The times., 1901-03-10

again with a sickening jerk, finging the
guide on his face barely quarter of an
inch on the right side of the precipice,
and the young Englishman-where?
The elder guide saw all that followed !;
il was not to be measured by ordinary
standards of time. The moment the rope
broke between his Herr and himself he
had flung himself fiat on his face on the
edge of the precipice, ready to slip his
arm under the rope that still tied the
young Englishman to the other guide,
who was his brother. to prevent it's being
cut by the jagged rock, should it stand
, the strain.
He joined in his brothers cry of horror,
and then his very blood seemed to freeze; ;
he hardly felt his brothers weight when
the latter stumbled to his feet and threw
the whole weight OF his body across his
legs, to keep him from tossing his balance
and following their unfortunate employer.
He craned forward until he hung OYER
! the edge of the precipice 10 his waist, his
every sense. and nerve, and faculty con-
| centrated in the act of seeing.
And this is what he saw. AS ne after
| ward told his colleagues. it happened
| quicker than fash of lightning.
He saw Valance drop a distance of
about fifty feet, carrying with him some
| fifteen feet Of loose rope. he saw this rope,
/ frayed to tassel where it had broken,
| twist itself round a slender peak that Sut-
| ted far out Of the recediug face of the
| rock: he saw, in a dazed sort of way, that
| the rope was held firm for a moment; he
saw the unfortunate mans body, impellsd
| by the sudden check to his horrible de-
scent, swing out horizontally, and then
| back toward the rocky face of the noun
| tain.
And then he looked away; he could not
! bear to see his Herr dashed TO atoms
on the seracs of the glacier below
And then roar, as of rolling thunder,
sounded in his ears He looked again. and
saw that the juttting peak Of rock on
! which the rope had caught had broken
bodily away, and fallen in thousand
atoms on to the ice, and-surely, mira
! Gle had been wrought,
4 little below that juttting peak, only
visible now that it had fallen, was a tiny
ledge, and on that in swinging back to-
ward the mountain face. the young man 5
body had caught. 1t looked as if breath
would precpitate il thousands of feet
through space into the yawning, ice
bound depths.
| take his place; then their eyeHzaAet. and
one word escaped them simultaneousiE-
''impossible.'
There was no foothold: it would be mad
( ness to attempt it. The ledge on which
they stood Overhung the place where the
young mans body lay. 1t meant being
lowered by a rope, it meant a pendulum
like swing. with chance of being dashed
TO death against the cruel rock; it meant
/ cIinging on TO nothing over a gulf thou
sands of feet deep while one slipped a
rope round the victim s body. even if one
could ever hope to reach him; it meant
strain of an unconscious body on the rope.
1t meant certain death, with no hope of
/ rescuing the Englishman.
They must go back as far as the glacier
and try To get at him that way. BY that
time he might be dead he might fall and
be dashed to pieces on the ice below.
The elder guide shouted, and a faint cry
answered; it reached their ears like Il
| wall and the echo took it up and it be
came Il moaning chorus. He lived.
They were the finest guides in the dis
trict; they knew no fear of thing that
was possible, but they could only look t
each other unnerVed, trembling, and NUT
ter: 1t is not to be donc."
And then a voice, a wOman's voice,
broke the deathIy stiffness, and the
brown-haired girl from the 'Internation-
! al" Olga Braun, the world-famous noun
| taineer, appeared al the junction of the
two tracks. She was i'm complete noun
! taneerng costume; she grasped an ice
| ak, aand a coil of rope was SUng over
up and stood by their side. and the two
! guides raised their hats again in almost
TeVerent greeting.
! Where is he?' she asked. hoarsely. Il
heard a cry just now. ! came up the
| other track-it is shorter, you know-to
| give him a surprise and go on with you
| To the top. Can't you speak? Oh my
| God. the roper' The ragged ends hang
ing round the men $ bodies told her only
too plainly what their parched lips found
/ it impossible to say.
Her presence and her solitary climb up
that second track, shorter, true. but far
more dangerous than the one they had
chosen. had robbed them for the moment
of their hahituaI stolid self-contrOl. The
elder pointed down the precipice.
In second she, in her turn, was lying
on her face, peering down into the abyss.
Her action reused the men professional
instinct; they knelt down and held her
tightly, and in a moment their sangfroid
returned. aand they were ashamed of
their collapse.
4 see him." she cried. Thank God.