"Dunbar! Dunbar! Dunbar!" This time there was an answer, clear and definite. "Hallo! Hallo! Hallo!" He turned excitedly to her. She also sprang to his feet. "He's there! I can hear him!" "Dunbar! Dunbar!" The answer came more clearly: "Hallo! Hallo! Hallo!" They continued to exchange cries. Sometimes the reply was faint. Once it seemed to be lost altogether. Then suddenly it was close at hand. A ghostly figure was shadowed. Dunbar came running. IX He caught their hands in his. He was breathless. He sank down on the stone beside them: "Give me a minute. . . . I'm done. Lord! this filthy fog. . . . Where haven't I been?" He panted, staring up at them with wide distracted eyes. "Do you realize? I've failed. It's no use our crossing in that boat now even if we could find it. We've missed that train. We're done." "Nonsense," Harkness broke in. "Why, man, what's happened to you? This isn't like you to lose your courage. We're not done or anything like it. In the first place we're all together again. That's something in a fog like this. Besides so long as we stick together we're out of their power. They can't force us, all of us, back into that house again. So long as we're out of that house we're safe." "Oh, are we?" said Dunbar. "Little you know that man. I tell you we're not safe--or Hesther's not safe--until we're at least a hundred miles away. But forgive me," he looked up at them both, smiling, "you're quite right, Harkness. I haven't any right to talk like this. But you don't know what a time I've had in that fog." "I had a little bit of a time myself," said Harkness. "Well in the first place," went on Dunbar, "I was terrified about you. I knew that you didn't know these cliffs well. When the fog started I called to you to come back, but you didn't hear me, of course. I was an idiot to let you start out at all. "And then, when it came to myself climbing them I wasn't very successful. I was nearly over the edge fifty times at least. But at last when I _did_ get to the top the ridiculous thing was that I started off in the wrong direction. There I was only five minutes from the cottage and the pony and Hesther; I know the place like my own hand, and yet I went in the wrong direction. "God knows where I got to. I was nearly over into the sea twice at least. I kept calling your names, but the only thing I heard in answer was that beastly bell. I never went very far, I imagine, because when I heard your voice at last, Harkness, I was quite close to it. But just to think of it! Every other emergency in the world I'd considered except just this one! It simply never entered my head." "Well now," said Harkness, "let's face the facts. It's too late for that train. Is there any other that we can catch?" "There's one at six, but I don't see ourselves hanging about here for another three hours, nor, if the fog doesn't lift, can Hesther get down into that cove. I'm not especially anxious to try it myself as a matter of fact."