"We were at play," he said hoarsely. "All day we were at play, and I forgot that this was the Grey Leap. There was a loose stone, and he slipped upon it. I think—I think—he is still alive."
What the fingers pointed at was plainly in sight, a little wisp of white caught upon a point of rock behind the shelter of which grew a stunted pine, but I readily comprehended how she had missed seeing him. A moment back, under the revelation of her cry and the touch of her hand, I, too, had gone blind as the sound as of many waters roared in my ears. And now, as love staggered her, she could not see the little bundle of white linen which might, as Brother Paul said, be alive, but which showed no life.
"Gaston!" she cried, her voice shrill and harsh by turns. "Gaston! Gaston!"
"I think he is alive," said Brother Paulus again, though what he founded his thought on God knows, unless it was on pure faith, for there was neither sound nor motion.
"Gaston! Gaston! Gaston!" she cried again, and then, rising, to my terror she set herself to find a way down the face of the rock.
Rising also, but only to his knees, Brother Paulus caught her by the skirt. He, too, had divined her intention, and saw its hopeless folly; no cliff amongst the many in the hills had so evil a repute as the Grey Leap.
"No, Suzanne, no," said he, "it is death; there is no way, I have searched, and there is none, none."
"You have searched, you, who let him fall! Stay on your knees and pray; that is your business; mine is to find a way down to my boy, or if there is none, to make a way."
"Let him fall?" said he, with a gasp, and wincing as if she had struck him with a whip. "How did I let him fall? Could I have helped it?"
"God knows," answered she; "but he was with you, and he fell."