you mean to be nice. However, I expect the others are waiting
for us and we must join them, although we won't go by the grass ridge,"
She indicated the slope of cracked rock in front. "The hold is pretty
good. Do you think you can get up?"

Lister doubted. He was athletic and steady, but the climb looked awkward
for a beginner.

"If you are going, I'll try."

"You imagine you can go where I can go?"

"Something like that," Lister admitted. "If I'm beaten, you're
accountable and will have to help."

He was satisfied by Barbara's frank laugh. Her mood was changeable. Not
long since he had, with awkward sympathy, thought her a proud humiliated
woman; now she was marked by the humor of a careless girl. He could,
however, play up to her later mood, and when they set off he began to
joke.

The rock slanted, and cracks and breaks gave a firm hold, but there was
not a crack wherever one was needed and the pitch was steep. Then in
places the slabs were slippery with wet lichen and Lister's ordinary
walking boots could get no grip. His jokes stopped and the sweat began
to dew his face. His breath got hard and he felt his heart beat. It was
obvious that climbing needed study.

For all that, he went on and found a strange delight in watching
Barbara. Her clothes harmonized with the soft colors of lichen and
stone; her movements were confident and light. He got no sense of
effort; her pose was seldom strained and the lines of her limbs and body
flowed in easy curves. He thought she rather flitted than labored up the
rock. Practice no doubt accounted for much, but something was due to
temperament. Barbara did not hesitate; she trusted her luck and went
ahead.

At length she stopped, pressed against the stone in the hollow of a
gully, while Lister crept obliquely across a long wet slab. He looked up
and saw her face, finely colored after effort, against a background of
green and gold. The berries on a small mountain-ash in a cranny
harmonized with the carmine of her skin. She looked down and smiled with
careless amusement.

Then Lister's foot slipped and he could get no hold for his hands. His
smooth boots drew a greasy line across the wet slab as he slid down.
Perhaps the risk was not very daunting, but he knew he must not roll
down far. At the bottom of the slab he brought up with his foot braced
against a knob, and he saw Barbara coming after him. When she stopped
her glance was apologetic.

"I forgot you hadn't prope