Old Man Savarin Stories

The brick walls narrow to eight inches as they ascend, and form a parapet rising above the roof. One of the time-keepers of the factory, Jack Hardy, a youn

s a sheer fall of one hundred feet to the ground, have done it with ease and without dizziness. Occasionally Hardy and I have

azing at me with parted lips, wide eyes, and an expression of horror so startling that I involuntarily stepped down to the bricklayer's platform in

alking off rapidly, disappeared round the mill. Curious about his demea

t now, Petherick," said I. "

that," h

pect me to

nd apparently much agitated. I began to joke him about his lugubrious expression

rely from my mind that I was surprised when, passing Petherick in

it again,

" I st

" he r

running on the

d. His earnestness was so marked that I

Petherick. If you tell me why you

u a strange adventure of my own, though perhaps you'll only laugh t

t down on his doorsteps that evening, and imme

y companions and I used to get much excitement, and sometimes a good deal of pocket money, by taking their eggs. One of us, placing his feet in a loop at the end o

ff. They paid out about a hundred feet of

The coast is scooped under by the waves, and in some places the cliff wall is as though it had been eaten away by seas once running in on higher levels. There will be an overhanging coping, then-some h

coping, the egg-gatherer would swing like a pendulum on the rope, and get on the rock, if not too far in, then put a rock on the loop to hold it till his return. When a le

cliff top; the rock wall went up pretty near perpendicular, till near the coping at the ground; but below the l

ce almost as level and even in width as that sidewalk. I remember fancying that it sloped outward more than usual, but instantly dismissed the notion, though Gaffer Pentreath, the oldest man in that countryside, used to tell us that we should not get the use of that ledge always. It had

ls below. Usually there were hundreds, but now there were millions on the wing, and instead of darting forth in playful motions, they seemed to be wildly

s and, nearer, a small yacht lay becalmed, heaving on the long billows. I could look do

stopped and set my back against the cliff, to rest whil

of the fissure and the hard-packed, root-threaded soil with which it was filled! Forcibly I pressed back, and in a flash looked along the ledge. The fissure was widening under my eyes, the rock before me seemed sinking outward, and with a shudder and a groan a

ost coolly I observed a long and mighty wave roll out from beneath. It went forth with a high, curling crest-a solid wall of wate

hich my glance had fallen; shuddering, I pressed hard against the solid wall at my back; an appalling cold slowly crept through me. My reason struggled against a wild desire t

How long this weakness lasted I know not; I only know that the unspeakable horror of that first period has come to me in waking dreams many and many a day since; that I have long nights

id. I myself had shuddered and grown cold, so strongly had my imagination realize

the ground without your Father. Fear not, therefore; ye are of more value than many sparrows." My faculties were so str

my eyes and gazed far away over the bright sea. The rippled billows told that a light outward breeze had sprung up. Slowly, and somewhat more distant, the t

d for hesitation. Night was coming on. I reasoned that my comrades thought me killed. They had probably gone to view the new condition of the p

ll; do you think you could move along it erect, looking down as you would have to? Yet it is only one hundred feet high. Imagine five more such walls on top of that and you trying to move sidewise-incapable of closing your eyes, forced to look down, from end to end, yes, three times

in fact, incline very slightly outward. It seemed to be thrusting me off. Oh, the horror of that sensation! Y

iping his lips nervously with the back of his hand, and looking askant, as at the narrow

that way, but the breadth of my shoulders would have forced me to lean somewhat more outward, and this I dared not and could not do. Also, to see a solid surface before m

out it had begun to jump to whitecaps, and in beneath me, where I could not see, it dashed and churned with a faint, pervading roar that I could barely distinguish. Before the descending sun a heavy bank of c

er, in fact, but the next moment stood firm, face to the beetling cliff, my heels on the very edge, and the new sensation of the abyss behind me no less horrible than that

gain. Then a mad eagerness to climb swept away other feeling, and my hands attempted in vain to clutch the rock. Not daring to cast my head backward

hope in that direction. But the distraction of scanning the cliff-side had given my nerves some relief; to my memory a

made progress that seemed almost rapid for some rods, and even had exultation in my quick approach to the rope. Hen

o grow distinct, my trembling hands told me that it moved bodily toward me; the descent behind me took an unspeakable remoteness, and from the utmost depth of that sheer air seemed to ascend steadily a deadly and a chilling wind. But I think I did not s

p-toe. Now I was convinced that the narrow pathway sloped outward, that this slope had become so distinct, so increasingly distinct, that I might at any moment slip off into the void. But dominating

cold, moist stone. But I never stopped. Faster, faster, more wildly I stepped-in a frenzy I pushed along. Then suddenly bef

ot to be seen! Wildly I looked over the other-n

rong breeze with a motion that had carried it away from my first hurried glances. With the relief tears pressed to my eyes and, face bowed to the

nt while, with closed eyes and bent head, he remained absorbed in the recollection

n crowded upon me. To turn around had been an attempt almost desperate, before, and certainty, most certainly, the ledge

the top, running fast as its end approached the edge, falling suddenly at last? Or was it fastened to the accustomed stake? Was any comrade near who would summo

with I know not what motions till again my back pressed the cliff. That was a restful sensation. And now for the decision of my fate! I looked at the rope. Not for a moment could I fancy it

se depth below. But what chance of striking it feet or head first? What chance of preser

nts of my life, good for an effort surpassing the human. Still the rope swayed as before, and its

trength was mine but for a moment, and that in the next reaction of weakness I should drop from the wall like a dead fly. Bracing m

e, twice, and again, it gave, gave, with jerks that tried my arms. I knew these indicated but tig

unately it was of dimensions to admit my body barely. I slipped it over my thighs up t

ht in brain fever. Many weeks I lay there, and when I got strong found that I had left my nerve on that awful cli

. Frazer, and have had your l

tmares ever since that I could no more walk on the high brickwork than