After a while the clouds spent their gathered energy and the rain fell in great torrents. Very soon the boys were drenched to the skin, but there seemed no escape. To go into the timber was dangerous, and blocking them in front was the yawning chasm.
"If we could only get at that old cliff dwellin'," suggested Fly, "we might find cover."
"We'll have to wait until we get our airship, to do that," laughed Hawke.
"There's a big rock down here," said Carl, returning from a short excursion which he had made along the side of the cascade, looking for shelter. "I think we can crowd under it till this is over."
The others hastily followed him, and were soon shielded from the rain under a huge, projecting boulder situated almost perilously on a smaller rock.
There they waited for some time, and about five o'clock the storm abated as quickly as it had arisen.
"Wonder where our pony is by this time!" speculated Fred.
"No telling," answered the Indian boy. "I'm afraid he's gotten scared and run away."
"With the grizzly!" Tender's tone was regretful.
They started back in the gray light of the obscured sun. Hawke hurried them, having an older person's concern for their welfare, and fearing they might suffer some bad results from wet clothing and cold.
"There ain't no chance of our pony's bein' there," remarked Tender, thinking more of the grizzly than anything else. "They'll think we're tellin' a fish story about that bear."
"If it was my own pony," said Carlito, "I wouldn't be afraid to bet my best quiver that he'd still be there. This one I don't know."
Their homeward journey was somewhat different from the climb upward. The ground was soggy and wet with soaked leaves and mud, while water constantly dripped upon them as they passed under the trees. The sun, now setting just above the peak, gave a wan light through a half-mist, half-fog, which had arisen. They were still in rather high altitude, and the air was moist and cold. Creeping things, frightened into their holes by the storm, now ventured forth and skimmed across the ground frequently, disappearing again under the scraggy underbrush.
"Soon be time for the bats and owls," observed Dunk, as a surprised lizard hurried across their path.