without Gerry's nerves!
The girl was in a desperately overwrought state by this time. The
troubles of the last few days culminating in her disgrace in class that
morning, added to the hopeless exhibition she had been making of
herself all through the afternoon, had rendered her unfit for even the
simplest thing. When ordered to climb the rope ladder she obeyed
dumbly, much in the way a condemned man might obey the order to walk to
the scaffold; and, spurred on by Muriel's urging from below, she did
succeed in mounting to a fair height. But rope ladders are not such
easy things to climb as a novice might suppose. They have a nasty
knack of doubling up and slipping away from you when you least expect
them to, and when she was some thirty feet up this was what happened to
the one Gerry was endeavouring to mount. And instead of trying to
regain her balance, the girl gave way to the panic that had possessed
her more or less all the afternoon.

She clutched desperately to the rope with her hands, and pushed hard
with her feet, which, of course, only had the effect of turning her
still more upside down.

"Let your body hang limp until you are in a proper position again,"
called Muriel. But Gerry was far too terrified and unnerved to act
upon her directions, even if she had been able to take in exactly what
they meant.

"Muriel! I--I can't get right way up," she gasped, struggling to keep
her self-control. But Muriel did not realise quite how frightened
Gerry really was. She spoke impatiently as she answered her, while a
gale of laughter at the unsightly figure poor Gerry made as she clung
to the rope like a drowning man, went through the gymnasium.

"Don't be such a little goat, Gerry!" cried the head girl. "Come down
again if you can't go any farther, but for goodness' sake make an
effort of some sort!"

Making an effort of any sort was quite beyond poor Gerry's power at the
moment. It seemed to her that she would soon be hanging quite upside
down, and when that happened she was sure that she would have to
release her hold. Already everything was swimming around her; black
specks danced before her eyes, and at last she gave vent to her terror
in an anguished cry for help.

"Oh, Muriel! Muriel! I'm going to fall!" she cried, with a piteous
note in her voice. And seeing that she really was in extremities, the
head girl was obliged to run up the ladder herself and bring her down.

"Well, you _are_ a littl