The roar of the river already sounded in Bucks's ears like a cataract, but the shock of extreme danger had numbed his apprehension. Chips of the sharp granite cut his feet like knives, and he knew that the sticky feeling upon his bare soles was blood oozing through the broken skin. He had already given up expectation of ever leaving the gorge alive and merely responded to his companion's will. The one thought that came to his mind was curiosity as to what Dancing ever expected to do if they reached the bottom without accident. Suddenly above the roar of the river he heard the muffled crack of fire-arms coming as if out of another world. He wondered whether they themselves were already being fired at, but experienced nothing more than curiosity in the thought. Only the pressure of the big hand that gripped his own impressed itself powerfully upon his consciousness, and at each squeeze he put his foot forward mechanically, intent on a dull resolve to obey orders. He presently felt a new signal from the long fingers that wound around his own. He tried to answer by stepping, but Dancing whose face was turned away, restrained him. Then it flashed on Bucks that the lineman was signalling Morse to him, and that the dot-and-dash squeezes meant: "Half-way down. Half-way down." Bucks answered with one word: "Hurrah!" But he squeezed it along the nerves and muscles like lightning. He could hear the labored breathing of his companion as he strained at intervals every particle of his strength to reach a new footing of safety. Every vine and scrubby bush down the cliff wall was tested for its strength and root, and Dancing held Bucks's hand so that he could instantly release it if he himself should plunge to death. Bucks had already been told that if this happened he must hang as long as he could without moving and if he could hold on till daylight he would be rescued by railroad men. All this was going through his head when, responding to a signal to step down, and, unable to catch some word that Dancing whispered, he stretched his leg so far that he lost his balance. He struggled to recover. Dancing called again sharply to him, but he was too wrought up to understand. Dizziness seized him, and resigning himself, with an exclamation, to death, he felt himself dropping into space. In the next instant he was caught in Dancing's arms: "Gosh darn it, why didn't you jump, as I told you?" exclaimed the lineman, setting him up on his feet. "You pretty near clean upset us both." "Where are we, Bill?" muttered Bucks, swallowing his shock. "Right here at the water, and them fellows up there beating the bush for us. There's shooting down town, too. Some new deviltry. How good a swimmer are you, Bucks? By gum, I forgot to ask you before you started." "I can swim better than I can climb, Bill." "We've only a quarter of a mile and downstream at that. And the current here would float a keg of nails."