a kindly heart. Family troubles had caused him to try his
fortunes in this out of the way portion of the globe.

It did not take long for them to build up the campfire and get an extra
torch. This done, all set off in the direction of the split in the
rocks, Jack Wumble leading the way and the others coming in a bunch
behind him.

The Rover boys knew not what to say or what to think. Had Tom tumbled
into that awful opening, and if so, was he alive or dead?

"If he went down there I don't see how he could escape," whispered Sam
to his brother. "Why, when I crossed on that tree I couldn't see the
bottom!"

"Let us hope he didn't take that tumble," was the low reply.

CHAPTER XXIII

A SLIDE DOWN THE MOUNTAIN SIDE

"My gracious, Dick! It sure is snowing some now!"

"Yes, and it is getting colder every minute."

"If we don't get out of the mountains putty quick we'll be snowed in,"
came from Jack Wumble.

"Did you calkerlate to git back to Dawson afore winter sot in?"
inquired Ike Furner, curiously.

"Why of course!" cried Sam.

"I don't see how you are goin' to make it."

"Oh, we must get back," said Dick. "If only we could find Tom," he
added, with a sigh.

It was fully an hour after they had left the campfire at the entrance
to the cave of the mountain. They had walked to the chasm where they
thought Tom might have had a tumble and crossed and recrossed it
several times. But they had found no traces of the missing Rover boy.

"If only we knew whether he went down in that opening!" said Sam, for
at least the tenth time. "Dick, do you suppose we can climb down into
it?"

"Not without a rope, Sam. The sides are too steep and slippery."

Time and again they called down. But no answer came back. If Tom was
down there he was either unconscious or dead.

And now it had begun to snow harder than ever. The air was so full of
the white flakes that they could not see ten feet in any direction. It
was a typical Alaskan snowstorm. There was a sweep to the wind that
found the very marrow of their bones.

What to do next the Rovers did not know, nor could the two miners
suggest anything. Finally, however, Ike Furner mentioned something
that set the youths to thinking.

"See here!" he cried. "The old tree is gone!"

"What tree?" asked all three of the others.

"Why, the big hemlock as was hangin' over the cliff. She was a
whopper, I kin tell you--biggest tree in these parts."

"Where