THE RAFT IN THE CANYON
Next morning Stamford started off the instant breakfast was over, but
he did not go further than the cook-house. He found it deserted, the
outfit having departed the day before on what promised to be a three
or four days' expedition. Stamford poked about the cook-house and
bunk-house with a vague idea of coming on clues left carelessly
exposed. In the midst of it the Professor walked in on him.
"Oh, I thought you were gone for the day," said the Professor, "and I
hoped our friends of the funny names might be back."
"I'm going now," Stamford returned shortly, and walked away, though
the Professor called to him.
From among the rocks on the river-bank he saw the buckboard pass
around the corrals and make for the ford. He followed.
Somewhere that herd of cattle in the little valley had crossed the
river, and he was determined to discover where. He had rather
definite ideas about them that led him to expect no information from
the ford.
In that he quickly proved himself right. He had seen, even from
where he lay on the opposite cliff, that most of the cattle had been
in the valley a long time; that was evident from their plumpness and
undisturbed feeding. The more recent arrivals were betrayed by their
rougher coats and leaner bodies, and by a wilder fling of the head
when the Professor approached them. There had been no rain on the
Red Deer in two months; their tracks, were there any, would show
plainly enough in the mud approaches to the ford.
But there was nothing there save the hoof-marks of the Professor's
team and a few dim old hollows that must have been there from the
spring.
He considered the possibility of a ford further east, but one near
enough to be of use to the valley he would have heard of.
Carefully examining the shore as he went, he turned back to the west.
Now and then he stopped to scrutinise the face of the opposite cliff
for marks of a slope on that side.
Not far from the end of the lowest corral he raised himself on a
rounded rock to look about him. Across the river was unbroken wall.
On this side was a stretch of tumbled erosions that cut off his view
from the ground. As he let himself down again his foot slipped and
he fell, feet first, between two rocks. He was surprised to hear the
crunch of leather, and, looking where his feet had gone, he saw a
saddle carefully hidden, and beneath it a bridle. More surprising,
it was not a stock saddle but an English pattern of the softest,
lightest kind, ridiculously small and compact--so small that a man's
coat would almost hide it.
He thrust it back and went hastily on. His eyes flitted
instinctively to the ranch-house, and just then the cook came from
the kitchen and emptied a pot. Stamford ducked, though a score of
heads would pass unnoticed in that jumble of rock at such a distance.
Keeping to the river-bed, he moved up-stream and presently the cliffs
beside him rose to the level of their mates on the other side. But
there was always room for him to advance. At places the walls
narrowed, the current rushing between with indescribable fury, and
widening below in eddying sullenness that was almost as terrifying.
That it did not always chafe its barriers in vain was shown by the
tumbled confusion everywhere.
In a few places deep crevices ran down from the prairie, and these
Stamford examined carefully. But there was no sign of a ford.
Equally alive was he to movement on the opposite cliff. By
lunch-time his clothes were showing marks of his tireless clambering.
Below him--during the last half-hour he had been rising on the face
of the cliff--a comfortable ledge invited, and he climbed down and
unslung his lunch. As he ate he realised how easy had been his
descent. Out before him extended a level floor of rock up-stream;
behind, a steep incline ran upward, disappearing around a bulge in
the rocky face. Stamford knew cattle would not follow such a steep
ledge at such a height. Below, the water ran smooth, but tiny
whirlpools covered its surface; the current beneath was swift and
treacherous.
He ate absent-mindedly, puzzled by the clear ledge ahead, while
elsewhere was such a chaos of fallen boulders. With the last
mouthful he retraced his steps, searching for some branching path to
the prairie above. He found it in a draw that left at right angles
the one he had followed down--an easy, grass-floored ascent.
Tangling and twisting, he reached the prairie.
In its depths were unmistakable evidences of cattle.
He returned to the lower level and followed it to its end. Gently it
fell to the level of the river; abruptly it ended in a wide platform
of rock that extended in under the cliff for fifty feet or more. On
all sides but the way he had come was towering rock only a bird could
pass.
Nonplussed, irritated by the dashing of his hopes, he poked about.
The bare rock all round could conceal nothing, and ten yards ahead
was the certain end. Yet at his feet were the marks of cattle. He
moved nearer the end of the platform and leaned against a pinnacle
that projected from the water. As he turned helplessly to the
opposite side of the river, the solution lay before his eyes, the one
thing he had never suspected.
A heavy raft lay tight against the pinnacle on which he leaned,
protected from the rush of water above by another jutting rock.
He approached it with incredulity. Quiet as the stream looked
superficially just there, he knew no motive power applicable at such
a place would breast that current. And clearly it was too deep and
swift to pole. In vain he examined the overhanging cliffs for wire.
At the very end of the ledge he caught sight of an end of cable wound
round a rock. Through his field-glasses he traced its exit across
the river. But still the method of passage was obscure, for the
cable stretched beneath the torrent, as did the wire that connected
it with the raft. Studying then the angle of the raft to the
current, he realised that the same principle prevailed here as
propelled the ferry across the South Saskatchewan at Medicine Hat.
It was surprisingly simple, yet he had nowhere else seen it in
practice. A wire extended from either end of the raft to the
cross-river cable, the shortening of the front one of which, together
with the extension of the rear one, forced the current itself, urging
against the angled side of the raft, to be the propelling power.
A burden lifted from Stamford's mind. Here was the crossing of the
herds to the hidden valley.... Here, too, was the means by which the
dogs--somehow unknown to Dakota and his comrades--were brought from
the valley and turned loose on the prairie on that memorable night.
He caught himself whistling, until he realised that no part of his
discovery assisted him to the solution of his own problem.
