CHAPTER XIV
Mountaineering
Easter was drawing very near, and the school was to break up for more than three weeks. Gipsy, to her intense delight, had been asked to spend the holidays with the Gordons, and Miss Poppleton had graciously allowed her to accept the invitation.
"We had meant to ask you for Christmas," said Meg, "and Mother had even got as far as writing a letter to Poppie; then Billy broke out in spots, and the doctor said we might all have taken the infection, and we must stop in quarantine. It was a horrible nuisance. I felt so savage! But we couldn't invite you to come and share measles! We're all looking forward most tremendously to your visit. I'm so excited I can hardly wait till the end of the term!"
After six months spent entirely at Briarcroft, Gipsy felt that the idea of a change was most welcome and exhilarating. She liked Meg, and wanted to see her home surroundings. The two younger sisters, Eppie and Molly, she knew already, as they were in the Lower Third and Second Forms, and she had always set them down, in school parlance, as "jolly kids". The rest of the family she hoped would prove equally interesting.
Poor Gipsy heaved many a sigh as she packed her box. Her outfit seemed such a very shabby one with which to go a-visiting, and she hoped Mrs. Gordon would not feel ashamed of her guest. At the last moment Miss Edith, looking rather guilty and self-conscious, popped hastily into the bedroom and thrust a small parcel into her hand.
"It's a little present, Gipsy dear," she said nervously, "just some new hair ribbons and a pair of gloves and a tie. You've no need to tell Miss Poppleton or anybody that I gave them to you. Don't thank me—I'd rather you didn't! I do hope you'll enjoy yourself, you poor child!"
"Oh, Miss Edie! If a letter should happen to come for me from South Africa while I'm away, you'd send it on, wouldn't you?" asked Gipsy wistfully.
"I'd bring it myself, at once," returned Miss Edith, as she scuttled out of the room in a desperate hurry.
Mrs. Gordon sent a cab to Briarcroft on breaking-up day, and when Gipsy's box had been placed on the top, Meg, Eppie, and Molly bore away their guest with great rejoicing. The Gordons lived at an old-fashioned house about a mile from the school. It seemed quite in the country, with fields all round, and had an orchard and large garden, a pond, an asphalted tennis court for wet weather, as well as a grass one, and a croquet lawn.
Mrs. Gordon welcomed Gipsy most kindly, and at once made her feel at home, and the remainder of the family were introduced by degrees. Mr. Gordon, a jovial, genial man, greeted her with a humorous twinkle in his eye.
"So this is Meg's idol! Glad to see you, my dear!" he remarked. "If you can cure Meg of standing on one leg and puckering up her mouth when she talks, I'll be grateful. She seems disposed to listen to you in preference to anyone here, so please act mentor."
"Oh, Dad! Don't be naughty!" shrieked Meg. "What will Gipsy think of you?"
"A favourable opinion, I trust," laughed Mr. Gordon, as he vanished into his own particular sanctum.
Donald, Meg's elder brother, seemed disposed to be friendly; but Billy, the twelve-year-old offender who had started the family with measles, was afflicted with shyness, and preferred to inspect the visitor from afar until he grew accustomed to her presence. Rob, the youngest, a roguish laddie of six, fell openly in love with Gipsy at first sight, and prepared to monopolize her company to an extent that Meg would by no means allow.
"She's my friend, and hasn't come here to play with little boys. Run away to the nursery, and leave us alone!" she commanded, enforcing her words by a process of summary ejection, regardless of all wails.
Gipsy had further to form an acquaintance with two dogs, three cats, a dormouse, and a tame starling, before she was considered intimate with the whole household, but after that she felt thoroughly at home.
The Gordons were a particularly jolly, merry, happy-go-lucky set of young people, and they made their guest so entirely welcome that at the end of a few days she might have known them all for years. Even the bashful Billy soon ceased turning crimson whenever he spoke to her, while Eppie and Molly disputed fiercely over the honour of sitting next to her at tea. It happened to be a fine Easter, so outdoor occupations were in full swing. Gipsy was an ardent tennis player, and revelled in golf also. She and Meg and Donald made many cycling excursions, for the neighbourhood was pretty and the roads were good. With packets of sandwiches tied to their handlebars they would start off for a whole day's ride, to explore some ruined abbey or ancient castle, or to get a picturesque view of the fells. Donald, who was keen on collecting birds' eggs, would often stop the party, to hunt for nests in the hedges or banks; while Meg, whose hobby at present was wild flowers, kept a watchful eye for any fresh specimens that she might find growing by the roadside.
