they miss me there'll be a pot
boiling, you may believe. If I get up," he added, "I'll let a string
down for a rope you must get for me. Once on top they can't hurt me....
Eh ben, A bi'tot, gargon Carterette!"

"O my good! O my good!" said the girl with a sudden change of mood. "To
think you have come like this, and perhaps--" But she dashed the tears
from her eyes, and bade him go on.

The tide was well out, the moon shining brightly. Ranulph reached the
point where, if the rock was to be scaled at all, the ascent must be
made. For a distance there was shelving where foothold might be had by a
fearless man with a steady head and sure balance. After that came about
a hundred feet where he would have to draw himself up by juttings and
crevices hand over hand, where was no natural pathway. Woe be to him if
head grew dizzy, foot slipped, or strength gave out; he would be broken
to pieces on the hard sand below. That second stage once passed, the
ascent thence to the top would be easier; for though nearly as steep,
it had more ledges, and offered fair vantage to a man with a foot like a
mountain goat. Ranulph had been aloft all weathers in his time, and his
toes were as strong as another man's foot, and surer.

He started. The toes caught in crevices, held on to ledges, glued
themselves on to smooth surfaces; the knees clung like a rough-rider's
to a saddle; the big hands, when once they got a purchase, fastened like
an air-cup.

Slowly, slowly up, foot by foot, yard by yard, until one-third of the
distance was climbed. The suspense and strain were immeasurable. But he
struggled on and on, and at last reached a sort of flying pinnacle of
rock, like a hook for the shields of the gods.

Here he ventured to look below, expecting to see Carterette, but there
was only the white sand, and no sound save the long wash of the gulf. He
drew a horn of arrack from his pocket and drank. He had two hundred feet
more to climb, and the next hundred would be the great ordeal.

He started again. This was travail indeed. His rough fingers, his toes,
hard as horn almost, began bleeding. Once or twice he swung quite clear
of the wall, hanging by his fingers to catch a surer foothold to right
or left, and just getting it sometimes by an inch or less. The tension
was terrible. His head seemed to swell and fill with blood: on the top
it throbbed till it was ready to burst. His neck was aching horribly
with constant looking up, the skin of h