"Rather not," said Wally, cheerfully, with his mouth full of sandwich. "I believe it's not so bad after we get past those rocks though, on to the top." "What," cried Fisher, "isn't _that_ the top then?" "Bless you, no. We have to go down a bit when we get there, and cross a bog, and then the real pike begins." The information was received with dead silence, and the party sat grimly munching their lunch with upturned eyes. "Which way do we go?" asked Cottle presently. "I suppose up by the stream. It's bound to lead up to the bog." The stream in question was a torrent which fell in a series of leaps through a narrow gorge in the rocks. Fisher minor looked very blue. "I wish I'd got my strong boots," said he. The dismal tone in which he uttered the words startled the others. "I say, young Fisher," said D'Arcy, "you're not done yet, are you!" Fisher minor had not the pluck to say "Yes." "I'll be game after this rest. I got a little blown up that last bit, that's all." "It doesn't look awfully far now," said Ashby. "It's further than it looks. Come on; let's be jogging," said Wally. The new ascent, which consisted chiefly in clambering from stone to stone up the rocky ravine, was less exhausting than the tramp up the bog, and as Wally was no better at this sort of climbing than any of the rest, he did not dishearten them by getting hopelessly ahead, but kept with the party. Occasionally they had to help one another up a specially stiff ledge, and this mutual accommodation was an additional source of comfort to the weak goers. Progress was very slow. Cash, having hauled himself up on to a little platform of moss, looked at his watch and was alarmed to find it was past one. The huge ravine, at the far head of which they could see the open sky, seemed a tremendous distance yet. And after that, according to Wally, was to come the bog and the cliffs beyond, on which Wisdom lost his life. Yet none of these things was quite so bad as the rolling up of some fleecy clouds behind them, which effaced the view below, and seemed to be crawling up the mountain in pursuit of them. Cash pointed this out to Wally, who grunted. "We shall miss the view from the top," said he. "If we ever get there," said Cash. On they scrambled again, casting every now and then a longing look upward at the grim ravine head, and now and then an anxious glance behind at the fast overhauling clouds. "We're bound to get out of it up there," sang out Wally. But almost as he spoke the light mist swept past him, blotting out everything but the boulder he stood on and a rift of the dashing water at his feet. The clouds had befriended Fisher minor. They did what he durst not do; ordered the party to halt. "Where are you?" shouted Wally from the invisible. "Here; where are you?" "Stay there; and I'll come to you." Slowly the party foregathered, and stood huddled in the blinding mist on a flat rock.