Page:Under Two Skies.djvu/42

 leaning over them and grasping the perpendicular rope a little higher than his head.

'The whim's not in working order.'

As he spoke Jim watched her face, with a rather reckless light in his blue eyes, for the effect of his little sell. He expected her to ride off at once; but she did nothing of the kind. She exhibited no annoyance at all, but would know all about the jamming of the bucket at the bottom.

'Then will some one have to go to the bottom?' she asked, shuddering—'down this endless awful rope?'

'Some one will. There's nothing else for it.'

Miss Jenny's eyes had been downcast; now she raised them swiftly. Her eyes often were downcast, and she as often raised them thus.

'Dare you?'

'I shouldn't wonder.'

The next sound was a sharp shrill cry from Miss Jenny. The little dainty riding-whip—which she had never once dropped on all her long and lonely rides—had somehow slipped from her fingers and fallen fairly into the mouth of the shaft, and so out of sight.