"I know it is better, uncle, ever so much better--but it is horrible all the same. Anyhow, don't ask me to do it, for I could not."
"I will see to that, Tom. You shall be one of the guards of the cañon. You would not be of much use in making the canoes, and you won't have to know anything about it till you go down and get on board."
Tom nodded his thanks; his heart was too full for him to speak, and he felt that if he said a word he should break down altogether. They rode rapidly along, passed through the little valley where the bear had been killed, without stopping, and went down the lower cañon, carefully examining it to fix upon the most suitable point for defence. There had been no recent fall, and though at some points great boulders lay thickly, there was no one place that offered special facilities for defence.
"Look here, boys," Harry said, reining up his horse at a point within two hundred yards of the lower end, "we can't do better than fix ourselves here. An hour's work will get up a wall that will puzzle the red-skins to get over, and there is the advantage that a shot fired here by the guard will bring our whole force up in a couple of minutes. I vote we ride the horses down to the river and let them pick up what they can, and then come back here and build the wall. It will be getting dark in an hour's time, and we may as well finish that job at once. Ben and Sam, you may as well pick out a couple of young fir-trees and bring them down at once, then there will be no time lost. Five of us will be enough for the wall. Keep your eyes open. Likely enough there is a bear or two about, and it would be a great thing for us to lay in a stock of meat before we start."
As soon as they issued from the gorge the horses were unsaddled and the stores taken off the pack-animals. As they were doing this Harry said a few words in a low tone to Sam. He then carefully examined the trees, and picked out two young firs. Sam and Ben took their axes, and the other five went up the gorge again, and were soon hard at work collecting boulders and piling them in a wall.
"There is a gun, uncle," Tom exclaimed presently.
"Well, I hope they have got sight of a bear, we shall want a stock of meat badly."