But it was not her shouts or his, which would not have carried one tenth the distance, that reached the group in the valley. One of them caught a glimpse of the wildly waving coat. There was a consultation and two or three fluttered handkerchiefs in response. Presently they moved on.
Sheba could not believe her eyes. "They're not leaving us surely?" she gasped.
"That's what they're doing," answered Gordon grimly. "They think we're calling to them out of vanity to show them where we climbed."
"Oh!" She strangled a sob in her throat. Her heart was weighted as with lead.
"I'm going to make it. I think I see my way from here," her companion called across to her. "A fault runs to the foot of the stairway, if I can only do the next yard or two."
He did them, by throwing caution to the winds. An icy, rounded boulder projected above him out of reach. He unfastened his belt again and put the shoes, tied by the laces, around his neck. There was one way to get across to the ledge of the fault. He took hold of the two ends of the belt, crouched, and leaned forward on tiptoes toward the knob. The loop of the belt slid over the ice-coated boss. There was no chance to draw back now, to test the hold he had gained. If the leather slipped he was lost. His body swung across the abyss and his feet landed on the little ledge beyond.
His shout of success came perhaps ten minutes later. "I've reached the stairway, Miss O'Neill. I'll try not to be long, but you'd better exercise to keep up the circulation. Don't worry, please. I'll be back before night."
"I'm so glad," she cried joyfully. "I was afraid for you. And I'll not worry a bit. Good-bye."
Elliot made his way up to the summit and ran along a footpath which brought him to a bridge across the mountain stream just above the falls. The trail zigzagged down the turbulent little river close to the bank. Before he had specialized on the short distances Gordon had been a cross-country runner. He was in fair condition and he covered the ground fast.
About a mile below the falls he met two men. One of them was Colby Macdonald. He carried a coil of rope over one shoulder. The big Alaskan explained that he had not been able to get it out of his head that perhaps the climbers who had waved at his party had been in difficulties. So he had got a rope from the cabin of an old miner and was on his way back to the falls.