Chapter Twelve.

Chapter Twelve.First Mountain Climb.The loud crack of something breaking awoke Saxe to the knowledge that a grey light was peering through the pines, and that, though he was comfortably warm, there was a crisp coldness in the air he breathed.Then there was another sharp crack, and another, as of sticks being broken; and he raised himself up to begin looking cautiously round. For Melchior had said that there were bears about still in the mountains, and the first idea that occurred to him was that a savage beast was breaking his way through the thick pine-wood with inimical intent.Another crack and another, very close at hand, and then a faint sighing sound—evidently the expiration of some living creature’s breath.Saxe felt a catching sensation at the breast, a tingling in the temples and cheeks, as if his veins were startled and his blood running wild; and he stole his hand softly out from under the rug, to try and reach his companions and rouse them to a sense of the impending danger—trying to recollect at the same moment where the ice-axes had been placed when they lay down overnight.But at that moment there was a sharper crack than ever, and a faint odour of burning, followed by the quick crackling so familiar when a green pine bough is thrown upon the flames.“Oh, what a coward I am!” thought Saxe, sinking back and placing his enlaced fingers beneath his head, as he gazed straight up at the dark branches above. “Just as if a bear would come and attack us, even if there was one anywhere near! He’d scuffle off as soon as he smelt man.”“Perhaps not if he was very hungry,” he thought, after a few minutes. “But I do wish I could feel brave, like men do, and not turn shaky and queer at the least thing. Here was I imagining all that rubbish just because I heard a stick broken by old Melchior to make the fire. Yesterday all I had to do was to walk along a shelf of rock, with some water running down below me. If it had been out in the open sunshine I shouldn’t have minded a bit; but because it was a little dark I fancied all sorts of stuff. Of course it was a bit startling to see a fellow go head over heels into a torrent along with a moke and be swept away; but I don’t believe old Melk was half so much frightened as I was.”“It’s very silly lying here,” he said to himself again, as the scent of the burning pine-wood increased. “Bit cold outside the rug; but we left the door and the windows open last night, and that’s healthy all the same. I do wish, though, I could get on without being scared so soon. Perhaps it’s all through being ill last year and feeling so weak. But I didn’t seem weak yesterday. I was precious tired, but so was Mr Dale. I’m afraid I’m a coward, and I suppose all I can do is to hide it and not let people see.”“They sha’n’t see!” he muttered, after a few minutes; and then he lay still, thinking of home, his mother and father, and of their ready consent when Mr Dale offered to take him as his companion in an experimental trip to the high Alps.“I wonder what they are all doing now?” he thought. “Asleep, of course. I don’t believe my mother would sleep comfortably, though, if she knew I was lying out here like this, with no bed-curtains and the snow just over us. It is rum, though—summer and winter all muddled up together so closely that you stand with your right leg in July, picking flowers and catching butterflies, and the left leg in January, so that you can turn over and make a snowball or pick icicles off the rocks.”A pleasant, drowsy sensation began to steal over him, and he was about to give way to it, when the idea came like a flash that it would be idle and cowardly; and this thought made him spring up, and fold the rug in which he had been rolled; and after a glance at where Mr Dale still slept, he went softly out of the clump of trees in the direction where he could hear the crackling, to find Melchior in the act of placing the tin kettle they had brought upon the fire.“Good morning, herr. A fine day.”“Not much day about it,” said Saxe, with a slight shiver. “What time is it?”“I don’t know, herr; but the sun will soon be up. Look!”He pointed overhead to where, grim-looking and grey, one of the mountains towered up: and right away, at a great height, there was what looked like a broad streak of pale—very pale—red, apparently a piece of cloud just over the mountain top.“What’s that?”“Snow, herr, beginning to be lit up by the sun. That is where we are going by-and-by—the mountain with the enow on one side but bare rock on the other.”Saxe stood gazing upward with a feeling of awe creeping over him. There was no mistake about height here. The line of snow, which ended as quickly as if it had been cut square at one end, seemed terribly far away; and Saxe was thinking that it seemed almost madness to try and reach such a spot, when Melchior drew his attention to first one and then another flake of ruddy light in the distance.“Clouds?” asked Saxe; though he felt what the answer would be.“No,” replied the guide—“mountain peaks. Will you awaken Mr Dale, or shall I?”“I am awake,” said that personage. “Is there any water near here? Oh yes, I remember. Well, Saxe, had your bath?”Saxe looked confused, and said nothing.“I asked you if you had had your bath, my lad,” said Mr Dale, looking at him wonderingly.“Well, the fact is,” stammered the boy, “there was no jug or basin, and I—”“Forgot it?” said Dale.“Yes, I forgot it,” replied the boy, with an effort; and as he spoke he felt to himself that this was a touch of moral, though it was not physical, cowardice, for he ought to have spoken out frankly.“Well, I’m going to have mine. How long will the coffee be, Melchior?”“Not a quarter of an hour, herr.”“Right. We’ll soon be back,” cried Dale; and a few minutes after he and Saxe were having a good scrub about the neck and shoulders, and glowing as if from an electric shock, so brisk and sharp was the water that came tumbling down over the rocks in the middle of one of the clumps of pines whose tops were freshened by the little cascade.Back to the alfresco breakfast, which Dale ate with his back resting against a block of stone nestling in a mass of whortleberry, and gazing up at the mountain, while he and Melchior discussed the plan of their ascent.“Yes,” said Dale, “you are right. We ought to take to the snow there, cross to that arête, and—”“What’s an arête?” said Saxe, who was listening eagerly.“That ridge along the summit of yonder spur or buttress,” said Dale. “That will bring us back to the main part of the mountain, and we ought to reach the shoulder from there.”“No, herr,” said the guide quietly; “the climbing would be too steep, and there is a slope there which later on will be swept by loose stones. Better take to the snow again, then work up it.”“But suppose it is in bad condition?”“It will be shaded from the sun till the afternoon, and quite hard. From there, you see, we can easily get to the shoulder, and then choose our way up the last part by the rocks or the snow. You see that either can be reached: that is plain enough from here.”“Yes, it looks easy,” said Dale thoughtfully. “The rock for preference, for I want to see the structure, and we may find specimens of what I am seeking.”“Yonder will be most likely,” said Melchior, pointing to a huge mass of dark mountain a few miles away, part of which was now glowing in the morning sun, whose bright rays made the ice and snow glitter on a score of peaks.“We’ll, try that later on,” said Dale. “Have you never been up it?”“No, herr; but I have been on others, where little crystals have been found in cracks; and they were mountains like that—very steep-sided, and having little snow.”“There’s plenty of time,” said Dale, raising his glass to examine the farther mountain attentively. “We’ll try that by-and-by. Has it any name?”“The Black Nun, herr. That is the White Nun, on beyond it, to the right.”“Yes, I’ll keep to my original plan,” said Dale, looking up once more to the mountain at whose foot they sat, “and in half an hour we’ll be off. How many hours will it take us?”“Eight or nine, herr. It depends on—”He paused and looked at Saxe.“To be sure, yes,” said Dale thoughtfully. “I think,” he continued, to Saxe’s great relief, “that, as this one is rather difficult and dangerous—”“It ought not to be dangerous, herr, if we are careful.”“Well, then, difficult,” continued Dale—“you had better content yourself, Saxe, by staying here in camp and watching us with the glass.”Saxe changed his position viciously.“I wish you would not think me such a coward, sir,” he said, with a display of temper. “I am to learn to climb: why not let me begin now?”As soon as he had spoken he repented; for he felt nervous about so steep a climb, and he told himself that, by his hasty words and assumption of eagerness, he had made his feelings clear to those who listened.Dale looked at him searchingly, and Saxe coloured beneath his gaze.“If it would be more satisfaction to you to come with us, do so by all means. It will be hard and toilsome, but Melchior and I will take, care of you.”“Oh, if they would not think me such a cowardly child!” thought Saxe. Then, aloud—“I should like to come, and I’ll do the best I can to keep up with you.”“And if there is a bit of extra difficult climbing, why, you—you must wait till we come back.”“Yes, I could do that,” replied Saxe; and as soon as the breakfast was ended a wallet was filled with food, a couple of bottles with water, and Melchior took the rope, passed his head and right arm through it, and looked at Dale as much as to say, “I am ready.”“Will these things be all right?” said the latter, taking an ice-axe from where it hung up on a tree; and he pointed to the basket.“There is no one here to touch them, herr.”“And the mule?”“He will not wander far from the basket, herr. We shall find him close at hand.”“Then, forward!” said Dale; and the little party began the ascent almost directly, their way being back up the snow slope down which, on the previous day, Saxe had made so rapid a descent; and it was only now that the boy realised how far he had come.“It will be easy coming back, herr,” said Melchior, as they stopped for a few minutes to rest, “and you must not lose your balance this time.”“Only a little out of breath,” replied Saxe; but as he spoke he could not help giving a glance up at the huge pile of granite, ice and snow towering high above his head.Dale laughed.“Well, Saxe,” he said, “are you beginning to find out how high the mountains are?”Saxe nodded.“Yes,” he said; “they deceive you at a distance. Is this the highest?”Dale laughed again.“Well,” he replied, “it is not quite the smallest. Say the medium. On again, Melchior!”“Yes, herr: let’s get as high as we can while the morning is young and the snow hard. We can take our time on the rock.”The guide was following the custom that seems to have come natural to man and beast—that of zigzagging up a steep place; but instead of making for the centre of the col, where it was lowest, he kept bearing to the left—that is, he made the track three times the length of that to the right, and he drew on toward where the slope grew steeper and steeper.The snow was far better to walk upon now, for the surface was well frozen, and they had only to plant their feet in the deep steps the guide made by driving the soles of his heavily nailed boots well into the crust.“Take care! take care!” he kept on saying to Saxe, who was in the middle. “There is no danger, but a slip would send you down, and you could not stop till you were at the bottom.”“I’ll mind,” said Saxe, as he stole a glance now and then up at the steep white slope above him, or at that beneath, beyond which the pines among which they had slept the past night now looked like heather.“Yes, it is all very big, Mr Dale,” he said suddenly.“Wait a bit. You don’t half know yet. Say it’s bigger than you thought. Getting harder, isn’t it, Melchior?”“Yes, herr. If it gets much harder, I shall have to cut steps; but only here and there, where it’s steepest.”“Isn’t it steepest now?” said Saxe, who felt as if he could touch the surface by extending his right hand.“Oh no, herr. You don’t mind?”“Not a bit,” cried the lad: “I like it.”“What’s the matter?” said Dale, as they still mounted the dazzling slope of snow, far now above the dip of the col over which they had come.“Bad piece here, sir. We’ll have the rope. I’ll fasten my end and hand the rest to you, to secure yourselves while I begin cutting.”“Right!” replied Dale; and a minute later he caught the rings of hemp thrown to him, and rapidly knotted the middle round Saxe, the end to his own waist; and as he knotted,click, click! chip, chip! went the ice-axe, deftly wielded by the guide, who with two or three blows broke through enough of the crust to make a secure footing while the ice flew splintering down the slope in miniature avalanches, with a peculiar metallic tinkling sound.“Will there be much to cut?” said Dale.“No, herr; only a step here and there to make us quite safe,”—and he chipped away again after a few steps, and broke in others with the toes of his boots.“I say,” whispered Saxe, “suppose he slipped while he’s swinging that axe round, he’d drag us both down too.”“And by the same argument, if you or I slipped, we should snatch him from his place.”“Yes; that’s what I thought.“That would only be in a very extreme case; and you may as well learn your mountaineer’s lesson at once. When we are roped together, and one slips, he generally saves himself by rapidly sticking the sharp pick of his axe into the snow. He gives the others ample warning by this that something is wrong before the jerk and strain come upon the rope.”“And what do they do?”“Drive their ice-picks right into the snow, hang back against the slope, and tighten the rope from one to the other. So that generally, instead of a fall, there is only a short slip. Do you understand!”“Yes, I think so.”“So it is that three or four who understand mountaineering, and work together and trust each other, go up and down places that would be impassable to the unskilful. Hah! we are getting to the top of this slope. Tut, tut! cutting again. Look out!”The last two words were roared out; and chip, chip, there came close upon one another the sound of two ice-picks being driven into the snow, the guide’s like an echo of Dale’s, for his axe was raised to cut a fresh step, but he changed the direction like lightning, drove it in high up the slope, and held on forward, Dale backward.For, in the most unexpected manner, one of Saxe’s feet had slipped as he stepped short, and down he went to lie helplessly a dozen feet from where he had stood, hanging suspended from the two ends of the rope—fortunately for him tight round the waists of his companions.“Herr, herr!” shouted the guide reproachfully, as he looked back over his shoulder, “where’s your ice-axe?”“Here,” said Saxe dolefully, raising it a little, and vainly trying to drive his toes through the hard crust, newly frozen in the night.“‘Here,’ sir!” cried Melchior: “but it has no business to be ‘here.’ Strike! strike hard! and drive it into the snow.”Saxe raised it in both hands, and struck.“No, no!” cried the guide; “take hold right at the end, and drive it in as high up as you can reach. Hah! that’s better. Now hand over hand. It will hold. Pull yourself up as high as you can.”“That do?” said Saxe, panting, after obeying the orders and contriving to get a couple of feet.“Yes,” said the guide, tightening the rope in company with Dale. “Now then, again! A better one this time.”The boy struck the pick in again as hard as he could, and was more successful. The rope was tightened to support him after he had climbed higher; and after three or four minutes he stood once more in his old place panting.“Wait till he gets his breath, Melchior,” said Dale. “There, boy, it has been a splendid lesson for you, in a place where the worst that could have happened to you was a sharp glissade and some skin off your hands and face. That ice-axe ought to have been driven like lightning into the snow, or the pick held towards it downward. It would have ploughed in and anchored you.”“I’ll try better next time,” said Saxe. “I’m sorry I’m so stupid.”“The young herr did well,” cried Melchior warmly. “Why, I have known men hang from the rope helpless and afraid to stir at such a time. Ready? Vorwarts!”He started again, cutting a step here and there, but very few now; and a quarter of an hour later a long path took them to where the smooth slope gave place to piled-up masses of rock, which looked as if they had been hurled down from above.Then came a couple of hours’ toilsome climb over broken stones, and up masses that were mastered by sheer scrambling. Now and then an easy rock slope presented itself, or a gully between two buttresses of the mountain, as they won their way higher and higher. Only once was there a really dangerous place—a mere ledge, such as they had passed along on the previous day, but instead of a raging torrent beneath them there was a wall of nearly perpendicular rock running down for about a thousand feet to a great bed of snow.But the distance was short, and Saxe stepped out bravely, perfectly aware, though, that his companions were keeping the rope pretty tight and watching his every step.“Well done!” cried Melchior.“Bravo, Saxe!” said Dale, as soon as they were safely across: “I see your head is screwed on right. Forward!”“But he don’t know what a weak screw it is,” thought Saxe. “Why, they must have seen how white I was! I shall never dare to get back that way.”Three or four awkward bits were circumvented; a couloir or gully full of snow mounted; and then there was a long climb up a moderate slope toward where a ridge of rocks stood out sharply, with snow sloping down on either side, the ridge running up far into the mountain; but before they could get to this a deep bed of old snow—“firn” Melchior called it—a great sheet, like some large white field, had to be passed.But this was mastered, and the climb began up towards the ridge.“The herr remembers this?” Melchior said.“No,” said Saxe.“Oh yes, you remember: that is the arête,” said Dale.“That? What! right up there?”“Yes. Are you surprised?”“Yes: I thought we had passed that, down below somewhere, hours ago.”“More faith in the size of the mountains,” said Dale merrily. “Well, Saxe, how do you feel now? Will you sit down and wait!”“No,” said the boy, through his set teeth, “I’m going right to the top.”

