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 good for me to try and climb it, for I'm aching all over and I just wouldn't have the strength. If I tied it around me you three couldn't pull me up over that edge. Of course if the rope's long enough you fellows can lower me down, or I could put a turn of the rope around me and get down myself, I reckon. How about that?"

"You'd get awfully scraped up, I'm afraid," said Bob. "I'm pretty sure the three of us can pull you up, Nod."

"I don't believe you could. It would be risky, anyway. Maybe, though, I can climb up somehow."

"Perhaps," offered Polly, "Ned will bring some one back with him to help."

"Let's hope so," said Laurie. "If he doesn't, the next best thing is a rope long enough to reach to the bottom. My idea was this, Bob." He paused long enough to shift one foot gingerly and relieve his jumping nerves. "I thought I could tie the end of the rope under my shoulders and work along this ledge that I'm standing on until I got where I could jump or drop or something."

"We could lower you the rest of the way if the rope lasted."