"I am coming!" I screamed at the top of my voice--"I am coming as fast as I can." The rocks gave back so many deceitful echoes that I was not certain from what point the imploring cry came; but I knew every inch of the beach for a mile up and down, and knew, too, that there was but one place in which with ordinary prudence there could be the slightest danger. So with unerring instinct I flew along the wet shingle to "Raymond's Cliff." At this point the beetling line of rocks which coiled and frowned along the coast terminated abruptly in precipitous crags. On one side it was sheer precipice, but on the other the cliff, exposed both to wind and wave, washed by the rains and gnawed at its base by ever-advancing and receding tides, had gradually been worn away in the centre by the constant crumbling of the sandy soil, so as to form a sort of ravine. It was a dangerous and gloomy place, and I had received many a warning from Mr. Raymond never to take Helen there. "Helen!" I cried--"Helen! if you are here, answer me. I cannot see you." A gull flew away from the cliff with a scream, and I could hear no other sound. "Tell me, Helen, if you are here." I heard a cry from above--almost inaudible it was so spiritless and faint--yet, gaze as I might toward the top, I could see nothing. I skirted the main rock and climbed as far as I easily could up the ravine. Here my attention was arrested by a dot of scarlet against the grim, bare face of the basalt. Yes, there she was, about forty feet above me, hanging on to a shelving rock with her little Italian greyhound in her arms. She was peering down, disclosing a pallid face. I saw at once that she had hung there until her strength was almost gone. "Listen to me, Helen," said I, calmly and very gently, for I had a ghastly dread that she would fall before my very eyes. "Don't look down: just keep your eyes fixed on the rock, and hold on tight until I reach you." She obeyed me. "Now," I went on authoritatively, "drop the dog--drop him, I say!--Here, Beppo! here!" She again obeyed me, and the dog scrambled down and fell--scratched and bruised, no doubt, yet otherwise unhurt--at my feet. "Helen, answer me one question," said I. "Can you wait until I go round up to the top and get a rope?" She gave a little scream of pitiful anguish: I saw her slight figure sway, and some loose stones came rattling down. "I feel so sick, so dizzy!" she cried. "I will climb up, then. Hold on tight for a few minutes more. Keep perfectly still, and don't look down: you know how well I can climb."