“Take hold the other line,” he said. The girl hesitated. “Do you hear? Grab it quick, and pull up hard, if you don’t want a tumble!”
The girl seized the part of the creeper which was fastened above, and drew herself up with convulsive energy. Instantly Blake rose to his knees, and grasping the taut creeper with one hand, reached down with the other, to swing the girl up beside him on the branch.
“All right, Miss Jenny,” he reassured her as he felt her tremble. “Sorry to scare you, but I couldn’t have made it without. Now, if you’ll just hold down my legs, we’ll soon hoist his ludship.”
He had seated her in the broadest part of the shallow hollow, where the branch joined the main trunk of the fig. Heaped with the reeds which he had gathered during the afternoon, it made such a cozy shelter that she at once forgot her dizziness and fright. Nestling among the reeds, she leaned over and pressed down on his ankles with all her strength.
The loose end of the creeper had fallen to the ground when Blake lifted her upon the branch, and Winthrope was already slipping into the loop. Blake ordered him to take it off, and send up the club. As the creeper was again flung down, a black shadow swept over the jungle.
“Hello! Sunset!” called Blake. “Look sharp, there!”
“All ready,” responded Winthrope.
Blake drew in a full breath, and began to hoist. The position was an awkward one, and Winthrope weighed thirty or forty pounds more than Miss Leslie. But as the Englishman came within reach of the descending loop, he grasped it and did what he could to ease Blake’s efforts. A few moments found him as high above the ground as Blake could raise him. Without waiting for orders, he swung himself upon the upper part of the creeper, and climbed the last few feet unaided. Blake grunted with satisfaction as he pulled him in upon the branch.
“You may do, after all,” he said. “At any rate, we’re all aboard for the night; and none too soon. Hear that!”
“What?”