CHAPTER TWENTY ONE.
Aleck went along the cliff the next day to look out for the boat, fullyintending to turn back if he caught sight of Eben's wife; but as far ashe could make out she was nowhere in that direction. Still he concludedthat she might possibly come to the place she affected, so he determinedto keep on his own side of the depression, lowering himself down to theshelf in which was the niche or crack, in the belief that he could get afair view over the sea from among the scattered masses of rock whilebeing quite out of the woman's sight if she should come after all.
He swung himself down till he stood upon the shelf, and gave one hastylook round, to come to the conclusion directly after that if the poorwoman sought his favourite look-out spot he could not have chosen aworse place, for he would be in full view, no matter where he crouched.
"I know," he said to himself; "I can get over here and lie down in thecrack on the other side."
He began to climb, after making for the hole where the lanthorn andtinder-box still lay tucked tightly in beyond the reach of the wind; andthe next minute, after making his way diagonally upward, he came uponthe beginning of a steep narrow gully, going right down more and moredeeply, so that forty or fifty yards away he could not see the bottom,the place having the appearance of being a vast crack formed by a suddensubsidence of the rocky cliff.
He was now out of sight from the other side of the great depression, andwas just congratulating himself upon his selection of a hiding-place andlook-out combined, when he recalled the sounds he had heard during aformer visit.
"Why, it must have been caused by something falling down here," heargued, and he looked outward, to see that this was one of thenarrowest, deepest and most savage-looking gullies he had seen, theplace being giddy to look down and impressing him with the belief thatthe greatest care was necessary for anyone to move about; and as hedropped down upon his knees it was with a feeling of relief and safety,for accustomed though he was to climbing about upon the cliffs, this oneparticular spot looked giddy and wild.
To his great satisfaction he found that he could follow the crack rightdown to the sea and obtain a good view without being seen, unless anyonehad followed his example and climbed; but what most took his attentionwas that though he had been climbing about the place often in search ofthe eggs of rare birds, he had never been there before, or noted theexistence of such a deeply-split cavity in the cliffs.
"I must have been able to see it from off the sea," he argued, but gavehimself up to the thought directly after that ridges and hollows had acompletely different aspect when seen from below.
"I should know it now directly if I were sailing by and looked up, ofcourse. I fancy I can recollect this steep wall-like bit down belowwhere I'm sitting."
He started the next moment, for a great gull had come gliding up frombehind and passed so closely over his head that he was startled by thefaint whizz of its outspread wings, while the bird itself was sostartled that it uttered a hoarse cry of alarm and plunged down headforemost like a stone.
"Why, that must have been the kind that made that cry like a hail,"cried Aleck, as the bird disappeared into the depths of the gully, whilehe had hardly realised the thought before there rose from below a faint,hoarse cry.
"I thought so," he said; "those birds have different cries and theysound strange, according to where you are."
He did not finish his words, for all at once the peculiar cry aroseagain, and this time it seemed to come from out of the deep jaggedhollow, and certainly from the other side.
"How strange!" said the lad, with a feeling akin to dread runningthrough him. "That can't be a bird."
He listened again, waiting for some minutes in the midst of the silenceof the great wilderness in which he crouched.
Then "Ahoy!" came up, so clearly that there was no room for doubt, andAleck's heart began to beat fast as thought after thought flashedthrough his brain.
"It must be someone calling," he felt and when after a few minutes thecry arose again, the thought struck him that it must come from somewherebeneath his feet, from an opening in the wall of the crack and thenstrike against the opposite wall, from which it was reflected, so thatit seemed to come from that side, and from some distance away.
Aleck waited till the cry came across again, and then shouted in answer:
"Hallo there! What is it?"
There was no response. Then after a pause came "Ahoy!" once more.
"Where are you?" shouted Aleck, but there was no reply, and the resultwas the same when he tried over and over again.
"Whoever it is, he can't hear me," thought the lad, and growing excitednow as he concluded that some fisherman, or perhaps a strange wanderer,had slipped, fallen, and perhaps broken a limb, he began to set aboutfinding him and affording help.
