"Well, it doesn't sound like it. You don't seem to be yourself, old chap. You know I always look up to you as being more plucky than I am. Here we are getting better every minute, and there is nothing to hurry about. They won't begin the supper till we get back. Leave the matches alone for a minute or two and give a good hail. They must be looking for us." "No, no; I can't shout now." "Why?" "Oh, I don't know. There, I must strike another match." "No, you mustn't. Give a good hail." "I can't, I tell you." "Well, I can," cried Dean. "I don't feel a bit frightened of bogeys now." "Ahoy-y-y-y-y!" he shouted, and there was a hollow echoing noise, but nothing approaching what they had heard before. Then they listened till the reverberations died out; but there was no hopeful sound to cheer them, and with a low despairing sigh which he tried in vain to suppress, Mark drew another carefully selected match across the side of the box. This time there was a flash, the head of the tiny wax taper blazed out, illumined the square hole into which Dean had slipped, and revealed him about a dozen feet below where his cousin was holding the match. "Quick!" cried Dean. "Get another out and light it before you burn your fingers. Well done--that's the way! Hold it more over. I want to reconnoitre, as the soldiers say." "Be careful!" panted Mark. "Mind you don't slip." "Trust me," said Dean. "No, no, don't light another. It will only be waste, because I have seen it all." "I had better light another match," cried Mark hoarsely. "No, you hadn't. Chuck that down; you are burning your fingers." The still burning end of the tiny taper lit up the sides of the square hole as it descended to the surface of the water and was extinguished with a faint _spet_. "Now then," cried Dean, "I have got it all fixed at the back of my eyes like what old Buck calls a fortygraff, and just where I am standing it is all straight up and down, but a little way to the left there's a regular set of holes just as if stones had been left out. Why, it's as easy as kissing your hand. This must have been one of the old temple wells, and these holes must have been left like steps for the old people to come down and clip their water." "Oh, do take care!" cried Mark. "Won't I just! I shall be all right. I say, old chap, what a lark!" "Lark!" cried Mark angrily. "What do you mean by that?" "Why, it seems to me quite comic to think that we two fellows, who ought to have known better, should have made such a hullabaloo about nothing at all. Oh, I say, isn't it lucky that nobody else was here! I wouldn't--" "Ah!" gasped Mark, as there was a faint rattling of bits of stone, and _plish, plash, plosh_, three fragments dropped into the water. "All right, sonny," said Dean, who had shifted his position and begun to climb. "I am _en route_; no tree roots here, though, but plenty of stony holes. Clear the course, for up I come!"