world.

At length, with a faint sigh of regret, she crossed the bridge and
walked slowly up a path which appeared to be little more than a rough
track hewn out of the rocky side of the cliff itself, uneven and strewn
with loose stones. Nan picked her steps gingerly. At the top of the
track her way turned sharply at right angles to where a narrow
ridge--so narrow that two people could not walk it abreast--led to
Tintagel Head. It was the merest neck of land, very steep on either
hand, like a slender bridge connecting what the Cornish folk generally
speak of as "the Island" with the mainland.

Nan proceeded to cross the narrow ridge. She was particularly
surefooted as a rule, her supple body balancing itself instinctively.
But to-day, for the first time, she felt suddenly nervous as she neared
the crag and, glancing downward, caught sight of the sullen billows
thundering far below on either side. Perhaps the events of the day had
frayed her nerves more than she knew. It was only by an effort that
she dismissed the unaccustomed sensation of malaise which had assailed
her and determinedly began the ascent to the castle by way of a series
of primitively rough-hewn steps. They were slippery and uneven, worn
and polished by the tread of the many feet which had ascended and
descended them, and guarded only by a light hand-rail that seemed
almost to quiver in her grasp as, gripped by another unexpected rush of
fear, Nan caught at it in feverish haste.

She stood quite still--suddenly panic-stricken. Here, half-way up the
side of the steep promontory, the whole immensity of the surrounding
height and depth came upon her in a terrifying flash of realisation.
From below rose the reiterated boom of the baulked waves, each thud
against the base of the great crag seeming to shake her whole being,
while, whichever way she looked, menacing headlands towered stark and
pitiless above the sea. She felt like a fly on the wall of some
abysmal depth--only without the fly's powers of adhesion.

Very carefully she twisted her body sideways, intending to retrace her
steps, but in an instant the sight of the surging waters--miles and
miles below, as it seemed--sent her crouching to the ground. She could
not go back! She felt as though her limbs were paralysed, and she knew
that if she attempted to descend some incalculable force would drive
her straight over the edge, hurtling helplessly to the foot of those
rugged cliffs.

For