CHAPTER XIX

THE FIXER

I couldn’t just stand there not doing anything so I ran into the wide part and up the side where it was easy to go up. I guess maybe I was kind of kidding myself that I could do something up there. I guess I didn’t want to see Pee-wee come falling down. If I could have helped I would have stayed there. But as long as I wasn’t doing anything I couldn’t keep still.

Up on the edge of the precipice there was only just that one grown up fellow kneeling down and looking over. I had never been up to that place before. Up there it didn’t look like a chasm, it was just a wide gap--you’d call it a cleft I guess.

I said kind of frightened like, “Did he say he was going to fall--the kid? Did he say that?” I guess I was trembling all over. “I heard him call he was coming down,” I said.

“That wasn’t him,” the man said. “Keep back.”

But a lot I cared what he told me to do. He waved his hand for me to keep back but I didn’t pay any attention. _Geee whiz_, he didn’t own the place and wasn’t Pee-wee my friend. Maybe you’d never think so, the way we were always at it, but just the same he was. I kneeled down and crept up to the edge and looked over. The tree was sticking out maybe about ten feet down. It was all rocky there and the tree was growing out from between rocks.

I called out and said, “Hey kid, they’re ready to catch you down there, so don’t be scared.” But all the while I knew they’d be mighty lucky if they could just catch him.

Just then I saw a head down there in the tree and then that fellow, Daraway Bravado or whatever they called him, crawled out from all that bunch of leaves and branches. There was blood trickling down his face. He was right close in by the precipice--I guess he was standing on the trunk of the tree.

“Is it solid?” the man called down to him.

“Yep, guess so,” he answered back.

I asked something but they didn’t pay any attention to me. I had to look way over to see that boy. I was lying down flat looking way over. I could hear the fellows down on the bottom calling but the young man up near me didn’t seem to hear them--anyway he didn’t bother with them. That moving picture boy, the way it seemed to me, he was standing on the trunk close in and his two arms were tight around a crooked rock that stuck out. I didn’t see how he could hold on to it, that’s the way it looked to me. But anyway he did. I heard him say, “Come on, and be careful.”

Then I saw Pee-wee--jiminies, he looked terrible! He was all blood and his clothes were torn and his face was white.

[Illustration: THEN I SAW PEE-WEE----JIMINIES, HE LOOKED TERRIBLE!]

“Get hold of my leg,” the other boy said, and he stuck one leg out.

I didn’t say a word. It seemed to me that if I spoke even, Pee-wee might fall. I didn’t want him to look up at me, I was afraid he’d tumble if he did. He was crawling so careful, and he was so scared, that it seemed as if anything might topple him over. I just held my breath while I was waiting. He grabbed hold of the boy’s leg, then he got hold of him round the waist. I just looked at that fellow’s hands, the way they were clutching hold of the rock. Oh, _did I hope_ he wouldn’t let go! Pee-wee climbed up on his shoulders and got hold of another rock and then the man who was reaching over was just able to get hold of one of the kid’s arms. Oh, that was risky work! Then that boy let go one of his hands--gee it gave me the _creeps_--and he reached up and held Pee-wee’s foot on his shoulder. Then he sort of guided the kid’s foot up to a smaller chunk of rock that stuck out. All the while the man had hold of Pee-wee’s arm. The next I knew the poor kid came scrambling up over the edge--he didn’t even see me. Even when I spoke he didn’t notice me. He just fell down flat on the ground--I thought he fainted but he didn’t.

I was just going to shout down that Pee-wee was safe all right when I heard a noise and somebody called, “_Righto._” I looked over the edge and that other boy wasn’t there.

Somebody called up, “Where’s the kid? Is he all right?”

“Tell ’em yes only my leg’s cut and I had a hair-breadth escape,” the kid said. I had to laugh the way he said it.

“That movie boy fell down I think,” I said to the man.

He went to the edge and shouted, “How about it down there?”

Sandy--I think it was Sandy--called back, “He’s all right--this one’s all right. How about the kid?”

“Did you tell ’em I had a hair-breadth escape from death?” Pee-wee asked me.

I just mussed up his hair with my hand--gee it was bad enough already--and I had to laugh, I just couldn’t help it. “You crazy little rascal,” I said to him. “Don’t ever talk about the Silver Foxes being crazy again. Do you think you can walk?”

“Anyway I showed him Boy Scouts are all right,” the kid said. “Actions speak louder than words, hey?”

“Your words are always loud enough,” I said. “You don’t need to bother about actions. After this stick to words. Come on, see if you can get up and I’ll help you down into the chasm.”

Already the man had gone down in a hurry.