EDINA TO THE RESCUE
At Billie Bradley’s desperate cry, Laura flung herself at the edge of
the cliff.
“I’m coming, Billie!” she shouted. “I’ll get to you some way, if I
break my own neck.”
Vi caught her and dragged her back.
“Wait!” she cried. “Someone is down there near the lake!”
Laura looked where Vi pointed and saw a small figure at the foot of
the cliff. It looked terribly far off, standing there on the massed
rocks bordering the lake. Moreover, judging from the clothes she
wore, the stranger was only a girl like themselves. Laura and Vi felt
that it would take a man’s strength to rescue Billie from her fearful
predicament.
The girl made a megaphone of her hands and shouted up to Billie.
“Hold fast a minute! I’ll get up to you!”
Laura and Vi watched, fascinated, as the girl began to ascend the steep
face of the cliff hand over hand like a monkey. She made amazingly
swift progress; but each moment the onlooking girls expected, feared,
that she would lose her grip, go hurtling over backward to a horrible
fate on the sharp-pointed, massed rocks at the foot of the cliff.
Meanwhile, Billie Bradley was striving to keep up heart and courage as
she pressed her body close against the rock of the cliff face, clinging
to the stout vine with nerveless fingers, striving to find a foothold
for her dangling feet.
Each time she moved, a wave of fear swept over her as the stout linen
cloth of her frock threatened to give way. She dared not even try to
help herself, for fear that one support would fail her!
Then the dress began to give beneath her weight, as she hung there,
dangling over eternity. She heard the sibilant hiss of splitting cloth
and braced herself for whatever fate might be in store for her.
It was then that she became aware that someone was approaching from
below. At first she thought that it was either Laura or Vi and wondered
how it was possible for them to have made their way around to the foot
of the cliff in such a short time.
However, in another moment or two, the girl came within her range of
vision and she saw that the newcomer was neither Laura nor Vi, but a
person who was a stranger to her.
Another rip of tearing cloth sent a shudder through Billie. The
stranger made amazingly swift progress up that dangerous ascent, but
Billie knew she must come very quickly if she was going to be in time.
Another few moments, and the rescuer would have arrived--too late!
Another ripping and tearing sound, and Billie’s weight sagged. She
clung desperately, with numbing fingers, to that clump of stout vine.
She knew by the feel of it in her hand that it was breaking loose. In
another minute or two the roots would be dislodged.
“Oh, hurry!” she called to the strange, gallant girl, who continued her
steady upward progress. “I’ve only a few moments left----”
“Hold fast! Never give up the ship! I’ll git up to that there shelf if
it takes a leg!”
The stranger was gasping from her exertions but her voice was round and
hearty, full of a vitality that Billie found tremendously reassuring.
The strange girl rapidly closed the distance between herself and
Billie. She climbed to a narrow ledge of rock that had been invisible
to Billie from where she hung and, across the space of three or four
feet, the eyes of the two girls met and clung.
Then Billie turned her eyes away. What could the strange girl do, now
that she was so near? She was in almost as precarious a position as
Billie herself, and certainly she had nothing at hand with which to
help except her own unaided hands and strength.
Suddenly Billie gasped and groped frantically at the cliff face. The
clump of vine had come loose in her hands, the sound of rending cloth
told her that the stout threads of her dress had parted at last! With
wild panic at her heart, she felt herself falling!
Something slapped the cliff face close to her clawing hand. A voice
said sharply:
“Grab that! Quick!”
Instinctively, Billie grabbed, clung.
The authoritative voice cried again:
“Now then! Help yourself if you can. This ledge makes purty good
footin’, though slippery. Hang on now. I’ll pull you up!”
Billie clung to the leather belt flung her by the strange girl. In
the interstices of the rock she managed to gain a toehold, and by a
prodigious effort and with the help of the strange girl she managed to
draw herself up to the ledge. There she clung, while an overpowering
dizziness assailed her. She swayed weakly, feeling faint and dizzy,
half expecting to plunge over the narrow ledge, but past caring very
much whether she did or not.
A sharp, angry voice broke through her failing consciousness.
“Not going to faint on me, are you? After me taking all the trouble to
save your life? Say! You make me good and tired!”
No shock of icy water could have reacted upon Billie Bradley with
better effect. She made a desperate effort to collect her failing
senses. She opened her eyes and stared vaguely at the hard young face
thrust so close to her own. She was dimly aware that an equally hard,
strong young arm had been thrust behind her shoulders, pressing her
close to the face of the cliff.
“Well, are you a quitter or ain’t you?” the rude voice demanded. “I
can’t get you down there all by myself. Chances are, if you faint,
we’ll both go crashing down onto them pointed rocks. And they won’t
make a soft bed, I promise you! Well, how about it? Are you going to
faint--or ain’t you?”
By a supreme effort Billie regained control of her slipping senses. She
stared coldly at the round, hard face of the young stranger.
“I’m not a quitter,” she said. “And I assure you, I have no intention
of fainting.” After a moment she added, as though as an afterthought:
“Thank you for saving my life!”
The strange girl grinned.
“Don’t mention it! Only I ain’t saved it yet. Reckon both of us have
got to look sharp if we want to get out of this jam alive. It ain’t no
easy going down this hill, let me tell you! Now then! Ready?”
Bitterly ashamed of her recent weakness, Billie assented. She would
have died rather than admit, even to herself, that her head was still
whirling and that she was forced to clench her teeth to keep them from
chattering.
That descent to the jagged rocks at the base of the cliff was one long
nightmare. If it had not been for the help and encouragement of the
strange girl, interspersed with occasional merciless taunts from the
same source, Billie knew she could never have made it.
As it was, she slipped and half fell, half slid the last fifteen or
twenty feet, finally landing amid a shower of pebbles and dirt in a
crevasse between two jagged rocks.
“Mercy!” she gasped.
“It is a mercy that you landed betwixt instead of on ’em.”
Billie looked up from her undignified position to find the strange girl
grinning down at her. She frowned and tried to rise, but found herself
wedged in so tightly that she could scarcely move.
“Like a sardine in a packed can,” remarked the strange girl unkindly.
Billie wanted to feel offended, but she could not. The comparison was
too apt. She met the quizzical, smiling glance of the strange girl and
suddenly laughed.
“You are a very frank person. But I do feel rather like a sardine. If
you will give me a hand, I think I can manage, if I try hard enough, to
get out of this ridiculous place.”
The pulling and tugging that ensued was a painful process for Billie.
She discovered that there was scarcely a portion of her body that
failed to boast either bruise or scratch.
“I’m pretty well disabled,” she admitted. “No tennis and no rowing for
me for a few days to come at least.”
“’Twouldn’t be best to try, I guess,” remarked the girl.
Ruefully, Billie bent to examine her torn skirt. As she straightened
up, a sharp exclamation escaped her.
“Hold on there! Where are you going?”