The water in the well reached Joel's arm-pits as he stood on its bottom and lifted Celia to his shoulder. She clung to him for a little with a suffocating grip, strangling, sobbing, panic-stricken. And as he strove to soothe her, for the first time fear laid its cold hand upon him. He looked up to the circle of blue sky so terrifyingly distant and it seemed incredible that he could ever have made that precipitous descent. Unencumbered he had accomplished the miracle, but he knew he could never climb back to the warm peace of the upper air with Celia in his arms.
The child's sobs were quieting. She was perched upon his shoulder, her arm wound tightly about his neck. Even at the moment when all the tragic possibilities of the event crowded on his mind, he felt the tremor of her rigid little body and thought anxiously that Celia was in danger of taking cold.
With an effort he took a grip upon realities. Gently he loosened the pressure of the child's encircling arms.
"Celia, honey, don't hold Uncle Joel so tight. He's got to get breath enough to holler, so somebody will come and take us out of this."
He had shouted till he was hoarse before he realized his folly. There were no neighbors near enough to hear his cries. The sensible thing was to husband his strength till some vehicle passed and then call lustily. Again he addressed the child.
"Celia, dearie, keep your ears open. When we hear wheels coming, we'll holler for all we're worth."
They listened till they heard upon the road the rhythmic foot-beats of horses, and the rattle of some farmer's wagon rumbling homeward from the village. Then together they screamed for help. But the hoofs went on beating their tattoo till the sound grew faint, and the rattle of the wagon died in the distance. Again and again the sound which told of human nearness woke hope in their hearts only to die in the ensuing silence.
"Uncle Joel," Celia wailed, "I'm co-old." Her sobs echoed uncannily as if the well were filled with the ghosts of weeping children. Again he gazed at the disk of blue sky overhead. He seemed to himself to be viewing it from some indeterminate half-way house between life and death. And yet of the two, the invisible world seemed nearer than the earth roofed over by that placid sky.
As time passed his suffering became acute. The weight of the child on his shoulder was an increasing torture. The cramped arm raised to hold her secure was racked by intolerable pain. The chill of the water was paralyzing. His heart labored. His breath came with difficulty. Celia seemed to be relapsing into an unnatural drowsiness. Her body sagged lifelessly. He found it necessary to stand close to the side of the well, that the wet stones might help to support her weight.
There was only once he prayed, unless his struggle be counted as one long prayer. But when his appeal found words, it was less a petition than a suggestion. "She's so little, Lord, for it to end here, and she's had a hard time so far. The fun's just beginning." It showed no lack of wisdom, perhaps, that his prayer ended there.