o the path of light until the intruder looked up. Then she jerked
back, forgetting that she was in the darkness and absolutely invisible.
The action was disastrous, however, for it shook Chris's diamond star
from her head, and it fell gently almost at the feet of the climber. An
instant later and his eyes had fallen upon it.

"What bloomin' luck," he said, hoarsely. "I suppose that girl yonder must
have dropped it over. Well, it is as good as a couple of hundred pound to
me, anyway. Little missie, you'd better take a tearful farewell of your
lumps of sugar, as you'll never see them again."

To Chris's quivering indignation he slipped the star into his
breast-pocket. Just for the moment the girl was on the point of crying
out. She was glad she had refrained a second after, for a really
brilliant thought occurred to her. She had never evolved anything more
clever in her life, but she did not quite realise that as yet.

Nearer and nearer the man with the maimed thumb came. Chris stepped back
into the shadow. She waited till the intruder had slipped past her in the
direction of the castle, and prepared to follow at a discreet distance.
Whatever he was after, she felt sure he was being ordered and abetted by
Reginald Henson. Two minutes, five minutes, elapsed before she moved.

What was that? Surely a voice somewhere near her moaning for help. Chris
stood perfectly still, listening for the next cry. Her sense of humanity
had been touched, she had forgotten Merritt entirely. Again the stifled
cry for help came.

"Who are you?" Chris shouted. "And where are you?"

"Henson," came the totally unexpected reply. "I'm down below on a ledge
of rock. No, I'm not particularly badly hurt, but I dare not move."

Chris paused for a moment, utterly bewildered. Henson must have been on
the look-out for his accomplice, she thought, and had missed his footing
and fallen. Pity he had not fallen a little farther, she murmured
bitterly, and broken his neck. But this was only for a moment, and her
sense of justice and humanity speedily returned.

"I cannot see anything of you," she said.

"All the same, I can see your outline," Henson said, dismally. "I don't
feel quite so frightened now. I can hang on a bit longer, especially now
I know assistance is at hand. At first I began to be afraid that I was a
prisoner for the night. No; don't go. If I had a rope I should have the
proper confidence to swarm up again. And there is a coil of rope