A river shone ahead. Fruit trees grew beside it, and the grass beneath them was soft. The boys sat there washing their feet. The small wound on Chris’s hand had healed. He changed the old cloth and listened to the water flowing over stones. It was the most comfortable afternoon they had had for days.
Hopeful shared a little fruit with him. They rested for the night and set off again the next morning. The right road grew hard, with loose stones pressing against their feet and a sun that grew hotter. But the meadow beside the river stretched on smoothly, as though it led the same way.
“Wouldn’t it be a little shorter over there?” Chris asked.
Hopeful looked. “Maybe. But it isn’t on the map.”
Chris grew impatient. He thought of his family still in the City of Destruction and felt he had already lost too many days. “There’s only a low fence between us,” he said. “We can still see the right road. We won’t get lost.”
While Hopeful hesitated, Chris climbed over. He straightened a leaning sign beside the fence, but its letters were old and he could not make out all of them. He did not want to admit he might be mistaken, so he said someone was already walking ahead. They only needed to follow.
The man’s name was Vain-confidence, and he walked quickly. When Chris called to him, he answered only, “I know the way. People always come through here.” The meadow really was comfortable, and the boys’ feet stopped hurting. Chris felt relieved. At last, he thought, he had found a good shortcut.
But the right road slowly disappeared behind the trees. When they asked Vain-confidence again, he still said only, “I know the way.” Clouds gathered. A few drops of rain fell, then suddenly it poured. Vain-confidence cried out and fell into a deep pit hidden by grass.
Chris hurried over, lay beside the pit, and reached down with his staff. He and Hopeful struggled hard before they managed to pull Vain-confidence onto a low rock. His leg was injured. Leaning against the stone and gasping, he finally admitted, “I’ve never been this far. I thought it was still the same path.”
Rainwater rushed down from higher ground. Soon swift streams crossed the meadow. They dared not go forward and could not find the low fence. Chris wanted to say it was all Vain-confidence’s fault. But just as he was about to speak, he remembered that he himself had climbed over first.
“I was in too much of a hurry,” he told Hopeful.
Hopeful was angry too. He did not immediately say it was all right. He only pulled Vain-confidence a little closer and reminded Chris that they must find shelter first. They moved along the rocks until they finally reached a cave.
That night, Chris hardly slept as he listened to the rain. Near dawn, Vain-confidence’s companions found him and took him away. Chris and Hopeful meant to return the way they had come. But at the cave entrance, they saw a pair of enormous feet.