“Bunce,” said Lionel, “you are an old woman. Goodbye.” There was a flash, and Bunce caught a momentary glimpse of a stern white face, and two resolute eyes. When the next flash came, Lionel was not to be seen. He was on his perilous journey down the Smugglers’ Staircase. “A madman—a crazy madman,” muttered Bunce. “If he gets safe to the bottom of the staircase, he’ll go no farther. Not as I’m going to desert him. Not likely. Though he did call me a old woman.” Going down on one knee on the wet grass, he put both his hands to his mouth, and shouted with all his might: “I’m going to the lighthouse for help, Mr. Dering.” He listened, but there came no answer. Presently, with a little quaking of the heart, he rose to his feet. “He needn’t have called me a old woman,” he muttered. With that he pulled his hat fiercely over his brow, and set off for the lighthouse at a rapid walk, which soon quickened into a run. How Lionel got down to the bottom of the staircase he could never afterwards have told. He only knew that when about half way down his foot slipped. The next thing he remembered was finding himself among the rocks at the bottom, bruised, bleeding, and partially stunned. A larger wave than usual, which dashed completely over him, gave him a shock which helped to revive him. Not the least perilous part of his enterprise was still before him. Already the tide was two feet deep at the foot of the cliff. Fortunately, the wind had gone down, and the rain had in some measure abated; but had it not been for the lightning’s friendly flashes, Lionel’s task would have been a hopeless one. The road he had to take was thickly strewn with huge boulders, and gigantic masses of rock which had fallen—some of them centuries ago—from the cliffs overhead. Between and over these Lionel had to make his way to the point where the stranger had fallen. It was a work of time and peril, more especially now that the tide was coming in so dangerously fast, beating and eddying round the rocks and dashing over them in showers of stinging spray. Lionel saw clearly that, in any case, it would be quite impossible for him to return by the way he was going till ebb of tide. He must find some “coign of vantage” among the fallen rocks, or high up in the face of the cliff, beyond reach of the waves, and there wait patiently for further help. But first to find the stranger.