The loud crack of something breaking awoke Saxe to the knowledge that a grey light was peering through the pines, and that, though he was comfortably warm, there was a crisp coldness in the air he breathed.

Then there was another sharp crack, and another, as of sticks being broken; and he raised himself up to begin looking cautiously round. For Melchior had said that there were bears about still in the mountains, and the first idea that occurred to him was that a savage beast was breaking his way through the thick pine-wood with inimical intent.

Another crack and another, very close at hand, and then a faint sighing sound—evidently the expiration of some living creature’s breath.

Saxe felt a catching sensation at the breast, a tingling in the temples and cheeks, as if his veins were startled and his blood running wild; and he stole his hand softly out from under the rug, to try and reach his companions and rouse them to a sense of the impending danger—trying to recollect at the same moment where the ice-axes had been placed when they lay down overnight.

But at that moment there was a sharper crack than ever, and a faint odour of burning, followed by the quick crackling so familiar when a green pine bough is thrown upon the flames.

“Oh, what a coward I am!” thought Saxe, sinking back and placing his enlaced fingers beneath his head, as he gazed straight up at the dark branches above. “Just as if a bear would come and attack us, even if there was one anywhere near! He’d scuffle off as soon as he smelt man.”

“Perhaps not if he was very hungry,” he thought, after a few minutes. “But I do wish I could feel brave, like men do, and not turn shaky and queer at the least thing. Here was I imagining all that rubbish just because I heard a stick broken by old Melchior to make the fire. Yesterday all I had to do was to walk along a shelf of rock, with some water running down below me. If it had been out in the open sunshine I shouldn’t have minded a bit; but because it was a little dark I fancied all sorts of stuff. Of course it was a bit startling to see a fellow go head over heels into a torrent along with a moke and be swept away; but I don’t believe old Melk was half so much frightened as I was.”

“It’s very silly lying here,” he said to himself again, as the scent of the burning pine-wood increased. “Bit cold outside the rug; but we left the door and the windows open last night, and that’s healthy all the same. I do wish, though, I could get on without being scared so soon. Perhaps it’s all through being ill last year and feeling so weak. But I didn’t seem weak yesterday. I was precious tired, but so was Mr Dale. I’m afraid I’m a coward, and I suppose all I can do is to hide it and not let people see.”

“They sha’n’t see!” he muttered, after a few minutes; and then he lay still, thinking of home, his mother and father, and of their ready consent when Mr Dale offered to take him as his companion in an experimental trip to the high Alps.

“I wonder what they are all doing now?” he thought. “Asleep, of course. I don’t believe my mother would sleep comfortably, though, if she knew I was lying out here like this, with no bed-curtains and the snow just over us. It is rum, though—summer and winter all muddled up together so closely that you stand with your right leg in July, picking flowers and catching butterflies, and the left leg in January, so that you can turn over and make a snowball or pick icicles off the rocks.”

A pleasant, drowsy sensation began to steal over him, and he was about to give way to it, when the idea came like a flash that it would be idle and cowardly; and this thought made him spring up, and fold the rug in which he had been rolled; and after a glance at where Mr Dale still slept, he went softly out of the clump of trees in the direction where he could hear the crackling, to find Melchior in the act of placing the tin kettle they had brought upon the fire.

“Good morning, herr. A fine day.”

“Not much day about it,” said Saxe, with a slight shiver. “What time is it?”

“I don’t know, herr; but the sun will soon be up. Look!”

He pointed overhead to where, grim-looking and grey, one of the mountains towered up: and right away, at a great height, there was what looked like a broad streak of pale—very pale—red, apparently a piece of cloud just over the mountain top.

“What’s that?”

“Snow, herr, beginning to be lit up by the sun. That is where we are going by-and-by—the mountain with the enow on one side but bare rock on the other.”

Saxe stood gazing upward with a feeling of awe creeping over him. There was no mistake about height here. The line of snow, which ended as quickly as if it had been cut square at one end, seemed terribly far away; and Saxe was thinking that it seemed almost madness to try and reach such a spot, when Melchior drew his attention to first one and then another flake of ruddy light in the distance.

“Clouds?” asked Saxe; though he felt what the answer would be.

“No,” replied the guide—“mountain peaks. Will you awaken Mr Dale, or shall I?”

“I am awake,” said that personage. “Is there any water near here? Oh yes, I remember. Well, Saxe, had your bath?”

Saxe looked confused, and said nothing.

“I asked you if you had had your bath, my lad,” said Mr Dale, looking at him wonderingly.

“Well, the fact is,” stammered the boy, “there was no jug or basin, and I—”

“Forgot it?” said Dale.

“Yes, I forgot it,” replied the boy, with an effort; and as he spoke he felt to himself that this was a touch of moral, though it was not physical, cowardice, for he ought to have spoken out frankly.

“Well, I’m going to have mine. How long will the coffee be, Melchior?”

“Not a quarter of an hour, herr.”

“Right. We’ll soon be back,” cried Dale; and a few minutes after he and Saxe were having a good scrub about the neck and shoulders, and glowing as if from an electric shock, so brisk and sharp was the water that came tumbling down over the rocks in the middle of one of the clumps of pines whose tops were freshened by the little cascade.

Back to the alfresco breakfast, which Dale ate with his back resting against a block of stone nestling in a mass of whortleberry, and gazing up at the mountain, while he and Melchior discussed the plan of their ascent.

“Yes,” said Dale, “you are right. We ought to take to the snow there, cross to that arête, and—”

“What’s an arête?” said Saxe, who was listening eagerly.

