."

"Good plan," said the shiftless one. "I expect to be in that shady
little place in a half-hour. Long Jim here, havin' nothin' else to do,
will watch over me all through the rest of the night, an' tomorrow when
the sun comes out bright, he'll be settin' by my side keepin' the flies
off me, an' me still sleepin' ez innercent ez a baby."

"That won't happen in the next thousand years," said Long Jim. "Ef
thar's anything fannin' you tomorrow, when you wake up, a Shawnee or a
Miami warrior will be doin' it with a tomahawk."

They quickly retraced their course to the cup, being extremely careful
to leave no trail, and were about to make ready for the night. Every one
of them carried a light blanket, but very closely woven and warm, upon
which he usually slept, drawing a fold over him. The dry leaves and the
blankets would make a bed good enough for any forest rover at that time
of the year, but Henry noticed a stone outcrop in a hill above them and
concluded to look farther.

"Wait till I come back," he said, and he pushed his way through the
bushes.

The outcrop was of the crumbling limestone that imparts inexhaustible
fertility to the soil of a great region in Kentucky. It is this decaying
stone or a stone closely akin which makes it the most wonderful cave
region in the world.

Higher up the slope Henry found deep alcoves in the stone, most of them
containing leaves, and also a strong animal odor, which showed that in
the winter they had been occupied as lairs by wild animals, probably
bears.

Looking a little farther he found one that penetrated deeper than the
rest. It might almost have been called a cave. It was so placed that at
that time of night the opening faced a bit of the moon that had made a
way through the clouds, and, Henry peering into the dusky interior,
judged that it ran back about twenty feet. There was no odor to suggest
that it had been used as a lair, perhaps because the animals liked the
alcoves better.

He threw in some twigs, but, no growl coming forth, he entered boldly
through an aperture about three feet across and perhaps five feet high.
He stepped on smooth stone, but as soon as he was inside he stopped and
listened intently. He heard a faint trickling sound, evidently from the
far side of the cave, which appeared to be both deeper and wider than he
had thought.

Henry surmised that the sound was made by running water, and standing a
long time, until his eyes could grow used, in