Mr. Gordon was an enthusiastic member of an Alpine Club, and he would sometimes take the elder and more reliable members of his family on to the fells for mountaineering practice. Many of the rocks afforded excellent training for Switzerland, without involving any special danger. These climbs were something quite new for Gipsy, and an immense delight. She was very fearless, and had a steady head, so she proved an apt pupil. Mr. Gordon would show her exactly how she must place her feet and hold herself so as to take advantage of the tiniest and narrowest ledges of rock, and she much enjoyed the excitement of accomplishing, under his guidance, what would have appeared to her impossible performances without his skilled advice. Meg and Donald had already received some training, and when Gipsy was sufficiently advanced to be able to keep up with them, Mr. Gordon allowed them all three to venture with him on a more difficult ascent, linked together with one of his Alpine ropes. Gipsy was proud indeed as she stood at the top of a jagged crag and waved her hand to Billy, who was taking a snapshot of the party from below.
Poor Billy was liable to fits of dizziness since his attack of measles, and was not allowed any real climbing, so he consoled himself by following the others about with a Brownie camera, and photographing them in the most dangerous-looking positions that he could catch.
"Billy must do some extra prints, and you could put them in the Magazine," suggested Meg to Gipsy. "You could write an article on 'Mountaineering in Cumberland'. It would be grand, and would make Maude Helm gnash her teeth with envy."
"Perhaps she's been doing something even more exciting to astonish us with," laughed Gipsy. "I wish we could have climbed a real mountain, like Skiddaw."
"Yes, there'd be some credit in that," commented Donald thoughtfully. He said no more at the moment, but a few days afterwards, when the three young people had set out on another cycling expedition, he had an enterprising plan to unfold.
"I vote we ride as far as Ribblethwaite, leave our machines there, and then climb Hawes Fell," he announced. "We've started so early we'd have heaps and loads of time. It would be a thing worth doing! I didn't broach the idea at home because I knew the Mater'd be in such a state of mind, and think we were going to break our necks. It will be time enough to tell about it when we come back. Are you two game to go?"
"Rather!" exclaimed both the girls rapturously.
Gipsy, with her Colonial bringing up and independent American ideas, did not realize any necessity to ask permission for such an expedition. She had been in far wilder places, and considered the Cumberland fells civilized ground compared with portions of the Rockies and certain mountainous tracts of New Zealand with which she was familiar.
If Meg had any qualms of conscience she contrived to quiet them with the comforting assurance: "Dad would have taken us if he hadn't been busy at his office, and we can manage so well ourselves now, we can get on all right without him."
Ribblethwaite was a pretty little village about six miles away, a typical north-country hamlet with its stone cottages, with mullioned windows and flagged stone roofs, its grey turreted church tower, and its quick-flowing, brawling river. It was well wooded, but it stood high, and at this early season of the year the trees were still bare, and only a few green buds showed here and there on the hedges. The gardens were full of golden daffodils and clumps of opening polyanthus; but primroses—which had long been in blossom in the sheltered garden at Briarcroft—were here only venturing into bud. As the inn looked clean and attractive, the three decided to leave their bicycles there, and to have a lunch of ham and eggs and coffee before setting out on their climb.
"Then we can take our sandwiches with us. We're sure to want them up there," said Donald.
"Yes; best to fortify ourselves thoroughly before we start," agreed Meg.
"Billy'll be fearfully sick when he hears where we've been," said Gipsy.
"Poor old Billy-ho! Yes, he'd have liked to follow us with his camera; but he's not quite up to tackling Hawes Fell just at present," agreed Meg.
The inn was a delightfully quaint, old-fashioned, primitive little place, such as is not often found in these days of modern improvements. Gipsy, who had had no opportunity before of seeing English country life, was enchanted with its sanded floor, its oak dresser with rows of willow-pattern plates, its pewter mugs and dishes, and the great brass preserving-pan that was set in the ingle-nook. She admired the oak beams of the ceiling, the rows of plant pots in the long mullioned window, the settle drawn up by the big fireplace, and the glass cases of stuffed pike and game birds that adorned the walls.