“That ridge along the summit of yonder spur or buttress,” said Dale. “That will bring us back to the main part of the mountain, and we ought to reach the shoulder from there.”

“No, herr,” said the guide quietly; “the climbing would be too steep, and there is a slope there which later on will be swept by loose stones. Better take to the snow again, then work up it.”

“But suppose it is in bad condition?”

“It will be shaded from the sun till the afternoon, and quite hard. From there, you see, we can easily get to the shoulder, and then choose our way up the last part by the rocks or the snow. You see that either can be reached: that is plain enough from here.”

“Yes, it looks easy,” said Dale thoughtfully. “The rock for preference, for I want to see the structure, and we may find specimens of what I am seeking.”

“Yonder will be most likely,” said Melchior, pointing to a huge mass of dark mountain a few miles away, part of which was now glowing in the morning sun, whose bright rays made the ice and snow glitter on a score of peaks.

“We’ll, try that later on,” said Dale. “Have you never been up it?”

“No, herr; but I have been on others, where little crystals have been found in cracks; and they were mountains like that—very steep-sided, and having little snow.”

“There’s plenty of time,” said Dale, raising his glass to examine the farther mountain attentively. “We’ll try that by-and-by. Has it any name?”

“The Black Nun, herr. That is the White Nun, on beyond it, to the right.”

“Yes, I’ll keep to my original plan,” said Dale, looking up once more to the mountain at whose foot they sat, “and in half an hour we’ll be off. How many hours will it take us?”

“Eight or nine, herr. It depends on—”

He paused and looked at Saxe.

“To be sure, yes,” said Dale thoughtfully. “I think,” he continued, to Saxe’s great relief, “that, as this one is rather difficult and dangerous—”

“It ought not to be dangerous, herr, if we are careful.”

“Well, then, difficult,” continued Dale—“you had better content yourself, Saxe, by staying here in camp and watching us with the glass.”

Saxe changed his position viciously.

“I wish you would not think me such a coward, sir,” he said, with a display of temper. “I am to learn to climb: why not let me begin now?”

As soon as he had spoken he repented; for he felt nervous about so steep a climb, and he told himself that, by his hasty words and assumption of eagerness, he had made his feelings clear to those who listened.

Dale looked at him searchingly, and Saxe coloured beneath his gaze.

“If it would be more satisfaction to you to come with us, do so by all means. It will be hard and toilsome, but Melchior and I will take, care of you.”

“Oh, if they would not think me such a cowardly child!” thought Saxe. Then, aloud—

“I should like to come, and I’ll do the best I can to keep up with you.”

“And if there is a bit of extra difficult climbing, why, you—you must wait till we come back.”

“Yes, I could do that,” replied Saxe; and as soon as the breakfast was ended a wallet was filled with food, a couple of bottles with water, and Melchior took the rope, passed his head and right arm through it, and looked at Dale as much as to say, “I am ready.”

“Will these things be all right?” said the latter, taking an ice-axe from where it hung up on a tree; and he pointed to the basket.

“There is no one here to touch them, herr.”

“And the mule?”

“He will not wander far from the basket, herr. We shall find him close at hand.”

“Then, forward!” said Dale; and the little party began the ascent almost directly, their way being back up the snow slope down which, on the previous day, Saxe had made so rapid a descent; and it was only now that the boy realised how far he had come.

“It will be easy coming back, herr,” said Melchior, as they stopped for a few minutes to rest, “and you must not lose your balance this time.”

“Only a little out of breath,” replied Saxe; but as he spoke he could not help giving a glance up at the huge pile of granite, ice and snow towering high above his head.

Dale laughed.

“Well, Saxe,” he said, “are you beginning to find out how high the mountains are?”

Saxe nodded.

“Yes,” he said; “they deceive you at a distance. Is this the highest?”

Dale laughed again.

“Well,” he replied, “it is not quite the smallest. Say the medium. On again, Melchior!”

“Yes, herr: let’s get as high as we can while the morning is young and the snow hard. We can take our time on the rock.”

The guide was following the custom that seems to have come natural to man and beast—that of zigzagging up a steep place; but instead of making for the centre of the col, where it was lowest, he kept bearing to the left—that is, he made the track three times the length of that to the right, and he drew on toward where the slope grew steeper and steeper.

The snow was far better to walk upon now, for the surface was well frozen, and they had only to plant their feet in the deep steps the guide made by driving the soles of his heavily nailed boots well into the crust.

“Take care! take care!” he kept on saying to Saxe, who was in the middle. “There is no danger, but a slip would send you down, and you could not stop till you were at the bottom.”

“I’ll mind,” said Saxe, as he stole a glance now and then up at the steep white slope above him, or at that beneath, beyond which the pines among which they had slept the past night now looked like heather.

“Yes, it is all very big, Mr Dale,” he said suddenly.

“Wait a bit. You don’t half know yet. Say it’s bigger than you thought. Getting harder, isn’t it, Melchior?”

“Yes, herr. If it gets much harder, I shall have to cut steps; but only here and there, where it’s steepest.”

“Isn’t it steepest now?” said Saxe, who felt as if he could touch the surface by extending his right hand.

“Oh no, herr. You don’t mind?”

“Not a bit,” cried the lad: “I like it.”

“What’s the matter?” said Dale, as they still mounted the dazzling slope of snow, far now above the dip of the col over which they had come.

“Bad piece here, sir. We’ll have the rope. I’ll fasten my end and hand the rest to you, to secure yourselves while I begin cutting.”

“Right!” replied Dale; and a minute later he caught the rings of hemp thrown to him, and rapidly knotted the middle round Saxe, the end to his own waist; and as he knotted,click, click! chip, chip! went the ice-axe, deftly wielded by the guide, who with two or three blows broke through enough of the crust to make a secure footing while the ice flew splintering down the slope in miniature avalanches, with a peculiar metallic tinkling sound.

“Will there be much to cut?” said Dale.

“No, herr; only a step here and there to make us quite safe,”—and he chipped away again after a few steps, and broke in others with the toes of his boots.

“I say,” whispered Saxe, “suppose he slipped while he’s swinging that axe round, he’d drag us both down too.”

“And by the same argument, if you or I slipped, we should snatch him from his place.”

“Yes; that’s what I thought.

“That would only be in a very extreme case; and you may as well learn your mountaineer’s lesson at once. When we are roped together, and one slips, he generally saves himself by rapidly sticking the sharp pick of his axe into the snow. He gives the others ample warning by this that something is wrong before the jerk and strain come upon the rope.”

“And what do they do?”

“Drive their ice-picks right into the snow, hang back against the slope, and tighten the rope from one to the other. So that generally, instead of a fall, there is only a short slip. Do you understand!”

“Yes, I think so.”

“So it is that three or four who understand mountaineering, and work together and trust each other, go up and down places that would be impassable to the unskilful. Hah! we are getting to the top of this slope. Tut, tut! cutting again. Look out!”

The last two words were roared out; and chip, chip, there came close upon one another the sound of two ice-picks being driven into the snow, the guide’s like an echo of Dale’s, for his axe was raised to cut a fresh step, but he changed the direction like lightning, drove it in high up the slope, and held on forward, Dale backward.

For, in the most unexpected manner, one of Saxe’s feet had slipped as he stepped short, and down he went to lie helplessly a dozen feet from where he had stood, hanging suspended from the two ends of the rope—fortunately for him tight round the waists of his companions.

“Herr, herr!” shouted the guide reproachfully, as he looked back over his shoulder, “where’s your ice-axe?”

“Here,” said Saxe dolefully, raising it a little, and vainly trying to drive his toes through the hard crust, newly frozen in the night.

“‘Here,’ sir!” cried Melchior: “but it has no business to be ‘here.’ Strike! strike hard! and drive it into the snow.”

Saxe raised it in both hands, and struck.

“No, no!” cried the guide; “take hold right at the end, and drive it in as high up as you can reach. Hah! that’s better. Now hand over hand. It will hold. Pull yourself up as high as you can.”

“That do?” said Saxe, panting, after obeying the orders and contriving to get a couple of feet.

“Yes,” said the guide, tightening the rope in company with Dale. “Now then, again! A better one this time.”

The boy struck the pick in again as hard as he could, and was more successful. The rope was tightened to support him after he had climbed higher; and after three or four minutes he stood once more in his old place panting.

“Wait till he gets his breath, Melchior,” said Dale. “There, boy, it has been a splendid lesson for you, in a place where the worst that could have happened to you was a sharp glissade and some skin off your hands and face. That ice-axe ought to have been driven like lightning into the snow, or the pick held towards it downward. It would have ploughed in and anchored you.”

“I’ll try better next time,” said Saxe. “I’m sorry I’m so stupid.”

“The young herr did well,” cried Melchior warmly. “Why, I have known men hang from the rope helpless and afraid to stir at such a time. Ready? Vorwarts!”

He started again, cutting a step here and there, but very few now; and a quarter of an hour later a long path took them to where the smooth slope gave place to piled-up masses of rock, which looked as if they had been hurled down from above.

Then came a couple of hours’ toilsome climb over broken stones, and up masses that were mastered by sheer scrambling. Now and then an easy rock slope presented itself, or a gully between two buttresses of the mountain, as they won their way higher and higher. Only once was there a really dangerous place—a mere ledge, such as they had passed along on the previous day, but instead of a raging torrent beneath them there was a wall of nearly perpendicular rock running down for about a thousand feet to a great bed of snow.

But the distance was short, and Saxe stepped out bravely, perfectly aware, though, that his companions were keeping the rope pretty tight and watching his every step.

“Well done!” cried Melchior.

“Bravo, Saxe!” said Dale, as soon as they were safely across: “I see your head is screwed on right. Forward!”

“But he don’t know what a weak screw it is,” thought Saxe. “Why, they must have seen how white I was! I shall never dare to get back that way.”

Three or four awkward bits were circumvented; a couloir or gully full of snow mounted; and then there was a long climb up a moderate slope toward where a ridge of rocks stood out sharply, with snow sloping down on either side, the ridge running up far into the mountain; but before they could get to this a deep bed of old snow—“firn” Melchior called it—a great sheet, like some large white field, had to be passed.

But this was mastered, and the climb began up towards the ridge.

“The herr remembers this?” Melchior said.

“No,” said Saxe.

“Oh yes, you remember: that is the arête,” said Dale.

“That? What! right up there?”

“Yes. Are you surprised?”

“Yes: I thought we had passed that, down below somewhere, hours ago.”

“More faith in the size of the mountains,” said Dale merrily. “Well, Saxe, how do you feel now? Will you sit down and wait!”

“No,” said the boy, through his set teeth, “I’m going right to the top.”

