It wasn’t any use for Harry to say what I should do, and I guess he knew
it. Mostly we did what he said and that was only right, I have to admit
it.
But, anyway, nothing could have stopped me then.
“You can’t go down here,” Harry said.
“I’ll go up the road a ways,” I told him; “it isn’t so steep up
farther.”
Harry told Grove to go back and stay in the car with Skinny and not let
him get out. Grove went back, keeping to the inside edge of the road. I
started along the road, looking for a place where I could climb down and
Harry threw the light along ahead of me, but I had to go so far that
pretty soon I was out of its reach.
“The cliff lower up that way?” he called after me.
“It isn’t so straight up,” I shouted back; “throw the light down where
he is, so it will guide me when I get to the bottom.”
It wasn’t so hard scrambling down at the place I chose. I guess it was
about five hundred feet further along from where Harry was, and about as
far again from where the car was standing. The place wasn’t so steep and
it wasn’t so high either, because the place where Harry was, was right
about at the top of the hill. Only, one thing, it was mighty dark and
blowing up windy, and while I was scrambling down I felt a drop of rain.
When I got to the bottom, I found it was all rough—rocky like—and it was
hard to walk down. But, one thing, I could see the light good and plain.
It looked just like a search-light, all straight and dusty, slanting
down from the highest part of the cliff.
I called to Harry to ask him if it was pointed at the spot, but he
didn’t answer me. I guess the wind was the other way, and besides, a
voice carries up better than it carries down. Anyway, I knew he was up
there on account of the light.
I started stumbling over rocks to get to the place where that shaft of
light ended. It made one of those big rocks awful bright, but I couldn’t
see the other rock, because it was behind it. And I couldn’t see the
space between; I was kind of glad I couldn’t. But I knew I had to come
to it.
All the while, I could sort of hear Pee-wee, the way he talked to Mrs.
West, and I remembered how we always laughed at him. I guessed we’d go
right back and I wondered how we’d fix—I mean what we’d do with
him—anyway, we’d have to carry the body to a town and then telegraph. I
said I wouldn’t want to be Harry to have to do that.
By now it was raining and blowing pretty hard. Two or three times I
called up, but only once I could hear an answer, and even then I
couldn’t make out what he said. I had to climb over rocks and big trunks
and roots of trees that must have fallen down from above some time or
other. It was pretty hard. All of a sudden, that shaft of light that I
was following was gone and I stood there in the rain and it was pitch
dark all around.
I shouted up to Harry at the top of my voice, and there was some kind of
an answer, but I couldn’t make it out.
“What’s the matter?” I yelled. “Throw the light down. I can’t see.”
I heard a voice that seemed kind of as if it was far, far off somewhere,
and I listened, trying to make it out. I wasn’t sure whether it was a
voice or just the wind.
I called out, “_What?_” Gee, my head just throbbed from shouting so
loud.
“_K-i-i-l-ld, k-i-i-l-d._” That’s just what the voice seemed to say.
All of a sudden I stumbled over a rock and fell down in the pitch dark
and knocked my head. For a second it made me see a bright light, but I
knew it wasn’t real. I could feel my forehead was bleeding. My leg was
hurt too, so I couldn’t get up. And my head just throbbed and throbbed
and throbbed.
I called as loud as I could and it just made my head pound all the more.
I shouted, “Throw the light down here; I’m hurt!”
But the only answer I could hear was that voice saying “_K-i-i-ild,
k-i-i-ild——_”