But, somehow, their homage made her feel uneasy; it put too great a distance beneath her and them.
The crown of daring which she wore did not fit quite so easily.
She began to feel like a usurper whose head might at any moment be taken off.
And, with that, she decided to vacate!
Drawing up her feet much more gracefully than her predecessor had done, she curled her body in the seat and raised it slowly until she was in a standing position, grasping the stone arms of the chair, turned–turned rather sickeningly, to be sure, until her breast was against the broad rock down which she had slid, then reached upward for a handhold by which to climb–to draw herself up.
There was one. The nickum–churlish climber–had pulled himself up by it. Like him, she had fought shy of it, sliding down, for fear it should catch in her clothing.
A little spur it was, projecting from a slight fissure, what he called a “nick,” in the rock, rather more than half-way up,–a good seven feet from the rocky armchair.
Breathlessly she reached upward, to grasp it.
And, lo! her lips fell apart–like a cleft stone.
At the same time her heart slunk out of her body and dropped into the precipice behind her.