Page:Boy scouts in the White Mountains; the story of a long hike (IA boyscoutsinwhite00eato).pdf/285

 top of Jefferson was visible through a rift even as the party watched, and presently a shaft of sunlight hit them, and the whole upper cone of Jefferson was revealed, a pyramidal pile of bare, broken stone.

"Give me the staffs and two towels," Peanut cried. "I'll have help here in half an hour!"

Rob went with him, and the two Scouts, forgetting how weary they were, began almost to run up the five hundred feet of the summit cone, without any path, scrambling over the great stones without thought of bruised shins.

When they reached the peak, the clouds were entirely off the range—they had disappeared as if by magic—and the sharp cone of Adams to the north-*east, almost two miles away in an air line, was plainly visible. As they stood on the highest rock, a flash of light sprang at them from the other summit.

"Hooray!" Peanut cried, "they're there! They're flashing a mirror at us!"

"More likely the bottom of a tin plate," said Rob. "Where'd they get a mirror? Out with your signals!"

Peanut tied a white towel to the end of each staff, and standing as high on the topmost rock as he could, held them out. Against the blue sky, on the peak of Adams, the two boys saw two tiny white specks break out in answer. They were so far away