"Very well," says she after a moment's pause. "Tell me when you are ready."
"We will wait a minute till your strength comes back," says I, for I felt her fingers quivering, despite my close hold.
"Nay, let us go at once, lest my courage fail," says she faintly. "But have a care when you come to the little ledge: it is loose; I felt it slide under my foot."
"Let me change places, that I may go first," says I.
"No, no!" cries she in an agony, as I was about to move; "for Heaven's sake, do not venture down the slope to pass me—do not leave go of my hand."
"So be it," says I; "but do prythee await till you feel stouter of heart." And then I tried to restore her confidence by all the means I could; but indeed my own heart quailed within me. For to realize our terrible position, you must fancy yourself standing on the steep roof of the highest cathedral, with no parapet to arrest your fall, and one of the slates so loose that it may slip under your foot, no matter how carefully you step.
"Thank you, Benet," says my dear lady. "You have brought my courage back. Come, let us go."
So with that she begins that backward journey; but now, instead of looking to the rock under my own feet, I was casting my eyes to my dear lady's for that loose rock she had spoken of. Presently I caught sight of it—a great slab that lay on the slope, with no space behind for a footing, and too wide to step across. And seeing this I sought with an eager fury for some means of stopping our fall if this slab should slide under our feet, but I could spy nothing but a fissure behind the slab, into which I might by chance thrust my arm in falling.
Now scarcely had my eye made this out when my dear lady stepped on the slab, and, to my sickening horror, I perceived it tilt a little, being very nicely poised; and doubtless had I set my foot firmly upon it at that moment, our combined weight would have held it firm and stationary, as it had in passing over it before, until it was released of my weight. But this did not occur to my slow wit at the right time—nay, rather, seeing this movement, I held back, and would have drawn my lady away. This hesitation (and maybe a little jerk I gave in my terror to her hand) was fatal, for ere I could cry aloud to her the great slab slid, and my dear lady, in striving to keep her balance, lost her footing and fell; then seeing that I was like to be drawn down the slope myself, when nothing in the world could have saved us from sliding with the slab to perdition, I threw myself on my face, and, flinging aside my stick, thrust my arm down that rent in the rock of which I have made mention. Thus I lay sprawled on that steep incline, half the length of my left arm wedged in the fissure above my head, and my right hand linked to my Lady Biddy's as she lay prone upon the slab.
My sole thought was to hold my dear lady, and this was no slight matter, for the edge of the slab had caught in her waist-belt, so that for a moment she and that great mass of rock hung, as I may say, on my bent arm. In that moment the bone of my forearm snapped like a dry stick, and indeed I thought my muscles must be torn asunder also, so sharp and strong was the strain upon it; but, thanks be to God, my lady's belt bursting, the slab slid from beneath her, and so was I relieved of that prodigious weight.