ning round in his
saddle and smiling encouragement. Rachel caught his eye and smiled too.
They struggled on for some time longer, nothing being heard but the
clatter of hooves striving on the loose stones. Then they saw that
Evelyn was off her ass, and that Mr. Perrott was standing in the
attitude of a statesman in Parliament Square, stretching an arm of stone
towards the view. A little to the left of them was a low ruined wall,
the stump of an Elizabethan watch-tower.

"I couldn't have stood it much longer," Mrs. Elliot confided to Mrs.
Thornbury, but the excitement of being at the top in another moment and
seeing the view prevented any one from answering her. One after another
they came out on the flat space at the top and stood overcome with
wonder. Before them they beheld an immense space--grey sands running
into forest, and forest merging in mountains, and mountains washed by
air, the infinite distances of South America. A river ran across the
plain, as flat as the land, and appearing quite as stationary. The
effect of so much space was at first rather chilling. They felt
themselves very small, and for some time no one said anything. Then
Evelyn exclaimed, "Splendid!" She took hold of the hand that was next
her; it chanced to be Miss Allan's hand.

"North--South--East--West," said Miss Allan, jerking her head slightly
towards the points of the compass.

Hewet, who had gone a little in front, looked up at his guests as if to
justify himself for having brought them. He observed how strangely the
people standing in a row with their figures bent slightly forward
and their clothes plastered by the wind to the shape of their bodies
resembled naked statues. On their pedestal of earth they looked
unfamiliar and noble, but in another moment they had broken their rank,
and he had to see to the laying out of food. Hirst came to his help, and
they handed packets of chicken and bread from one to another.

As St. John gave Helen her packet she looked him full in the face and
said:

"Do you remember--two women?"

He looked at her sharply.

"I do," he answered.

"So you're the two women!" Hewet exclaimed, looking from Helen to
Rachel.

"Your lights tempted us," said Helen. "We watched you playing cards, but
we never knew that we were being watched."

"It was like a thing in a play," Rachel added.

"And Hirst couldn't describe you," said Hewet.

It was certainly odd to have seen Helen and to find nothing to say abou