Chapter Thirteen.Saxe goes to the Top.“Ten minutes’ rest, herr,” said the guide.“And lunch?”“No, herr—only for a pipe;” and Melchior drew out his big tobacco holder and filled up, while Dale took out a cigar. “Here’s a sheltered place to get a light,” continued the guide, leading the way to a niche in the rocks and striking a match.“Well,” said Dale, “what do you think? Will he do it?”“Shall I speak the truth, herr?” said the guide, puffing quietly away.“Of course.”“He’s horribly frightened, herr; but he would sooner die than show it.”“Exactly: you are right. Will he hold out?”“That he will, if he is a long time doing it.”“Will you stand by me, Melchior?”“Of course, herr. I am your servant, and I am more: we are all brothers in the mountains, ready to stand by each other to the end.”“Then, if he has the pluck that every English boy should have—the pluck that English boys always have had—he shall go right to the top, even if we have to sleep somewhere half-way down.”“If we can get him to the top, herr,” said Melchior, laughing in his quiet, grave way, “never mind about the coming down. Bless him! I’ll carry him down what you English call pig-a-back, if he’s worn out.”“Then we’ll take him. Is it a very stiff climb higher—dangerous?”The guide shrugged his shoulders.“The herr is a mountaineer, and sees as much as I do. I have never been up here, but the mountains are much alike on the whole. I think we can do it.”“Yes, alone: but with that lad?”“Well, herr, if we come to a very dangerous bit I should say give it up for his sake. But we shall see.”They stood smoking and looking about at the different parts above them, marking out the way they would go when they had mastered the arête, and then returned to Saxe, who was lying down in the sunshine resting.“Well. Saxe: ten minutes nearly up. Will you stop or go on?”Saxe looked rather pale, but he laughed.“Wait here, getting cold?”“No! there will be plenty of sunshine.”“Yes, but—wait here hours while you two go up to the top and sit down, see the view and eat all the lunch. No; I’m coming with you.”“Right: you shall. Ready, Melchior!”“Yes, herr. I think we’ll have the rope again: I can give you both a bit of a haul sometimes.”“He means me only,” thought Saxe, “and I won’t let him.”“Now, gentlemen!” the guide went on, as he stood shading his eyes, “that snow’s pretty firm, I think, and will not slip. We ought to master the arête in an hour.”“An hour to do that little bit!” thought Saxe, as he looked up; but he did not utter his thoughts; he was really beginning to understand that dots meant big rocks, and snow patches that seemed the size of the hand great beds.“Vorwarts!” cried Melchior; and he began to climb with the activity of a monkey, getting up to the extent of the rope, and then seating himself and drawing it in as Saxe followed him and fully grasped now that it was like getting up the sloping ridge of some mighty roof all in vast ruins. For the rocks rose out of the snow which fell away steeply on either side—how far the curve prevented him from seeing; but once, when he took hold of a great projecting piece of rock about double the size of his head, it came away and went rolling down the slope to his right, carrying more and more snow with it, till all disappeared with a curious hissing rush, which was followed many seconds later by a low reverberating roar.“I ought to have tried that stone,” said the guide quietly. “That’s right, herr: steady. Shall I pull?”“No, no!” pleaded Saxe.“Good! That block—now this. Well done! Get behind me and sit down and rest.”Saxe felt disposed to refuse; but he took his place, and in a minute or two Dale was up by them, and the guide went on again, repeating the slow cautious process.It was necessary, for the way up grew steeper and some of the rocks looser and far larger than that which Saxe had started, gave way at the first touch of the guide, and had to be turned off sideways to prevent mischief to those who followed.As they rose higher the slope down on either hand seemed more appalling; and once, as Saxe climbed to him, Melchior said, with a smile—“Never mind the two snow slopes, herr.”“I don’t—much,” panted Saxe.“Don’t look at them, and don’t think of them at all. Think of what you are doing. There is plenty of room for us, good foothold, and nothing to mind. That’s the way: hook on firmly with your ice-axe. It is better than a hand.”Over and over was this slow process repeated up and up that arête—the little serrated blocks they had seen from below proving mighty masses worn by frost and sunshine till in places they were quite sharp. But, as Melchior said, they gave excellent foothold; and at last the snow above them, a great bed surrounded by rock, was gained, and they all sat down to rest while Dale drew out his watch.“An hour and five minutes, Melchior,” he said. “And good work, sir. That was a very stiff climb. What are you thinking, young herr?”“Of how terribly steep the mountain seems from up here,” replied Saxe, who was holding by a piece of granite and gazing down.“No more steep than it was coming up, lad,” cried Dale. “Now, Melchior! what next?”“Right across this snow, sir. It is perfectly safe; and then we can take the slope above there, and we are on the shoulder. Then, as we arranged, we’ll take to the rock or the snow again, whichever seems best.”“Ready, Saxe?”“Yes,” said the boy shortly; and for the next hour they tramped over snow like hailstones, and then zigzagged up a slope beyond it, where in the steepest places a little cutting became necessary; but this was all mastered in time, and the shoulder was reached, from which half a mile away the final peak arose—a blunt hillock with perfectly smooth snow on one side, bare rock, broken and rugged, on the other, while the snow at the top seemed to have been cut clean off perpendicularly.Half an hour’s rugged walk brought them to a point where they had to decide whether to turn north and climb the snow, or south and take to the bare steep rock.“What do you say, Melchior?” said Dale, giving the guide a meaning look at the same time.“The snow is too steep, and it looks dangerous there. It is now well on in the afternoon, and our weight might start it; and if it did—you know.”“What!” said Saxe excitedly. Dale was silent for a few moments.“I do not want to scare you, lad, but you have to learn these things. If we started the snow at that angle, it would all go down with a rush into the nearest valley.”“And what would become of us!”Neither of the men answered; but Saxe knew.“That is going to be a stiff climb, Melchior,” said Dale, after a few minutes’ searching the place with his eyes.“I dare say it will be, sir,” replied the guide. “Are you ready?”“Yes.”They started again, taking to the rocky face where the steepness kept the snow from hanging. The sun was now shining full upon them, adding its heat to that produced by the exertion. The advance was slow and tentative for some time, resulting in several failures; and so painfully steep had the place become that Dale twice, to Saxe’s great relief, suggested that it would be better to give it up, and the guide seemed to be unwillingly about to agree, when all at once a narrow rift opened out before them.“We’re at the top, herr,” he cried joyfully; and, stepping out, he stopped in the furrow carved in the mountain’s side, and prepared to climb.“Can you get up there?” said Saxe, wiping his streaming face and gazing skyward.“Yes, herr, and you can too. Once up there, the rest will be easy.”Dale looked doubtful, but he said nothing—only stood watching while Melchior crept right into the narrowest part and began to ascend, taking advantage of every crack and prominence, rising higher and higher without a moment’s hesitation, though so narrow was their standing-place, that unless Dale and Saxe could stop him in case of a slip, the unfortunate man would glance off and shoot into space.Melchior was still climbing on when this idea struck Dale, who turned sharply to his young companion.“Why are you staring down there!” he said, as he noticed that Saxe had turned from watching the guide and was looking down the tremendous series of precipices stretching step-like from where he stood to the valley southward.“I was thinking how deep it is.”“Think of how far it is to the top, and let the rest take care of itself. Here,” he whispered, “stand close in with me. If he slips we must stop him somehow. Well,” he cried aloud, “can you manage it?”“Oh yes, herr; and so will you,” cried Melchior. “It is not so very hard. This rift seems as if made on purpose.”The task looked very laborious all the same. But the man’s climbing skill was wonderful; nothing seemed to daunt him, and at the end of a few minutes there came a triumphant jodel from the invisible spot to which he had made his way.Directly after the rope fell in rings from above.“Let the young herr fasten it round him before he begins to climb,” cried Melchior; and he was obeyed.“You will never climb that, Saxe,” said Dale. “It was a hard task for him.”“But I must try,” said the boy huskily; and he started at once, desperately and in haste.“Bravo! one does not know what one can do till one tries,” cried Dale. For with the rope always kept taut to help him and give him confidence, Saxe climbed on, his nerves in such a state of exaltation that he forgot how dizzy it had made him feel to see Melchior mount, but at the same time remembered almost exactly how he had planted his feet in the critical places.This went on till he was three parts of the way up, where a projecting rock overhead had to be passed; and the boy now felt, as he rested for a few moments, that if he slipped there or failed to cling sufficiently tightly, he must fall to the broad shelf where Dale was standing, and rebound into the awful depths below.In fancy he saw himself bounding from place to place, always gathering speed, till he lay a shapeless mass among the stones of the valley; and, in spite of himself, he turned his head and looked down.The view was so appalling, as he clung there, that a low hoarse sigh escaped him; his nerves tingled; a curious sensation ran up his spine, and as he wrenched his head away from the sight which fascinated him, he closed his eyes.A tug at the rope roused him, and brought him back to himself, just as Dale was pressing forward into the gash in the rock, ready to seize him as he fell.“Come, herr,” Melchior shouted, from his invisible resting-place. “Are you at that bit of sticking-out rock? Come along: it’s very easy.”Saxe raised his arms, which had felt nerveless the moment before, took a fresh hold, and began to climb desperately. The first movements were horrible, and he felt the creeping sensation of horror once more, and stopped, clinging hard, thinking that he could do no more; but the rope was against his face, and as it vibrated he knew that even if he slipped it would hold him, and the cold, dank sensation passed away again as he got a good foothold and was helped by the strain on the rope; and just while he was saying to himself, “I shall never do it—I shall never do it!” a great hand seized the rope round his chest, and he was drawn right on to a rocky platform, where Melchior was seated with his legs widely apart, and his heels against two projecting corners.“Well done, herr!” cried the guide, laughing, as he proceeded to untie the rope: “you and I will do some of the big peaks yet.”Saxe said nothing, but seated himself twenty feet farther up the rock, with his heels planted in the same way as the guide’s, and letting the rope pass through his hands as it was gathered into rings.“Ready, herr!” shouted Melchior.“Yes,” came from below; and the rope was thrown over the edge.“Make it fast round your waist, herr,” cried Melchior; and then, turning to Saxe, he said, with a smile meant to inspire confidence, “We can pull him up if he likes.”“Now!” came from below.“Ready,” shouted the guide; and then to Saxe—“Pull as I pull, herr, steady and strong, always keeping a tight grip, in case of a slip. It gives him confidence.”Saxe nodded; the rope was kept tight, and drawn in foot by foot, till, just as the lad was thinking of what a tremendous jerk it would be if Dale slipped, the latter’s head appeared above the rock, with his ice-axe projecting over his shoulder, it having worked up in the climbing till it threatened to escape from the belt and fall.“Take a good grip of the rope with one hand, herr,” said Melchior quietly: “we have you. Now get hold of your ice-axe and push it on before you.”Dale obeyed without a word, as mountaineers do follow out the instructions one gives to another without question; and this done, he finished the climb and stood up.“Rather a bad bit,” he said; “that projecting rock was awkward.”“Yes, herr, it teased me a little,” replied Melchior quietly, “but I found good hold for my feet. What do you think of it now?”“Why, there’s no more to do but walk quietly up this slope.”“And in ten minutes we shall stand on the snow at the very top.”Saxe drew a long breath full of relief as he looked behind him; and, gathering up the rope, Melchior trudged on ahead, picking the best path among the weathered and splintered rocks, till in a short time he climbed up over the last slope, dug his ice-axe in the thick stratum of snow, which began suddenly and sloped down toward the north, and uttered a loud jodel.The others joined him directly, a peculiar sensation of nervousness still affecting Saxe, though the place was perfectly safe, and he could have run some distance in any direction without risk of a fall.“Grand!” cried Dale, as he looked round. “What a view! and how strange that we should be able to stand here on the dividing line one foot on snow, one on rock. Well, Saxe, I congratulate you on your first ascent. You have done wonders.”“Have I?” said the boy nervously.“Yes, wonders, herr. Bravo! Bravo!”“Have I?” said Saxe faintly, as to himself he thought, “Oh, if they only knew!”“Yes, my boy; but what’s the matter?”“I—I don’t know,” he panted; “I—I feel as if I had overdone it, and broken something.”“Eh? What? Where?” cried Dale, anxiously catching him by the arm.“Here,” said Saxe, striking his chest: “I can’t breathe enough; it comes short, like that.”The others burst out laughing; and Saxe stared at them angrily: it seemed so unfeeling.“Sit down, boy. Come, Melchior, lunch or dinner. We’ve got to descend. Why, Saxe lad, where’s your school teaching?”“My teaching?”“Yes. Don’t you know you are about eleven or twelve thousand feet above sea-level?”“I know we are terribly high.”“Yes, and the air is so thin and rarefied that breathing is hard work. That’s nothing. Now for a good rest and refresh. We must not stay up here very long.”“No, herr,” said the guide, spreading the contents of the wallet on the rocks in the sunshine. “The weather changes quickly up these mountains. Look! yonder the mists are gathering already.”He pointed to the clouds hanging round the nearest peak, as they sat down and ate with mountaineers’ appetites, till, just as they were ending, Melchior rose—rather excitedly for him.“Look!” he said, pointing: “you do not often see that.”He pointed to where the landscape, with its peaks and vales, was blotted out by a peculiar-looking sunlit haze, in which were curious, misty, luminous bodies; and as they looked, there, each moment growing more distinct, were three gigantic human figures, whose aspect, in his highly strained state, seemed awful to one of the lookers-on.“Change of weather, Melchior,” said Dale.“Perhaps, herr; but I think we shall have plenty of time to get down first.”“What is it?” said Saxe, whose eyes were fixed upon the strange apparition.“Only our reflections on the face of that mist,” said Dale. “Lift up your alpenstock and wave it.”Saxe did so, and the central giant did the same.“Both hands.”This was imitated, and every other movement, in a weird fashion that was impressive as it was startling.“It is only one of Nature’s own looking-glasses,” said Dale laughingly.“But there are some of our people who look upon it as a warning,” said the guide gravely. “They say it signifies that those who see it will soon die in the mountains.”Saxe turned pale. He was in such an exalted condition, mentally as well as bodily, that the slightest thing threatened to upset him; and at the guide’s words a profound sensation of horror attacked him, making him feel utterly unnerved:“They had all those dreadful places to descend.”

