Swiss guides, than whom there is no more generous body of men in the world.
Unerringly Ralph led his companions through arêtes, glissades, bergschrunds, rücksacs, gendarmes, vorwaerts, couloirs, aiguilles, never hesitating, never flinching from any obstacle, heedless, it seemed, alike of the raging blizzard and the ever-thickening darkness. At times he was obliged to carry the others one by one along razor edges of hard blue ice. At times he would cling precariously by one hand to a projecting splinter of rock, while with the other he lowered them all bodily into the depths of a crevasse, gripping his ice-axe meanwhile steadfastly between his teeth. Once at least he was compelled to hang downwards by his toes while he hewed steps beneath him in a perpendicular wall of ice. And through it all his face retained its stern impassivity and he addressed no word to his exhausted companions.
At length the most wonderful feat in the history of climbing was finished, and the party, weary but thankful, stood at the foot of the mountain. The three guides fell on their knees before their rescuer, but he ignored them and turned his cold, hard gaze upon Lady Margaret.
"You are now safe," he said icily. "My presence is no longer necessary. Take the third turning on the left, the second on the right and the fifth on the left, and then ask again. Before I leave I ought perhaps to congratulate you upon your approaching marriage to your—er—amiable cousin;" and without waiting for a reply he was gone.
*****
Alone, Ralph Wonderson sat upon a rock and reflected that no food had passed his lips since that hurried breakfast in the Fahrjoch Hut. Wearily he drew out a packet of sandwiches from his pocket.
A moment later he was racing back to his former companions. In his day he had been half-mile champion, but now he knocked a full minute off his previous best time.
He found the others as he had left them. Lady Margaret looked up with a glad cry as he flew round the corner.
"Madge," he cried, waving the piece of newspaper which had been wrapped round his sandwiches,—"Madge, you can't marry him!"
Lord Tamerton leaped forward with a white face. "What do you mean?" he hissed. "You are mad. She must marry him, or the family is ruined."
"She can't marry him," repeated Ralph calmly. "Sir Ernest Scrivener alias Marmaduke Moorsdyke is married already! Read this."
And he thrust the fragment of newspaper into Lord Tamerton's hand.
With a low cry of content Lady Margaret fell into her lover's arms. "Oh, my dear!" she murmured.
And as they stood clasped in a close embrace the clouds parted and far, far above them appeared the beautiful white summit of the Wetterhorn shining dazzlingly in the sunlight.
"BUSINESS AS USUAL DURING ALTERATIONS."
Spit for Spat.
Orator, in Hyde Park:—
"An' when the German Ambassador left St. Petersburg 'e spat in the Russian Ambassador's face. An' the Russian Ambassador in Berlin 'e spat in the German Ambassador's face."
In Order of Merit?
"Full reports of the Petersfield Gymkhana, Eastmeon Show, and Liphook Horticultural Exhibition and Sports, will be published in to-morrow's issue of the 'Hampshire Telegraph and Post,' which will contain also a complete record of news of the Great European War."—Portsmouth Evening News.
The following letter was addressed to a Hong Kong chaplain by his orderly:—
"Pleas sur excuse me this morning for I ham sitting for my examining asion at the peak schools for my certificate sur and I will be down as soon as possible sur to deliver the letters sur And if I ant there before you go away sur put the keys under the steeps sur."
We feel confident he passed all right.
