of this indeed he had i now remembered said very little at all about the people he had exhausted his eloquence on the fish i recalled his words when i asked him about she is a daughter of the poor thing that was all had he been up to a practical joke if so it seemed rather a sorry one to me just then but anyhow i could not draw back now i could never face him again if i did not go on and what was more serious i could never face myself el i was weak enough to have a thought that after all the mysterious might not come but the recollection of the fish of which my friend had spoken as if they had been the golden fish of the nights banished that i asked about the streams around l yes there was good fishing but they were all too anxious to tell me about the danger of going over the mountain to give much thought to the fishing no one without blood could cross the devil s ledge two men had disappeared three years ago a man had disappeared there last year he had gone and had never been heard of afterward the devil s ledge was a bad pass why don t they look into the matter i asked the reply was as near a shrug of the shoulders as a can accomplish it was not easy to get the proof the mountain was very dangerous the very slippery there were no witnesses etc of the mountain was not a man to trouble he hates englishmen said one significantly el i am not an englishman i am an american i explained this had a sensible effect several began to talk at once one had a brother in another had cousins in and so on the group had by this time been by the addition of almost the entire population of the settlement one or two rosy women having babies in their arms standing in the rain utterly regardless of the steady it was a time can i get a place to stay here i inquired of the group generally yes � oh yes there was a consultation in which the name of was heard frequently and then a man stepped forward and taking up my bag and rod case walked off i following escorted by a number of my new friends i had been in s little house about an hour and we had just finished supper when there was a murmur outside and then the door opened and a young man stepping in said something so rapidly that i understood only that it concerned of the mountain and in some way myself of the mountain is here and wants to speak to you said my host will you go yes i said why does he not come in he will not come in said my host he never does come in he is at the church yard said the messenger he always stops there they both spoke broken english i arose and went out taking the direction indicated a number of my friends stood in the road or street as i passed along and touched their caps to me looking very queer in the dim twilight they gazed at me curiously as i walked by i turned the corner of a house which stood half in the road and just in front of me in its little yard was the little white church with its square heavy short spire at the gate stood a tall figure perfectly motionless leaning on a long staff as i approached i saw that he was an elderly man he wore a long beard once yellow but now gray and he looked very straight and large there was something grand about him as he stood there in the dusk i came quite up to him he did not move sl good evening i said good evening are you mr i asked drawing out my letter i am of the mountain he said slowly as if his name embraced the whole title i handed him the letter you are i am taking my cue from his own manner the friend of her friend his great friend can you climb i can are you steady yes it is well are you ready i had not counted on this and involuntarily i asked in some surprise to night to night you cannot go in the day i thought of the speech i had heard no one goes over the mountain except at night and the ominous conclusion who goes over the mountain comes no more my strange host however diverted my thoughts a stranger cannot go except at night he said gravely and then added i must get back to watch over i shall be ready in a minute i said turning in ten minutes i bad bade good by to my simple hosts and leaving them with a evidence of my consideration to secure their lasting good will i was on my way down the street again with my light luggage on my back this time the entire population of the little village was in the road and as i passed along i knew by their murmuring conversation that they regarded my action with profound i felt as i returned their touch of the cap and bade them good by a little like the of old who about to die saluted at the gate my strange guide who had not moved from the spot where i first found him insisted on taking my luggage and his around it and flinging it over his back he me his stick and without a word strode off straight toward the black mountain whose vast wall above us to the clouds i shall never forget that climb we were hardly out of the road before vo began to ascend and i had shortly to stop 