"I was allowin' that we'd better give the contrivance a try while we had time, so's to make certain it would work smooth."
This seemed a reasonable precaution, and Captain Eph knotted the padded rope around the first assistant's body, after which the window overlooking the eastern side of the ledge was opened, and Mr. Peters clambered up on the sill.
The keeper and Uncle Zenas, sitting near each other, hauled the line taut as it ran through the block, and when Mr. Peters swung himself off the sill of the window, they lowered him slowly to the rocks below.
Sidney, standing near by, could see the first assistant as he went boldly into the surf, and, as the waves carried him from his feet, the two men in the kitchen readily pulled him backward and upward until it was possible for him to regain his footing.
"It's a good plan, Uncle Zenas," Captain Eph said approvingly; "but I allow that Sammy stands a chance to get more or less skin scraped off of him if we're called upon to do the job in a hurry."
"He won't know it until the job is done, an' then we'll have plenty of time to patch him up. Sonny, s'pose you get the glasses, an' keep your eye on the dory."
When Sidney returned to the kitchen with the glasses in his hand, Mr. Peters had just been hauled up through the window, and was standing by the stove while the water, unheeded by Uncle Zenas, ran in streams from his garments to the floor.
It was now possible to see the oncoming dory plainly with the naked eye, for she was hardly more than a mile away, and drifting rapidly toward the ledge; but by the aid of the glasses the lad could make out plainly the forms of the two occupants, one of whom appeared to be crouching in the bow with his head above the rail as if watching, while the other lay without movement in the stern.
"She couldn't make a better course for this 'ere ledge if the best sailor who ever walked a plank was steerin' her," Captain Eph said as he looked seaward. "She'll strike nearabout the cove, an' the question is whether Sammy can get that far before bein' knocked down."
"Don't be in too big a hurry to pull me out, an' I'll get mighty near to those fellows, if so be the dory strikes anywhere near where we're expectin'," Mr. Peters said as he came toward the window. "We won't be havin' any too much time, if I start now," and he stepped out of the window, clutching the sill until the two at the rope were ready to lower him away.