“Ten minutes’ rest, herr,” said the guide.

“And lunch?”

“No, herr—only for a pipe;” and Melchior drew out his big tobacco holder and filled up, while Dale took out a cigar. “Here’s a sheltered place to get a light,” continued the guide, leading the way to a niche in the rocks and striking a match.

“Well,” said Dale, “what do you think? Will he do it?”

“Shall I speak the truth, herr?” said the guide, puffing quietly away.

“Of course.”

“He’s horribly frightened, herr; but he would sooner die than show it.”

“Exactly: you are right. Will he hold out?”

“That he will, if he is a long time doing it.”

“Will you stand by me, Melchior?”

“Of course, herr. I am your servant, and I am more: we are all brothers in the mountains, ready to stand by each other to the end.”

“Then, if he has the pluck that every English boy should have—the pluck that English boys always have had—he shall go right to the top, even if we have to sleep somewhere half-way down.”

“If we can get him to the top, herr,” said Melchior, laughing in his quiet, grave way, “never mind about the coming down. Bless him! I’ll carry him down what you English call pig-a-back, if he’s worn out.”

“Then we’ll take him. Is it a very stiff climb higher—dangerous?”

The guide shrugged his shoulders.

“The herr is a mountaineer, and sees as much as I do. I have never been up here, but the mountains are much alike on the whole. I think we can do it.”

“Yes, alone: but with that lad?”

“Well, herr, if we come to a very dangerous bit I should say give it up for his sake. But we shall see.”

They stood smoking and looking about at the different parts above them, marking out the way they would go when they had mastered the arête, and then returned to Saxe, who was lying down in the sunshine resting.

“Well. Saxe: ten minutes nearly up. Will you stop or go on?”

Saxe looked rather pale, but he laughed.

“Wait here, getting cold?”

“No! there will be plenty of sunshine.”

“Yes, but—wait here hours while you two go up to the top and sit down, see the view and eat all the lunch. No; I’m coming with you.”

“Right: you shall. Ready, Melchior!”

“Yes, herr. I think we’ll have the rope again: I can give you both a bit of a haul sometimes.”

“He means me only,” thought Saxe, “and I won’t let him.”

“Now, gentlemen!” the guide went on, as he stood shading his eyes, “that snow’s pretty firm, I think, and will not slip. We ought to master the arête in an hour.”

“An hour to do that little bit!” thought Saxe, as he looked up; but he did not utter his thoughts; he was really beginning to understand that dots meant big rocks, and snow patches that seemed the size of the hand great beds.

“Vorwarts!” cried Melchior; and he began to climb with the activity of a monkey, getting up to the extent of the rope, and then seating himself and drawing it in as Saxe followed him and fully grasped now that it was like getting up the sloping ridge of some mighty roof all in vast ruins. For the rocks rose out of the snow which fell away steeply on either side—how far the curve prevented him from seeing; but once, when he took hold of a great projecting piece of rock about double the size of his head, it came away and went rolling down the slope to his right, carrying more and more snow with it, till all disappeared with a curious hissing rush, which was followed many seconds later by a low reverberating roar.

“I ought to have tried that stone,” said the guide quietly. “That’s right, herr: steady. Shall I pull?”

“No, no!” pleaded Saxe.

“Good! That block—now this. Well done! Get behind me and sit down and rest.”

Saxe felt disposed to refuse; but he took his place, and in a minute or two Dale was up by them, and the guide went on again, repeating the slow cautious process.

It was necessary, for the way up grew steeper and some of the rocks looser and far larger than that which Saxe had started, gave way at the first touch of the guide, and had to be turned off sideways to prevent mischief to those who followed.

As they rose higher the slope down on either hand seemed more appalling; and once, as Saxe climbed to him, Melchior said, with a smile—

“Never mind the two snow slopes, herr.”

“I don’t—much,” panted Saxe.

“Don’t look at them, and don’t think of them at all. Think of what you are doing. There is plenty of room for us, good foothold, and nothing to mind. That’s the way: hook on firmly with your ice-axe. It is better than a hand.”

Over and over was this slow process repeated up and up that arête—the little serrated blocks they had seen from below proving mighty masses worn by frost and sunshine till in places they were quite sharp. But, as Melchior said, they gave excellent foothold; and at last the snow above them, a great bed surrounded by rock, was gained, and they all sat down to rest while Dale drew out his watch.

“An hour and five minutes, Melchior,” he said. “And good work, sir. That was a very stiff climb. What are you thinking, young herr?”

“Of how terribly steep the mountain seems from up here,” replied Saxe, who was holding by a piece of granite and gazing down.

“No more steep than it was coming up, lad,” cried Dale. “Now, Melchior! what next?”

“Right across this snow, sir. It is perfectly safe; and then we can take the slope above there, and we are on the shoulder. Then, as we arranged, we’ll take to the rock or the snow again, whichever seems best.”

“Ready, Saxe?”

“Yes,” said the boy shortly; and for the next hour they tramped over snow like hailstones, and then zigzagged up a slope beyond it, where in the steepest places a little cutting became necessary; but this was all mastered in time, and the shoulder was reached, from which half a mile away the final peak arose—a blunt hillock with perfectly smooth snow on one side, bare rock, broken and rugged, on the other, while the snow at the top seemed to have been cut clean off perpendicularly.

Half an hour’s rugged walk brought them to a point where they had to decide whether to turn north and climb the snow, or south and take to the bare steep rock.

“What do you say, Melchior?” said Dale, giving the guide a meaning look at the same time.

“The snow is too steep, and it looks dangerous there. It is now well on in the afternoon, and our weight might start it; and if it did—you know.”

“What!” said Saxe excitedly. Dale was silent for a few moments.

“I do not want to scare you, lad, but you have to learn these things. If we started the snow at that angle, it would all go down with a rush into the nearest valley.”

“And what would become of us!”

Neither of the men answered; but Saxe knew.

“That is going to be a stiff climb, Melchior,” said Dale, after a few minutes’ searching the place with his eyes.

“I dare say it will be, sir,” replied the guide. “Are you ready?”

“Yes.”

They started again, taking to the rocky face where the steepness kept the snow from hanging. The sun was now shining full upon them, adding its heat to that produced by the exertion. The advance was slow and tentative for some time, resulting in several failures; and so painfully steep had the place become that Dale twice, to Saxe’s great relief, suggested that it would be better to give it up, and the guide seemed to be unwillingly about to agree, when all at once a narrow rift opened out before them.

“We’re at the top, herr,” he cried joyfully; and, stepping out, he stopped in the furrow carved in the mountain’s side, and prepared to climb.

“Can you get up there?” said Saxe, wiping his streaming face and gazing skyward.

“Yes, herr, and you can too. Once up there, the rest will be easy.”

Dale looked doubtful, but he said nothing—only stood watching while Melchior crept right into the narrowest part and began to ascend, taking advantage of every crack and prominence, rising higher and higher without a moment’s hesitation, though so narrow was their standing-place, that unless Dale and Saxe could stop him in case of a slip, the unfortunate man would glance off and shoot into space.

