Long and wearily I waited, contemplating the difficulties of my situation, and in the end I almost determined to hazard the further descent without the help of the rope, trusting merely to the skill of my hands and feet.

My first endeavour was to get back along the shelf of rock until the rope should hang perpendicularly.  Accordingly I restored the young seagulls to their nest, turned myself round with my face to the cliff, and, with much difficulty, retraced my way for some distance.  I was in a half-creeping position, holding by the right hand to niches of the cliff, when, a sharp corner of stone digging into my knee, I stumbled, and would surely have fallen far down upon the rocks of the beach, had I not still held firmly to the rope.

The sudden jerking, however, did one good thing; it loosened the knot from the place where it had been held in the rock above, and the rope itself came down by its own weight until it hung from my waist where I had tied it.

The further descent was now performed with comparative ease, and in the manner I had at first intended.  I hung the rope at half its length over a point of rock, seeing now that it had a free run, and allowing the two ends to fall.  Then I swarmed down the double line until I found another suitable place for hanging the rope by.  Thus making the descent by repeated stages, I stepped at last upon the level rocks of the beach, sincerely thankful for my escape from so great peril.

When I scrambled over the rocks towards the boat I found she was floating in full three fathoms of water, so that my only course was to swim out to her.  This, however, was a small matter after what I had gone through.  I stripped myself on one of the outlying rocks, and plunging into the water soon reached the boat and clambered over the stern.  I was obliged to “slip the anchor,” for the painter was tied deep below the water and had to be sacrificed.  But I did not take long to recover my clothes and dress myself, and then I took to the oars with a will and rowed along the shore in search of Robbie.

Steep and frowning looked the great cliff that I had come down.  I regarded it with a new interest, and felt some sense of pride and satisfaction in my narrow escape from so serious a danger.  Again I took my viking’s stone in my fingers, and my faith in it was complete.

Robbie was patiently waiting for me seated on one of the outer rocks in a further bay.  His face brightened as he saw me rounding the point.

“Man, Ericson,” he exclaimed joyfully, “I’m real glad to see ye again!  I e’en thought ye’d met wi’ some mischance.  I was terribly feared!”

“Feared, were you?  Well, so was I; but I managed all right, you see, thanks to the viking’s charm.”

Robbie brought on board the gun, with his rabbit and the dead gannet.  And then we rowed back to Stromness.  It was long past sundown when we rounded the Ness point, and the beacon lights were streaming over the bay, but we reached the little quay at the end of the Anchor Close without any mishap.  Both of us were very hungry after our sport.