Part 28 (2/2)

The ground became rougher at every step and finally in despair I called a halt. The sun was well up by this and the mist had cleared away from the hills, though filmy vapors still lingered in what I knew must be the hollows. In front was a causeway, strewn with boulders, and beyond that what I took to be a sea of wattles. I could see no use in progressing further in that direction, and I said so as succinctly as I could.

c.u.mshaw was inclined to argue, but the consensus of opinion was against him. The outcome of it was that we decided to retrace our steps. Before we did so I suggested looking about for something that would give us an indication of our present position.

I stumbled on it quite by accident. Another step further and I would have fallen down the funnel-shaped opening that gaped at my feet. I drew back just in time to save myself, and for the second time that morning my heart gave a jump. To think that we had gone so close to missing it altogether! The thing, so to speak, had lain at our feet all the time. I turned about and searched the landscape for my companions. Moira was visible in the near distance; the wattles had swallowed c.u.mshaw.

”c.u.mshaw, Moira, I've found it!” I called at the top of my voice.

Moira whipped round at the sound of my voice. I waved to her and she came running towards me. A second later I saw c.u.mshaw come out of the shadows, and I yelled at him with all the power of my lungs. I don't know what he must have thought of the yelling, dancing, frantically waving figure that caught his eye. He must have fancied for a moment that I had gone mad. Then, in a flash, so he says, the truth dawned on him, and he in his turn sprinted towards me, the one idea uppermost in his mind being that the valley must have been found. At the same instant my soul was singing ”Eureka!” and Moira was weeping and laughing at the same time.

”c.u.mshaw,” I cried, as he came within speaking distance, ”if that's not the funnel that your father and Bradby left the valley by you can call me a goggle-eyed Chinaman.”

And then somehow we all seemed to be talking together.

”That must be the valley down under the wattles.”

”I knew we'd find it.”

”It only shows that one should never give in.”

”If we hadn't fallen down that slope last night....”

”If I hadn't kept going when you all wanted to turn back, you mean.”

”It's found now and that's the best part of it.”

I must confess that I lost my head just as the others did. I should have known better, I suppose, than to go yelling out our discovery at the top of my lungs, but knowing's one thing and doing's altogether different.

I've seen miners on the Lakekamu shouting themselves hoa.r.s.e over even less of a discovery, seasoned men who knew how and when to hold their tongues. Could tyros like ourselves be blamed for what we did? I don't think so.

”That's the funnel right enough,” c.u.mshaw said. ”There can't possibly be two of the same kind in the same district. I'm sure this is the one; it's been described too often to me for there to be any mistake about it. But what's puzzling me is the valley. There doesn't seem to be much of one here. All I can see is wattles, wattles whichever way I look.”

”There's one way to settle it,” I said in an aside to him, and I looked at Moira.

He gathered from my warning glance that I had something to say I didn't want her to hear, so he s.h.i.+fted out of earshot with me.

”There's things you don't want a girl to see,” I explained as we walked off; ”but if this is the valley the skeletons of those two horses should be down there somewhere,” and I pointed over the edge of the funnel.

”I'll go down,” he said with alacrity. ”I guess it's my go. It's time I took some sort of a risk.”

”You surely don't expect there'll be anything wrong?” I queried.

”I can't say,” he answered with a shrug of his shoulders. ”Anyway, I think you'd better get back to Miss Drummond. She's looking over this way, and in a minute or so she'll be asking awkward questions, if you don't go and tell her something.”

”All right,” I agreed. ”Look as slippy as you can, but be careful. An injured man is always more or less of a nuisance, you know.”

He grinned cheerfully at that, and then, without another word, turned on his heel and made off towards the funnel. I walked back to Moira.

”What are you going to do now?” she asked me suspiciously. ”What's Mr.

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