The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1901-03-10

again with a sicIening jerk, finging the
guide on his face barely "A quarter of an
| inch on the right side of the precipice,
and the young Englishman-where?
The elder guide saw all that followed
it 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 its being
| cut by the jagged rock, should it stand
F, 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 losing his balance
and following their unfortunate employer.
He craned forward until he hung over
! the edge of the precipice to his waist, his
every sense, and nerve. and faculty con-
| centrated in the act of seeing.
And this is what he saw. As he after
ward told his colleagues it happened
quicker than flash 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 dazed sort of way, that
| the rope was held firm for a moment; he
| saw the unfortunate man body, impsllsd
| 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,
A 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 S
body had caught. 1t looked as if a breath
would precipitate il thousands of feet
through space into the yawning, ice
bound depths
take his place; then their eyennAet. and
one word escaped them simultaneously
impossible
There was no foothold: it would be mad
I ness to attempt it. The ledge on which
they stood overhunE the place where the
young mans body lay 1t meant being
lowered by a rope, it meant a pendulum
like swing, with a chance of being dashed
to death against the cruel rock; it meant
clinging on TO nothing over a gulf thou
sands of feet deep while one slipped 4
rope round the victims body. even IL one
could ever hope to reach him: 1t 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 fail and
be dashed to pieces on the ice below.
The elder guide shouted, and a faint cry
answered; it reached their ears like a
wall. and the echo took it up and it be-
came 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 at
each other. unnerved, trembling, and NUT
ter: 1T is not to be donei'
And then a voice, a woman's vgice,
broke the deathly stiffness. and the
brown-haired girl from the ''Internation-
al Olga Braun, the world-famous noun
taineer, appeared at the junction Of the
two tracks. She was in complete noun
taineering costume; she grasped an ice
ak, aand a coil of rope was slung over
up and stood by their side. and the two
guides raised their hats again in almost
reverent greeting.
Where is he?" she asked hoarsely. II
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 mems 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 habitual stolid self-contrOl. The
elder pointed down the precipice.
In "A second she. in her turn, was lying
on her face. peering down into the abyss.
Her action reused the mems professional
instinct; they knelt down and held her
tightly. and in a moment their sangfroid
returned, aand they were ashamed of
their collapse.
Il see him." she cried. Thank God, l