r him to expose himself to such danger:

"I say!" he thought. "Seems to me you're showing the white feather,
Lupin, old boy. Throw up the enterprise? Then Daubrecq will babble his
secret, the marquis will possess himself of the list, Lupin will return
empty-handed, and Gilbert..."

The long rope which he had fastened round his waist caused him needless
inconvenience and fatigue. He fixed one of the ends to the strap of his
trousers and let the rope uncoil all the way down the ascent, so that he
could use it, on returning, as a hand-rail.

Then he once more clutched at the rough surface of the cliff and
continued the climb, with bruised nails and bleeding fingers. At every
moment he expected the inevitable fall. And what discouraged him
most was to hear the murmur of voices rising from the boat, murmur so
distinct that it seemed as though he were not increasing the distance
between his companions and himself.

And he remembered the Sire de Tancarville, alone, he too, amid the
darkness, who must have shivered at the noise of the stones which
he loosened and sent bounding down the cliff. How the least sound
reverberated through the silence! If one of Daubrecq's guards was
peering into the gloom from the Lovers' Tower, it meant a shot... and
death.

And he climbed... he climbed... He had climbed so long that he ended
by imagining that the goal was passed. Beyond a doubt, he had slanted
unawares to the right or left and he would finish at the patrol-path.
What a stupid upshot! And what other upshot could there be to an
attempt which the swift force of events had not allowed him to study and
prepare?

Madly, he redoubled his efforts, raised himself by a number of yards,
slipped, recovered the lost ground, clutched a bunch of roots that came
loose in his hand, slipped once more and was abandoning the game in
despair when, suddenly, stiffening himself and contracting his whole
frame, his muscles and his will, he stopped still: a sound of voices
seemed to issue from the very rock which he was grasping.

He listened. It came from the right. Turning his head, he thought that
he saw a ray of light penetrating the darkness of space. By what effort
of energy, by what imperceptible movements he succeeded in dragging
himself to the spot he was never able exactly to realize. But suddenly
he found himself on the ledge of a fairly wide opening, at least three
yards deep, which dug into the wall of the cliff like a passage, while