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CHAPTER XVI
“UNDERGROUND!”

Harry Ware struck another match. This time the two imprisoned lads did not bother to look above them. They knew that escape in that direction was an impossibility. Instead, they turned their attention to their immediate surroundings.

Suddenly Percy Simmons gave a cry of triumph.

“Look! See there, Hardware, old boy, isn’t that a crack or fissure in the rock?”

“Sure enough,” responded his companion, who had just time to notice the crack in the rock wall of their prison before the light of the match died out.

“Maybe we can get out that way,” sputtered Persimmons, all agog at the thought that a means of escape had been opened to them.

“Perhaps we can, but it looks pretty narrow,” responded Hardware dubiously. “Anyhow, it’s worth trying. Strike another match and we’ll have a good look at it.”

A second inspection showed the boys that the fissure, though narrow, was sufficiently wide for them to squeeze into in all probability. Although in the event that it grew smaller further on, they would be as badly off as before. Still, as Harry Ware had said, it was worth trying, and the two boys clambered off the body of the unfortunate pony and began forcing their way into the fissure. Harry Ware went first and Percy Simmons, who was stouter, followed close behind.

For a distance of some five feet they managed to forge ahead. But suddenly Persimmons gave a grunt.

“I’m stuck, Harry, I can’t get any further.”

“Too bad; I guess we’ll have to turn back,” Hardware started to say, when he gave a cry of delight.

“It’s all right. It broadens out beyond here. Come on, Percy, you can squeeze through alright.”

“I’ll try,” declared the stouter of the two youths valiantly, and, with a violent effort, he forced himself forward. It cost him almost all the breath in his body, but he succeeded in passing the narrow place and then found himself beside his companion in what appeared to be a much larger space beyond. Another match was struck which revealed the place into which they had forced their way as a circular cave with a dome-like roof from which water dripped in a constant shower.

It was cold and damp and the boys shuddered as the water, which was icy cold, pattered about them as if a violent rainstorm was in progress.

“Ugh! What sort of a place have we landed in now, I’d like to know,” muttered Percy Simmons. “Shivering snakes, it’s like a Cave of the Rains, or something of that kind.”

“That’s so. We can’t stay here; it’s like being in a damp ice box. We must find some way out.”

“Where do you suppose we are, anyhow?”

“Evidently in some subterranean cavern or passage that runs under the hillside.”

“The question is, where does it come out?”

“That’s what we’ll have to see. There must be a way out.”

“Oh, of course,” assented Persimmons with suspicious eagerness.

Neither boy dared to admit, even to himself, that it was altogether a possibility that there might not be any way out; in which case they would be in as bad a fix as before. As for waiting at the bottom of the hole down which White-eye had pulled them, it was beginning to grow painfully apparent that they might stand a good chance of remaining there till Doomsday without anyone discovering their whereabouts.

Once more matches were struck and they gazed eagerly about them. They fully realized now that it was becoming a matter of life and death to them to find some means of escape from this underground prison into which, through no fault of their own, they had blundered.

But rigidly as they inspected their prison, it was some time before they found that on one side of the cavern a low archway in the rock led into what appeared to be another rift in the rocky formation underlying the mountain side.

“Shall we try it?” asked Hardware as his sixth match fluttered out.

“Unanimous unicorns, yes!” was the energetic reply. “We can’t stay here, and it’s no use going back.”

“Good, the word is forward, then.”

Hardware, as he spoke, bent low to get under the archway of living rock, which, centuries before, had been tunneled out during some disturbance of the earth, and once more the boys found themselves in a narrow rift through which they could barely squeeze.

“Gracious, if this gets any narrower we are stuck for fair,” gasped Persimmons, as they shoved and panted through the darkness.

“Don’t think of that; just say to yourself, ‘We’ve got to get out of this,’” urged young Simmons’ companion.

In this way they went forward for some distance further when the rift began to widen once more. Suddenly they collided with a solid wall of rock. It appeared that the rift had come to an end.

“Shivering centipedes, we’re stuck!” groaned Persimmons abjectly.

“Hold on a minute,” counseled his companion, “wait till I strike another match. Thank goodness, we brought a good supply of them.”

“Yes, it’s a lucky thing that Mountain Jim insisted on our filling the match safes. We’d be in an awful fix without them.”

To the huge delight of the boys, the light showed them that the rift branched off in two directions at the point they had reached. They had bumped into the rocky wall that formed the apex of the triangle at which the two new passages met the old one.

But now they faced a fresh problem. Which passage would they take? They tossed a coin. Heads would be the right-hand one, tails the left. The coin indicated the right-hand rift and into it, accordingly, they struck off. The floor of the passage appeared to rise abruptly and they soon found their further progress blocked by a rocky wall.

