“Yes,” panted Mark, who was pressing his hands to his breast.
“But I say, what’s the matter with you? Your voice sounds so queer!”
“Does it? I shall be better directly. Fancying you had fallen set my heart off racing—a sort of palpitation; but it’s calming down now. Can you hold on? Are you safe?”
“Well, I don’t feel so bad. That horrible frightened feeling has gone off, and I think I can hold on or begin to climb again now.”
“No, no; don’t try yet,” cried Mark.
“All right; but what are you going to do?”
“Come down to you as soon as I can breathe more easily. I am all of a quiver, and just as if I had been running a race.”
“All right, then, wait; but it’s of no use for you to try to get down. What good could you do?”
“I don’t know yet,” replied Mark. “All I know is that I can’t leave you like this. I must come and help you.”
“No, you mustn’t,” said Dean. “You would only be in the way, and I am getting more and more all right. I felt just like a little child in the dark for the time; but that nasty sensation has all gone now. Why, Mark, old man, you seem to be worse than I was.”