CHAPTER XV

THE TROUBLES OF GILROY

Following carefully the directions given them by Norman, Ned and Jimmie toiled up the slope until they came to the summit of the ridge which lay along the side of the Sierra Nevadas and then turned to the north. The way was steep and rocky, but in their anxiety and excitement they made good progress.

“The boy may be lying,” Ned replied in answer to Jimmie’s question, “but we can’t take that for granted. We’ve just got to go and see if the boys are in such a predicament as he described.”

“At first,” Jimmie announced, “I had rather a good opinion of Norman. But lately I’ve been thinking over all the tricks he has played on us, and I’m becoming convinced that he is a bad egg.”

“The record does look rather black,” Ned answered. “Every time we have listened to advice or suggestions from him, we have gotten into trouble. He has always told a good story, and we have always had the worst of it. If this proves true in the present case, we will settle with him the next time he comes across our path.”

“You don’t suppose they’ll go to the camp and stir up Gilroy, do you?” asked Jimmie after a long time.

“If they do, he’ll be scared out of his skin!” Ned laughed.

“What made me ask,” Jimmie went on, “is that I saw lights flashing back there, and I thought I heard some one calling.”

“You must be mistaken!” Ned insisted.

“Now just come over here and look for yourself,” Jimmie answered. “Here’s an elevation, something like the one I stood on when I saw the commotion and heard the voice at the camp. Come on over and see what you can make of it.”

Ned stepped to the elevation occupied by his chum and looked out over the slope of the mountain. From where he stood the entrance to the cave was not in sight, it being concealed by the dip of the rock in which the cavern lay. However, a short distance up the slope, he saw a light moving and heard the call of a frightened voice.

“There!” Jimmie exclaimed triumphantly. “What do you make of that?”

“Perhaps the boys have returned,” suggested Ned. “Perhaps they are calling to us now not to wander off in search of them. Suppose we wait here a minute and see?”

“That ain’t any of our boys putting up a roar like that!” Jimmie insisted. “I’ll bet a dollar it’s that fat old confidential clerk. Say, Ned!” he went on, “that fellow has got more screech in him than any full-grown man I ever saw. Do you mind how he cut the air with his agony when the bear had him up the tree?”

“It certainly is Gilroy!” Ned exclaimed impatiently. “Now, what do you suppose sent him up here after us?”

“He probably found himself alone,” suggested Jimmie, “and wandering out, saw our light. I remember of flashing one when we passed around that big boulder.”

“He’s coming on like an insane man!” said Ned angrily. “If there’s an enemy within ten miles of us, he will have no difficulty in locating us after this. I wish I could stop him.”

Ned did not in the least overstate the case when he said that Gilroy was coming on like an insane person. After finding himself alone in the cave, the fat clerk had seized a searchlight and dashed out in quest of the boys. As Jimmie had suggested, he had seen a flash of light up the slope and followed on.

As he advanced now, puffing so that his approach might be heard many rods away, he swung the light frantically in the air and called out at the top of his voice. With an exclamation of impatience, Ned turned on his own light and ran toward him.

“Keep still!” he shouted as soon as the voice of the clerk gave him an opportunity to cut in. “Keep still, I tell you! You’ll have every robber and murderer in the mountain down on us!”

“And now it’s robbers and murderers, is it?” shrieked the clerk. “It was bears and panthers down in the cave. I saw a bear sneaking up to the provision box just as I left. He seemed to want to eat me!”

By this time Jimmie had joined the two, and now stood with a grin on his freckled face, rather enjoying the situation.

“And you chased off and left him chewing up our grub, did you?” he demanded. “What are we going to eat tomorrow?”

“Oh my! oh my!” wailed Gilroy. “I don’t believe there will ever be any tomorrow. Once I get out of this brutal country, I’ll never leave New York again!”

“What are we going to do with him, Ned?” asked Jimmie.

“He’s simply got to go back to the cave,” Ned answered. “We can’t have him with us at a time like this.”

“I can’t go back to the cave!” shouted Gilroy, again brandishing his searchlight in the air. “I won’t go back to the cave alone!” he continued. “If you insist on my leaving you, I’ll start afoot over the mountains for San Francisco.”

“If you should do a fool thing like that,” Jimmie declared, “the bears would have a beautiful feast of fat clerk before morning!”

“I won’t go back to the cave, I just won’t!” insisted Gilroy.

“Well,” Ned said hesitatingly, “if you’ll keep your eyes open and your mouth closed, and hand me that light so you won’t be showing it every second, you may come along with us.”

Gilroy meekly handed over the electric, and the three proceeded on their way, Ned walking close to the fat clerk in order to ensure his silence. Jimmie trailed along with a grin on his face.

Finally Ned paused and pointed to two parallel ridges to the north.

“There,” he said, “unless I am very much mistaken, are the ridges which stand on either side of the Devil’s Punch Bowl.”

“Then we’ll soon know whether that messenger is a liar or not,” Jimmie stated. “He may be all right, but, just the same, I’m looking for some one to butt in on us every minute now!”

They were not molested, however, as they walked along, winding into gulches, climbing to the top of crags, and occasionally making their way over narrow ledges. Gilroy actually shivered as the boys forced him along, sometimes leading him by the arm, at other times pushing him along with many sly winks and chuckles.

