He did not know how they got there.

He was quivering all through, and the perspiration of tense effort dripped from him.

While he stood there gasping, the packet of provisions, which had apparently rested for a few moments among the gravel dislodged by his efforts to climb up, rolled down the slope, and he watched it rush downward until he turned his eyes away.

It was too horribly suggestive; but his gaze was drawn back again against his will, and he saw the package vanish suddenly.

That made it quite clear that the slope ended in another wall of crags.
He did not remember whether Ida or the others said anything to him; but they crept on again, almost immediately, clinging to the rock, and scarcely venturing to glance down at the climbing forest which now appeared to lie straight beneath them but very far away.