iff from which he had
apparently fallen, and which lifted its blank and stony face above
him, with no care now but to drink the sunshine on which his eyes were
closed, and then Rowland had an immense outbreak of pity and anguish. At
last they spoke of carrying him back to the inn. "There must be three or
four men," Rowland said, "and they must be brought here quickly. I have
not the least idea where we are."

"We are at about three hours' walk from home," said Singleton. "I will
go for help; I can find my way."

"Remember," said Rowland, "whom you will have to face."

"I remember," the excellent fellow answered. "There was nothing I could
ever do for him in life; I will do what I can now."

He went off, and Rowland stayed there alone. He watched for seven long
hours, and his vigil was forever memorable. The most rational of men was
for an hour the most passionate. He reviled himself with transcendent
bitterness, he accused himself of cruelty and injustice, he would
have lain down there in Roderick's place to unsay the words that had
yesterday driven him forth on his lonely ramble. Roderick had been fond
of saying that there are such things as necessary follies, and Rowland
was now proving it. At last he grew almost used to the dumb exultation
of the cliff above him. He saw that Roderick was a mass of hideous
injury, and he tried to understand what had happened. Not that it helped
him; before that confounding mortality one hypothesis after another
faltered and swooned away. Roderick's passionate walk had carried him
farther and higher than he knew; he had outstayed, supposably, the first
menace of the storm, and perhaps even found a defiant entertainment
in watching it. Perhaps he had simply lost himself. The tempest had
overtaken him, and when he tried to return, it was too late. He
had attempted to descend the cliff in the darkness, he had made the
inevitable slip, and whether he had fallen fifty feet or three hundred
little mattered. The condition of his body indicated the shorter fall.
Now that all was over, Rowland understood how exclusively, for two
years, Roderick had filled his life. His occupation was gone.

Singleton came back with four men--one of them the landlord of the inn.
They had formed a sort of rude bier of the frame of a chaise a porteurs,
and by taking a very round-about course homeward were able to follow a
tolerably level path and carry their burden with a certain decency. To
Rowland it seemed