“I am here, my friends, in the middle of a bush.  I dare not move.  It is so dark I cannot see where to put my foot.  Can you lower me a lantern, and I will see if I can climb up?”

Grooton hastened back to the cottage.

“I think you will be all right,” I cried out.  “It is not half as steep as it looks.”

“I believe,” he answered, “that I can see a path up.  But I will wait until the lantern comes.”

The lantern arrived almost immediately.  We lowered it to him by a rope, and he examined the face of the cliff.

“I think that I can get up,” he cried out, “but I should like to help myself with the rope.  Can you both hold it tightly?”

“All right,” I answered.  “We’ve got it.”

He clambered up with surprising agility.  But as he reached the edge of the cliff he groaned heavily.

“Are you hurt?” Lady Angela asked.

“It is my foot,” he muttered, “my left foot.  I twisted it in falling.”

Grooton and I helped him to the cottage.  He hobbled painfully along with tightly clenched lips.

“I shall have to ask for a pony cart to get up to the house, I am afraid,” he said.  “I am very sorry to give you so much trouble, Mr. Ducaine.”

“The trouble is nothing,”.  I answered, “but I am wondering how on earth you managed to fall over the cliff.”

“I myself, I scarcely know,” he answered, as he sipped the brandy which Grooton had produced.  “I am subject to fits of giddiness, and one came over me as I stood there looking down.  I felt the ground sway, and remember no more.  I am very sorry to give you tall this trouble, but indeed I fear that I cannot walk.”

“We will send you down a cart,” I declared.  “You will have rather a rough drive across the grass, but there is no other way.”

“You are very kind,” he declared.  “I am in despair at my clumsiness.”

I gave him my box of cigarettes.  Lady Angela hesitated.

“I think,” she said, “that I ought to stay with you, Prince, while Mr. Ducaine goes up for the cart.”

“Indeed, Lady Angela, you are very kind,” he answered, “but I could not permit it.  I regret to say that I am in some pain, and I have a weakness for being alone when I suffer.  If I desire anything Mr. Ducaine’s servant will be at hand.”

So we left him there.  At any other time the prospect of that walk with Lady Angela would have filled me with joy.  But from the first moment of leaving the cottage I was uneasy.

“What do you think of that man?” I asked her abruptly.  “I mean personally?”

“I hate him,” she answered coolly.  “He is one of those creatures whose eyes and mouth, and something underneath his most respectful words, seem always to suggest offensive things.  I find it very hard indeed to be civil to him.”

“Do you happen to know what Colonel Ray thinks of him?” I asked her.

“I have no special knowledge of Colonel Ray’s likes or dislikes,” she answered.