Presently his head appeared above the brink.
“Let me take the child from you, Rob,” he said, leaning over solicitously.
When the transfer had been safely made it was no trouble to help Rob over the edge of the precipice, for such the wall of the aperture appeared to them.
“Mighty well done, I want to tell you, Rob!” said Ralph, earnestly, as he squeezed the hand of the still trembling scout leader, for the recent effort had naturally been quite a strain on the boy’s nervous system.
Rob was laughing. After it was all over he effected to make light of his achievement, as that class of boys always do, never liking to hear themselves praised.
“Oh! it was a mere trifle, Ralph, and I’m only sorry I monopolized the fun. But take the light, will you, and turn it on the boy. I want to look him over, and see what the worst is we must expect.”
The little fellow presented rather a pitiable aspect. He had received several scratches, and his face was quite bloody; besides that, his clothing was badly torn, possibly brought about through making a passage amidst thorns while lost in the woods.
“Say, he does look pretty bad, now,” admitted Tubby, seriously.
“Looks don’t count for much, Tubby,” Rob soon told him. “We can wash his face and hands, and improve his appearance a hundred per cent; if only he hasn’t any broken bones; and, so far, I don’t find anything of that kind. It’s strange how a child may fall from a fourth-story window and never seem to be hurt. Caleb hit his head, and has lain in something of a swoon for hours. Perhaps it was just as well, for if he had moved, he might have fallen the rest of the way down to the bottom of that hole. He’s just beginning to get his senses now, after all this time.”