off
to the side; he groped forward half a dozen steps, encountered an
outjutting knob of stone, slipped by it, and found that the split in
the cliff now slanted off the other way and widened so that there was a
space five or six feet across. How far ahead the fissure extended he
could form no idea yet. He turned back for Betty and bumped into her
just inside the entrance.

"It's just the place for us tonight," he said. "Though how in the
world you stumbled onto it gets me."

"The bushes grew close to the rocks," Betty explained. "I was thinking
that we could creep back of them and find a little space where, with
the brush on one side and the cliff on the other, we'd be hidden. And
I found this hole."

"The air gets in and it's clean and fresh," he went on. "We couldn't
hope for better."

"The walls are so close," whispered Betty, with a little shudder.
"They give one the feeling they're going to press in and crush you."

"They widen a bit in a minute." He groped on ahead, came again to the
outthrust knob and pressed by. "Here we turn a little to the right and
here's room for a dozen people."

Betty hurried and stood close to him. In vain her eyes sought to
penetrate the absolute dark; no slightest detail of floor or wall was
offered save vaguely through the sense of touch.

"It's dark enough to smother you," she whispered. "I wonder what's
ahead of us? I wish we dared have a light!"

He was silent a moment.

"Maybe we do dare," he said thoughtfully. "The crookedness of this
place ought to shut off any glow from the outside. Let's go on a
little further and we'll try."

He went on slowly, feeling a cautious way with his feet, his hand on
the wall of rock at his side, Betty pressing on close behind him. Thus
they continued another dozen paces or so. Then they stopped because
they could find no means of continuing; so far as they could tell by
groping with their hands the fissure narrowed again until it was no
wider than the original entrance, and its irregularities presented
difficulties to blind progress.

"Stand here," said Kendric. "Close to the rock. Here's a match. I'll
slip back to the mouth of the place and we'll see if there's any glow
gets that far."

"Hurry, then," said Betty, with a little shiver, fingers finding his
and taking the match.

Appreciating her sensations he hurried off through the dark. He
rounded the turn, called softly to her to strike the match and went on