Then she dropped her hat, sprang to her feet, and ran forwards, forgetting that she had no shoes on.

She saw a figure clinging to the rocks, where they suddenly narrowed, and she heard the cry again, desperate with fear and weak with effort.

A young girl had evidently been trying to climb down, when she had lost her footing, and had only been saved from a bad fall because her grey woollen frock had caught her upon a projecting point of granite, giving her time to snatch at the strong twigs of some alp-roses, and to find a very slight projection on which she could rest the toe of one shoe.

She was hanging there with her face to the rock, eight or ten feet from the ground, which was strewn with big stones, and she was in such a position that she seemed unable to turn her head in order to look down.
In ten seconds Regina was standing directly below the terrified girl, raising herself on tiptoe, and trying to reach her feet with her hands, to guide them to a hold; but she could not.
"Don't be frightened," Regina said in Italian, which was the only language she knew.
"I cannot hold on!" answered the girl, trying to look down, but feeling that her foot would slip if she turned her head far enough.
"Yes, you can," Regina replied, too much roused to be surprised that the answer had come in her own language.

"Your dress will hold you, even if you let go with your hands.