And it was then that the quiet voice of Peter Benton was heard. He was talking to Madge Saunderson, who with the other two girls had been whispering together, ignorant that he was close behind them in the shadow. "Do I understand you to say, Miss Saunderson, that Captain Seymour is only pretending?" "You had no business to hear what I said, Mr. Benton," she answered, angrily. "I wasn’t talking to you." But the Doctor appeared interested, and very few of either sex had ever hesitated for long when he became serious. "You will kindly tell me at once whether this is a joke," he said, grimly. For a moment the girl’s eyes flashed mutinously, and then she laughed—a laugh which rang a little false. "If you wish to know, it is," she answered, defiantly. "I wanted to find out if Mr. Benton would consider a human life worth saving." She laughed again, as the four men with one accord turned their backs on her. "Perhaps it would be as well, then," said Peter, calmly, "for you to tell Captain Seymour that the charming little jest has been discovered, and that he can come down again." She looked at him contemptuously; then, raising her voice, she shouted to the man above: "You can come: down, Captain Seymour: they’ve found out our little joke." But the aviator remained motionless. "Come down," she cried again. "Can’t you hear me?" But Seymour’s face, like a white patch, still peered down, and suddenly a girl started sobbing. "It would seem," remarked Peter, "that the plot is going to be successful after all." The next moment, before anyone realized what was happening, he was climbing steadily up towards the motionless man at the top. There was only one remark made during that second ascent, and it came from the Doctor. "You deserve, young woman," he said, quietly, to Madge Saunderson, "to be publicly whipped through the streets of London." Then silence reigned, broken only by Peter, as he paused every now and then to shout some encouraging remark to the man above. "I’m coming, Seymour. Absolutely all right. Can’t you send for one of your bally machines, and save us both the trouble of climbing down again?" Between each remark he climbed steadily on, until at last he was within a few feet of the aviator. "Look away from me, Seymour," he ordered, quietly, gazing straight into the unblinking, staring eyes above. "Look at the brickwork beside you. Do as I tell you, Seymour. Look at the brickwork beside you." For what seemed an eternity to those below the two men stayed motionless; then a great shuddering sigh broke from them—Seymour was no longer looking down. It was only the General who spoke, and he was not conscious of doing so. "By Gad! you’re right, Doctor," he muttered. "He’s thoroughbred right enough—he’s thoroughbred." And the Great Doctor, whose iron nerve had earned for him the reputation of being one of the two finest operating surgeons in Europe, wiped the sweat from his forehead with a hand that shook like a leaf.