Tallente’s head had been the wonder even of members of the Alpine Club, years ago in Switzerland.  He found himself now in this strangest of all positions, absolutely steady and unmoved.  Sheer below him, dark, rushing waves broke upon the rocks, sending showers of glittering spray upwards.  Above, the little lookout with its rustic paling seemed almost more than directly overhead.  The few stars and the fugitive moon seemed somehow set in a different sky.  He felt a new kinship with a great gull who came floating by.  He had become himself a creature of the wild places.  Presently he began once more to let himself down, hand over hand, to where the next little clump of trees showed a chance of a precarious foothold.  The rope chafed his fingers but he remained absolutely steady.  Once he trusted for a moment to a yew tree, growing out of a fissure in the rock, which came out by the roots and went hurtling down into space.  From overhead he heard Robert’s terrified cry.  The rope stood the strain of his sudden clutch, however, and all was well.  A little lower down, holding on with one hand, he took his torch from his pocket and examined the surface of the cliff.  Nothing apparently had been disturbed, nor was there any sign of any heavy body having been dashed through the undergrowth.  Soon he went on again, and, working a little to the left, stood for a moment upon a green, turf-covered crag, a tiny plateau covered with the refuse of seagulls and a few stunted trees, from amongst which a startled hawk rose with a wild cry.  He waited here until the moon shone once more and he could see the little strip of shingle below.  Nowhere could he find any trace of the thing he sought.

At the end of half an hour’s climbing, he reached the end of the rope.  The little cove, filled with tumbled rocks and a narrow strip of beach, was still about eighty feet below.  The slope here was far less precipitous and there was a foothold in many places amongst the thinly growing firs and dwarfed oaks.  Calmly he let go the rope and commenced to scramble.  More than once his foot slipped, but he was always in a position to save himself.  The time came at last when he stood upon the pebbly beach, surprised to find that his knees were shaking and his breath coming fast.  The little place was so enclosed that when he looked upwards it seemed as though he were at the bottom of a pit, as though the stars and the doubtful moon had receded and he was somehow in the bowels of the earth instead of being on the sea level.  There were only a few feet of the shingle dry, and a great wave, breaking amongst the huge rocks, drenched him with spray.  He proceeded with his task, however, searching methodically amongst the rocks, scanning the pebbly beach with his torch, always amazed that nowhere could he find the slightest trace of what he sought.  Finally, drenched to the skin and utterly exhausted, he commenced once more the upward climb.  He was an hour reaching the end of the rope.  Then he blew the whistle and the rest was easy.  Nevertheless, when the paling came into sight and he felt Robert’s arms under his shoulders, he reeled over towards the seat and lay there, his clothes caked in red mud, the knees of his knickerbockers cut, blood on his hands and forehead, breathless.  Robert forced brandy down his throat, however, and in a moment or two he was himself again.