hen he puffed away as calmly
as if there was nothing in this world to trouble him.

"If the gate be shut," he resumed, "it will keep out prospectors, tramps
and Injuns." With that he went to smoking his red-willow[1] bark again.

[Footnote 1: The trappers and Indians made Kil-i-ki-nic, or
Kinnikinick, by mixing tobacco with the inside bark of red
willow, which is the common name for the red osier of the
dogwood family. EDITOR.]

But I could not view the situation so complacently, and when the rain
had ceased as suddenly as it began, with some difficulty I caught my
horse and made my way to the gate, to discover that my worst fears were
realized; a large section of the cliff had split off the Mesa and slid
down into the narrow gateway completely filling the space and leaving a
wall of over one hundred feet of sheer precipice for us to climb before
we could escape from our Eden-like prison.

Again a wave of superstitious dread swept over me as I viewed the
tightly closed exit, a dread that perhaps after all there was more to
Big Pete's superstitions about the Wild Hunter than I dared to admit,
else why should that cliff which had stood for thousands of years take
this opportunity to split off and choke up the ancient trail?

The longer I questioned myself, the less was my ability to answer. I sat
on a stone and for some time was lost in thought. When at length I
looked up it was to see Big Pete with folded arms silently gazing at the
barricaded exit and the muddy pool of water extending for some distance
back of the gateway into the park.

"Well, tenderfut, you was dead right in your judication. The gate air
shut sure 'nuff. Our horses ain't likely to take the back trail and
leave us, that's sartin."

"Oh, Pete," I exclaimed, "how will we ever get out? Must we spend the
remainder of our lives here?"

"It do look as if we'd stop hyer a right smart bit," he admitted, "maybe
till this hyer holler between the mountains all fills with water agin
like it was onct before, I reckon. Don't you think that we'd better get
busy and build a Noah's Ark?"

"Pete, you'd joke if the world came to an end. But seriously I think we
might move our camp back to the far end of your park."

CHAPTER VII

One day after we had selected our new camp, I took my rod along and
wandered into the wonderful forest of ancient trees. There I seated
myself on a log to think over my experience. Somehow my own trials and
ambitions