“Yes, John—yes.”
She set to work in the dark, rolling the sheets up and knotting the ends as stoutly as she could. Yet she mistrusted the knots, lest they should slip and dash the man to the stones below. And in her dread of it she pondered the case, and then looked up at the window.
“Have you a knife?”
“Surely, being a sailor.”
He fumbled for it, cramped and wedged in as he was, and dropped it down upon the bed. Barbara felt for it, and, cutting off two thick strands of her hair, bound down the ends of the knots with the strands so that they should hold more surely under his weight.
“Here, John.”
She mounted the bed and held the end to him, and he knotted it about the bar as firmly as a seaman could.
“Can you reach it when I have gone? Try.”
She reached out her hands.
“Yes, easily. Take the knife back. They might find it, and suspect.”