A feeling of discomfort had been increasing for some time, and he
decided that he was under observation. Clambering nonchalantly to
his feet, he retired to the cover of the pinnacle that concealed the
raft from below, and seated himself behind it. After a time his
curiosity overcame him. Turning on his knees he slowly advanced his
head to look across the river.
As his eyes came over the edge of the bank he saw an end of wire
protruding from a small pile of rock close to the water's edge. It
extended out into the river and disappeared. He knew by its position
that it was intended to be concealed even from those who commonly
used the raft. The action of the current had worked the end from its
covering of stones. He drew back without touching it.
At the end of an hour he decided to brave the eyes he knew were still
on the watch.
Again he was late for dinner, but from a distance he saw the
Professor and his sister drive rapidly up to the ranch-house. They,
too, were late.
"Really," the Professor chided, trying to induce a frown to gather on
his placid forehead, "your continued indignity in the matter of eats
is a subject for solemn consideration."
"I am at a disadvantage," returned Stamford. "I have no team to
hustle me and my discoveries home at night. With Gee-Gee and his
fellow a good driver could, I am sure, cover from five miles up the
other side of the river, and cross the ford, in the time it would
take me to walk it on this side. With an exceptional driver I'd lose
miserably."
"Some day," proposed the Professor genially, "we'll try it. I'm
growing quite conceited over my mastery of the incorrigible Gee-Gee.
I won't always be so busy as I am now."
"If that day delays, you'll never be able to get to town the mountain
of button material collecting at the back door."
"Always," returned the Professor gravely, "I'm looking for something
bigger. That discovery I hinted at last night---- You wait, you
cold-blooded editor. We palæontologists may be denied some thrills,
but at least when we make mistakes there's no libel action. If I
could be assured that in the wonderful national museum for which I
have the honour to collect there would stand through the ages a
monument to the memory of one, Amos Bulkeley---- It doesn't mould
readily to Latin, does it?"
Stamford sighed wearily.
The Professor stooped to look beneath the blind.
"Your husband!" he announced across the table.
Presently Cockney jerked Pink Eye to his haunches before the door.
"Anything left to eat?" he called. "I'm starving."
"When Mr. Stamford has his fourth helping there won't be," replied
the Professor. "He's a past master at keeping others talking while
he eats."
"Stamford, take Pink Eye to the corral," ordered Cockney. "The
bottom corral, you know. He's too tired to be breezy."
"Here! Let me tackle him." The Professor was advancing in a circle
on Pink Eye, as if with a vague idea of securing a strangle hold
before the broncho could put up a defence. "If I could end the
summer with the thought that I'd handled a real devil of a broncho,
my pride would sustain me for a whole winter. Even Gee-Gee seems to
have lost all ambition."
"Don't you bother," Cockney growled. "I'll take him myself."
Stamford came forward valiantly.
"Don't be afraid of him," cautioned Cockney, removing the saddle.
"If he cuts up, let him go; he won't go far. Here's the key to the
gate. I think you'll find it swing easily enough. We'll have real
hinges and a new gate before another season. Be sure and lock up."
The Professor watched Stamford gingerly lead the jaded horse away.
"I haven't the heart to let him go alone," he decided, and set off
running. "If we don't come back," he shouted over his shoulder,
"you'll find me gathering up what's left of Mr. Stamford."
Stamford, turning at sound of the Professor's heavy feet, saw Cockney
standing before the ranch-house, watching them in that speculative
way of his.
Pink Eye was honoured with a corral all to himself, an unusually
strong one of six-foot fences, with a network of wire stapled about
it. The gate, a clumsy affair of cotton-wood logs, hinged to the
post by heavy loops of iron, was fastened at its other side by a
chain passing through a huge staple in the gate and padlocked around
the fence post. This post was sunk in the ground close to the main
post of the fence, apparently added to fill an over-wide breach left
by a makeshift gate.
The Professor took the key and pulled the gate open for Pink Eye to
scamper through.
"Humph!" he growled. "The key seems a bit superfluous, with that
contraption to move before Pink Eye could get out."
He closed the padlock and started back for the ranch-house.
"You're sure you locked it?"
Stamford, remembering Cockney's last words, turned back. To his
surprise the loop had not caught, though the Professor had turned the
key in the lock. The latter, apologetic, returned and corrected the
mistake.
"They'd have thought we were too frightened to do the job right," he
remarked, with a sheepish grin. "Just the same, it's a tiresome rite
to go through for one lone broncho that wouldn't go far if he got
away."
"Oh," Cockney exclaimed, several minutes after they were back in the
sitting-room, "the key!"
The Professor fumbled through his pocket and produced it.
"Pink Eye must look on his corral," he observed, "as the equine
equivalent of a jail. Is he in the habit of spending his evenings at
the corner saloon, or----"
"It's a habit I have of wishing to reserve my own things for myself,"
said Cockney shortly.
"There are worse foibles," was the Professor's sweet reply. He gave
the embarrassed laugh that usually preceded a confession. "One of
mine is ever so much less respectable. I'm simply scared to a panic
at thought of fire--fire anywhere--here at the ranch-house--wherever
I spend the night. I know how foolish it is, but my instincts are
stronger than my intelligence. I must have been a wolf a few lives
back. At home I always sleep downstairs on that account."
"Unless both Stamford and ourselves give up our downstairs rooms I
don't see how we can satisfy you at the H-Lazy Z," said Cockney.
"Of course I'd have to be near him," put in Isabel hastily. "So it's
quite impossible. Please don't think of indulging his foolishness
any more."
"At any rate," said Stamford stubbornly, thinking of the limitations
imposed on his uncertain night investigations by an upper room, "I'm
not going to give up my room until my host orders it."
"Your host," said Cockney emphatically "is going to do no such thing."