"She is killed!" moaned Helen, and covered her face with her mittened hands.
"Ruth! Ruth!" called Tom, charging back toward the broken snow-drift.
But Bobbins caught and held him. "Don't make a fool of yourself, old man!" commanded the big fellow. "You can't help her by falling over the cliff yourself."
"Oh! how deep can that place be?" gasped Ralph Tingley.
"What will mother say?" cried his brother.
"Ruth! Ruth!" shouted Ann Hicks, and dropped on her knees to crawl to the edge.
"You'll be down there yourself, Ann!" exclaimed Helen, sobbing.
"A couple of you useless boys grab me by the ankles," commanded the western girl. "Come! take a good hold. Now let me see——"
She hung half over the verge of the rock. The fall was sheer for fifty feet at least. It was a narrow cut in the hill, with apparently unscalable sides and open only toward the lake.
"I—I don't see a thing," panted the girl.