The point in debate is settled as before between Goodchild and the landlord,and the expedition moves on,not down the mountain,but marching straight forward round the slope of it.The difficulty of following this new route is acutely felt by Thomas Idle.He finds the hardship of walking at all greatly increased by the fatigue of moving his feet straight forward along the side of a slope,when their natural tendency,at every step,is to turn off at a right angle,and go straight down the declivity.Let the reader imagine himself to be walking along the roof of a barn,instead of up or down it,and he will have an exact idea of the pedestrian difficulty in which the travellers had now involved themselves.In ten minutes more Idle was lost in the distance again,was shouted for,waited for,recovered as before;found Goodchild repeating his observation of the compass,and remonstrated warmly against the sideway route that his companions persisted in following.It appeared to the uninstructed mind of Thomas that when three men want to get to the bottom of a mountain,their business is to walk down it;and he put this view of the case,not only with emphasis,but even with some irritability.He was answered from the scientific eminence of the compass on which his companions were mounted,that there was a frightful chasm somewhere near the foot of Carrock,called The Black Arches,into which the travellers were sure to march in the mist,if they risked continuing the descent from the place where they had now halted.Idle received this answer with the silent respect which was due to the commanders of the expedition,and followed along the roof of the barn,or rather the side of the mountain,reflecting upon the assurance which he received on starting again,that the object of the party was only to gain 'a certain point,'and,this haven attained,to continue the descent afterwards until the foot of Carrock was reached.
Though quite unexceptionable as an abstract form of expression,the phrase 'a certain point'has the disadvantage of sounding rather vaguely when it is pronounced on unknown ground,under a canopy of mist much thicker than a London fog.Nevertheless,after the compass,this phrase was all the clue the party had to hold by,and Idle clung to the extreme end of it as hopefully as he could.
More sideway walking,thicker and thicker mist,all sorts of points reached except the 'certain point;'third loss of Idle,third shouts for him,third recovery of him,third consultation of compass.Mr.Goodchild draws it tenderly from his pocket,and prepares to adjust it on a stone.Something falls on the turf -it is the glass.Something else drops immediately after -it is the needle.The compass is broken,and the exploring party is lost!
It is the practice of the English portion of the human race to receive all great disasters in dead silence.Mr.Goodchild restored the useless compass to his pocket without saying a word,Mr.Idle looked at the landlord,and the landlord looked at Mr.
Idle.There was nothing for it now but to go on blindfold,and trust to the chapter of chances.Accordingly,the lost travellers moved forward,still walking round the slope of the mountain,still desperately resolved to avoid the Black Arches,and to succeed in reaching the 'certain point.'
A quarter of an hour brought them to the brink of a ravine,at the bottom of which there flowed a muddy little stream.Here another halt was called,and another consultation took place.The landlord,still clinging pertinaciously to the idea of reaching the 'point,'voted for crossing the ravine,and going on round the slope of the mountain.Mr.Goodchild,to the great relief of his fellow-traveller,took another view of the case,and backed Mr.
Idle's proposal to descend Carrock at once,at any hazard -the rather as the running stream was a sure guide to follow from the mountain to the valley.Accordingly,the party descended to the rugged and stony banks of the stream;and here again Thomas lost ground sadly,and fell far behind his travelling companions.Not much more than six weeks had elapsed since he had sprained one of his ankles,and he began to feel this same ankle getting rather weak when he found himself among the stones that were strewn about the running water.Goodchild and the landlord were getting farther and farther ahead of him.He saw them cross the stream and disappear round a projection on its banks.He heard them shout the moment after as a signal that they had halted and were waiting for him.Answering the shout,he mended his pace,crossed the stream where they had crossed it,and was within one step of the opposite bank,when his foot slipped on a wet stone,his weak ankle gave a twist outwards,a hot,rending,tearing pain ran through it at the same moment,and down fell the idlest of the Two Idle Apprentices,crippled in an instant.
The situation was now,in plain terms,one of absolute danger.
