--I give
myself! Only destroy him too! Save her! save her!"

Again Blake stirred, and this time he opened his eyes. Ashton had sunk
down in a huddled silent heap. Blake gazed up at the watchfire on the
heights, smiled, and turned over to again fall asleep.

CHAPTER XXVII

LOWER DEPTHS

Beetling precipices shut off the direct light of the moonbeams and
left the abyss again in dense darkness long before the coming of the
laggard dawn. Blake slept on, storing up strength for the renewal of
the battle. Yet even he could not outsleep the reluctant lingering of
night. He awoke while the tiny flame of the watchfire still flickered
bright against the inky darkness of the sky.

Ashton had fallen into a fitful doze. The engineer stood up and
silently groped his way to and fro on the shelf of rock, stretching
and limbering his cramped muscles. He wasted no particle of energy;
the moment he had relieved his stiffness he stretched out again. He
lay contemplating that flame of love on the heights until it faded
against the lessening blackness of the sky and the rays of the morning
sun began to angle down the upper precipices.

He rose to take out two portions of food from the single pack in which
he had bound up all the provisions. The portion for Ashton was small;
his own was smaller. He roused the dozing man and placed the larger
share of food in his hand.

"Don't drop it," he cautioned. "That's all I can let you have. We must
go on rations until we can see a way out of this hole."

Ashton ate his meager breakfast without replying. The fire within him
had burned to ashes. He was cold and dull and dispirited. He had
failed. He would have been willing to sit and brood, and wait for God
to answer his prayer.--But his waiting was not to be an inert
lingering in the place where he had failed.

The moment the down-creeping daylight so lessened the gloom of the
depths that Blake could take rod readings, he plunged over into the
stream, with a curtly cheerful command for Ashton to prepare to
follow. Too dejected even to resist, the younger man silently obeyed.
When Blake signaled to him through the dimness, he held the rod on the
last turning-point of the previous day, and lowered himself from the
shelf down into the stream.

The evening before, the water at this point had come up to his waist.
It was now only knee-deep. His surprise was so great that in passing
Blake he broke his sullen silence to remark the fact and