the p'ints of the
compass," as he would say. His first discovery was that the ford we had
found in the darkness served as the river crossing of an ancient and
well-used Indian trace. Along this trace from the eastward the powder
train had come, no longer ago than mid-afternoon of yesterday; and
arguing from this that the night camp of the band would be but a short
march to the westward, Yeates had pushed on to feel out the enemy's
position.

For a mile or more beyond the ford he had trailed the convoy easily. The
Indian trace or path, well-trampled by the numerous horses of the
cavalcade, followed the up-stream windings of the swift river straight
into the eye of the western mountains. But in the eye itself, a rocky
defile where the slopes on each hand became frowning battlements to
narrow valley and stream, the one to a darkling gorge, the other to a
thundering torrent, the trail was lost as completely as if the powder
convoy had vanished into thin air.

Here was a fresh complication, and one that called for instant action.
We had counted upon a battle royal in any attempt to rescue the women;
but that Falconnet, impeded as he was by the slow movements of the
powder cargo, could slip away, was a contingency for which we were
wholly unprepared.

So, as you would guess, the hunter breakfast was hurriedly despatched;
and by the time the sun was shoulder high over the eastern hills we had
broken camp and crossed the river, and were pressing forward to the
gorge of disappearance.

On each hand the mountains rose precipitous, the one on the left
swelling unbroken to a bald and rounded summit, forest covered save for
its tonsured head high in air, while that on the right was steeper and
lower, with a line of cliffs at the top. As we fared on, the valley
narrowed to a mere chasm, with the river thundering along the base of
the tonsured mountain, and the Indian path hugging the cliff on the
right.

In the gloomiest depths of this defile we came upon the hunter's
stumbling-block. A tributary stream, issuing from a low cavern in the
right-hand cliff, crossed the Indian path and the chasm at a bound and
plunged noisily into the flood of the larger river. On the hither side
of this barrier stream the trail of the powder convoy led plainly down
into the water; and, so far as one might see, that was the end of it.

As we made sure, we left no stone unturned in the effort to solve the
mystery. No horse, ridden or led, could h