“Perishing panhandles, what’ll we do now?” gasped young Simmons.

“Try the other one,” was his companion’s brief response.

CHAPTER XVII
A DESPERATE CHANCE

The other passage proved to be much the same as the one they had tried.

“I hope this doesn’t end in nothing,” muttered Hardware as they made their way along it.

They took a few steps more when Harry Ware gave a sudden yell of alarm and surprise.

“W-w-what’s up now?” gasped out Persimmons; but before Harry could reply both boys found themselves tumbling downward. The bottom appeared suddenly to have dropped out of the cavern passage.

“We’re lost!” choked out Persimmons as he felt his feet go from under him.

Neither boy knew anything more till they found themselves lying on the ground, Persimmons stretched across Hardware’s recumbent body.

“Whew! The second tumble to-day,” gasped out young Simmons, “this place is as full of holes as a porous plaster. Are you hurt, Harry?” For poor Hardware had given a groan.

“Yes, that is, I don’t know. Ouch! I’ve bust my ankle, I think.” The boy gave a loud moan, which rang hollowly against the walls of the dismal place.

“Is it badly hurt?” gasped Persimmons in a dismayed tone.

“Get up off me and I’ll try to stand up. Give me a hand to rise. That’s it – wow, but it’s painful!”

“Do you think you can use it, Harry?”

“Y-y-y-yes,” came bravely from poor Hardware, who was suffering excruciating pain, “but it feels as if a million little dwarfs were poking needles in it.”

“Lean on me a minute. If we could only find some water, I’d bandage it. Say, we seem to be the two most unlucky kids on earth!”

“That’s what. I wonder if we’ll ever get out of this?”

Young Simmons made no reply. For the life of him he could not have found words just at that moment. It was all he could do to choke back his sobs. He was a plucky enough lad, yet he could hardly be blamed for feeling a pang of black despair clutching at his heart as he revolved in his mind their truly desperate situation. After a minute he regained control of himself, however.

“We’ll light up and have a look around,” he said, as cheerily as he could. “I want to see what sort of place it is that we’ve dropped in on so unceremoniously.”

He struck a match; but it was instantly blown out. Both lads now noticed for the first time that quite a stiff breeze was blowing against their faces. The air felt fresh and chilly and evidently came from some opening further along.

“Well, this breeze is a good sign,” declared Hardware; “it means that this place must open out somewhere along the route.”

“Blithering blizzards, that’s so!” cried young Simmons with a gleam of his customary cheerfulness. “Do you think you can walk, old man?”

“Oh; I’ll hobble along somehow,” declared Harry Ware bravely.

“Lean on me and that will make it easier. We’ll have to go slow, though. I’ve a notion that one more drop would finish us.”

“Like aviation liniment,” responded Harry.

“How’s that?”

“One drop is enough,” responded Harry with a chuckle, despite his pain.

Both boys laughed, and somehow, as is often the case, it made them feel better. As they advanced, cautiously, as you may imagine after their experiences, the breeze grew stronger till it fanned their faces in a regular gale. Their clothes had got wet in the Cave of the Rains and they felt chilled to the bone. But before long a gray light sifted into the rift which presently opened out above them, and looking up they could catch a glimpse of the sky.

“Hurray! We’ll soon be out of here now!” cried Harry squeezing his comrade’s shoulder on which he was leaning heavily.

“I hope so,” was the response, “but hark! what’s that?”

A roaring sound, not unlike that caused by a train rushing through a tunnel broke on their ears as he spoke.

“Goodness! Sounds like a den of wild beasts!”

But the next instant they found out what it was that caused the roaring sound, and at the same time experienced a shock of disappointment as their hope of speedy release was rudely dashed.

The rift terminated abruptly in a sort of rocky basin with steep sides topped with big trees and brush. The center of this basin was a sort of whirlpool formed by a stream which rushed in at a fissure at one side and out of a similar crack in the rocky walls at the other. A groan fairly forced itself from the lips of both boys as they gazed at the smooth, steep sides of the rock basin and realized the impossibility of scaling them, even had Harry’s ankle not been injured.

The stream entered the basin by a small waterfall which tumbled in a foamy mass over great rocks grown with green moss, and it was the roaring of this that had caused the odd noise they had heard in the tunnel.

“Stuck!” was Harry’s exclamation as they stood on the foot-wide strip of beach on the marge of the pool.

Percy Simmons could only echo his companion’s exclamation. Utterly disheartened they sank down on the strip of beach, the spray from the waterfall dashing unnoticed in their faces. For the first time since the beginning of their misfortunes the two boys were on the verge of giving way utterly.

How long they sat thus they didn’t know; but it was Harry Ware who broke the silence. Both boys were chilled to the bone, and their clothes needed drying. Besides this, an idea had just struck Harry. He thought that if any search was made for them a column of smoke might be a good thing to attract attention to their whereabouts, and a good fire would serve a double purpose.