Melchior was still climbing on when this idea struck Dale, who turned sharply to his young companion.

“Why are you staring down there!” he said, as he noticed that Saxe had turned from watching the guide and was looking down the tremendous series of precipices stretching step-like from where he stood to the valley southward.

“I was thinking how deep it is.”

“Think of how far it is to the top, and let the rest take care of itself. Here,” he whispered, “stand close in with me. If he slips we must stop him somehow. Well,” he cried aloud, “can you manage it?”

“Oh yes, herr; and so will you,” cried Melchior. “It is not so very hard. This rift seems as if made on purpose.”

The task looked very laborious all the same. But the man’s climbing skill was wonderful; nothing seemed to daunt him, and at the end of a few minutes there came a triumphant jodel from the invisible spot to which he had made his way.

Directly after the rope fell in rings from above.

“Let the young herr fasten it round him before he begins to climb,” cried Melchior; and he was obeyed.

“You will never climb that, Saxe,” said Dale. “It was a hard task for him.”

“But I must try,” said the boy huskily; and he started at once, desperately and in haste.

“Bravo! one does not know what one can do till one tries,” cried Dale. For with the rope always kept taut to help him and give him confidence, Saxe climbed on, his nerves in such a state of exaltation that he forgot how dizzy it had made him feel to see Melchior mount, but at the same time remembered almost exactly how he had planted his feet in the critical places.

This went on till he was three parts of the way up, where a projecting rock overhead had to be passed; and the boy now felt, as he rested for a few moments, that if he slipped there or failed to cling sufficiently tightly, he must fall to the broad shelf where Dale was standing, and rebound into the awful depths below.

In fancy he saw himself bounding from place to place, always gathering speed, till he lay a shapeless mass among the stones of the valley; and, in spite of himself, he turned his head and looked down.

The view was so appalling, as he clung there, that a low hoarse sigh escaped him; his nerves tingled; a curious sensation ran up his spine, and as he wrenched his head away from the sight which fascinated him, he closed his eyes.

A tug at the rope roused him, and brought him back to himself, just as Dale was pressing forward into the gash in the rock, ready to seize him as he fell.

“Come, herr,” Melchior shouted, from his invisible resting-place. “Are you at that bit of sticking-out rock? Come along: it’s very easy.”

Saxe raised his arms, which had felt nerveless the moment before, took a fresh hold, and began to climb desperately. The first movements were horrible, and he felt the creeping sensation of horror once more, and stopped, clinging hard, thinking that he could do no more; but the rope was against his face, and as it vibrated he knew that even if he slipped it would hold him, and the cold, dank sensation passed away again as he got a good foothold and was helped by the strain on the rope; and just while he was saying to himself, “I shall never do it—I shall never do it!” a great hand seized the rope round his chest, and he was drawn right on to a rocky platform, where Melchior was seated with his legs widely apart, and his heels against two projecting corners.

“Well done, herr!” cried the guide, laughing, as he proceeded to untie the rope: “you and I will do some of the big peaks yet.”

Saxe said nothing, but seated himself twenty feet farther up the rock, with his heels planted in the same way as the guide’s, and letting the rope pass through his hands as it was gathered into rings.

“Ready, herr!” shouted Melchior.

“Yes,” came from below; and the rope was thrown over the edge.

“Make it fast round your waist, herr,” cried Melchior; and then, turning to Saxe, he said, with a smile meant to inspire confidence, “We can pull him up if he likes.”

“Now!” came from below.

“Ready,” shouted the guide; and then to Saxe—“Pull as I pull, herr, steady and strong, always keeping a tight grip, in case of a slip. It gives him confidence.”

Saxe nodded; the rope was kept tight, and drawn in foot by foot, till, just as the lad was thinking of what a tremendous jerk it would be if Dale slipped, the latter’s head appeared above the rock, with his ice-axe projecting over his shoulder, it having worked up in the climbing till it threatened to escape from the belt and fall.

“Take a good grip of the rope with one hand, herr,” said Melchior quietly: “we have you. Now get hold of your ice-axe and push it on before you.”

Dale obeyed without a word, as mountaineers do follow out the instructions one gives to another without question; and this done, he finished the climb and stood up.

“Rather a bad bit,” he said; “that projecting rock was awkward.”

“Yes, herr, it teased me a little,” replied Melchior quietly, “but I found good hold for my feet. What do you think of it now?”

“Why, there’s no more to do but walk quietly up this slope.”

“And in ten minutes we shall stand on the snow at the very top.”

Saxe drew a long breath full of relief as he looked behind him; and, gathering up the rope, Melchior trudged on ahead, picking the best path among the weathered and splintered rocks, till in a short time he climbed up over the last slope, dug his ice-axe in the thick stratum of snow, which began suddenly and sloped down toward the north, and uttered a loud jodel.

The others joined him directly, a peculiar sensation of nervousness still affecting Saxe, though the place was perfectly safe, and he could have run some distance in any direction without risk of a fall.

“Grand!” cried Dale, as he looked round. “What a view! and how strange that we should be able to stand here on the dividing line one foot on snow, one on rock. Well, Saxe, I congratulate you on your first ascent. You have done wonders.”

“Have I?” said the boy nervously.

“Yes, wonders, herr. Bravo! Bravo!”

“Have I?” said Saxe faintly, as to himself he thought, “Oh, if they only knew!”

“Yes, my boy; but what’s the matter?”

“I—I don’t know,” he panted; “I—I feel as if I had overdone it, and broken something.”

“Eh? What? Where?” cried Dale, anxiously catching him by the arm.

“Here,” said Saxe, striking his chest: “I can’t breathe enough; it comes short, like that.”

The others burst out laughing; and Saxe stared at them angrily: it seemed so unfeeling.

“Sit down, boy. Come, Melchior, lunch or dinner. We’ve got to descend. Why, Saxe lad, where’s your school teaching?”

“My teaching?”

“Yes. Don’t you know you are about eleven or twelve thousand feet above sea-level?”

“I know we are terribly high.”

“Yes, and the air is so thin and rarefied that breathing is hard work. That’s nothing. Now for a good rest and refresh. We must not stay up here very long.”

“No, herr,” said the guide, spreading the contents of the wallet on the rocks in the sunshine. “The weather changes quickly up these mountains. Look! yonder the mists are gathering already.”

He pointed to the clouds hanging round the nearest peak, as they sat down and ate with mountaineers’ appetites, till, just as they were ending, Melchior rose—rather excitedly for him.

“Look!” he said, pointing: “you do not often see that.”

He pointed to where the landscape, with its peaks and vales, was blotted out by a peculiar-looking sunlit haze, in which were curious, misty, luminous bodies; and as they looked, there, each moment growing more distinct, were three gigantic human figures, whose aspect, in his highly strained state, seemed awful to one of the lookers-on.

“Change of weather, Melchior,” said Dale.

“Perhaps, herr; but I think we shall have plenty of time to get down first.”

“What is it?” said Saxe, whose eyes were fixed upon the strange apparition.

“Only our reflections on the face of that mist,” said Dale. “Lift up your alpenstock and wave it.”

Saxe did so, and the central giant did the same.

“Both hands.”

This was imitated, and every other movement, in a weird fashion that was impressive as it was startling.

“It is only one of Nature’s own looking-glasses,” said Dale laughingly.

“But there are some of our people who look upon it as a warning,” said the guide gravely. “They say it signifies that those who see it will soon die in the mountains.”

Saxe turned pale. He was in such an exalted condition, mentally as well as bodily, that the slightest thing threatened to upset him; and at the guide’s words a profound sensation of horror attacked him, making him feel utterly unnerved:

“They had all those dreadful places to descend.”

