"What do you mean?"

"Why," I said, "a tiled well is absolutely safe, you see. Nothing can
happen in a tiled well, Hawkins."

"Now, don't stand there grinding out your cheap wit, Griggs," snapped
Hawkins. "How the dickens are we going to escape being soaked?"

Down, down, down, down, went the ladder.

"Well," I said, thoughtfully, "the bottom usually falls out of your
schemes, Hawkins. If the bottom will only fall out of the water department
of your pumpless pump within the next half-minute, all will be lovely."

"Oh, dry up!" exclaimed the inventor nervously. "Goodness! We're halfway
down already!"

"Why not climb?" I suggested.

"Really, Griggs," cried the inventor, "for such an unpractical man as
yourself, that idea is remarkable! Climb, Griggs, climb. Get about it!"

I think myself that the notion was rather bright. If the ladder was
climbing down into the well, we could climb up the ladder.

And we climbed! Good heavens, how we did climb! It was simply a
perpendicular treadmill, and with the rungs a full yard apart, a mighty
hard one to tread.