Page:The heart of Monadnock (IA heartofmonadnock00timl).pdf/123

rocks. Didn't see any Staircase—unless it was all Staircase. He couldn't see anything but high rocks. Map useless. Didn't look anything like it should. Nothing that looked like a Valley, much less like Paradise. Well, he browsed around a little, and saw those stones that they told him marked a way. Cairns? Thank you. So he followed them, hoping to find a Valley that led up, though he had always supposed that valleys led down. Ever climbed mountains before? No. NEVER. This was the first; likely to be a very emphatic last. He liked good level seashore where one could see where one was going. Asbury Park for him. But—well—he kept going after those little stones. Oh, yes, he could see them all right. He wasn't blind. But the blamed things kept on going down; it was into a valley all right, only he wasn't going where he wanted to get—on top. First he thought it might twist around somehow. At last he concluded to turn around and try some other way—but he didn't realize how far down he had gone.