"Now, Quong, on with you."
"Me go 'long nex? All light."
He stepped down on the ledge, carefully catching hold of the rock, and
edged his way along without a moment's hesitation.
"There, Gordon," said Gunson, "that's the advantage of having a very
small brain. On with you next, Dean. I want to see you lads over
safe."
"But I ain't got a small brain," said Esau. "Won't you go first?"
"No. I went over the clatter slide first, and regretted it directly I
had started. I felt as if I ought to have been last. Now then, don't
hesitate."
"But--"
"Shall I go over, Esau?" I said. "Yes, please. One of my legs is a
bit stiff, and I think I'll take off my boots first."
By this time Quong had nearly reached the part where there was the
projection to go round, and I stepped down with something else to think
about, for I saw Gunson laughing rather contemptuously at Esau, who sat
down at once to remove his boots, his face scarlet with shame and
annoyance, for Gunson said mockingly--
"Don't take off the stiff leg too, my lad; you'll want it."
I glanced back, and caught Esau's eye, and fancied that I heard his
teeth click together as he gave a kind of snap, looking as if he would
like now to take my place for very shame.
But it was too late. I was already on the ledge, feeling for places to
get a hold, and finding that the rock was so full of cracks that I could
insert my fingers easily enough, and steady myself as I shifted my leg
along. Gunson had followed down close behind me.
"Well done!" he shouted, so as to be heard above the roar of the water.
"Don't look down at the river, my lad, but keep your eyes on the rock,
and you'll soon be over."
I made no attempt to reply, but kept sidling my way along slowly and
cautiously, and finding the task much easier than I thought it would
prove; in fact, if it had been solid ground below me instead of that
awful torrent, I felt that the task would have been nothing. It was the
thought that a slip would be fatal which made all the difference, and I
had hard work to resist the magnetic attraction of that writhing water,
which seemed to be trying to make me look at it, so that I might turn
giddy and fall.
Step by step, with a careful hold taken, and making myself determined as
I mastered my feelings of cowardice, I kept on in a fixed stolid way,
till I thought that I must be half-way along the ledge, and that now
every step would bring me nearer to safety, when, to my utter
astonishment, I found myself within a yard of Quong, who was again
seated on a block of stone, blinking thoughtfully, and ready to look up
at me and nod and smile.
A curious feeling of satisfaction came over me--that glow of pleasure
one feels at having conquered a difficulty, and instead of going on I
edged back a little, till I could stand and watch for the others coming.
To my surprise I found that Gunson was half-way across, and he hastened
his pace as he saw me there.
"Here, what is it?" he shouted, so as to make his voice heard. "Afraid
to go any further?"
"No, no; I stepped back to see Esau come along."
"Oh! He had not got both his boots off when I started."
There stood Esau plainly enough beside the Indian. His boots were tied
together by the strings, and hung about his neck, and he was watching
us.
I should have shouted at him, but my words would not have been heard,
and even if I had felt disposed to wave my hand, leaving part of my
hold, Esau could not have seen me, as Gunson was between. And still the
lad did not move.
We saw the Indian look at him and walk down toward the ledge, and it
seemed to us as if he tried to make him go by saying something, which of
course Esau could not understand in words, but he comprehended his
movements, and we saw him turn upon him angrily.
"Oh," shouted Gunson, "I wish that savage would spur him on with one of
his spears, the miserable coward!"
"He'll come directly," I shouted back. "He isn't a coward, only it
takes him a long time to make up his mind."
"He and I will have a desperate quarrel one of these days, I know. Hah!
at last," cried Gunson, for, as if desperate, Esau now stepped on to the
ledge and began to sidle along, the Indian coming close behind him.
But he made very slow progress, stopping every now and then to look down
at the water; and at such times we saw him clinging fast to the rock, as
if afraid to move afterwards. Then on again for two or three steps,
with the Indian calmly following him up and waiting his pleasure.
This went on till Esau was about half-way, when we saw him look down
again, and then make quite a convulsive clutch at the rock, against
which he now rested motionless, and without making an effort to move.
"Is he resting?" I shouted.
"No; lost his nerve entirely," said Gunson. "Stop where you are and
hold my rifle."
He thrust it into my hand, and then went quickly along the ledge back to
where Esau stood motionless, and I saw him go to the poor fellow and
speak to him.
Esau raised his head and looked at him as I thought piteously, and then
once more he began to edge his way along, step by step, with Gunson
close by him, and, as it seemed to me, through the mist which rose from
the water, holding one arm behind him to help him along.
Very soon, though, I saw what had been done. The Indian had stretched
out one of the spears he carried behind Esau, and Gunson had hold of the
other end, so that as they held it the shaft formed a rail behind Esau's
back, giving him more moral than real support, but sufficient to
encourage him to try, with the result that they soon came so near that I
had to creep back along round the corner; and a few minutes later we
were on better ground, where the Indians raised the packs once more, and
again led the way onward, with Esau and me last.
