"It would have been one way out of it all, wouldn't it?" he replied with a touch of bitterness. "Oh, hush! Don't speak like that." "I won't--if it annoys you. But, anyway, you needn't worry. I shan't die young. The gods don't love me enough." Ann ignored this. "Do you think you could stand now?" she asked practically. Tony's eyes gleamed mirthfully. "I'm very comfortable as I am," he remarked, rubbing his cheek against her skirt. She resisted the temptation to smile. "I'm not--particularly," she returned briefly. "I've got cramp." He sat up at once. "Oh, by Jove! Why didn't you say so before?" "Because I hadn't got it before. I was much too concerned about you to have time for it. How do you feel? Shall I help you up?" But Tony disclaimed the necessity for any assistance. As he said, he had only been knocked out of time for a few minutes. He might have been made of indiarubber for all the actual harm his fall had done him. He rose to his feet without difficulty and proceeded to help Ann to hers. "How do we get back?" he asked. Then, glancing upwards: "I'm hanged if I'm going to try and climb up there a second time. How on earth did you get here? You didn't drop from the skies, I suppose, like an angel?" "There's a ledge--it's rather narrow, but one can just squeeze round, and it brings you out somewhere on the top. Are you sure you can manage it, though? You won't turn faint or anything?"--anxiously. "No"--with impish gravity. "I shan't 'turn faint or anything.' In fact, I could dance a hornpipe here if you liked. Still, I'll hold your hand--just in case of accidents"--audaciously. "Shall I go first? Oh, by the way"--he paused. "Here's your blue gentian. Won't you have it?" Ann felt her throat contract as she recalled what the little blue flower had so nearly cost. Her eyes filled in spite of herself. "Good heavens! Don't cry over it!" Tony laughed carelessly. He had recovered his usual bantering manner of speech which yet always seemed to hold an undercurrent of bitterness. "It's not worth that. See, I'll chuck it away, so that it can't remind you of the unpleasant shock I gave you this afternoon." He tossed the flower over the edge of the ravine. For an instant it seemed to hover in the air like a blue butterfly. Then it sank slowly out of sight. "Here endeth the first lesson," commented Tony. "Lesson on what?" "On trying to get things which an all-wise Providence has considerately placed out of your reach." Without giving her time to reply, he continued: "Give me your hand--no, you must"--as she hung back. "I'm not going to have you risking this ledge again alone."