Chapter Fourteen.A Mountain Mist.“Hah!” ejaculated Dale, as he watched the strange phenomenon; “people will talk superstitious nonsense and believe in ghost stories, portents and other old women’s tales. But don’t you take any notice of them, Saxe. They will not do for Englishmen. Why, you have no faith in such things, Melchior?”“Not much, herr,” said the guide, smiling: “I have seen the ‘spectre of the Brocken,’ as people call it, twenty times at least. But I do fear mists.”“Yes; those are real dangers. And you think we shall have them here!”“Yes, herr. I should like us to descend at once. We can do nothing in a fog.”“Come along, Saxe: we’ll go down.”“Can’t—can’t we stop a little longer?” said the lad hesitatingly.“No. You will have plenty more chances of seeing views like this, or finer. What is it, Melchior?”“We were forgetting all about the rocks, herr. There are some curious bits here.”He picked up two or three fragments and handled them, but Dale threw them aside after a glance.“Only very fine, hard granite, with scarcely a grain of felspar,” he said. “What about this?”As he spoke he stooped down over a narrow crevice running up a portion of the summit.“Yes. There may be something here, but it would require blasting tools and power to open it out. Look here, Saxe!”He pointed to the narrow split, in which it was just possible to get the end of his ice-axe handle; and as Saxe bent down he saw that the sides were lined with tiny quartz crystals, which grew bigger lower down.“I want to find a rift in the mountains leading into a cavern where we may find crystals worth saving. Yes, Melchior, I will not waste time. These are of no value. Lead on.”The guide had been giving an anxious look round, for there was a faint sighing of the wind, and clouds were floating around them now and then, shutting off the sun.“I should like to get well down, herr, before the weather changes. The young herr would find it terribly cold.”“Hadn’t we better wait till it gets clearer,” said Saxe, “and go down then?”“If we did we might not be able to get down at all,” said Dale quietly.“Why?”“We might be frozen to death. Come, Saxe, you must not be greedy. You’ve had a splendid ascent on a lovely day, and you will have others. Always pay respect to your guide’s opinion about the weather. Come along.”Saxe could hang back no longer, though the sensation of dread he suffered from was terrible. Try how he would, there was the horror of that first bit of the descent before him; and, shuddering and feeling cold, he followed to the edge of the rock where he had found the guide sitting, and a fresh access of horror came over him as Dale said coolly:“Now, Melchior, it is your turn to go first and have the use of the rope. I’ll come last.”“We can all use it, herr,” said the guide. “It will be quite long enough if I pass it round this block and let both ends hang down. I can draw it after us when we are down.”He threw the rope over a great block of granite, and proceeded to draw it along till the ends were equal, when he lightly twisted the rope and threw it over the precipice.“Then I’ll go first,” said Dale; and, seizing the twisted rope, he lowered himself over the edge, hung in sight for a few moments, and then, as soon as his hands were clear of the edge, allowed himself to slide down, while Saxe’s palms felt cold and wet.He watched the rope intently and strained his ears, and then started, for Melchior gently laid his hand upon his shoulder.“What is it?” cried Saxe excitedly. “Has he fallen?”“No, herr; and nobody is going to fall. You are fancying troubles. I know. I have not led strangers up the mountains for twenty years without studying their faces as well as the face of Nature. I can read yours. You are scarcely yourself, and feeling fear where there is no need. Come now, take a long breath. Make an effort, and be calm. I’ll draw up the rope and fasten one end round you, and lower you down.”“No,” cried Saxe excitedly; “I can get down without. Is he safe yet?”“Safe? He is down: look at the rope shaking. Shall I draw it up?”For answer Saxe stooped down, and rose again to get his ice-axe well behind him in his belt. Then he stooped again, seized the lightly twisted rope, lay down upon his chest, thrust his legs over the edge of the precipice, worked himself back till he was clear, and began to glide slowly down.He shuddered, for the rope began to twist; and directly after, instead of gazing at the rough granite rock, he was facing outward, and gazing wildly down at the step-like series of precipices below.“Not too fast,” came from Dale; and this brought him back to his position, and, twisting his legs about the double rope, he slipped down more slowly, wondering the while why the rope had ceased to turn and swing, till he saw that it was being held tightly now.“Well done!” cried Dale: “you are getting quite at home at it. Right!” he shouted to Melchior, whose two legs appeared directly after, then his body, and he slid down rapidly, as if it were one of the most simple things in the world—as it really was, save that, instead of being close to the level, it was twelve thousand feet above.As Melchior joined them, he rapidly untwisted the rope, held the two ends apart, and, as he drew with his left, he sent a wave along from his right, and threw the end up, with the result that the rope came away easily, and was rapidly coiled up.The mists were collecting on the summit as they reached the snow bed, but they followed their old track easily enough; and when at last, in what seemed to be a surprisingly short space of time, they came to the head of the arête, the white, spectral looking fog was creeping down in long-drawn wreaths, toward which Melchior kept turning his eyes.“Look as if they will catch us soon,” said Dale quietly.“Pray Heaven they may not till we are clear of this ridge, herr!” said the guide piously. “Now, quick—the rope! You will go first.”The rope was rapidly attached, and, as Dale started to descend, it seemed to Saxe that he was disappearing over the edge of a precipice; and as this was repeated again and again while they reversed the way by which they had ascended, the guide sitting fast and holding on till they were down, the place seemed far more terrible, and the snow slopes on either side almost perpendicular.They made good way, however, Melchior keeping on inciting them to fresh exertion.“Go on, gentlemen—go on!” he said. “I have you safe. The rope is good. Go on, herrs—go on!”But the descent over those rugged knife-edged ridges was so perilous, that Dale went slowly and cautiously; and when he reached each stopping-place he held on till Saxe had passed down to him. Once the boy seemed to totter as he was passing from one of the rocks to the other, over a patch of snow between them; but the firm strain upon the rope gave him support, and he reached the rock and began to lower himself.In spite of their hastening, that which Melchior had apprehended happened: a cloud of mist suddenly started in advance of the rest, which had formed upward, and now completely veiled the summit. This mist-cloud rolled rapidly down when the party were about two-thirds of the way down the ridge, and just as Saxe was being lowered down.An ejaculation from the guide made the lad look up; and he saw the stern, earnest face for a moment, then the fog rolled over it, and the guide’s voice sounded strange as he shouted:“Go on, young herr; and directly you reach Mr Dale sit fast. Don’t move.”Five minutes later Melchior was with them, and they crouched together, partly on rock, partly in snow.“We must not move, herr,” said Melchior. “It is unfortunate, but I was rather afraid. If it had held off for another quarter of an hour, I should not have cared.”“Will it last long?” asked Saxe.“Who can say, herr! Perhaps for days. In the mountains, when the weather is bad, we can only wait and hope.”“Had we not better try to get down off this edge?”“As a last resource, if the mist does not lift, herr. But not yet.”Dale uttered an impatient ejaculation; but the guide filled and lit his pipe, settling himself down quite in the snow.“Wind may come later on,” he said, “and then perhaps we can get down. It is a pity, for this is the worst place in the whole descent. But there: the mountains are mountains, and anything is better than an icy wind, that numbs you so that you cannot stir.”He was scarcely visible, close as he was; but he had hardly finished speaking when Saxe saw his head, at first faintly, then clearly—for the cloud of mist had been still descending, and literally rolled down past them, Saxe himself standing out clear, then Dale, and the rocks below them one by one as far as the curve permitted them to see.It was bright sunshine now once more, and as the rays from the west shot by, it was between two strata of clouds, glorifying that which was below and lighting up that above.“Quick, herr!” said Melchior, in an authoritative tone. “We have this bad piece to finish, if we can, before another cloud rolls down.”The descent was continued, seeming to Saxe almost interminable. Then they were hurrying along over the snow, after passing the morning’s resting-place, and on and on till the shelf was reached with the precipice running down so steeply, just as mist came rolling down from above and also up from the depths below, meeting just where the party stood roping themselves together.But, to the surprise of Saxe, the guide took no heed—he merely went on fastening the rope till he had done.“You will not venture along that shelf while it is so thick, Melchior?” said Dale.“Oh yes, herr. We must not wait here.”“But the danger!”“There is scarcely any, herr,” replied the guide. “The great danger is of going astray. We cannot go wrong here. We have only to go along the shelf to the end.”“But it is like going along the edge of a precipice in the dark.”“It is like darkness, and more confusing, herr; but we have the wall on our left to steady us, and where we are is terribly exposed. Trust me, sir.”“Forward!” said Dale quietly. “Keep the rope fairly tight.”Melchior stepped at once on to the ledge, and the others followed, all three going cautiously and very slowly through the opaque mist, which looked so solid at Saxe’s feet that more than once he was ready to make a false step, while he wondered in himself that he did not feel more alarm, but attributed the cause rightly to the fact that he could not see the danger yawning below. To make the passage along this ledge the more perilous and strange, each was invisible to the other, and their voices in the awful solitude sounded muffled and strange.As Saxe stepped cautiously along, feeling his way by the wall and beating the edge of the precipice with the handle of his ice-axe, he felt over again the sensations he had had in passing along there that morning. But the dread was not so keen—only lest there should be a sudden strain on the rope caused by one of them slipping; and he judged rightly that, had one of them gone over the precipice here, nothing could have saved the others, for there was no good hold that they could seize, to bear up against the sudden jerk.“Over!” shouted Melchior at last. “Steady, herr—steady! Don’t hurry! That’s it: give me your hand.”“I can’t see you.”“No? Come along, then, another yard or two: you are not quite off the ledge. That’s it. Safe!”“And thank goodness!” said Dale, with a sigh of relief, a few minutes later. “That was worse than ever. Saxe, my lad, you are having a month’s mountaineering crowded into one day.”“Yes, herr,” said Melchior; “he is having a very great lesson, and he’ll feel a different person when he lies down to sleep.”“He will if we have anywhere to sleep to-night. It seems to me as if we must sit under a block of stone and wait until this mist is gone.”“Oh no, herr,” said the guide; “we will keep to the rope, and you two will save me if I get into a bad place. I seem to know this mountain pretty well now; and, if you recollect, there was nothing very bad. I think we’ll go on, if you please, and try and reach the camp.”“You asked me to trust you,” said Dale. “I will. Go on.”“Forward, then; and if I do not hit the snow col I shall find the valley, and we can journey back.”For the first time Saxe began to feel how utterly exhausted he had grown. Till now the excitement and heat of the journey had monopolised all his thoughts; but, as they stumbled on down slope after slope strewn with débris, or over patches of deep snow, his legs dragged heavily, and he struck himself awkwardly against blocks of granite that he might have avoided.The work was comparatively simple, though. It was downward, and that must be right unless Melchior led them to the edge of some terrible precipice right or left of the track they had taken in the morning.But matters began to go easier and easier, for at the end of another hour’s tramp they suddenly emerged from the mist, coming out below it, and after a few more dozen steps seeing it like a roof high above their heads.Here the guide stopped, mounted a stone, and stood looking about him in the evening light.“I see,” he cried: “we are not half an hour out of our way. Off to the right we shall reach the snow, and then our task is done.”Melchior was right: in less than the time he had named they reached the place where they had left the great snow slope, up which they had had to zigzag; and after descending it diagonally for some distance, the guide proposed a glissade.“The young herr shall come down behind me this time,” he said; and after a few preliminary words of advice they started, and rapidly descended safely to the débris at the foot of the snow, from which the walk to the camp was not long.Melchior soon had a good fire burning, with Gros standing near contemplating it solemnly, while Dale placed their provisions ready.“Now, Saxe, my lad,” he said, “I congratulate you on your display of honest English pluck to-day. I don’t see that any boy of your age could have behaved better. Come along: coffee’s ready. You must be half starved.”There was a pause.“Ready, Melchior?”“Yes, herr: the coffee smells heavenly, and I have an appetite for three.”“You shall satisfy it, then. To-morrow we’ll go back and fetch all our traps, and then come over here again; for I do not think we can get a better part for our search. Come, Saxe, wake up.”But there was no reply: Saxe was sleeping with all his might after the tremendous exertions of the day.

“Hah!” ejaculated Dale, as he watched the strange phenomenon; “people will talk superstitious nonsense and believe in ghost stories, portents and other old women’s tales. But don’t you take any notice of them, Saxe. They will not do for Englishmen. Why, you have no faith in such things, Melchior?”

“Not much, herr,” said the guide, smiling: “I have seen the ‘spectre of the Brocken,’ as people call it, twenty times at least. But I do fear mists.”

“Yes; those are real dangers. And you think we shall have them here!”

“Yes, herr. I should like us to descend at once. We can do nothing in a fog.”

“Come along, Saxe: we’ll go down.”

“Can’t—can’t we stop a little longer?” said the lad hesitatingly.

“No. You will have plenty more chances of seeing views like this, or finer. What is it, Melchior?”

“We were forgetting all about the rocks, herr. There are some curious bits here.”

He picked up two or three fragments and handled them, but Dale threw them aside after a glance.

“Only very fine, hard granite, with scarcely a grain of felspar,” he said. “What about this?”

As he spoke he stooped down over a narrow crevice running up a portion of the summit.

“Yes. There may be something here, but it would require blasting tools and power to open it out. Look here, Saxe!”

He pointed to the narrow split, in which it was just possible to get the end of his ice-axe handle; and as Saxe bent down he saw that the sides were lined with tiny quartz crystals, which grew bigger lower down.

“I want to find a rift in the mountains leading into a cavern where we may find crystals worth saving. Yes, Melchior, I will not waste time. These are of no value. Lead on.”

The guide had been giving an anxious look round, for there was a faint sighing of the wind, and clouds were floating around them now and then, shutting off the sun.

