Part 30 (2/2)
”They give one the feeling they're going to press in and crush you.”
”They widen a bit in a minute.” He groped on ahead, came again to the outthrust k.n.o.b and pressed by. ”Here we turn a little to the right and here's room for a dozen people.”
Betty hurried and stood close to him. In vain her eyes sought to penetrate the absolute dark; no slightest detail of floor or wall was offered save vaguely through the sense of touch.
”It's dark enough to smother you,” she whispered. ”I wonder what's ahead of us? I wish we dared have a light!”
He was silent a moment.
”Maybe we do dare,” he said thoughtfully. ”The crookedness of this place ought to shut off any glow from the outside. Let's go on a little further and we'll try.”
He went on slowly, feeling a cautious way with his feet, his hand on the wall of rock at his side, Betty pressing on close behind him. Thus they continued another dozen paces or so. Then they stopped because they could find no means of continuing; so far as they could tell by groping with their hands the fissure narrowed again until it was no wider than the original entrance, and its irregularities presented difficulties to blind progress.
”Stand here,” said Kendric. ”Close to the rock. Here's a match. I'll slip back to the mouth of the place and we'll see if there's any glow gets that far.”
”Hurry, then,” said Betty, with a little s.h.i.+ver, fingers finding his and taking the match.
Appreciating her sensations he hurried off through the dark. He rounded the turn, called softly to her to strike the match and went on again until he was near the entrance. So still was it that he heard the scratching of the match against the sole of her sandal. But no flare of light came out to him.
”Did you light it?” he asked.
”Yes. Couldn't you see it?”
”Not a glimmer. Wait a minute and I'll bring in some stuff for a fire.”
The match burned down until it warmed her fingers and went out. In the dark she waited breathlessly. A sigh of relief escaped her when she heard him coming.
He went down on his knees and made a very small heap of the dry leaves and twigs he had sc.r.a.ped up. When he set fire to it and straightened up they watched the flames eagerly. There was scarcely more light than a candle casts but even that faint illumination brought something of cheeriness with it. They looked about them curiously. They could see dimly the pa.s.sageway along which they had come; they could make out its narrowing continuation on into the ma.s.s of the mountain. They looked up and saw an ever dwindling s.p.a.ce merging with darkness and finally lost in utter obscurity. Underfoot was debris, rocky soil worn away from the cliffs throughout the ages, here and there fallen slivers and scale of rock. Shadows moved somberly, misshapen and grotesque, like brooding spirits of evil stirring in nightmare.
Kendric threw on a little more fuel and, to make doubly sure, went outside again, standing in the open beyond the fringe of bushes.
”Never a flicker gets through,” he announced when he returned. ”A man would have to come close enough to hear the wood crackle or smell the smoke to ever guess we had a fire going. And even the smoke is taken care of.” They tilted back their heads to see how it crept lazing up and up until it was dissipated among the lofty shadows. ”If we can manage water and food,” he went on, ”I think we would be safe here a year. The lazy devils taking Zoraida's pay can't make it up this way on horseback, and they're not going to climb on foot up every steep bit of mountainside hereabouts, looking for us.”
”A year?” gasped Betty.
”I hope not.” He became conscious of a sudden sense of relief after all that the night had offered and his old joyous laughter shone in his eyes. ”But there may be wisdom in sticking close for a few days.
Until they decide we've gone clear.”
It was the time, inevitable though it may be long delayed, of relaxing nerves and muscles. Betty sat down limply, her hands loose in her tap, her eyes drawn to their fire, looking tired and wistful. Kendric, looking at her, felt a hot rush of anger at Zoraida for being the cause of their present condition. Betty lifted her head and caught the expression molding his face. She was wrapped about with her red gown and Zoraida's cloak; her ankles were bare; then were scratches on them; her sandals looked already worn out; her hair was tumbled and snarled.
She shook it loose and began combing it through with her fingers, then twisting it up into two loose brown braids.
”If we do have to stay a while,” said Betty, gathering her courage in both hands, looking up at him an managing a smile, ”I'll show you how I can cozy the place up. Tomorrow, while you're doing the man's part and finding us something to eat, I'll show you what a housekeeper I can be.
Why, I can make this just like home; you'll see.”
While he was doing the man's part! In her mind, then, it was all simplified and reduced to that. His, naturally, was to be the task of furnis.h.i.+ng food, for nothing was clearer than that they must eat and that filling the larder was Jim's affair and not Betty's. Where he was to get food and how and what kind of food it might be was to be left to him. There was Betty for you, quite content to leave such matters where they properly belonged--in a man's hands. But he might rest a.s.sured that whatever he brought in, be it a handful of acorns or pine nuts or the carca.s.s of a lean ground squirrel, would be, in Betty's eye, splendid!
”Somehow,” he burst out, ”in spite of Zoraida and all the bandits in Mexico, we'll carry on!”
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