On reaching home the girls found breakfast waiting, but Jo Ann could scarcely eat in her eagerness to get to the balcony before Felipe cleaned the office.
While Florence went to the kitchen to discuss menus with Juana, Jo Ann and Peggy slipped to the balcony. The rope, they found, was hanging just as they had left it the day before, and while not very conspicuous against the dull gray color of the wall, Jo Ann felt that it ought to be put completely out of sight. As she studied the wall, she unwound the roll of heavy cord she had bought earlier in the morning.
“Look down the street, Peg,” she ordered. “Do you see anybody?”
“No, it seems practically deserted right now,” Peggy replied. “Why?”
“I have to climb part way up that rope again, and I don’t want any spectators,” she explained while fastening the cord to the end of the rope. “If you see anybody coming, let me know.”
“All right.”
As soon as she began climbing up the rope, Jo Ann realized how sore her muscles were from the unusual strain she had put upon them the day before. Would she be able to make it to the top? she wondered. “I’ve got to do it,” she told herself the next moment, tightening her lips into a firm line.
Inch by inch she pulled herself up, slipping the cord through each of the loops in the rope as she went. On reaching the roof she found it extremely difficult to steady herself while passing the cord through the highest loops, but as she was determined to pull the rope up as high as possible, she kept on trying. Having succeeded at last in getting it through the loop at the roof’s edge, she took the end of the cord between her teeth and began to slip slowly down the rope.
When she was a little over halfway, Peggy suddenly cried, “Hurry, Jo! Here come some people! I believe they see you—they’re looking this way. Hurry!”
Instinctively Jo Ann turned her head to see the people. As she did so, her elbow scraped the rough plastered wall. A sharp pain instantly shot through her arm, and slightly loosening her hold on the rope, she slipped rapidly to the floor.