WORKING THE ANIMAS 127 



I had left. Above remained some fifty feet of rim- 

 rock, almost perpendicular, but not difficult to ne- 

 gotiate provided one kept a cool head. Yet just 

 here, with the long climb almost over, a thoughtless 

 moment brought me as close, I think, to sudden death 

 as I have ever knowingly been. 



I was two-thirds up the rampart of rock, resting 

 on a little ledge some eight inches wide and clasp- 

 ing with both arms a pillar of stone whose pointed 

 top stretched two feet above my head. It seemed 

 firm enough for my purpose, which was to pull my- 

 self up on this until I had gained a crevice, just 

 above, that promised to make the rest easy. As a 

 rule we always tested the stability of a support be- 

 fore trusting our entire weight to it, for in a great 

 many instances the fault, a peculiarity of formation, 

 splits a slab from the main body so that a touch or 

 a pull will dislodge it. But this time, careless with 

 the thought of imminent success, I quite neglected 

 such precautionary measures. 



I reached above, grasped the top of the oblong 

 rock and with a sharp heave raised myself with my 

 arms. As I did so the supposedly solid mass gave 

 with my weight. For an empty moment I felt my- 

 self falling backward. There was no time to cal- 

 culate. By a lucky instinct I glanced to the right, 

 spied what seemed to be a narrow foothold a few 

 feet away and leapt for it. 



It held ! And as I clung there, suspended above 

 the abyss, I heard the great block I had dislodged a 