The beach was littered with all sorts of drift wood, from big logs to small sticks that the stream had brought down probably during a spring freshet and which had lodged there.

When he had succeeded in rousing Percy from his lethargy of despair, Harry limped briskly about, helping his companion build a roaring fire. The heat was grateful to their chilled skins, and taking off their outer garments they spread them out to dry. It was while they were sitting thus, discussing their situation with more cheerfulness than hitherto they had been able to muster, that Harry’s attention was caught by a partridge sitting on a hemlock limb that overhung the rocky basin on their side. Raising his rifle, which had survived all accidents, he fired at it, and rather to his surprise the bird came tumbling down, landing almost at their feet.

“Come on, we’ll have some broiled partridge, bread and chocolate,” he cried, addressing the woebegone Persimmons. “It’s no good starving, even if we are in a tight fix.”

He skinned and cleaned the bird and then broiled it on a flat rock which he had previously heated in the fire. The two boys ate the bird hungrily, although it was not at all overdone, being half raw, in fact. But their appetites were too keen to be discriminating, and after despatching it and eating some of their moist bread and chocolate they felt much better.

By this time it was midafternoon. Their clothes were dry and after putting them on again, they seated themselves on the margin of the pool and discussed their plight.

“If only we had a boat!” mused Harry, after some discussion.

“Jumping jellyfish, you’re right there, Harry,” exclaimed Persimmons; “but just the same why don’t you wish for an airship while you are at it?”

“Because we can’t get an airship and we can have a boat.”

“What! Have you gone crazy?”

“Never more serious in my life. I mean what I say.”

“What, that we’ve got a boat?”

“No; what I mean is, that we can make one.”

“Go on,” said Persimmons, staring at his companion as if to make sure that he was in possession of his right senses.

“It’s no use looking at me like that, Perce. I’m quite in earnest. The only question is, if we make the boat, have you nerve enough to ride on it?”

“I’d ride on anything to get out of this place. I wish that eagle up yonder would come down and offer to carry me out. You’d see how quick I’d take him up. But honest, Harry, do you mean what you say?”

“Surely. See that old log over there? That one with the rope dangling from it?”

“Yes,” rejoined his companion anticipatively.

“Well, I reckon it drifted from some old lumber camp or other and the rope came with it. However, that’s not the point. The rope is on it and we can ride on it out of this pool through that rift in the rocks.”

“But the log will roll over with us.”

“That’s just where the rope comes in. We’ll lash two of the logs together and then take our chances. If we get spilled, why we can both swim and I’m pretty sure that outside this pool we can find a bank to land on.”

“Inventive Indians! You’re a wonder, Harry. I’d never have thought of that in a hundred years. Come on, let’s get busy. The sun must be getting pretty low, and if we do get out we’ve got a long hike back to camp. I think” – he broke off abruptly. “I forgot your ankle,” he exclaimed, “you can’t walk far on that.”

“No, but you can leave me some place and get help. That part will be all right. The main thing is to reach some place from which you can strike back to camp.”

“That’s right. Well, let’s get busy and lash two of the logs together and then try to chute the chutes.”

A log of about the size of the stick of lumber to which the rope was attached was secured and rolled alongside it on the shelving beach. By using smaller logs as levers the boys raised the large ones and lashed them together as firmly as they could, so as to form a sort of raft. The rope, on testing proved to be lamentably old and rotten; but the lads were not by this time in a mood to be critical. They were crazy to escape from their rock-walled cul-de-sac, and would have been willing to dare almost anything that held out even a remote hope of relief.

At length all was ready, and using their levers they got their crude raft into the water. Then they selected two poles which they thought might come in handy to shove the craft off any obstructions that it might strike. This done, they were ready to make their adventurous dash.

“All ready?” asked Harry, wading out into the water.

“Ready as I’ll ever be,” was the reply.

“Get aboard then.”

Without further words both boys scrambled upon the lashed logs and shoved off with their poles. The next instant the raft was in deep water. An eddy caught it, whirling it swiftly into the middle of the pool.

“Wow! But it’s swifter than I thought,” gasped Harry, as a wave swept over the raft.

His companion did not reply. At the instant he was poling hard to keep the raft from being swept against a rock, for he knew that the force of a collision would, in all likelihood, cause the logs to break apart. For a second the raft swung round dizzily, waves and spray breaking over it and drenching the boys afresh. The next minute it was caught in the main current of the stream and, like a flash, it shot through the rocky rift of the basin and was hurtled down a passage between steep cliffs, through which the waters boiled like a mill race.