The lunch was a great success—a smoking dish of fried ham and eggs, home-made bread and farmhouse butter, thin oatcakes and moorland honey, and coffee, with thick yellow cream to pour into it.
"Beats school, doesn't it?" said Donald, with a chuckle of enjoyment, as he helped himself to a third serving of honey. "I say, though, we shan't have to stop too long feasting here if we mean to get to the top of Hawes Fell. It's a jolly good step, I can tell you."
"We're ready!" returned Meg smartly. "We were only waiting for you to finish gormandizing."
"Thanks for the compliment! One doesn't get the chance of heather honey every day, and I've a remarkably sweet tooth. Anything in the way of jam or preserves left near me invariably vanishes."
The way up the fell lay first over the old stone bridge that spanned the river, then across fields, and by a narrow footpath leading up a steep and thickly-wooded hillside. Though the trees were still in their winter garb they were none the less lovely for that; the lack of foliage revealed the delicate tracery of their boughs and the beauty of their straight stems, which, in one or two terraced glades, were like the columns and shafts of some great cathedral. The sun shining down the glen gave a soft purplish tint to the bare twigs, and brought out in bolder contrast the deep dark green of the innumerable masses of ivy that had utterly taken possession of and choked some of the trees supporting them.
"Isn't it glorious? I always say our fells need a great deal of beating," said Meg, who was an enthusiast over her native county. "I don't believe there's a wood equal to this anywhere!" and she began to sing the old north-country ditty:
"A north-countree maid
Up to London had strayed,
Although with her nature it did not agree.
She wept and she sighed,
And she bitterly cried:
'I wish once again in the north I could be!
Oh! the oak and the ash and the bonny ivy tree,
They all grow so green in the north countree!'"
"Don't know whether you'll get Gipsy to agree with you; she ought to be a dab critic of scenery by now," grunted Donald.
"Oh, it's lovely!" said Gipsy, who was enjoying herself immensely. "Of course it's quite, quite different from America, or Australia, or South Africa. It's smaller, but it's prettier in its own way. It looks much more cultivated."
"Ah! wait till you get right out on the moor at the top. You won't insult that by calling it cultivated."
The woods were soon left behind, and the pathway led ever upwards, first through a tangle of heather and bilberry and gorse; then, higher still, over short, fine, slippery tracts of grass. They were reaching the upper region of the fell, where the hard rock cropped out into great splintered crags, weathered by countless winter storms, and where no bushes or softer herbage could face the struggle for existence. So far the walk had been comparatively easy, but now the footpath had disappeared, and they were obliged to trust to their knowledge of mountaineering. The top still towered above them a very long way off, and they calculated it would need a two hours' climb before they could reach the particular crag that marked the extreme summit.
Donald assumed the leadership of the party, and, scanning the mountainside with what he called an Alpine eye, decided which would be their best course to pursue. There were several steep precipices and awkward places that must be avoided, for though they were all quite ready to try their skill at scaling rocks, it seemed no use to waste unnecessary time over performing difficult feats.
"I expect that last crag will give us enough practice in that," remarked Donald. "I've brought a rope with me in case we want it—got it wound round and round my waist under my coat."
"Oh, that explains why you look so stout to-day!" laughed Meg. "I should think it's pretty uncomfortable."
"Not a bit of it! It keeps me warm. I call it jolly cold up here."
"I believe we've reached the Arctic zone!" agreed Gipsy.
The air had undoubtedly grown colder with every hundred feet of their ascent. The sunshine had disappeared, grey clouds had gathered, and feathery flakes of snow began to fall lightly. The grass was soon covered with a thin white coating which gave a delightfully Alpine aspect to the scene. The prospect was glorious—the sharp, splintered, snow-crested crags stood out in bold relief against the neutral-tinted sky, and the long stretches of moor below them looked soft and blurred masses of whiteness.
"We can find our way home by our footsteps in the snow!" said Gipsy, drawing long breaths of the pure, exhilarating air.
"I wonder if we ought to turn back," said Meg, rather doubtfully.
"Turn back!" exclaimed Donald. "You don't mean to say you want to turn tail now, Meg? Why, we're just getting to the exciting part!"
"I was only thinking of the snow."
