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A Literal Cliff-hanger for the Reader and the Narrator-Protagonist

“Good-bye, my boy,” I said, “I hope that we shall meet again, wherever it is that we go to.”

The fact was I did not expect to live another two minutes.

Next I retreated to the far side of the rock, and waited till one of the chopping gusts of wind got behind me, and then I ran the length of the huge stone, some three or four and thirty feet, and sprang wildly out into the dizzy air. Oh! the sickening terrors that I felt as I launched myself at that little point of rock, and the horrible sense of despair that shot through my brain as I realised that I had jumped short! But so it was, my feet never touched the point, they went down into space, only my hands and body came in contact with it. I gripped at it with a yell, but one hand slipped, and I swung right round, holding by the other, so that I faced the stone from which I had sprung. Wildly I stretched up with my left hand, and this time managed to grasp a knob of rock, and there I hung in the fierce red light, with thousands of feet of empty air beneath me. My hands were holding to either side of the under part of the spur, so that its point was touching my head. Therefore, even if I could have found the strength, I could not pull myself up. The most that I could do would be to hang for about a minute, and then drop down, down into the bottomless pit. If any man can imagine a more hideous position, let him speak! All I know is that the torture of that half-minute nearly turned my brain.

I heard Leo give a cry, and then suddenly saw him in mid air springing up and out like a chamois. It was a splendid leap that he took under the influence of his terror and despair, clearing the horrible gulf as if it were nothing, and, landing well on to the rocky point, he threw himself upon his face, to prevent his pitching off into the depths. I felt the spur above me shake beneath the shock of his impact, and as it did so I saw the huge rocking-stone, that had been violently depressed by him as he sprang, fly back when relieved of his weight till, for the first time during all these centuries, it got beyond its balance, fell with a most awful crash right into the rocky chamber which had once served the philosopher Noot for a hermitage, and, I have no doubt, for ever sealed the passage that leads to the Place of Life with some hundreds of tons of rock.

All this happened in a second, and curiously enough, notwithstanding my terrible position, I noted it involuntarily, as it were. I even remember thinking that no human being would go down that dread path again.

Next instant I felt Leo seize me by the right wrist with both hands. By lying flat on the point of rock he could just reach me.

“You must let go and swing yourself clear,” he said in a calm and collected voice, “and then I will try and pull you up, or we will both go together. Are you ready?” [Chapter XXVII, "We Leap," 19; in volume, pp. 303-304]

Commentary: "in the dreadful womb of the volcano"

Both concluding illustrations (in serial and volume) realise much the same moment. Having lost the board with which they initially traversed the gulf, Leo and Holly will have to leap across to grab the spur of rock. But Holly, two decades older than his lithe companion, finds this no easy task, even after taking a run at it. Fortunately, Leo has no trouble in making the leap, and, as both pictures suggest, comes to Holly's rescue. Further complications beset their escaping from the country of the Amahagger, not the least is the prospect of being hot-potted since they will no longer have Ayesha to protect them.

This is the critical moment in their escape from the subterranean world of the Bath of Fire. Only by the light of the energy shaft will Holly and Leo be able to judge how far across the gulf they will have to leap to land on the rock pinnacle, which is the first stage in getting through the funnel-like caves to the Cavern of Nook, the philosopher and hermit. Ayesha is now dead, transformed into a monkey and aged twenty-two hundred years in mere minutes by an overdose of the immortal fire. Nor do they have to worry about Job, who has died of terror and exhaustion. But they must leap across before the shaft of light, the energy of the whole planet, disappears for another day, leaving them to perish of dehydration in the intense darkness once the oil for their lamps gives out.

Strategically placed at the head of the final, full instalment in the fifteen-part serialisation, “Next instant I felt Leo seize me by the right wrist with both hands.” grips readers' attentions, compelling them to consume the weekly number as rapidly as possible to arrive at the crucial moment that Johnson has realised — the last and climactic composite woodblock engraving in the series.

Related Material: The Cliff-Hanger Ending in the British Volume Edition (1887)

• “I Swung To and Fro.” by Maurice Greiffenhagen (1888)

Bibliography

Haggard, H. Rider. "SHE:" A History of Adventure. Illustrated by E. K. Johnson. The Graphic Magazine, Vols. XXXIV and XXXV. 2 October 1886 to 8 January 1887.

Haggard, H. Rider. She: A History of Adventure. Illustrated by E. K. Johnson. New York: Harper & Bros., 1887.

Haggard, H. Rider. She: A History of Adventure.  Illustrated by Maurice Greiffenhagen and Charles H. M. Kerr. London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1888.

"Johnson, Edward Killingworth." Haynes Fine Art. Web. Accessed 8 April 2025. https://www.haynesfineart.com/artists/edward-killingworth-johnson-uk

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Created 29 April 2025