ed and flung open, disclosing a steep,
winding stair. Almost on her hands and knees Diana scrambled up, and up,
and up till she reached the triforium, the narrow stone gallery that ran
round the church under the clerestory windows. The first few yards were
safely protected with arches, pillars, and a balustrade, but after that
came a stretch of about twenty feet with no parapet at all. The gallery
was only twenty-four inches wide; on the one side was the wall, on the
other a sheer drop of about thirty feet. Diana paused, and set her
teeth. She did not dare to walk it, but she knelt down and crawled along
till she reached the next piece of balustrade. Then she unrolled her
Union Jack, and, tying it by its cords to the pillars, arranged it so
that it hung down into the church and covered the exact spot of blank
wall that Monty had indicated. She had just finished when she heard
footsteps in the porch. Not wanting to be caught by the Vicar, she began
to crawl back in the same way as she had come. Perhaps the sense that
someone might be watching her from below unnerved her, for the return
journey seemed far worse than the outward one had done. She did not
venture to look down, but kept her eyes on the wall. Half-way she was
suddenly seized with a horrible paroxysm of dizziness. For a moment or
two she lay flat, too frightened to move, while her giddy head seemed to
be spinning round. With a supreme effort she mastered the sensation, and
crawled on, inch by inch, till she once again reached safety. With
rather tottering knees she came down the winding staircase, and through
the small door to the chancel steps. Mrs. Fleming, Meg, Monty, and Neale
were standing by the lectern when she appeared. Mrs. Fleming was white
as chalk; the others were staring open-mouthed, with a queer strained
look in their eyes.

"Well, I've done it, you see!" said Diana jauntily.

The Flemings gazed at her without speaking. Monty went and locked the
door of the staircase and put the keys in his pocket. The silence was
embarrassing.

"I think it looks very nice hanging there," declared Diana, nodding at
her Union Jack.

"My dear," said Mrs. Fleming in a shaky voice, "if you knew what I
suffered when I saw you creeping along the triforium you couldn't speak
so lightly. It isn't right to risk your life in this fashion."

Diana tried to carry the matter off airily, but the boys were grumpy and
would not speak. Meg kept looking at her with a peculia