yon wall. He was working as
silently as he could, but with a fierce eagerness that caused an
occasional slip of the crowbar on the rock.

Although the great block of stone weighed over two tons, its base was
small and rounded, and the mass behind it gave him leverage for his
bar. Every inch that he pried it forward, the stones slipped farther
down into the widening crack and held the vantage he had gained.
Already the bowlder had been pushed out at the top many inches. It
was almost balanced. The time had come to see if he could not pry it
over with a single heave.

He did not propose to fall over after the rock. He turned his face to
the brink, set the end of the bar in the crevice, and braced himself
to heave backwards on the outer end. He put his weight on it and
pulled. He could feel the rock give--the top was moving outward. A
little more, and it must topple over.

Close behind him spoke a voice so hoarse and low-pitched with horror
that it sounded like a man's--"Drop that bar! drop it!"

With the swiftness of a wolf, he bounded sideways along the rim-rock.
In the same lightning movement, he whirled face about and whipped his
Colt's from its holster. His finger was crooking against the trigger
before he saw who it was that confronted him. The hammer fell in the
same instant that he twitched the muzzle up and sideways. The heavy
bullet scorched the girl's cheek.

Above the crashing report rose a wild cry, "Miss Chuckie--God!"

Through the blinding, stinging powder-smoke she saw him stagger
backwards as if to flee from what he thought he had done. His foot
went down over the sharp edge. He flung up his hands and dropped into
the abyss.

She did not shriek. She could not. Her tongue clove to the roof of
her mouth. Her heart stopped beating. She crumpled down and lay
gasping. But the fascination of horror spurred her to struggle to her
knees and creep over to peer down from the place where he had fallen.

Beneath her was only blank, utter darkness. No sound came up out of
the deep except only that ceaseless reverberation of the hidden river.
Twelve hundred feet down, the falling man had struck glancingly upon
the smooth side of an out-jutting rock and his crushed body had been
flung far out and sideways. It plunged into the rapids below the
barrier and was borne away down the canyon. But this the girl could not
have seen even in midday.

She looked for the red star of the distant fire where she knew her
bro