"Why, that makes it all the more like Switzerland! You don't suppose Dad turns back at the snowline when he's doing a climb? We're in luck to have the chance of a little snow. I wish there'd been a keen frost, and we could have tried an ice axe somewhere. Pluck up your courage, Meg! You'll never do the Matterhorn if you shirk Hawes Fell!"
Thus encouraged Meg said no more, though she had her private doubts about the wisdom of proceeding farther. It is an unpleasant task to be a drag on other people's amusement, and both Donald and Gipsy were very keen on making the ascent. So they scrambled onward and upward, slipping often on the rapidly freezing rocks, helping each other over difficult places, sighing for nailed boots and alpenstocks, but laughing and enjoying the fun of the adventure.
To climb to the summit certainly taxed all their strength. The mountain seemed to heave before them in a succession of huge boulders, and as each one was scaled another appeared beyond it. At length they reached a piled confusion of rocks, where a little cairn had been built of small stones and loose pieces of shale.
"There we are! The very place!" shouted Donald. "I knew we'd find it if we pegged along. Now, can you girls tackle this last bit? Wouldn't you like to use the rope?"
The final piece of crag was slippery enough to justify Donald's offer, and as he seemed particularly anxious not to have brought his rope in vain, the others consented to give it a trial. With its aid the difficult bit was accomplished fairly easily, and the three were soon standing in triumph by the cairn, hurrahing and waving their handkerchiefs with much excitement.
"I'm going to eat my sandwiches here; I'm fagged out," declared Gipsy, sitting down on a stone and suddenly realizing that she was tired and hungry.
The others followed suit, very ready for a rest and a picnic. It was a long time since their lunch at the inn, and the frosty air had given them keen appetites. It was too cold to sit still, however, for more than five or ten minutes; a bitter wind had sprung up, and the snow, which had only fallen very lightly before, began to come down in thicker and heavier flakes.
"We'd better be going, or we shan't be able to find our way," worried Meg anxiously.
"Right-o! only we must each add a stone to the cairn first," replied Donald. "I've a pencil here, and we'll write our names on them as proof conclusive that we've been, in case anybody doubts our word afterwards."
So "Gipsy Latimer", "Margaret Gordon", and "Donald Alexander Gordon" were duly inscribed on smooth pieces of shale and placed as evidence on the top of the pile, after which ceremony the three began their descent with something of the feeling of Arctic explorers who had reached the Pole.
It was indeed high time to return. Clouds were blowing up fast, and with the thickening snow began rapidly to obscure the view. The trio went very cautiously, trying to remember various landmarks which they had noticed on the way up. Gipsy's idea of retracing their footsteps in the snow soon proved futile, for already all tracks were obliterated. It was impossible to see far in front of them, and but for the compass that hung on Donald's watch-chain they would have had no notion of where they were going.
"We must keep due west, and look out sharp for precipices. Don't let us get separated on any account. Hadn't we better use the rope again?"
"I don't believe we're anywhere near the way we came up. I don't recognize these rocks in the least," said Meg.
"Never mind, if we get down somewhere to civilization," returned Gipsy.
"Yes, but we don't want to be five miles away from our bicycles!"
"We're all right!" exclaimed Donald jubilantly. "Here's the piece of white quartz we were sitting on, I'm sure. Yes!" (grubbing about under the snow) "I'm right, for here's a scrap of the silver paper from the chocolate we were eating. Hurrah! I'm going to set up for an Alpine guide!"
The snow was clearing considerably as they got farther down the mountainside, and after a while they were able to recognize various points of the landscape, and realized that Donald's compass and instinct for locality had led them correctly.
"It was a narrow squeak, though," confessed Meg. "I don't mind telling you now that I thought we should have to stay up there all night! It's getting fearfully late—we must sprint back when we reach our machines."
"We'll have some hot tea at the inn first," declared Donald. "You girls will never sprint six miles without!"
Very tired, but exceedingly proud of themselves, the mountaineers reached home at half-past eight, to find Mr. and Mrs. Gordon looking out anxiously for their return.
"You young scamps! I'd no idea you were going climbing on your own!" said Mr. Gordon. "I'd have forbidden it if I'd known. Hawes Fell is a nasty little bit at the finish."
"But we did it, Dad!" cried Meg excitedly. "We put our feet on all the right ledges, just as you taught us. Oh! Don't you think I'm old enough to go to Switzerland with you next summer, and try some real ice work? You promised you'd take me when I was fifteen!"