"What do you mean?" cried Forbes. "Are you mad, Chutney?"
"Mad? No. I wish I were. You are blind, Melton. How can we get that rope up the seventy feet stretch from the ledge to the summit of the cliff?"
CHAPTER XXXII.
GOOD-BY TO THE LAKE.
Melton dropped the rope and staggered back from the cliff, his face deadly pale.
"Yes," he said hoarsely, "you—you are right, Chutney. How could we have done such a foolish thing? From that narrow width of the ledge one could not throw a rope twenty feet in air. We are hopelessly cut off from our companions."
"Hullo, down there!"
It was Carrington hailing them from the top of the cliff, and they could make out his figure dimly in the torchlight.
"What is the matter?" shouted Guy lustily, making a trumpet of his hands.
In a moment the reply came distinctly to their ears.