human
One time the braves were down hunting and an awful storm came up--a kind of waterspout--and when they got back to their rock they found their little staircase had been all broken to pieces, and only a few steps were left hanging away up in the air. While they were camped at the foot of the rock, wondering what to do, a war party from the north came along and massacred 'em to a man, with all the old folks and women looking on from the rock. Then the war party went on south and left the village to get down the best way they could. Of course they never got down. They starved to death up there, and when the war party came back on their way north, they could hear the children crying from the edge of the bluff where they had crawled out, but they didn't see a sign of a grown Indian, and nobody has ever been up there since.
gpt
There couldn't have been many people up there, Percy demurred.
human
How big is the top, Tip?
gpt
Oh, pretty big. Big enough so that the rock doesn't look nearly as tall as it is. The top's bigger than the base. The bluff is sort of worn away for several hundred feet up. That's one reason it's so hard to climb.
human
Nobody knows how they got up or when. A hunting party came along once and saw that there was a town up there, and that was all.
gpt
Of course there must be some way to get up there. Couldn't people get a rope over someway and pull a ladder up?
human
I know a way. Me and Uncle Bill talked it all over. There's a kind of rocket that would take a rope over--life-savers use 'em--and then you could hoist a rope-ladder and peg it down at the bottom and make it tight with guy-ropes on the other side. I'm going to climb that there bluff, and I've got it all planned out.
gpt
Bones, maybe, or the ruins of their town, or pottery, or some of their idols. There might be 'most anything up there. Anyhow, I want to see.
human
Sure nobody else has been up there, Tip?
gpt
Dead sure. Hardly anybody ever goes down there. Some hunters tried to cut steps in the rock once, but they didn't get higher than a man can reach. The Bluff's all red granite, and Uncle Bill thinks it's a boulder the glaciers left. It's a queer place, anyhow. Nothing but cactus and desert for hundreds of miles, and yet right under the bluff there's good water and plenty of grass. That's why the bison used to go down there.
human
Somebody getting into old Tommy's melon patch,
gpt
Say, Tip, when you go down there will you take me with you?
human
Maybe.
gpt
Suppose one of us beats you down there, Tip?
human
Whoever gets to the Bluff first has got to promise to tell the rest of us exactly what he finds,