YOU could n't , anyhow . '' `` Could n't I ? '' cried Anne rashly . `` Then I dare you to do it , '' said Josie defiantly . `` I dare you to climb up there and walk the ridgepole of Mr. Barry 's kitchen roof . '' Anne turned pale , but there was clearly only one thing to be done . She walked toward the house , where a ladder was leaning against the kitchen roof . All the fifth-class girls said , `` Oh ! '' partly in excitement , partly in dismay . `` Do n't you do it , Anne , '' entreated Diana . `` You 'll fall off and be killed . Never mind Josie Pye . It is n't fair to dare anybody to do anything so dangerous . '' `` I must do it . My honor is at stake , '' said Anne solemnly . `` I shall walk that ridgepole , Diana , or perish in the attempt . If I am killed you are to have my pearl bead ring . '' Anne climbed the ladder amid breathless silence , gained the ridgepole , balanced herself uprightly on that precarious footing , and started to walk along it , dizzily conscious that she was uncomfortably high up in the world and that walking ridgepoles was not a thing in which your imagination helped you out much . Nevertheless , she managed to take several steps before the catastrophe came . Then she swayed , lost her balance , stumbled , staggered , and fell , sliding down over the sun-baked roof and crashing off it through the tangle of Virginia creeper beneath -- all before the dismayed circle below could give a simultaneous , terrified shriek .
XXXXX Anne had tumbled off the roof on the side up which she had ascended Diana would probably have fallen heir to the pearl bead ring then and there .
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