There was no opportunity to speak. The raft was rushed onward with almost the speed of an express train. Sick and dizzy from the violent motion, drenched through, and thoroughly frightened, the two boys could only crouch close and hang on for dear life. Once a sudden lurch almost caused Harry to roll off, but young Simmons caught him in the nick of time.

All at once, above the roar of the waters that shot along through the rocky chasm, there came a deeper diapason – a loud, thunderous sound that proceeded from right ahead of them. Louder it grew and louder, till its deafening uproar drowned out all other sounds.

“What is it?” shouted Harry at the top of his lungs, but to his comrade his voice sounded like a whisper.

Then came a sudden shout from young Simmons who had raised his head and glanced beyond the plunging, dizzily swaying raft.

“Great goodness! We’re being swept toward a waterfall. Get out the poles.”

“Pole off! Pole off!” yelled Harry, forgetting his ankle and seizing up his pole as he rose to his feet.

At the same instant there was a cracking, rending sound, and the two boys were swept asunder on separate logs.

The raft had parted under the strain and they were carried helplessly toward the waterfall of unknown height that boomed and thundered ahead of them.

CHAPTER XVIII
FACING GRIM DEATH

Of what occurred then, neither boy had in the retrospect any clear idea. Over and over they were rolled in a vortex of white water, each clinging for dear life to his log. Then came a plunge into a breathless abyss and, after what appeared to be an eternity of submergence, they rose to the surface, half-choked and blinded by their immersion. There followed a fierce fight with the boiling, foaming water at the base of the fall, and then both boys found themselves almost side by side in the 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 log before him, for in some mysterious way throughout the awful buffeting they had received in their tumble through the water, both boys had retained their hold on their logs.

It was a rather difficult task to reach the shore, for their wet clothing hampered them sadly and they were greatly fatigued. At last their feet encountered solid ground. Like two drowned creatures they dragged themselves up the bank of the pool beneath the fall and spread themselves panting, on the grass, incapable for the moment of either thought or speech.

“Woof!” panted Percy Simmons at length, gazing back and upward at the fall, “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 that waterfall 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 I ever 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 white waters from a height that appeared to be fully fifty feet above where they lay, although in all probability the drop was not half that altitude.

“Say, Persimmons,” murmured Harry presently.

“Well?”

“Has it struck you that we are mighty lucky to be lying here safe and sound 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 Harry presently. “It’s getting late and they’ll be worried to death over us.”

“Not half so worried as we were over ourselves about twenty minutes ago,” breathed Persimmons fervently.

“I don’t know about that. But look, the sun is getting low. We’d better start.”

“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 can stay 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 camp must lie over that ridge to the east.”

“Then we came under part of the hill and were brought by that river down into the valley here.”

“That’s what. It seems funny to think of all we’ve been through since we left camp this morning, doesn’t it? I wish we could have brought back 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 rugged surface they had traveled by that strange subterranean route, bored or shaken out there when the world was in its infancy. It was a strange thought that theirs were the first human feet that, almost beyond a doubt, had ever trod those gloomy rifts beneath the earth’s surface. But being boys, they did not waste much time on speculations of this kind. Instead, they munched what remained of their chocolate, a sad, pulpy mess, and cheered themselves as they trudged along by thoughts of a camp fire and a hot supper.

They did not make very rapid progress. Although Harry’s ankle was much improved, yet it gave him pain as he walked, and from time to time they were compelled to sit down and rest on a rock or a log. Both boys still carried their rifles by the bandoliers, and an examination had shown that the water had not injured the almost waterproof locks. But the weapons, although lightweight, felt as heavy as lead on their tired backs as they toiled up the rugged steeps.

“Well,” remarked Harry as they paused, not far from the top of the ridge which they had crossed that morning, “camping in the Canadian Rockies isn’t all fun, is it?”

“Galloping grasshoppers, no!” was the fervent rejoinder. “If this is what the professor calls getting experience, I’d rather accumulate mine in less strenuous fashion.”

“I imagine, though, that after a good night’s rest and some supper we’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 we did.”

“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 day every time we look at it.”

“Thanks. I don’t need any reminder. I can recollect it all perfectly well without a souvenir.”

They paused once more to rest Harry’s ankle, when suddenly young Simmons gave a glad exclamation.

“Look, Harry! Over yonder among those trees! There’s a man on horseback coming 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 it be?”

Just then the solitary horseman emerged from the shadow of the white birches that stood ghost-like against their dark back-ground of pine. The red glow of the setting sun streamed full upon him, bathing both rider 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, but he’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 bent down, he came riding out of the wood into the sunset light. Suddenly he raised 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 uncouth figure wheeled his pony and dashed off into the wood from whence he had come.

“Well, what do you know about that?” gasped Persimmons, gazing after him.

“I don’t know what to make of it. He looked like a wild man; but that was one of our ponies, I’ll take my oath on that.”