"Roger, what have you been about? Are you hurt?" Sir Richard said.
Hurt! was that all? She ventured to open her eyes, and saw Roger limping towards them, covered with dust and lime, but smiling through the incrustation. She rushed forward and took hold of his arm with both her hands.
"Roger! Then nothing has happened?"
"I am not a ghost," he said, half laughing, "and I'll give you my word if you like never to try that confounded place again. You must speak to Murray—he is more shaken than I am. Didn't you think he was mad, with that horrible laugh?"
"What were you doing?" said Sir Richard. "Surely not the incredible folly of climbing that wall! What good could it do you? I don't wonder Mary is upset. Pray go in now; pray go in. You see he is not hurt."
"But Mr Murray! Oh, Roger, how did it all happen? How did you escape? What made him laugh so?" said Miss Ridley, shuddering. "I thought you were killed, and that he had lost his senses. Oh, Roger, what a laugh!"
"Pooh! Some fellows have that fiendish way of laughing, and he got nervous. Don't you see it's all right now? You'll have to thank him, though," Roger added, hastily; "but for him I should have been carried down feet foremost, as the people say. I don't know what we can say to him—he has saved my life!"
"Oh, God bless him! God bless him!" cried Mary. She made a step forward, then turned again, with a visible tremor.
"But are you sure he is—quite—quite——Mr Murray," she added, growing very pale, and putting out her hands to him as he approached from under the old doorway, "oh, how can I thank you? You have saved Roger's life!"
Abel was paler than she was, and his face looked like that of a man absolutely worn out and exhausted. "It was nothing," he said. "I knew one way was safe, but not the other. The upper arch always crumbled at a touch—but I frightened you, I know I must have frightened you. It is a foolish weakness I have. I laugh when I am agitated."