"We must! We must!" cried Miss Forest, clinging to her friend as she looked down the steep way they had come. "It can be no worse than going up. Indeed, I do not believe we can get back. Do you think so, Grace?"
Her friend smiled and said, "We are doing well, are we not, Mr. Winslow?"
"You certainly are. Fifty feet more will take us out of this brook bed to a road less steep, though perhaps less easy to climb."
Having rested for a short time, they again began the ascent, but a few more yards brought them to the most difficult place to surmount they had met with.
"Now, ladies, I have helped you up so far," said Winslow, after he had examined the wall before and above them; "you must now help me." He spoke cheerfully. "This place is too high for me to go up without a little help. Just above is the last of the brook bed for us."
"How may we help you?" said Miss Gaston, surveying the red and apparently impassable wall they were yet to climb. Her face told Winslow that she felt the difficulty of their position. Her friend sat down without a word, the picture of despair.
Winslow lost no time. Taking from his pocket a large knife, he carefully selected a place measuring from Miss Gaston's head, and in a few minutes had cut a notch in the loose rock large enough to receive part of a foot. He then cut another as high from the base as she could reach with her foot to lift her weight from the ground. Between the two now cut he made another.
"Now, ladies you must hold me against the rock when I step up on the lowest notch."
Placing his foot in position he rose up, and while held there by both the young women he cut a fourth notch above the highest one. Miss Forest saw what he wished to do and became more hopeful again.
"Less than three minutes will find us all above. Now, ladies, your assistance again."