Page:Lost with Lieutenant Pike (1919).djvu/182

 Arkansaw, on the search for the head of the Red River.

But instead of rounding the gap in the cliffs, the trail had led away, and away, ever northward, into the midst of the snow-caps. Presently, or after a couple of days, it had come out at the bank of another river, frozen over, forty paces wide, and flowing, as the lieutenant discovered, northeast!

That was a disappointment and a surprise. He and the doctor plainly were puzzled. The river was wrong. To be the Red River it should have flowed southeast. The lieutenant decided that this river must be the Platte River—or the beginnings of it, for the great Platte River was known to flow mainly through the plains, far north of the Pawnee country, and hundreds of miles distant.

The snowy mountains had closed around. They rose high and white and coldly silent. There appeared to be no way out, except by the back trail to the Arkansaw again, or by following this new river down-stream, but where?

The trail was continuing, up along this frozen river that wound through a series of snowy valleys