"Smith was on the point of answering that he preferred not to smoke, but intended to read the night through, and could on no account consent to the lamp being veiled, when it occurred to him that it was of no use cutting off his nose to spite his face. He was just dying for a smoke.
So the bargain was struck, and we were soon puffing away like traction engines.
"Now the Frenchman who had been turned out of his seat was no fool of a Gaul. Whether suggested by the settling of our little difference or originating with himself, the idea seemed to strike him that he too might just as well obtain terms from the enemy to his own advantage.
The unlicked cub aforesaid was slumbering peacefully in his corner, his long legs straight across the compartment, for we were three on that side, and there was no room to put them on the seat. The first station we stop at, up gets the Frenchman, flings open the door, letting in a sort of young hurricane, and of course stumbling over the sleeper"s legs. Aggressive female looks daggers. But when this had happened several times--for the stoppages were pretty frequent, and even though but for a minute the Frenchman took good care to tumble out--she began to expostulate.
""It was cruel to disturb her poor boy"s slumbers continually like that.
Surely there was no necessity to get out at every station."
"That Frenchman"s grin was something to see. He was _desole_; but _enfin_! What would madame? He had been turned out of his corner seat, and could not sleep sitting bolt upright. It was absolutely necessary for him to get a mouthful of fresh air and stretch his legs at every opportunity. But the remedy was in madame"s hands. Let _monsieur_ change places with him. Monsieur was young, whereas he was--well, not so young as he used to be. Otherwise he was sorry to say it, but his restlessness would compel him to take exercise at every station they stopped at.
"Heavens! that old termagant looked sick. But she was thoroughly bested. If she refused the enemy would be as good as his word, and her whelp might make up his mind to stay awake all night. So she caved in, sulkily enough, and with much bland bowing and smiling the Frenchman got back his corner seat, or one as good, and the cub snored on his dam"s shoulder. Thus we all regained our rights again, and everybody was happy."
"Devilish good yarn, Fordham," said Phil. "But you be hanged with your Smith, old man. Why, that was you--you all over."
"Was it? I said it was Smith. But the point is immaterial, especially at this time of day. And now, Phil, own up, as you contemplate this howling, hungry crowd of the alpenstock contingent, that you bless my foresight which coerced you into posting on every stick and stone you possess, bar your trusty knapsack. If you don"t now, you will when we get to Visp and tranquilly make our way through a frantic mob all shouting for its luggage at once. Here we are at Sierre. Sure to be a wait. I wonder if there"s a _buffet_. Hallo! What now?"
For his companion, whose head was half through the window, suddenly withdrew it with a wild e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n, then rushed from the carriage like a lunatic, vouchsafing no word of explanation as to the phenomenon--or apology for having stamped Fordham"s pet corn as flat as though a steam roller had pa.s.sed over it. The latter, scowling, looked cautiously forth, and then the disturbing element became apparent. There, on the platform, in a state of more than all his former exuberance, stood Philip, talking--with all his eyes--to Alma Wyatt, and with all his might to her uncle and aunt, who had just stepped out of the train to join her. And at the sight Fordham dropped back into his seat with a saturnine guffaw.
But the next words uttered by his volatile friend caused him to sit up and attend.
"This is a most unexpected pleasure, General," Philip was saying. "Why I thought you were a fixture at the Grindelwald for the rest of your time."
"Couldn"t stand it. Far too much bustle and noise. No. Some one told us of a place called Zinal, and we are going there now."
"What an extraordinary coincidence!" cried Phil, delightedly. "The fact is we are bound for that very place."
"The devil we are!" growled Fordham to himself at this astounding piece of intelligence. "I have hitherto been under the impression, friend Phil, that we were bound for Visp--_en route_ for Zermatt."
"But--where"s Mr Fordham? Is he with you?" went on Mrs Wyatt.
"Rather. He"s--er--just kicking together our traps. I"ll go and see after him. Fordham, old chap, come along," he cried, bursting into the carriage again.
"Eh?" was the provokingly cool reply.
"Don"t you see?" went on Phil, hurriedly. "Now be a good old chap, and tumble to my scheme. Let"s go to Zinal instead."
"I don"t care. How about our traps though? They"re posted to t"other place."
"Hang that. We can send for "em. And er--I say, Fordham, don"t let on we weren"t going there all along. I sort of gave them to understand we were. You know?"
"I do. I overheard you imperil your immortal soul just now, Philip Orlebar. And you want me to abet you in the utter loss thereof? It is a scandalous proposal, but--Here, hurry up if you"re going to get out.
The train is beginning to move on again."
"Delighted to meet you again, Fordham," said the old General, shaking the latter heartily by the hand. "What are your plans? They tell us we ought to sleep here, in Sierre, to-night and go on early in the morning."
"That"s what we are going to do."
"A good idea. We might all go on together. They tell me there"s a capital hotel here. Which is it," he went on, glancing at the caps of two rival commissionaires.
