The Border Boys with the Texas Rangers. Goldfrap John Henry

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      CHAPTER VI.

      THE POOL OF DEATH

      The blow that had been dealt the boy came from one of the timbers of the raft, which had been torn to pieces as it was swept over the falls. How long Jack remained insensible he did not know; but when he recovered his senses he found himself struggling in a seething pool of water at the foot of the falls. Luckily he was able to catch hold of one of the logs of the raft as it was swept by him, and clinging to this he began to strike out with his legs, hoping to make his way to the edge of the pool.

      Many times during that desperate struggle for existence Jack felt certain that death would intervene before he could accomplish his purpose. Once another log, that was being swept round like a straw in that boiling vortex of foaming waters, was dashed against the one to which he clung. The shock almost forced the lad to relinquish his hold. But he hung on like grim death.

      Blinded by foam and half choked, the boy, with bull–dog grit, stuck to his purpose, and at last was rewarded by feeling ground under his feet. A moment later, bruised, breathless and drenched to the skin, he flung himself panting on the sandy shore of the pool, too exhausted to move further.

      He lay there, actually feeling more dead than alive, for a long time before he felt capable of moving. But at last he found strength to drag himself further up the bank. Fumbling in his pocket, he found that his water–tight match box was in its proper place, and in the darkness he set about making preparations to build a fire. Luckily, on the brink of the pool there was any quantity of dry wood cast up by the maelstrom of waters, and the boy soon had a roaring blaze kindled. Stripping to his underclothing he hung his other garments on sticks in front of the blaze while he basked in its cheery rays.

      By the glow he could see a part of the pool, and as he gazed at its troublous surface and foaming fury he marveled that he had been able to escape with his life. The firelight also showed him that he was in a sort of rock–walled bowl, with steeply sloping sides scantily clad in places with stunted bushes. He was still sitting by this fire, trying to think of some way out of his dilemma, when exhausted nature asserted herself and he sank into a deep slumber beside the warm blaze.

      When he awoke the sun was shining down on his face. The daylight showed him that he had blundered into an astonishing place indeed. As he had guessed, by what he could see of the place by firelight, he was at the bottom of a rocky bowl into which the falls over which he had tumbled roared and thundered unceasingly as they had been doing for uncounted centuries.

      Jack estimated the height of the falls as being fully sixty feet. The boiling pool appeared to be about an acre or so in extent, and was furiously agitated by the constant pouring of the mighty falls. And now Jack became aware of a curious thing.

      All about the edges of the pool, where the circular motion of the water had evidently cast them up, were myriads of bones. They appeared to be the remains of cattle and various kinds of game; but some of them caused Jack to shudder as he had a distinct notion that they were of human origin.

      All at once, while he was still exploring the strange place into which he had fallen, he came across a bleached skull lying amid a pile of bones and débris. The ghastly relic gave him a rude shock as he gazed at it.

      “Gracious!” the boy exclaimed, with a shudder, “this place might well be called a Pool of Death. How fortunate I am to be alive; although how I am going to get out of this scrape I don’t know. One thing is certain, I cannot remount by the falls. I must see what lies in the other direction.”

      Up to that moment, so agitated had the castaway boy been that he had almost entirely forgotten the Mexican with whom he had had the battle on the raft. The thought of the man now suddenly recurred to him. Jack sighed as he realized that the Mexican could hardly have been so fortunate as he had been. In all probability he had forfeited his life to the Pool of Death.

      With such melancholy thoughts in his mind Jack set about exploring the rocky basin for some means of exit. Although he was determined not to give way to despair, the boy could not but own that his situation was well–nigh desperate. He was many miles from his friends, and probably in an uninhabited part of the country. He had no food; nor even if there had been any game had he the means of shooting it.

      His hunger was now beginning to make itself painfully manifest. On some bushes that clung to the walls of the Pool of Death were some bright–colored berries, but Jack dreaded to try them. For all he knew they might be deadly poison.

      Searching for an exit, Jack was not long in finding one. The pool was drained by a narrow crevice in the rocky walls, forming a passage. On the brink of the water was a strip of beach, not much wider than a man’s hand. Beside this pathway the water roared and screamed in its narrow bounds, but Jack knew that if he was to get out of this place at all he must dare the rocky passage.

      Stifling his fears as well as he could, the famished, bedraggled lad struck pluckily out. Sometimes the passage grew so narrow that he could have bestridden the stream. At other points it widened out and, looking up, Jack could see the blue sky far overhead. In reality the passage was not more than half a mile in length but, so carefully did Jack have to proceed, it appeared to be four times that length at least.

      The passage ended with almost startling abruptness. Jack could hardly repress an exclamation of amazement as he saw upon what a strange scene it opened. Beyond its mouth lay a broad valley, carpeted with vivid green grass and dotted here and there, like a park, with groups of trees. Viewed in the sparkling sunlight it was indeed a scene of rare beauty and Jack’s heart gave a throb of delight as he beheld it.

      “Surely,” he thought, “some rancher must live hereabouts who will give me food and lend me a horse to ride back to San Mercedes.”

      For the first few minutes following his discovery of the valley the boy did not doubt but that he should find an easy and speedy means of escaping from his difficulties. But it gradually began to dawn upon him that the place upon which he had so oddly blundered was not inhabited at all. At least, he could see no sign of a human habitation.

      Then, too, somewhat to his dismay, he noticed another feature of the valley which had at first escaped his attention altogether.

      The place was completely enclosed by steep, lofty cliffs, and appeared as if, at some early period of the world’s growth, it had been dropped below the level of the surrounding country by some mighty convulsion of nature.

      For the rest the valley appeared to be about a mile in length and half a mile wide at its broadest part. Through the center of it the stream that issued from the passage beyond the Pool of Death meandered leisurely along.

      “Well,” exclaimed Jack, to himself, gazing somewhat disconsolately about him, “this is a beautiful spot into which I have wandered; but somehow it doesn’t appear to solve my difficulties. In the first place, I don’t believe it is frequented by human beings, and in the second, so far as I can see, there is no way out of it. I wonder where on earth I can be? Certainly not on the Rio Grande itself. I begin to suspect that that current hurled the raft off into some side stream which terminated in the falls.”

      It may be said here that Jack’s theory was correct. The valley in which he found himself had been caused by a convulsion of nature similar to that which effected the wonderful Yosemite Valley in California. It was, in fact, a miniature reproduction of that famous scenic marvel. As the boy likewise suspected, the raft had indeed been hurried by the stream from the main current of the Rio Grande and drawn into a side fork of the river.

      Although Jack did not know it at the time, he was on Mexican soil and far removed from his friends, as he paced the strange secret valley.

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