Once he started a dog barking and had to remain motionless for a long time, but the most trying experience was that when he had cautiously stolen very near to the grange, a figure on horseback rode up and passed within a yard of him. He stepped behind a tree and saw the door opened. A flood of light streamed out and before he could get on the further side of the tree again he felt he must be seen.
Once more he waited a long time till all was dark and quiet. He climbed the first tree with less difficulty than he expected, but the branches of the two trees were further apart than he had thought. Finally he had to go up higher and lay the rope over a branch and lower himself, holding the two ends and then, after reaching the other tree, pull the rope over the branch by one end.
The rain and the darkness made discovery less likely; but everything was slippery and the difficulties were greatly increased. Having climbed up higher he started along one branch but after he had reached the furthest safe point he found that he was still a long way from the wall.
Again he tried a second branch, but, although a little nearer, it was an awful gulf in the black night.
A third time he crept slowly along another slippery branch that swayed and bent under his weight. “Suppose the whole thing should break, elm trees are notoriously treacherous,” he thought.
The branch was worse than the second and he had to go back to that one. This time he managed to wriggle out a couple of feet further, where the branch gave a sudden turn upward and to the left, parallel to the face of the wall. He could dimly discern the top of the parapet on a slightly lower level, perhaps six feet distant. He tied a heavy knot in the rope and swung it out to hit the stonework, so as to measure the distance. It was perhaps rather under than over seven feet. But a seven foot jump from a wet swaying branch, with a forty foot drop in the pitch darkness was a fearsome task. The thought made him feel quite sick and the nausea made his brain reel. A slight squall of wind blew up and the branch rocked and creaked ominously. He had to hold on with all his strength or he would have fallen.
When he had recovered himself a little, a thought struck him; he would double the rope and loop it round the branch and then tie the ends firmly about him under the arm-pits. The rope was not very strong; but surely, if doubled, there was just a chance of its standing a sudden jerk.
After he had done this, he nerved himself for the last effort, but before standing up, he prayed for Aline passionately, fervently, as though the intensity of his prayer should insure its answer. He then rose and, balancing himself with difficulty, leaped across. He reached the parapet; but it was wet, while the lichens on it made it like glass and he slipped down, down, down, into the void.
He heard a laugh as of a fiend and saw Aline’s face blanched with pity; there was an awful wrench under his arms and a snap above; one of the thicknesses of rope had broken;—but he was still alive. He climbed hand over hand feverishly, without pausing an instant, up the slimy rope and then held on to the branch, while wave after wave of uncontrollable terror swept over him. His excitement was so violent that he feared he would lose his reason. He used all his will power to bring it under control; but he could not do it. Must he abandon the attempt, could he ever force himself, there, in the horrible yawning blackness to go through with it again? His teeth chattered and, do what he would, his hands shook till he nearly fell again. Then he thought of Aline and saw her swimming the river, while he rested his wounded arm upon her shoulder. “Coward,” he hissed through his teeth, “coward. But oh, Aline, if only it were for you!”