Hugh and the others laughed at such a clever explanation.

"Whatever the truth may be," said Hugh, "I hardly believe it'll turn
out anything like that, K.K. But you might as well start on. We're
only losing time here, and it seems as though the thing doesn't mean
to give us another sample of that swan song."

"For which, thanks!" sighed Julius. "I know music when I hear it, and
if that's what they call a song of the dying swan excuse me from ever
listening to another. I can beat that all hollow through a megaphone,
and then not half try."

So the chauffeur started up, and they were soon moving along the rough
road that had once, no doubt, been kept in repair, when the heavy
wagons carried out the building stone quarried from the hillside, but
which was now in a pretty bad shape.

Two minutes afterwards and the road took them directly alongside the
quarry dump, where the excavated earth had been thrown. They could
now see the cliff rising up alongside. It looked strangely bleak,
for, of all things, there can hardly be a more desolate sight than
an abandoned stone quarry, where the weeds and thistles have grown up,
and puddles of water abound.

Of course, the boys all stared, as they slowly wound along the road
in full view of the entire panorama that was being unrolled before
their eyes. They noted how in places there seemed to be deep fissures
along the abrupt face of the high cliff. These looked like caves,
and some of them might be of considerable extent, judging from their
appearance.