"I don't think," she remarked, helping herself to a sandwich, "that anybody's going to be cruel enough to make me do it."
"If I do it," said Holton, "no one else will ever have to try it again in winter. It will be like discovering the North Pole—there's nothing in it for the second man."
"You're not going to try it! Please don't!" cried Mrs. Holton. "If you got hurt it would spoil the party for everybody."
"Don't worry, Aunt Nellie. It's as easy as walking home."
He was already throwing off his overcoat, measuring the height and choosing a place for his ascent.
Amid a chorus of protests and taunts he began climbing rapidly. Phil rose and watched him with sophisticated eyes as he began mounting. She saw at once that he had chosen the least fortunate place in the whole face of the declivity for an ascent. There were two or three faintly scratched paths, by which the adventurous sometimes struggled to the top, and she had herself experimented with all of them; but Holton had essayed the most precipitous and hazardous point for his attempt.
At the start he sprang agilely up the limestone which for a distance thrust out rough shelves with ladder-like regularity; and when this failed, he caught at the wild tangle of frozen shrubbery and clutched the saplings that had hopefully taken root wherever patches of earth gave the slightest promise of succor. As his difficulties increased a hush fell upon the spectators.
He accomplished half the ascent, and paused to rest, clinging with one hand to a slender maple. He turned and waved his cap, and was greeted with a cheer.
"Better let it go at that!" called one of the young men. "Come on back."
Charles flung down a contemptuous answer and addressed himself to the more difficult task beyond. Particles of ice and frozen earth detached by his upward scramble clattered down noisily. Withered leaves, shaken free from niches where the winds had gathered them, showered fitfully into the valley. He began drawing himself along by shrubs and young trees that covered a long outward curve in the face of the cliff. Those below heard the crackle of frozen twigs, and the swish of released boughs that marked his progress. Phil stood watching him with an absorbed interest in which fear became dominant. Better than the others Phil knew the perils of the cliff, the scant footholds offered by even the least formidable points in the rough surface.