even though
the thought flashed on her brain that now this man whom she had
wounded could hurl her to destruction by a touch. She had no fear of
him; only pressed upward steadily. In another moment, her head passed
above the level of the ledge. She took the hand Garry Hawks held out
and climbed upon the narrow support, where she shrank back against the
cliff, after one glance into the gulf yawning at her feet. The level
space was a scant yard in width here, and lessened on the side away
from the falls, until it ceased entirely. In the other direction, it
ran, broadening a very little, to where a tiny cleft showed in the
precipice. Plutina guessed that this marked the entrance to a cavern.
Despite the bravery of her changed mood, the eerie retreat daunted her
by its desolate isolation. Then, Hodges climbed upon the ledge, and
she heard his shout, coming faintly to her ears above the roar of the
cascade which fell just beyond the cavern's mouth.

"Welcome, home, Honey!" he bawled, with his detested jocularity.
"They hain't nobody a-goin' to butt in on our love-makin' up hyar."

Tittering and leering, he seized the girl by the arm, and led her,
unresisting, to the cranny that was the door of the cave. A glance
over her shoulder showed Garry Hawks on his knee, hauling up the
ladder. She knew that with its disappearance there would remain nought
by which the searchers could guess whither she had vanished, or how.
Once again, courage went out of her. In its place was despair.

CHAPTER XX

The cave into which Plutina now entered was a small, uneven chamber,
some three yards in width at its highest point. It extended back for a
little way, but the roof sloped downward so sharply that only in the
central space could the girl stand upright, and even there Hodges had
to stoop. On the far side was a hole in the rocky wall. It was hardly
a yard in height, but the faint glow that marked it was proof that it
reached to the daylight outside. At the best, it could serve as a
passage-way only to one creeping on hands and knees. So much Plutina
perceived in the first curious survey of her prison. The inspection
was rendered possible by the murky light of a tallow candle, fixed in
its own grease to a fragment of stone near the center of the cavern.

As the outlaw released his hold on her arm, the girl sank down
listlessly on a part of the wall that projected like a bench near the
entrance. She leaned back against the cold ston