"Feel round for this edge, Joeboy, and find out which is the safe way to go." "Um!" grunted the black; and after giving Sandho a final pat on the neck, he went down on all-fours and crawled away through the darkness so silently that at the end of a few minutes I began to feel alarmed, wondering whether he had made some terrible slip and gone over.
It was vain to argue with myself, for the shock I had received when the horse slipped had not passed away.

No doubt my previous experiences had weakened me, and made me less able to fight against what was a very ordinary trouble for a mountain rider.
Another five minutes passed away--minutes which seemed terribly prolonged as I sat there in the darkness knowing I dared not stir, and convinced that we must be upon a projecting bracket of rock whose shape I could mentally picture, with only one narrow pathway off, and that hidden by the mist.

At last I could bear it no longer, and, leaning forward to try and penetrate the darkness beyond the horse's head, I called twice: "Joeboy! Joeboy!" "Joeboy here, Boss," came from behind me, and I uttered a sigh of relief as the great fellow seemed to rise up close by and laid his hand upon my arm.
"Where have you been ?" I said in a querulous, excited way.
"Where, Boss Val say?
Go all round.

Better stop till morning." "Yes," I said, with a sigh of relief.

"Let's stop till morning.