There was only the light of the stars, but the ridges were clearly outlined because of the stretches of snow which cloaked them.

At last they came to the verge of the pit and looked down.

“This is the place, sure enough!” Ned decided. “Unless the boy who gave the information is an accomplished liar, we ought to find our chums at the bottom of this wicked old precipice.”

Gilroy stood for a moment trembling on the edge of the cavern and then almost dropped back into Ned’s arms.

“We’ll never get down there, never!” he wailed. “We’ll drop off into space and never see the Great White Way again.”

“Go to it, partner!” grinned Jimmie, not a little disgusted at the lack of physical courage exhibited by the fat clerk. “Get your troubles all off your chest and then cheer up. The worst is yet to come!”

Gilroy sat flat down at the lip of the Devil’s Punch Bowl and almost sobbed out his grief and fright.

“If I ever get out of this rotten old country,” he declared, “I’ll lock myself up in a steam-heated flat, and remain there as long as I live!”

Leaving the fat clerk bewailing his fate, Jimmie made his way to where Ned was standing, looking anxiously down into the depression.

“Do you see anything of the boys?” he asked.

“Not a thing,” Ned replied. “The fact of the matter is,” he went on, “that we couldn’t distinguish a flock of white elephants down there. It’s darker than a pocket!”

“Then what are we going to do?” demanded Jimmie. “The boy didn’t lie about the locality, but it may be that he lied about the lads being here. Anyway,” he went on, “we’ve got to make our way down this wicked old drop and find out whether they’re here or not.”

The narrow ledges down which Jack and Frank had made their way were now out of sight because of the darkness. In fact, to the boys looking into the black hole from above, there seemed no possible way of entering the place where they believed their chums to be.

While they stood there, wondering how the downward journey was to be made in safety even with the rope, the round eye of an electric searchlight became visible at the mouth of the channel from which the water had been led away. Jimmie pointed to it eagerly.

“They are there!” he cried excitedly. “There they are, sure enough!”

“It must be the boys,” Ned replied, “because that finger of light comes from an electric torchlight, and, so far as I know, we are the only ones having them here.”

“Then this Norman kid told the truth for once in his life!” Jimmie admitted. “If he really has directed us to the assistance of our friends I’ll forgive him all the mean things he ever did to us.”

“Well,” Ned said in a moment, “we can now try the rope. We don’t know whether it is long enough to reach the bottom or not, but it will at least bring us nearer to our chums. I don’t half like the idea of going down in the darkness, because there’s no knowing what we may run into, but it’s got to be done all the same.”

“Let me go!” exclaimed Jimmie excitedly. “You and Gilroy can stay here and handle the rope.”

“But you always get lost, little boy!” Ned said with a chuckle.

“I don’t know how I’m ever going to get lost in the bottom of a dip like that,” Jimmie answered. “From what I can see of it, it looks about like the bottom of an old brass kettle.”

After listening to the conversation of the boys for a moment, and reaching the conclusion that he would be required to drop into the dark pit with the others, Gilroy now sprang to his feet and approached Ned with trembling footsteps.

“T can’t get down there!” he almost shouted. “My arms are weak, and my shoulders are lame, and I never could hang onto the rope. I should fall and be crushed to a pulp on the rocks below!”

“Look here, Gilroy!” Ned said angrily. “You must remember that we have troubles of our own. If you don’t want to go with us, perhaps you may be able to find your way back to camp.”

“Never, never, never!” cried the fat confidential clerk. “Didn’t I tell you that I left a bear at the camp?”

“Well,” Ned argued with the fellow, “you and I will lower Jimmie into the hole. Then you can lower me and wait until we get ready to come back. I’ll leave a revolver and searchlight with you, only you mustn’t do any shooting, and you mustn’t show the light under any circumstances. It would be dangerous to do so.”

“You’ll be sure to come back?” pleaded Gilroy. “It would be a wicked thing to do to leave me here in the darkness!”

“Aw, of course we’ll come back!” interrupted Jimmie. “We’ve got to come back, for there’s no other way to get out of the gloomy old den.”

Gilroy seemed to be more cheerful over this arrangement, and assisted quite capably in lowering Jimmie over the lip of the precipice. The two passed out the rope to the boy dangling at the lower end until the cord was almost entirely unwound. Then a call from below announced toe them that the lad had found footing.

“Now then,” Ned explained to the confidential clerk, “when the rope is drawn up, you lie down on your stomach on the other side of the ledge so that you may by no possibility be drawn down. Pay out the rope slowly till I tell you that I have reached bottom and then leave it dangling over the edge. We may have to make a quick jump for it, you know,” he added. “In that case, we want it handy.”

Gilroy’s teeth fairly chattered at the thought of being left alone with such a responsibility, but he said nothing, and Ned soon stood by Jimmie’s side at the bottom of the precipice.

“Have you seen any more lights?” the boy asked.

“Nary a light,” was the reply, “but I thought once that I heard voices coming from the spot in which the illumination was seen.”

“Then we may as well be moving in that direction,” Ned observed, and directly the two boys found themselves gazing at the opening from which the water had been recently drained.