The Furnace of Gold | Page 8

they were all at the gate of something awful, but her nature

rose to meet it. She said nothing; she simply obeyed directions and
looked with new emotions on the somewhat drooping mare to whom
her own safety was entrusted.
Van was once more in his saddle. He started, and the ponies behind
resumed their faithful plodding at his heels.
A few rods ahead they encountered a change, and Beth could scarcely
repress a gasp of surprise and apprehension. The trail was laid upon the
merest granite shelf, above that terrible chasm. She was terrified,
frankly. The man and pony in the lead were cut with startling sharpness
against the gray of the rock--the calico coloring, the muscular intensity,
the bending of the man to every motion--as they balanced with
terrifying slenderness above the pit of death.
For a moment the girl thought nothing of herself and of how she too
must pass that awful brink, for all her concern was focused on the man.
Then she realized what she must do--was doing--as her roan mare
followed on. She was almost upon it herself!
Her hand flew down to the reins to halt the pony, involuntarily. A wild
thought of turning and fleeing away from this shelf of destruction
launched itself upon her mind. It was folly--a thing impossible. There
was nothing to do but go on. Shutting her eyes and holding her breath
she felt the mare beneath her tremulously moving forward, smelling out
the places of security whereon to rest her weight.
Elsa, sublimely unresponsive, alike to the grandeur or the danger of the
place, rode as placidly here as in the valley.
They passed the first of the shelf-like brinks, traversed a safer contour
of the wall, and were presently isolated upon the second bridge of
granite, which was also the last, much longer than the first, but perhaps
not so narrow or winding.
Van had perspired in nervous tension, as the two women rode above the
chasm. Men had gone down here to oblivion. He was easier now, more
careless of himself and horse, less alert for a looseness in the granite

mass, as he turned in his saddle to look backward.
Suddenly, with a horrible sensation in his vitals, he felt his pony
crumpling beneath him, even as he heard Beth sound a cry.
A second later he was going, helplessly, with the air-rush in his ears
and the pony's quiver shivering up his spine. All bottomless space
seemed to open where they dropped. He kicked loose the stirrups, even
as the pony struck upon the first narrow terrace, ten feet down, and felt
the helpless animal turned hoofs and belly upward by the blow.
He had thrust himself free--apart from the horse--but could not cling to
the rotten ledge for more than half a second. Then down once more he
was falling, as before, only a heart-beat later than the pinto.
Out of the lip of the next shelf below the pony's weight tore a jagged
fragment. The animal's neck was broken, and he and the stone-mass
plunged on downward together.
Van half way fell through a stubborn bush--that clung with the
mysterious persistency of life to a handful of soil in a crevice--and his
strong hands closed upon its branches.
He was halted with a jolt. The pony hurtled loosely, grotesquely down
the abyss, bounding from impacts with the terraces, and was presently
lost to mortal sight in the dust and debris he carried below for a shroud.
Sounds of his striking--dull, leaden sounds, tremendous in the
all-pervading silence--came clearly up to the top. Then Van found his
feet could be rested on the shelf, and he let himself relax to ease his
arms.
CHAPTER III
A RESCUE
Beth had uttered that one cry only, as man and horse careened above
the pit. She now sat dumbly staring where the two had disappeared.
Nothing could she see of Van or his pony. A chill of horror attacked her,

there in the blaze of the sun. It was not, even then, so much of herself
and Elsa she was thinking--two helpless women, lost in this place of
terrible silence; she was smitten by the fate of their guide.
Van, for his part, looked about as best he might, observing his situation
comprehensively. He was safe for the moment. The ledge whereon he
was bearing a portion of his weight was narrow and crumbling with old
disintegration. The shrub to which he clung was as tough as wire cable,
and had once been stoutly rooted in the crevice. Now, however, its hold
had been weakened by the heavy strain upon it, and yet he must
continue to trust a part of his weight to its branches. There was nothing,
positively nothing, by which he could hope to climb