When Genevieve had quieted the baby and overtaken Isobel, the latter was ready with a question: "You know Tom so well. Why is he going on down? He said that he would at once return after reaching the place where the head of the tunnel is to be." "He must have seen the beacon," replied Genevieve. "He could not have mistaken that. Something has forced him to change his plans. It may be they were swept down some place in the river that he knows they cannot re-ascend." "Oh! do not say it!" sobbed the girl. "If they cannot get back--oh! what will they do? How will they ever escape?" "Is there no other place?" asked Genevieve. "Think, dear. Is there no break in these terrible precipices?" "There's a place where the wall slopes back--but steep, oh, so steep! Yet it is barely possible--" The girl's voice sank, and she glanced about at Gowan. "It is just this side of where more than five thousand sheep were driven over into the canyon. That was four years ago. I have never since been able to go near the place." "Tom said that he rode all along the canyon for miles. You say it may be possible to climb up at that place. He must have seen it, and he has remembered it." "Then you think--?" "I know that if it is possible for anyone to climb the wall, Tom will climb it--and he will bring up Lafayette with him." "Dear Genevieve! You are so strong! so full of hope!" "Not hope, dear. It is trust. I know Tom better than you. That is all." "Another flash!" cried Isobel. "So soon, yet all that long way from the last! They are traveling far faster!" "Yes, they have finished with the levels," divined Genevieve. "We must hasten." Isobel called the news to the silent puncher, and all moved along to overtake the hurrying fugitives below. Though both parties went so much faster, Blake's frequent shots kept the anxious watchers above in closer touch than at any time before. At last they came to that Cyclopean ladder of precipices, rising one above the other in narrow steps, and all inclined at a giddy pitch far steeper than any house roof. Yet for a long way down them the field glasses showed their surfaces wrinkled with shelves and projecting ledges and creased with faults and crevices. The party went past this semi-break in the sheer wall, and halted on the out-jutting point of the rim where the luckless flock of sheep had been driven over to destruction. No reference was made to that ruthless slaughter of innocents. Gowan calmly set about preparing a camp. The ladies lay down to watch in the shade of a frost-cracked rock on the verge of the wall. Already the time had come and gone for the regular signal of the revolver shot. The watchers began to grow apprehensive. Still their straining eyes saw no flash in the depths. A half hour passed. Their apprehension deepened to dread. An hour--they were white with terror. Suddenly a tiny red spot appeared--not a flash that came and went like lightning, but a flame that remained and grew larger.