Part 38 (1/2)
He paused, and he drew in a great breath
He was looking to the west, where the sun was beginning to sink behind the mountains
”An' now, Johnny, if you're ready, an' if Joanne is ready, we'll go,” he said
CHAPTER XXVII
As they went up out of the basin into the broad er valley, MacDonald rode between Aldous and Joanne, and the pack-horses, led by Pinto, trailed behind
Again old Donald said, as he searched the valley:
”We've beat 'e up on the other side of the range, and I figger they're just about a day behind--old back there We got about a hunderd pounds in them fifteen sacks, an' there ice that much It's hid somewhere Calkins used to keep his'n under the floor So did Watts
We'll find it later An' the river, an' the dry gulches on both sides of the valley--they're full of it! It's all gold, Johnny--gold everywhere!”
He pointed ahead to where the valley rose in a green slope between two mountains half a mile away
”That's the break,” he said ”It don't seem very far now, do it, Joanne?”
His silence seemed to have dropped fro ”But it was a distance that night--a tumble distance,” he continued, before she could answer ”That was forty-one years ago, co November An' it was cold, an' the snoas deep It was bitter cold--so cold it caught o a little later The slope up there don't look steep now, but it was steep then--with two feet of snow to drag ourselves through I don't think the cavern is more'n five or six miles away, Johnny, mebby less, an' it took us twenty hours to reach it It snowed so heavy that night, an' the wind blowed so, that our trail was filled up or they ht ha' followed”
Many ti old Donald a question
For the first time he asked it now, even as his eyes swept slowly and searchingly over the valley for signs of Mortih and Quade
”I've often wondered why you ran aith Jane,” he said ”I knohat threatened her--a thing worse than death But why did you run? Why didn't you stay and fight?”
A lol rumbled in MacDonald's beard
”Johnny, Johnny, if I only ha' could!” he groaned ”There was five of them left when I ran into the cabin an' barricaded un out of thean' they was afraid to rush the cabin They was _afraid_, Johnny, all that afternoon--_an' I didn't have a cartridge left to fire!_ That's ent just as soon as we could crawl out in the dark I knew they'd coht ha' killed one or two hand to hand, for I was big an' strong in them days, Johnny, but I knew I couldn't beat 'em all So ent”
”After all, death isn't so very terrible,” said Joanne softly, and she was riding so close that for a moment she laid one of her warm hands on Donald MacDonald's
”No, it's sometimes--wunnerful--an' beautiful,” replied Donald, a little brokenly, and with that he rode ahead, and Joanne and Aldous waited until the pack-horses had passed the to see that all is clear at the su now right into the face of that mysterious rumble and roar of the ether at the top of the break, and here MacDonald swung sharply to the right, and caes past had been a wide and rushi+ng torrent Steadily, as they progressed down this, the rurew nearer It seeain MacDonald turned, and a quarter of an hour later they found thee of a s mountains that shut out the sun, and a hundred yards to their right was a great dark cleft in the floor of the plain, and up out of this caer of monster beasts imprisoned deep down in the bowels of the earth
MacDonald got off his horse, and Aldous and Joanne rode up to him In the old man's face was a look of joy and triuht it was, Johnny!” he cried ”Oh, it ht when Jane an' I come this way! It took us twenty hours, Johnny!”
”We are near the cavern?” breathed Joanne
”It ain't uess But we'll camp here
We're pretty well hid They can't find us An' from that sum the thoughts that were in MacDonald's reat desire, Aldous went to hio on alone if there is ti that the other would understand him ”I will make camp”