“Heavens! He’ll fall into the volcano!” almost screamed Ned.
The sight was almost too painful to be borne. There didn’t appear to be a chance that Herc could save himself. To Ned and the guide it seemed that he was doomed to be plunged into the crater and burned to death in its glowing, oven-like depths.
But suddenly Ned gave a cry of joy. In his fall, Herc had struck the very ledge upon which he had spied the glittering specimens of rock, one of which he had been so anxious to procure. By an almost superhuman effort he had checked his fall, and was now lying trembling and pale on this insecure shelf overhanging the glowing mouth of the crater.
Ned set out running, with the guide at his heels. When he reached a spot directly above the ledge to which Herc was clinging, he shouted down at him:
“Are you all right, Herc?”
“Yes, so far; but the gases from this bake-oven are choking me. Get me out of here quick!”
“Can’t you climb up?”
“No; the cliff bulges out right above me. I could never make it.”
“Goodness, what are we to do? Here, you,” to the guide, “hurry and get a rope some place.”
“No can get rope nearer than Glenwood,” declared the guide.