"Geysers!" cried Bob. "Oh! now I get onto what you mean. You think,
then, that in the heart of Thunder Mountain a giant geyser spouts every
once in a while; and that as the water is dashed against the rocky
walls it makes the ground shake. Is that it, Frank?"
"Yes," replied the other, "and the noise is so like thunder that when
it is forced out through several queer, funnel-shaped openings like
this one, it has puzzled the Indians for hundreds of years. Bob, more
than that, I believe that every once in so many years, when an extra
convulsion shakes things up here, the water bursts out through some
passage, and rushes down that _barranca_ in a wave perhaps twenty feet
high."
"But they call it a cloud burst, Frank," suggested Bob.
"I know they do, but still I stick to my idea," Frank went on.
"And this promises to be an extra strong outburst. Nick said so
anyhow; didn't he, Frank?" Bob queried, a new anxiety in his tone.
"Just what he did. You're wondering now, that if what I said is true,
whether this passage right here is one of those through which all that
water dashes, on its way to the rocky _barranca_?"
"Yes, that's the truth. How about it? Could you see any signs here to
tell about that?"
"I suppose I could if they were here, but I don't discover any.
Besides, I thought of that before we entered, and I give you my word
that I don't believe any big volume of water ever went out through
here.
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