.
With care, she told herself, after a long scrutiny, she might make the
descent. The rope about her she knew could not reach to the bottom of
the cliff. She would untie it and trust entirely to her clinging hands
and prehensile moccasined feet. She stood up, suddenly confident of
her own powers in this element. Cupping her hands about her mouth she
shouted to Harlan informing him of her intention. Evidently he did not
hear her, or else she could not hear his answer. After waiting a few
minutes she untied the rope from about her and cautiously began the
descent.

Very slowly and carefully she lowered herself, her feet and hands
clinging tenaciously. The keen salt wind ballooned her ragged skirts
about her. Occasionally when her foot slipped and showers of loosened
particles rolled down startling birds from their perches in screaming
clouds, she could feel the blood pounding in her temples in momentary
fright. At first she marveled at her own daring--then she reveled in
it.

As she descended she began to experience that thrill which comes to
those who tread where no other human foot has trodden, who look on
scenes no other human eye has visioned. She felt sure she was the
first to visit this part of Kon Klayu, for the steep cliffs at the
south were inaccessible both from the east and from the west side of
the Island, even at the lowest tide. And in all the tales of Kon Klayu
she had heard, no one had ever mentioned the chasm down which she had
come to the ledge. In this section of tidal waves and occasional heavy
earthquakes, it was possible that the cleft had opened up recently.

At last she felt her feet on the beach below. She straightened and
turned to face the ocean. The waters were sewn with jagged rocks and
long-running reefs. Sleek-haired seals bobbed up to look humanly at
her. A thin, high-rising jet of water afar out bespoke the presence of
a whale. Back of her loomed the precipitous wall of the cliff. She
gasped at her own daring as her eye followed the rough stairway down
which she had descended. A moment she wondered, with dismay, if she
could possibly climb back again; a moment she pictured her plight
should she be caught here when the tide came in and covered the narrow
beach; then her attention was drawn by that which lay farther along.
She ran forward, wending her way in and out between the giant balls of
stone that lay about her.

At the base of the precipice just ahead of her, a