Coming to the belief more fully that the sound came from beneath him,Aleck lay down upon his chest with his head over the brink of the rockygash, and, holding on tightly, strained out as far as he could to lookdown. But he could see nothing, and rose up again to look to his leftfor the dying out in the solid cliff of the top end of the gorge.
That meaning a difficult climb, he made up his mind, to lower himselfdown over the edge, and setting his teeth, he began to lower himselfover; but a slip at the outset so upset his nerves that he scrambledback, panting as if he had been running a mile.
"Nearly went down," he muttered. "That's not the way to help anyone whohas just fallen."
He paused for a few moments to think about getting help from Eilygugg.
"There are no smugglers at home now," he said to himself, and histhoughts turned homeward.
"Uncle couldn't climb up here and handle ropes," he muttered; "and asfor Ness--bah! he's a stupid muddling old woman.
"I must get right round somehow and see where the opening is," said thelad, at last. "But when I have found it, what then? I must get backhere again; and then? Yes, I must have help and a rope. Oh, what alonely old place this is when you want anything done! Bah! What agrumbler you are," he cried, the next moment. "You forgot all aboutTom. He's sure to be over to-day, and I'll bring him with a rope."
This thought heartened the lad up, and he set off cautiously and quicklyto get round by the head of the great rocky gash to the other side.
The journey was very dangerous and bad, but he was a good climber, andat the end of a dozen yards he was stopped by a great block which layacross his path with the portion to his right overhanging the gulf,forcing him to go round by the other end.
This he passed with ease, and he uttered a cry of astonishment the nextmoment, for he found himself at the narrow head of a transverse gashwhich stopped further progress in the way he intended, but offeredapparently, as it curved round and down, an easy descent to the verypart he wished to reach. And so it proved, for proceeding cautiously,he began to descend by a narrow ledge or shelf, with the overhangingwall on his right and a sheer fall of twenty feet on his left.
A few yards further it was forty feet, and again a few yards placed himin a position that cut off all view of the bottom.
"Won't do to be giddy here," he said to himself. "Who'd have thought offinding such a place?"
He moved along cautiously, holding on by the rock on his right, andfound that it was singularly cracked and riven, but it afforded goodhold. Directly after a short pause and peer forward and downward to tryif he could see any signs of the poor fellow who had called for help, hestepped on again slowly and cautiously, anchoring himself, as it were,by thrusting his arm to the elbow in a perpendicular crack, so that hecould hang outward and get a better view down.
"Hullo!" he ejaculated, in wonder. "How strange!" and he began tosniff, as a cool dank puff of air saluted his nostrils and he recognisedthe peculiar odour of decaying seaweed.
"This narrow crack must go right down to the sea somewhere," he said tohimself. "Well, why not? Rocks do split all sorts of ways. There, I'mright," he added, for there was another moist puff of cool air, and incompany w
ith it a peculiar far-off whispering sound, one which he wellknew, for he had heard it thousands of times, it being the soft rattlingof pebbles running back over one another after being cast up by a wave.
"This is queer," he muttered, and, withdrawing his arm, he took anotherstep or two along the ledge, which curved more round to his right, sothat he could not see above a couple of yards, while upon getting to theend of these he found that he had to pass an angle in the rock facewhich brought him to where the ledge widened out considerably.
"I must be just under where I lay down to look over," he said tohimself, and having plenty of room now he turned to look upward, andthen stopped short as if turned to stone, for from somewhere just beyondwhere he stood came the soft hollow rush and hiss of shingle following aretiring wave, and with it a distant hollow-sounding "_Ahoy_!"
But Aleck did not start forward to peer down some deep chasm leadingthrough the huge cliffs to the sea, but, as has been said, stood fast,looking upward, as if turned to stone, his attention having been seizedupon by the rattling, rustling sound made by something above his head,and the next moment a pair of feet came into sight so close to him thathe could have touched them where they hung on a level with his eyes.
They stopped short, with the toes resting for a few moments upon aprojecting stone, and then a man dropped lightly upon the broad ledgewith a panting ejaculation of relief.