The tunnel
zigzagged twice at a sharp angle, and then, quite suddenly, the
dimness changed to warm sunlight, and we emerged at his heels upon a
prospect that well excused my gasp of astonishment.
We stood at the lower end of a smooth, green glade, through which a
broad stream--a river, almost--came swirling, its murmur drowned in
the thunder of the waterfall behind us, which the bushes now
concealed. The glade was, in fact, a valley-bottom, thinned of
undergrowth and set with tall trees; and the stream such a stream as
tumbles through many an English deer-park. The whole scene might
have been transplanted from England but for a wall of naked cliff,
sharply serrated, which enclosed the valley on the left. And under
it, like a smooth military terrace at the foot of a fortress, the
glade curved upward and out of sight.
The scene, I have said, was almost typically English--but to the eye
only.
"Faugh!" exclaimed Miss Belcher, looking about her and sniffing
suspiciously. "A pretty place enough, but full of malaria, or I'm a
Dutchwoman! And what a horrible silence!"
"Malaria?" said Mr. Rogers, quietly. "There's better scent than
malaria in this valley, and we're hot on it. Here's the river, and--
What does the chart say, boy? Five trees, a mile and a half from the
creek-head? We must have come a mile already.
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