“I don’t want to take any chances of this entrance being seen by anyone on the outside,” Pitch said. “We can always open it again when we’re ready to come in this way. What we’ve got to do now, Steve,” he added quickly and with great concern, “is to go back the way we came. That’s what we’ve got to do next.”

“Sure, Pitch,” Steve said. “Sure.”

With Pitch doing all the talking, they walked back through the tunnel until they came to the chasm. Steve kept looking ahead, hoping he might catch a glimpse of Flame.

“We don’t have to get excited about this,” Pitch was saying in a high, broken voice. “We’ve got plenty of time to use that entrance and to do a good job of exploring this island. All I want to do now is to make sure we can get back to the dory all right. Then we’ll have two ways of getting to Blue Valley.” Pitch stopped, and then he said frankly, “I guess I might as well admit it, Steve. I’ve never been so excited about anything in my whole life!”

“I know,” Steve said.

Pitch looked at him as though he were seeing Steve for the first time in a long while. “But you don’t seem very enthusiastic about what we’ve found, Steve. You’re certain you realize—”

“What this means? What we’re doing?” Steve finished for him. “Yes, I know, Pitch.”

Pitch said slowly, “Then it’s still the horse, Steve. Isn’t it?”

Steve shrugged his shoulders. “It’s still the horse, Pitch. I feel the same way about him as you do about all these other things. I just can’t forget him as you’d like me to do, Pitch.”

Pitch said seriously, “I know how you feel, Steve, but I’m thinking of your safety. I must hold you to your promise that you’ll have nothing more to do with that wild stallion. He’s savage and would kill you if you ever got close to him. You know that as well as I do. If you’d only admit it, it would be much easier for both of us.”

Steve didn’t want to argue with Pitch again. He felt, from what he’d seen of Flame, that the horse would not hurt him. So he said only, “I promised you that I wouldn’t run after him any more, Pitch. I’ll keep my word.”

“And if you don’t run after him, you’ll have nothing more to do with him,” Pitch muttered as they went along. Then, changing the subject, “It’s getting dark. Good thing we’re going to camp out here. I wouldn’t like to think of going back through that marsh at night.”

They had reached the end of the chasm, with the smaller valley spread out before them, when they saw the red stallion again.