When this accident occurred, he had been on a level with the sill and just about to step warily on to it. The effect of the breaking of the rung was to make him execute this movement at about fifteen times the speed which he had contemplated. There was a moment in which the whole universe seemed to dissolve, and then he was on the sill, his fingers clinging with a passionate grip to a small piece of lead piping that protruded from the wall and his legs swinging dizzily over the abyss. The ladder, urged outward by his last frenzied kick, tottered for an instant, then fell to the ground. The events just described, though it seemed longer to the principal actor in them, had occupied perhaps six seconds. They left Mr. Carmody in a world that jumped and swam before his eyes, feeling as though somebody had extracted his heart and replaced it with some kind of lively firework. This substitute, whatever it was, appeared to be fizzing and leaping inside his chest, and its gyrations interfered with his breathing. For some minutes his only conscious thought was that he felt extremely ill. Then becoming by slow degrees more composed, he was enabled to examine the situation. It was not a pleasant one. At first, it had been agreeable enough simply to allow his mind to dwell on the fact that he was alive and in one piece. But now, probing beneath this mere surface aspect of the matter, he perceived that, taking the most conservative estimate, he must acknowledge himself to be in a peculiarly awkward position. The hour was about a quarter to six. He was thirty feet or so above the ground. And, though reason told him that the window sill on which he sat was thoroughly solid and quite capable of bearing a much heavier weight, he could not rid himself of the feeling that at any moment it might give way and precipitate him into the depths. Of course, looked at in the proper spirit, his predicament had all sorts of compensations. The medical profession is agreed that there is nothing better for the health than the fresh air of the early morning: and this he was in a position to drink into his lungs in unlimited quantities. Furthermore, nobody could have been more admirably situated than he to compile notes for one of those Country Life articles which are so popular with the readers of daily papers.