Page:Honore Willsie--Judith of the godless valley.djvu/327

 the warm face of the rock. He brought the horses up to the camp, fed them and himself, and as the sun shot over the Indian Range, then prepared to lead the horses onward.

The crest of Black Devil now lifted immediately above him. Just below the crest, a ledge broad enough for a pack team led straight into the blue of the sky. To the right the dark wall of the crest. To the left a sheer drop where the canyon between Lost Chief Range and Black Devil yawned hideously. This ledge, this narrow, painful crossing, made the Pass.

Douglas drew his ax and prepared to roughen a trail over the ice for the horses. But to his unspeakable delight, he had not gone far when he discovered that another ax and other horses had gone over the ice before him. He was grinning cheerfully as he sheathed his ax and took Tom's reins in hand.

It was noon when he reached the Pass. Sheer red walls to the right, rising to the hovering top of Black Devil. Still the sickening canyon depths to the left. To the south, myriad peaks, a whole world of peaks, snow-covered, serene. Far, far below, a blurred green valley, with a tiny white spot in its center. Johnson's Basin. The slope south from the Pass was very steep and deep with snow, but Douglas saw Judith's trail zig-zagging to a low shoulder round which it disappeared.

He fed the horses, ate some biscuits and bacon, both frozen, and started downward. Shortly snow began to fall, but he had no difficulty in following trail until mid-afternoon. Then he paused on the low shoulder. There were scrub pines in which Judith had made a camp. The snow had thickened until Doug could see scarcely ten feet ahead. He was utterly weary and very cold. He knew that he ought to go into camp for the night but