The CODE of the MOUNTAINS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22540, 3 October 1936, Page 9 (Supplement)

The CODE of the MOUNTAINS

A Story of the French Alps

By GUNBY HADATH

"tie was still debating this when they came to the refuge, a solid structure under the lee of a snow ridge built on a foundation, o:- platform, of rock blasted out from the mountain. Here was a caretaker, and here, on most days, might have been a few other climbers biding their time. As Paul passed through the ever-open door, and shouted for the caretaker, 110 voice responded.' "Within there? Within there?" Paul called out again and again. Then turning to his companion. "Come on!" he bade. "We'll have a 10 minutes breather before wo go on." 80 they unroped and helped themselves to the water which stood waiting for one and all in large earthenware pitchers. <; They had now reached a height of nearly 11,000 feet, with the hardest part of their climb rising over their heads. This was another 2600 feet, all sti£F snow and ico work, to the formidable Aiguille c.u Gouter, unless they encountered tho Frenchman's missing friend on the way. And Paul had ceased long age to believe in such a prospect. Find him they would, he dare say; but in some dire condition. Either the man had fallen and broken a limb, or the sickness and blindness caused by the snow had disc bled him; or exhaustion had overcome him. But while running these possibilities through his mind, Paul kept his fears to himself, assuming a confidence, which ho could not really accept, to encourage his comrade./ "You know." he remarked, as they donned their thick goggled glasses and re-attached their rope, testing every knot faithfully, "you know, Sl'sieur, that under the spur of the Gouter there's another refuge where your friend may have passed the night—" "But he promised—" tho man interjected. *"oh, no doubt he did," Paul answered, cutting him short, "but it's ono thing to make' a promise right down below, and quite another thing to keep it right up above. Your friend may have found that he could not descend before daybreak—" "Then why has he not descended? The day is far gone." "Exactly," Paul responded, controlling his patience. "But when he awoke he, was tired —let us suppose that. Or he suffer} perhaps from a little bout of snow-.rickness. There are many whom such nickness has swept for two days, so that prudently they have waited till it passed off." "Then you think we shall find him?" "In the refuge, I hope, M'sieur," Paul uttered with caution. "And if not?" "We search," Paul replied, very quietly. , "Well, en avartl" shouted the Frenchman. They were under the ice-face soon, where Paul, in the lead, had to cut step by step for tiieir feet with his axe in one hand while with the other he found, and kept hold. And as he cut and mounted eich step, ho must pause for the other to follow; holding his breath in fear lest each moment he"-feel the shock of that terrible tug on the rbpe which would tell him that the other had stumbled or lost his footing. He must then bear the strain for them both till the man could recover. Once more ho thanked his stars for his fitness and strength, and for the coinparativo smallness of his companion. So Paul was experiencing tho cares of a guide, and realised for the first time up to the lilt how much responsibility rested on guides. But Duval had beaten back his frenzy in his own peril; and was climbing, could Paul have beheld him, with an agility and a steadiness of nerve and foot beyond expectation. And when they crawled over the ice-face and came to the brow, where Paul was able to turn round and look at the Frenchman, the laLter smiled a litilo and nodded his head, as much as to say: "Well? You didn't think I could do it." Paul pointed upward to the rugged and ruthless "needle" of rock overhead. Scarred anci broken by deep fissures where tho snow rested and broken by frozen water-courses, it threw its sharp pecks to the skies ono after tho other like tho turrets of Some monstrous castle. And, pointing still, "Seo there!" Paul said, "011 tho last ledgo under the needle? That little black speck in tho snow is tho, refuge, M'sieur." So they rose again to their feet on the top of the ice-wall and began to thread the treacherous plateau of snow which, thanks to Marcel Mercier, Paul knew full well. Not very far now before they reachec. the ice causeway bridging tho void to the first of the ledges'. And this natural bridge thus iorniod by ice-coael rock required only a steady head for its crossing. "Almost there!" Paul called cheerfully over his shoulder, as they rounded tho spur near tho bridge-head. Ho had scarcely spoken when his heart came into his mouth —for there was 110 longer any such bridgo as he had seen recently. Here remained but a ribbon of ice which a goat might havo traversed or a tight-rope walker have hazarded. Al) elso had collapsed. Paul paled. "Wo must not go on," ne cried, stopping immediately. But Duval's frenzy returned. "Wo must!" he was screaming. "I forbid you," Paul repeated. The Frenchman laughed wildly. And as that wild laugh was echoed back / c

1 by tho rocks, lie went round Paul in a rush and set foot on the bridge. Unable to stop him, Paul bawled to him, "Straddle it! Straddle it!" And the Frenchman complied. He lowered his body upon tho palms of his hands until he was sitting his saddle of ico like a man on a horse. But the man on a. horso has only a few feet to fall. And the man on the saddle of ice had untold depths below him. Paul was now at the further end of tho rope, and as the Frenchman began to work himself recklessly forward, he might have cut the rope and let Duval go on, for why should two of them invite broken necks? But —■ the code of the mountain! Paul set his teeth desperately, fiercely; and as the rope tautened he, too, first dropped 011 to his knees and then, with a warning shout to tho Frenchman to pause, he lowered his own body astride on the bridge." "Go slowly, man!" he shouted again. "Inch by inch." Inch by inch! What more could it be in this terror. For now Paid knew terror as never he'd known it before. It strode, the ico with him, it made his head swim, it called the blood from his body to drum in his ears. It was choking him. He mastered it, and rigidly fixing his eyes on a spot between the shoulderblades of his leader, he compelled his muscles and nerves to keep time with each movement . . . They were half way across when that happened which Paul had foreseen. The leader swayed, lost his balance, recovered it, but collapsed. Collapsing thus, his body stayed huddled an instant; then sagged slowly sideways with naught but tho rope to Bupport it. Paul might have cut that rope now, had he acted like lightning. Yet he braced himself. Ho drew in and on his breath, till his lungs were nigh bursting; for one instant of horror, as the other's body dropped over, he rocked to the shock and believed his last hour was come. But his fingers had closed on a knob of the ice-covered rock, and with knees that were gripping till the ice tore his flesh, with closed eyes, with lips moving mutely, he resisted . . . he held fast ... he' won. The man he had saved was swinging unconscious in mid-air. Ah, now—if only the rope held . . . • • ft ft • When the rescue party found them a few minutes later and had extricated both of them at great risk, they told Paul, as soon as his shock had sufficiently passed, that Duval's friend was still in the refuge. Then said Henri Mercier to Paul, in a grave, broken voice: "Say for why did'st thou risk thy life for the life of that crazy one? Thou should'st have severed the rope when he rushed on the bridge." Paul's fingers stole to the badge of the guides on his breast. "I was wearing this," he breathed, quietly. THE END