He was on the chin of King George, groping in the jaw for some hollow into which he could insert a foot, some nodule sufficiently firm to which he could hold. Now he was plastered against His Majesty's cheek, sliding towards the ear. Then down came a hail of dislodged flints and a snow shower of chalk, as Jack slipped. Next moment a scud of vapour swept past and blotted out the summit of the cliff. Winefred had her knuckles pressed into her mouth to check the cry that she could not otherwise restrain, or the gasp that accompanied every venturesome movement of the climber. When the fog passed away she saw him again. He had reached a green ledge where grew samphire. She wondered what he was about. She could see that he was shaking the cord. This was passed over projecting ribs of rock overhead. Clearly at last she made out that he needed more of the rope to be let out. He was on a terrace that ran in under arches of rock, and there doubtless nests abounded. But the line was entangled by the rock over which it passed, and so strained that no amount of shaking would communicate a signal to those above. Winefred could see Jack, his feet at the edge, looking up, shaking the cord, then desisting, then striving to disengage it, so that the vibration might be continuous, but all his efforts were ineffectual. Should she ascend to those aloft, by the thorn tree? It would take her twenty minutes to reach them, and by that time Jack's object in signalling would be gained or abandoned. She saw him stand motionless, considering what his course should be. Then she saw him release himself from the rope and fix the crosspole upon which he had been seated and fasten it between two horns of chalk. At that moment down rushed something that turned and whirled through the air. It was the roller over which the rope had passed. With the relaxation of the strain, it had shot over the brink. With the fall of the roller the cord had become loosened, and, to her horror, Winefred saw the end with the crosspole dangling free at a distance of several feet from the shelf on which stood the climber. The fall of the roller had disengaged the crosspole. She knew at once that he was a prisoner fast in the face of the terrible precipice, with fifty feet of impending crag above, and nearly four hundred of sheer drop below. With a cry of dismay she cast herself on the pebbles. Then a hand was laid on her shoulder, and she was shaken, and she heard her mother's voice, agitated with feeling: 'Winefred, this is too much! After that I have robbed him, are you about to kill him?' 'Mother!' She started to her knees. 'Mother!' 'On me only is the guilt of the robbery, on you――that of his death.' 'Mother!' In a tempest of conflicting feelings――fear for Jack, horror at what had been revealed, she gasped: 'You say that, mother!' Jane Marley shrank back.