We trudged on in silence for nearly an hour before Esau spoke. I had
tried to draw him into conversation several times, but he had preserved
a sulky silence, which annoyed me, and I went on just in front, for of
course we were in single line. All at once he said loudly--
"'Tain't my fault."
"What is not?"
"That. I was born and brought up to walk on flag-stones. I was never
meant to do this sort of thing; if I had been, mother would have paid
for me to learn to walk on tight-ropes."
"There," I said, "you got over it. Never mind now."
"But I ain't got over it, and I do mind now," he cried angrily. "How
would you like to be laughed at because you were thought to be a coward?
And I ain't one, I'm sure."
"Of course you are not."
"But of course I am, and you know I am. I never expected British
Columbia was made like this. Here's a pretty place! Why, it's just as
if the world had been split open ever so far, and we was obliged to walk
along the bottom of the crack."
"Yes," I said, as I looked up the side of the canon to where the sky
seemed to be a mere strip above our heads; "but then see how awfully
grand it is."
"Oh, yes, I know it's awfully enough, but I don't see no grand. I wish
I hadn't come."
"What, because we've had a bit of difficulty?"
"Bit? Why it's all difficulty. I couldn't help it. I wanted to come
along pluckily like you did, but something inside wouldn't let me. It
was just as if it kept whispering, `Don't go; you'll be sure to fall,
and then what'll your mother say?'"
"But it was a horrible bit to go along."
"You didn't seem to think so," he said, in an ill-used tone.
"But I did feel so, and I was frightened."
"Couldn't ha' been, or you'd have stuck fast same as I did."
"But I was frightened, I tell you, and so was Gunson."
"Then he needn't have been so nasty with me."
"What did he say?"
"Nothing. That was the worst of it. Only wish he had, 'stead o'
looking at me as he did. For I couldn't help it a bit."
"Well, never mind; it's all past now."
"It ain't, I tell you, and never will be past. Everybody will know that
I am a horrible coward, and it will stick to me as long as I live."
I tried to laugh, at him and pass it off, but it was of no use. He took
it regularly to heart, harping constantly upon Gunson's manner to him.
"But you are making mountains of mole-hills," I cried at last, angrily.
"Well, that's what they are made out of, isn't it, only plenty of it."
"But you say he looked at you."
"Yes; he looked at me."
"Well, what of that? There's no harm in his looking at you."
"Oh, ain't there? You don't know. He just can look. It was just as if
he was calling me a miserable cowardly cur, and it cut me horrid.
S'pose I did stick fast in the middle of that path--Bah! it isn't a path
at all--wasn't it likely? If I hadn't stopped and held on tight, I
should ha' been half-way back to the sea by this time, with my nose
knocked off at the least, and the salmon making a meal of what was left
of me. 'Course I held on as tight as I could, and enough to make me."
"Well, never mind," I said. "There: I won't hear a word more about it.
Perhaps I shall be a horrible coward next time, and then Gunson will
look at me."
"If he does, I shall hit him, so there."
Esau looked ill-used at me because I laughed, and kept on muttering all
the time we were in that terrible gorge, just as if the gloom of the
place oppressed him. As for me, I seemed to have enough to do to watch
where I placed my feet as we slowly climbed on for hour after hour,
thinking all the time of the valley I had read of years before in the
_Pilgrim's Progress_, and feeling half ready to see some horrible giant
or monster rise up to stop our way.
It was rapidly growing so dark down between those terrible jagged walls
that I began to think we should have to make camp soon and sleep there
in some one or other of the black hollows, and without fire, for there
was nothing visible but scraps of moss, when, all at once, on turning a
corner which had appeared to block the way, it began to grow lighter,
for the sides of the gorge were not so perpendicular.
Then another corner was turned, and it was lighter still with the warm
soft light of evening, and there in the distance was a glowing spot
which I took at first for the sun, but which I knew directly after to be
the ice-capped top of a mountain glowing in the sun. Below it was the
pine forest again, looking almost black, while away on high a cascade
came gliding down like golden spray, touched as it was by the setting
sun.
Half an hour's more weary tramp, and the chief of the Indian party
stopped short, and we found that we had suddenly come upon an opening by
the river where about a couple of dozen Indians were standing by the
rows of salmon they had hung up to dry in the sun.
They all stood gazing at us in a stolid way, till the man who had guided
us went up to them, and then one of the party turned back to their
cluster of teepees and came up to us directly after with a friendly
offering in the shape of a couple of freshly-caught still living salmon,
which Quong bore off eagerly to a spot above the camp.
"But the Indians," I said to Gunson. "Shall we be safe?"
"Safe or in danger, my lad," he replied, "I want food and rest. This is
the worst day's work we have had. Ah, I am beginning to believe in
Quong. Here, let's help the little fellow. You get some water while I
cut some wood."
As we separated I had to go by Esau, who looked at me suspiciously.
"I say," he whispered, "what has old Gunson been saying about me?"