still alive?”
“So it seems. It’s a good thing we didn’t know of the existence of thatwaterfall before we built the raft.”
“How’s that?”
“Because in that case we would never have had the nerve to use it.”
“Cantering cascades, I guess you are right! That was the wildest ride Iever took in my life.”
“And the wildest you are ever likely to, I reckon.”
“Let’s hope so, anyhow. Hammering hummingbirds, what a drop!”
Both boys gazed at the fall, which thundered and boomed its whitewaters from a height that appeared to be fully fifty feet above wherethey lay, although in all probability the drop was not half thataltitude.
“Say, Persimmons,” murmured Harry presently.
“Well?”
“Has it struck you that we are mighty lucky to be lying here safe andsound after all we’ve been through?”
“You just bet it has,” was the hearty response. “Walloping waterfalls,if it wasn’t that I’m so hungry I’d think I was dead.”
“We’d better be seeing about getting back to camp,” said Harrypresently. “It’s getting late and they’ll be worried to death over us.”
“Not half so worried as we were over ourselves about twenty minutesago,” breathed Persimmons fervently.
“I don’t know about that. But look, the sun is getting low. We’d betterstart.”
“Right you are; but how about your ankle?”
“It doesn’t hurt half so much now. I guess I can make it all right.”
“All right. But if it hurts you badly, I guess I can carry you a way.Or maybe we can find a hut of some trapper or something where you canstay till I bring help.”
“Got your compass?” was Harry’s next question.
“Yes; but the sun would give us our direction in any event. The campmust lie over that ridge to the east.”
“Then we came under part of the hill and were brought by that riverdown into the valley here.”
“That’s what. It seems funny to think of all we’ve been through sincewe left camp this morning, doesn’t it? I wish we could have broughtback poor old White-eye, though.”
“So do I. We’ll have to get another pony some place, I guess.”
Talking thus, the two boys began to climb the hill under whose ruggedsurface they had traveled by that strange subterranean route, bored orshaken out there when the world was in its infancy. It was a strangethought that theirs were the first human feet that, almost beyond adoubt, had ever trod those gloomy rifts beneath the earth’s surface.But being boys, they did not waste much time on speculations of thiskind. Instead, they munched what remained of their chocolate, a sad,pulpy mess, and cheered themselves as they trudged along by thoughts ofa camp fire and a hot supper.
They did not make very rapid progress. Although Harry’s ankle was muchimproved, yet it gave him pain as he walked, and from time to timethey were compelled to sit down and rest on a rock or a log. Both boysstill carried their rifles by the bandoliers, and an examination hadshown that the water had not injured the almost waterproof locks. Butthe weapons, although lightweight, felt as heavy as lead on their tiredbacks as they toiled up the rugged steeps.
“Well,” remarked Harry as they paused, not far from the top of theridge which they had crossed that morning, “camping in the CanadianRockies isn’t all fun, is it?”
“Galloping grasshoppers, no!” was the fervent rejoinder. “If this iswhat the professor calls getting experience, I’d rather accumulatemine in less strenuous fashion.”
“I imagine, though, that after a good night’s rest and some supperwe’ll feel different about it.”
“Maybe. But to-day we’ve done nothing but tumble in.”
“Yes, and we were lucky to get out again every time as easily as wedid.”
“True for you. I guess there’s not so much to grumble about after all.”
“Anyhow, we got a fine bearskin. It will help to remind us of this dayevery time we look at it.”
“Thanks. I don’t need any reminder. I can recollect it all perfectlywell without a souvenir.”
They paused once more to rest Harry’s ankle, when suddenly youngSimmons gave a glad exclamation.
“Look, Harry! Over yonder among those trees! There’s a man on horsebackcoming toward us. Maybe we can get you a lift into camp!”
“Perhaps it is some one from the camp. No; it isn’t, though. Who can itbe?”
Just then the solitary horseman emerged from the shadow of the whitebirches that stood ghost-like against their dark back-ground of pine.The red glow of the setting sun streamed full upon him, bathing bothrider and horse in a flood of crimson light.
“Why,--that’s--that’s one of our horses!” exclaimed Harry suddenly.
“So it is. Maybe that fellow’s been sent out to search for us. Wow, buthe’s a wild-looking customer, though!”
His shaggy hair, huge, unkempt beard and ragged clothes did, indeed,give the horseman a mysterious, almost uncanny look as, with head bentdown, he came riding out of the wood into the sunset light. Suddenly heraised his head and saw the two boys for the first time.
“Hey, mister!” cried young Simmons.
The next instant, with a wild cry like that of some animal, the uncouthfigure wheeled his pony and dashed off into the wood from whence he hadcome.
“Well, what do you know about that?” gasped Persimmons, gazing afterhim.
“I don’t know what to make of it. He looked like a wild man; but thatwas one of our ponies, I’ll take my oath on that.”