“Can you ascend?”
I half extended my hand to assist Hildegarde, but perhaps she failed to note the fact, or else did not care to accept my aid, for she mounted the ladder with the agility of a gazelle leaping over the green veldt—a swish of her skirts and she had landed upon the gently sloping roof of the toolhouse.
I wanted to cry “well done,” but something seemed to hold my tongue; she would not care for such an expression of appreciation on my part.
“You next, Carmencita,” I said, and the child was up in almost a twinkling, to meet the eager, outstretched hand above, and be drawn safely to the roof.
“I’m last,” declared Robbins.
“Very good,” was my reply, and with a rush I darted up the ladder.
Then came the sturdy mate—the lantern I had blown out and left below, as we had no longer any need for its services, and its light might betray us to the enemy.
They had scattered in various directions, so that the whole garden seemed to be undergoing a species of spring cleaning, bushes being roundly whipped and every foot of ground closely searched—all but the very corner where we were so busily engaged in working out our own salvation.
No sooner was Robbins able to plant his feet upon the roof than he laid hold of his side of the clumsy ladder, even as I had grasped the other.
It was a cumbersome affair, that certainly reflected no great credit on its builder, but something had to come when the two of us got to work, and hence the ladder was successfully hoisted and swung over the outside of the wall.