“I should like to get well down, herr, before the weather changes. The young herr would find it terribly cold.”

“Hadn’t we better wait till it gets clearer,” said Saxe, “and go down then?”

“If we did we might not be able to get down at all,” said Dale quietly.

“Why?”

“We might be frozen to death. Come, Saxe, you must not be greedy. You’ve had a splendid ascent on a lovely day, and you will have others. Always pay respect to your guide’s opinion about the weather. Come along.”

Saxe could hang back no longer, though the sensation of dread he suffered from was terrible. Try how he would, there was the horror of that first bit of the descent before him; and, shuddering and feeling cold, he followed to the edge of the rock where he had found the guide sitting, and a fresh access of horror came over him as Dale said coolly:

“Now, Melchior, it is your turn to go first and have the use of the rope. I’ll come last.”

“We can all use it, herr,” said the guide. “It will be quite long enough if I pass it round this block and let both ends hang down. I can draw it after us when we are down.”

He threw the rope over a great block of granite, and proceeded to draw it along till the ends were equal, when he lightly twisted the rope and threw it over the precipice.

“Then I’ll go first,” said Dale; and, seizing the twisted rope, he lowered himself over the edge, hung in sight for a few moments, and then, as soon as his hands were clear of the edge, allowed himself to slide down, while Saxe’s palms felt cold and wet.

He watched the rope intently and strained his ears, and then started, for Melchior gently laid his hand upon his shoulder.

“What is it?” cried Saxe excitedly. “Has he fallen?”

“No, herr; and nobody is going to fall. You are fancying troubles. I know. I have not led strangers up the mountains for twenty years without studying their faces as well as the face of Nature. I can read yours. You are scarcely yourself, and feeling fear where there is no need. Come now, take a long breath. Make an effort, and be calm. I’ll draw up the rope and fasten one end round you, and lower you down.”

“No,” cried Saxe excitedly; “I can get down without. Is he safe yet?”

“Safe? He is down: look at the rope shaking. Shall I draw it up?”

For answer Saxe stooped down, and rose again to get his ice-axe well behind him in his belt. Then he stooped again, seized the lightly twisted rope, lay down upon his chest, thrust his legs over the edge of the precipice, worked himself back till he was clear, and began to glide slowly down.

He shuddered, for the rope began to twist; and directly after, instead of gazing at the rough granite rock, he was facing outward, and gazing wildly down at the step-like series of precipices below.

“Not too fast,” came from Dale; and this brought him back to his position, and, twisting his legs about the double rope, he slipped down more slowly, wondering the while why the rope had ceased to turn and swing, till he saw that it was being held tightly now.

“Well done!” cried Dale: “you are getting quite at home at it. Right!” he shouted to Melchior, whose two legs appeared directly after, then his body, and he slid down rapidly, as if it were one of the most simple things in the world—as it really was, save that, instead of being close to the level, it was twelve thousand feet above.

As Melchior joined them, he rapidly untwisted the rope, held the two ends apart, and, as he drew with his left, he sent a wave along from his right, and threw the end up, with the result that the rope came away easily, and was rapidly coiled up.

The mists were collecting on the summit as they reached the snow bed, but they followed their old track easily enough; and when at last, in what seemed to be a surprisingly short space of time, they came to the head of the arête, the white, spectral looking fog was creeping down in long-drawn wreaths, toward which Melchior kept turning his eyes.

“Look as if they will catch us soon,” said Dale quietly.

“Pray Heaven they may not till we are clear of this ridge, herr!” said the guide piously. “Now, quick—the rope! You will go first.”

The rope was rapidly attached, and, as Dale started to descend, it seemed to Saxe that he was disappearing over the edge of a precipice; and as this was repeated again and again while they reversed the way by which they had ascended, the guide sitting fast and holding on till they were down, the place seemed far more terrible, and the snow slopes on either side almost perpendicular.

They made good way, however, Melchior keeping on inciting them to fresh exertion.

“Go on, gentlemen—go on!” he said. “I have you safe. The rope is good. Go on, herrs—go on!”

But the descent over those rugged knife-edged ridges was so perilous, that Dale went slowly and cautiously; and when he reached each stopping-place he held on till Saxe had passed down to him. Once the boy seemed to totter as he was passing from one of the rocks to the other, over a patch of snow between them; but the firm strain upon the rope gave him support, and he reached the rock and began to lower himself.

In spite of their hastening, that which Melchior had apprehended happened: a cloud of mist suddenly started in advance of the rest, which had formed upward, and now completely veiled the summit. This mist-cloud rolled rapidly down when the party were about two-thirds of the way down the ridge, and just as Saxe was being lowered down.

An ejaculation from the guide made the lad look up; and he saw the stern, earnest face for a moment, then the fog rolled over it, and the guide’s voice sounded strange as he shouted:

“Go on, young herr; and directly you reach Mr Dale sit fast. Don’t move.”

Five minutes later Melchior was with them, and they crouched together, partly on rock, partly in snow.

“We must not move, herr,” said Melchior. “It is unfortunate, but I was rather afraid. If it had held off for another quarter of an hour, I should not have cared.”

“Will it last long?” asked Saxe.

“Who can say, herr! Perhaps for days. In the mountains, when the weather is bad, we can only wait and hope.”

“Had we not better try to get down off this edge?”

“As a last resource, if the mist does not lift, herr. But not yet.”

Dale uttered an impatient ejaculation; but the guide filled and lit his pipe, settling himself down quite in the snow.

“Wind may come later on,” he said, “and then perhaps we can get down. It is a pity, for this is the worst place in the whole descent. But there: the mountains are mountains, and anything is better than an icy wind, that numbs you so that you cannot stir.”

He was scarcely visible, close as he was; but he had hardly finished speaking when Saxe saw his head, at first faintly, then clearly—for the cloud of mist had been still descending, and literally rolled down past them, Saxe himself standing out clear, then Dale, and the rocks below them one by one as far as the curve permitted them to see.

It was bright sunshine now once more, and as the rays from the west shot by, it was between two strata of clouds, glorifying that which was below and lighting up that above.

“Quick, herr!” said Melchior, in an authoritative tone. “We have this bad piece to finish, if we can, before another cloud rolls down.”

The descent was continued, seeming to Saxe almost interminable. Then they were hurrying along over the snow, after passing the morning’s resting-place, and on and on till the shelf was reached with the precipice running down so steeply, just as mist came rolling down from above and also up from the depths below, meeting just where the party stood roping themselves together.

But, to the surprise of Saxe, the guide took no heed—he merely went on fastening the rope till he had done.

“You will not venture along that shelf while it is so thick, Melchior?” said Dale.

“Oh yes, herr. We must not wait here.”

“But the danger!”

“There is scarcely any, herr,” replied the guide. “The great danger is of going astray. We cannot go wrong here. We have only to go along the shelf to the end.”

“But it is like going along the edge of a precipice in the dark.”

“It is like darkness, and more confusing, herr; but we have the wall on our left to steady us, and where we are is terribly exposed. Trust me, sir.”

“Forward!” said Dale quietly. “Keep the rope fairly tight.”

Melchior stepped at once on to the ledge, and the others followed, all three going cautiously and very slowly through the opaque mist, which looked so solid at Saxe’s feet that more than once he was ready to make a false step, while he wondered in himself that he did not feel more alarm, but attributed the cause rightly to the fact that he could not see the danger yawning below. To make the passage along this ledge the more perilous and strange, each was invisible to the other, and their voices in the awful solitude sounded muffled and strange.

As Saxe stepped cautiously along, feeling his way by the wall and beating the edge of the precipice with the handle of his ice-axe, he felt over again the sensations he had had in passing along there that morning. But the dread was not so keen—only lest there should be a sudden strain on the rope caused by one of them slipping; and he judged rightly that, had one of them gone over the precipice here, nothing could have saved the others, for there was no good hold that they could seize, to bear up against the sudden jerk.

“Over!” shouted Melchior at last. “Steady, herr—steady! Don’t hurry! That’s it: give me your hand.”

“I can’t see you.”

“No? Come along, then, another yard or two: you are not quite off the ledge. That’s it. Safe!”

“And thank goodness!” said Dale, with a sigh of relief, a few minutes later. “That was worse than ever. Saxe, my lad, you are having a month’s mountaineering crowded into one day.”

“Yes, herr,” said Melchior; “he is having a very great lesson, and he’ll feel a different person when he lies down to sleep.”

“He will if we have anywhere to sleep to-night. It seems to me as if we must sit under a block of stone and wait until this mist is gone.”

“Oh no, herr,” said the guide; “we will keep to the rope, and you two will save me if I get into a bad place. I seem to know this mountain pretty well now; and, if you recollect, there was nothing very bad. I think we’ll go on, if you please, and try and reach the camp.”

“You asked me to trust you,” said Dale. “I will. Go on.”

“Forward, then; and if I do not hit the snow col I shall find the valley, and we can journey back.”

For the first time Saxe began to feel how utterly exhausted he had grown. Till now the excitement and heat of the journey had monopolised all his thoughts; but, as they stumbled on down slope after slope strewn with débris, or over patches of deep snow, his legs dragged heavily, and he struck himself awkwardly against blocks of granite that he might have avoided.

The work was comparatively simple, though. It was downward, and that must be right unless Melchior led them to the edge of some terrible precipice right or left of the track they had taken in the morning.

But matters began to go easier and easier, for at the end of another hour’s tramp they suddenly emerged from the mist, coming out below it, and after a few more dozen steps seeing it like a roof high above their heads.

Here the guide stopped, mounted a stone, and stood looking about him in the evening light.

“I see,” he cried: “we are not half an hour out of our way. Off to the right we shall reach the snow, and then our task is done.”

Melchior was right: in less than the time he had named they reached the place where they had left the great snow slope, up which they had had to zigzag; and after descending it diagonally for some distance, the guide proposed a glissade.

“The young herr shall come down behind me this time,” he said; and after a few preliminary words of advice they started, and rapidly descended safely to the débris at the foot of the snow, from which the walk to the camp was not long.

Melchior soon had a good fire burning, with Gros standing near contemplating it solemnly, while Dale placed their provisions ready.

“Now, Saxe, my lad,” he said, “I congratulate you on your display of honest English pluck to-day. I don’t see that any boy of your age could have behaved better. Come along: coffee’s ready. You must be half starved.”

There was a pause.

“Ready, Melchior?”

“Yes, herr: the coffee smells heavenly, and I have an appetite for three.”

“You shall satisfy it, then. To-morrow we’ll go back and fetch all our traps, and then come over here again; for I do not think we can get a better part for our search. Come, Saxe, wake up.”

But there was no reply: Saxe was sleeping with all his might after the tremendous exertions of the day.

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