“Where are you going?” said Railsford.
“I’m going to hop up beside him,” shouted Dig, almost beside himself with relief.
The master caught him firmly by the arm.
“If you think of such a thing, Oakshott, I shall get Farmer White here to cart you straight back to Grandcourt.”
This terrible threat sobered Dig at once. He waited impatiently till the two men had made their arrangements, and then, with beating heart, accompanied the master to the ruin.
“He is safe up where he is,” said the latter, “and says he has room to sit down and a back of ivy to lean against. But he must be half drowned and frozen. It will do him good to know you are here. Now stay where you are, while I get on the wall and shout to him. He cannot hear us down here.” Dig waited, and listened to the master scrambling up the ivy and feeling his way on his hands and knees along the wall to the bottom of the arch.
Then he heard him shout—
“Arthur, are you there, all right?”
And his heart leapt as a shrill reply came back from the heights.
“Oakshott is here with me,” shouted the master.