“It’s you, all right,” said Foy when Pringle reached the rock and straightened himself up.

“I told you so,” said Pringle, peering into the shadows of the cleft.  “I can’t see you.  And how am I going to get to you?  There are twenty men with point-blank range.  I’m muddy, scratched, bruised, tired and hungry, sleepy and cross—­and there’s thirty feet in the open between here and you, and it nearly broad daylight.  If I try to cross that I’ll run twenty-five hundred pounds to the ton, pure lead.  Well, we can put up a pretty nifty fight, even so.  You go back to the other outlet of your cave and I’ll stay here.  I’m kinder lonesome, too....  Toss me some cartridges first.  I only got five.  I left in a hurry.  You got forty-fives?”

“Plenty.  But you can’t stay there.  They’ll pot you from the top of the bluff, first off.  Besides, you got a canteen, I see.  You back up to that mountain mahogany bush, slip under it, and worm down through the rocks till you come to a little scrub-oak tree and a big granite bowlder.  They’ll give you shelter to cross the ridge into a deep ravine that leads here where I am.  You’ll be out of sight all the way up once you hit the ravine.  I’d—­I’d worm along pretty spry if I was you, going down as far as the scrub oak—­say, about as swift as a rattlesnake strikes—­and pray any little prayers you happen to remember.  And say, Pringle, before you go ...  I’m rather obliged to you for coming up here; risking taking cold and all.  If it’ll cheer you up any I’ll undertake that anyone getting you on the trip will think there’s one gosh-awful echo here.”

“S’long!” said Pringle.

He wriggled backward and disappeared.

Ten minutes later he writhed under the bush at Foy’s feet.

“Never saw me!” he said.  “But I’ll always sleep in coils after this—­always supposing we got any after this coming to us.”

“One more crawl,” said Foy, leading the way.  “We’ll go up on top.  Regular fort up there.  If we’ve got to die we’ll die in the sun.”

He stooped at what seemed the end of the passage and crawled out of sight under the low branches of a stunted cedar.  Pringle followed and found himself in the pitch dark.

“Grab hold of my coat tail.  I know my way, feeling the wall.  Watch your step or you’ll bark your shins.”

The cave floor was smooth underfoot, except for scattered rocks; it rose and dipped, but the general trend was sharply upward.

“You’re quite an institution, Pringle.  You’ve made good Stella’s word of you—­the best ever!” said Foy as they mounted.  “But you can’t do me any good, really.  I’ll enjoy your company, but I wish you hadn’t come.”

“That’s all right.  I always like to finish what I begin.”

“Well,” remarked Foy cheerfully, “I reckon we’ve reached the big finish, both of us.  I don’t see any way out.  All they’ve got to do is to sit tight till we starve out for water.  Wish you was out of it.  It’s going to be tough on Stella, losing her friend and—­and me, both at once.  How’s she making out?  Full of fight and hope to the last, I’ll bet.”