Part 35 (1/2)
”Do you think we're on the right trail, still?” asked Van, dubiously.
”They didn't say anything about this other hill.”
That was so. But they hadn't said anything about there being two trails, either. They had said that when we struck the trail over the mesa, to follow it to the mines.
”It must be the right trail,” I said, back. ”All we can do is to keep following it.”
Seemed to me that we had gone the twenty miles already. But of course we hadn't.
”Maybe we've branched off, on to another trail,” persisted Van. ”The horses turned, you remember. Maybe we ought to go back and find out.”
”No, it's the right trail,” I insisted, again. ”There's only the one, they said.”
We must stick to that thought. We had been told by persons who knew. If once we began to fuss and not believe, and experiment, then we both would get muddled and we might lose ourselves completely. I remembered what old Jerry the prospector once had said: ”When you're on a trail, and you've been told that it goes somewhere, keep it till you get there.
n.o.body can describe a trail by inches.”
We went on and on and on. It was down-hill and up-hill and across and through; but we pegged along. Van was about discouraged; and it was a horrible sensation, to suspect that after all we might have got upon a wrong trail, and that we were not heading for the doctor but away from him, while Fitz and Ward were doing their best to save Tom, thinking that we would come back bringing the doctor.
We didn't talk much. Van was dubious, and I was afraid to discuss with him, or I might be discouraged, too. I put all my attention to making time at fast walk and at trot, and in hoping. Jiminy, how I did hope.
Every minute or two I was thinking that I saw a light ahead--the light of the mines. But when it did appear, it appeared all of a sudden, around a shoulder: a light, and several lights, cl.u.s.tered, in a hollow before!
”There it is, Van!” I cried; and I was so glad that I choked up.
”Is that the mines?”
”Sure. Must be. Hurrah!”
”Hurrah!”
The sight changed everything. Now the night wasn't dark, the way hadn't been so long after all, we weren't so tired, we had been silly to doubt the trail; for we had arrived, and soon we would be talking with the doctor.
The trail wound and wound, and suddenly, again, it entered in among sheds, and the dumps of mines. At the first light I stopped. The door was partly open. It was the hoisting house of a mine, and the engineer was looking out, to see who we were.
”Is the doctor here?” I asked.
”Guess so. Want him?”
”Yes.”
”He has a room over the store. Somebody hurt? Where you from?”
”Harden's ranch. Where is the store?”
”I'll show you. Here.” He led the way. ”Somebody hurt over there?”
”No. Sick.”
We halted beside a platform of a dim building, and the engineer pounded on the door.
”Oh, doc!” he called.