"The "Belle Vue." But it"s only a step. Hardly worth while getting into the omnibus."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
IN THE VAL D"ANNIVIERS.
There are few more beautiful and romantic scenes than the lower end of the Val d"Anniviers as, having after a long and tedious ascent by very abrupt zig-zags reached Niouc, you leave the Rhone Valley with its broad, snake-like river and numberless watch-towers, its villages and whitewashed churches, and Sion with its cathedral and dominated by its castled rock in the distance--you leave all this behind and turn your face mountainwards.
Far below, glimpsed like a thread from the road, the churning waters of the Navigenze course through their rocky channel with a sullen roar, their hoa.r.s.e raving, now loud, now deadened, as a bend of the steep mountain-side opens or shuts out the view beneath, and with it the sound. From the river the slopes shoot skyward in one grand sweep-- abrupt, unbroken, well-nigh precipitous. Pine forests, their dark-green featheriness looking at that height like a different growth of gra.s.s upon the lighter hue of the pastures--huge rocks and boulders lying in heaped-up profusion even as when first hurled from the mountain-side above, seeming mere pebble heaps--_chalets_, too, in brown groups like toy chocolate houses or standing alone perched on some dizzy eyrie among their tiny patches of yellow cornland--all testify to the stupendous vastness of Nature"s scale. And at the head of the valley the forking cone of the Besso, and beyond it, rising from its amphitheatre of snow, the white crest of the Rothhorn soaring as it were to the very heavens in its far-away alt.i.tude. And the air! It is impossible to exaggerate its clear exhilaration. It is like drinking in the glow of sunshine even as golden wine--it is like bathing in the entrancing blue of the firmament above.
"Alma, you have treated me shockingly," Philip was saying, while they two were seated by the roadside to rest and await the arrival of the others, who might be seen toiling up the zig-zags aforesaid, but yet a little way off. "Shockingly, do you hear. You never wrote me a line, as you promised, and but that by great good luck we happened to be in the same train I should never have known you were coming here at all."
"That"s odd. Is the place we are going to of such enormous extent that we could both be in it without knowing of each other"s proximity?" she said innocently, but with a mischievous gleam lurking in her eyes.
"No--er--why?"
Alma laughed--long and merrily. "You are a very poor schemer, Phil.
Your friend would have had his answer ready--but you have regularly-- er--"given yourself away"--isn"t that the expression? Confess now--and remember that it is only a full and unreserved confession that gains forgiveness. You were not going to Zinal at all--and you have hoodwinked my uncle shamefully?"
"What a magician you are!" was the somewhat vexed answer. And then he joined in her laugh.
"Am I? Well I thought at first that the coincidence was too striking to be a coincidence. Where were you going?"
"To Zermatt. But what a blessed piece of luck it was that I happened to put my head out of the window at that poky little station. But for that only think what we should have missed. Heavens! It"s enough to make a fellow drop over the cliff there to think of it."
"Is it! But only think what an unqualified--er--misstatement you have committed yourself to. Doesn"t that weigh on your conscience like lead?"
"No," replied the sinner, unabashed. "It"s a clear case of the end justifying the means. And then--all"s fair in love and war," he added, with a gleeful laugh.
"You dear Phil. You are very frivolous, you know," she answered, abandoning her inquisitorial tone for one that was very soft and winsome. "Well, as we are here--thanks to your disgraceful stratagem--I suppose we must make the best of it."
"Darling!" was the rapturous response--"Oh, hang it!"
The latter interpolation was evoked by the sudden appearance of the others around a bend of the road, necessitating an equally sudden change in the speaker"s att.i.tude and intentions. But the sting of the whole thing lay in the fact that during that alteration he had caught Fordham"s glance, and the jeering satire which he read therein inspired him with a wildly insane longing to knock that estimable misogynist over the cliff then and there.
"Well, young people. You"ve got the start of us and kept it," said the General, as they came up. His wife was mounted on a mule, which quadruped was towed along by the bridle by a ragged and unshaven Valaisan.
"Alma dear, why didn"t you wait for us at that last place--Niouc, isn"t it, Mr Fordham?" said the old lady, reproachfully. "We had some coffee there."
"Which was so abominably muddy we couldn"t drink it--ha--ha!" put in the General. "But it"s a long way on to the next place--isn"t it, Fordham?"
"Never mind, auntie. I don"t want anything, really," replied Alma. "I never felt so fit in my life. Oh!" she broke off, in an ecstatic tone.
"What a grand bit of scenery!"
"Rather too grand to be safe just here?" returned Mrs Wyatt, "I"m afraid. I shall get down and walk."
The road--known at this point as "Les Pontis"--here formed a mere ledge as it wound round a lateral ravine--lying at right angles to the gorge-- a mere shelf scooped along the face of the rock. On the inner side the cliff shot up to a great height overhead on the outer side--s.p.a.ce.