Blake emptied the powder from one of the cartridges into the little pile of splinters, and holding the edge of another shell against a corner of the rock, tapped the cap with a stone. At the fifth stroke the cap exploded. The loosened powder of the cartridge flared out into the powder-sprinkled tinder. Soon a fire of the dry, half-rotted driftwood was blazing bright and almost smokeless in the twilight of the depths. "Now haul up the rod," directed Blake, and he lay back to bask in the grateful warmth. Ashton drew up the level rod and came back over the ledge. He found that the engineer had freed himself from the last coils of the rope and was unraveling the end that had been next his body. But his eyes were upturned to the heights. "Look--the flag!" he said. "Already?" exclaimed Ashton. "Yes. No doubt one of them has been waiting on that out-jutting point.--Now, if you'll break the rod. We've got to get my leg into splints." The crude splints were soon ready. For bandages there were strips from the tattered shirts of both men. Unraveled rope-strands, burnt off in the fire, served to lash all together. Beads of cold sweat gathered and rolled down Blake's white face throughout the cruel operation. Yet he endured every twist and pull of the broken limb without a groan. When at last the bones were set to his satisfaction and the leg lashed rigid to the splints, he even mustered a faint smile. "That beats an amputation," he declared. "Now if you can help me up under the cliff, where you can plant the fire against a back-log--I want to dry out and do some planning while you're climbing up for help. I've an idea we can put in a dynamo down here, with turbines in the intake and in the mouth of the tunnel--carry a wire up over the top of the mesa and down into the gulch. Understand? All the electric power we want to drive the tunnel, and very cheap." "My God!" gasped Ashton. "You can lie here--here--maimed, already starving--and can plan like that?" "Why not? No fun thinking of my leg, is it? As for the rest, you're going up to report the situation. They'll soon manage to yank me out of this blessed hole." Ashton's face darkened. "But that's the question," he rejoined. "Am I going to go up? Am I going to try to go up?" Blake looked at him with a steady, unflinching gaze. "There's something queer about all this. Isn't it time you explained? When the rope came off that last cliff in the gorge and I saw that you had untied it before sliding down, I thought you were off your head. And two or three times today, too. But since we landed here--" "Your broken leg," interrupted Ashton--"it made me forget. You had saved me with the rope. I had to help you. Now I see how foolish I have been. I should have left you to lie here, and flung myself back over into the water." "Why?" calmly queried Blake.