The light was not yet good. Their muscles were stiff, physical fatigue
reacted on their nervous strength, and at the belt of snow they stopped.
The belt was perhaps ten yards across and occupied a channel in the
rocks. The surface was smooth and hard, and Deering imagined if one
slipped one would not stop until one reached the valley. A row of small
holes, however, indicated that Stannard's party had gone across and up
the dark, forbidding buttress on the other side. Deering frankly shrank
from the labor and risk of crossing, but he dared not turn back.
"Where the boys have gone we mustn't stop," he said. "Tie on the rope
and give me the grub-hoe."
Peter gave him the hoe. The blade was curved, like a carpenter's adze,
and at its head was a short pick. The tool, although rather heavy, was a
good ice-ax. In soft snow, one can kick holes, but the snow was hard and
Deering doubted if the notches Stannard had cut would carry him. He used
the pick, balancing in a hole while he chipped out the next, and when
they got across he sent Peter in front. Their hands were numb and where
the snow had melted veins of ice filled the cracks in the rocks. The
hold was bad and Peter stopped at the bottom of a slab Deering had
remarked when he sent him in front.
"I sure don't know how we're going to get up."
"Stannard got up," said Deering and looked about.
Thirty feet below him the belt of snow pierced the rocks. It looked
nearly perpendicular and the snow-field at its foot was horribly steep.
In the shadow, the surface was gray and dark patches marked where rocks
pushed through. A very long way down, across a sharp but broken line,
the color was blue, and Deering thought the line the top of a precipice.
He turned and looked up. The slab was upright and about ten feet high;
he could not see a crack or knob, but he noted two or three fresh
scratches.
"Lean against the rock and spread your arms," he said, and when Peter
did so climbed up his back.
Standing on the other's shoulders, he could reach the top of the slab.
The top was nearly flat and went back for some distance, but the snow
was hard. Deering dared not trust his numbed hands and he tried the
pick. The blade got hold, but he could not see farther than the handle.
If he had caught a small lump of ice that would not support him, the
rope would pull Jardine off the rock. All the same, something must be
risked.
"Brace up good," he said and trusted the pick.
The tool held and he got his chest on the top, but now the blade was
near his body, his reach was short and when he used his hand his stiff
fingers slipped across the snow. It was obvious he must move the pick,
but the tool was his main support and the effort to push it forward
might send him down. Still, if he could get three or four inches higher,
he might, perhaps, balance on the edge.
His boots got no grip on the smooth slab, but when he used his knee his
clothes stuck to the stone. When his waist was nearly level with the top
he pulled out the pick and moved it forward. For a moment or two the
blade came back and he began to go down; then it held and after a stern
effort he was up. The rock above the ledge was broken, and throwing the
rope across a knob, he helped Peter.
Half an hour afterwards, they reached the ridge behind the buttress.
Deering's hands were bleeding and he was not cold. His skin was wet and
he breathed by labored gasps. In front, the ridge went up, unevenly, to
the neck. The narrow, broken top, for the most part, was supported by
precipitous rocks. One must use caution and could not go fast, but after
a time a snow cornice began on one side. The top, leveled by the wind,
was smooth, and, so far as it rested on the stone, was firm. As a rule,
a snow cornice is widest above, and Deering knew if he crossed the line
where it overhung its base he might break through, but the marks in
front indicated where Stannard had gone.
Stannard knew much about snow cornices and Deering wondered whether he
could not have found some grounds for throwing off the rope and letting
Jimmy venture on the dangerous overhang. He had obviously not done so;
moreover he had brought his companions up the buttress. If Deering
himself had meant to let somebody fall, he thought he would have tried
at the awkward slab. In fact, he admitted that to picture Stannard's
weighing a plan like that was theatrically extravagant. Yet he knew
Stannard, who was not the man people thought. He was very clever and if
he plotted to get rid of Jimmy, he would not do so soon after he had
taken him into the mountains. He would wait until he had nearly carried
out his job and was bringing his party down from the rocks. Anyhow,
Deering's business was to overtake the party. To wonder whether he
exaggerated Jimmy's danger would not help.
For a time he made good progress along the cornice, and in the afternoon
he reached the neck. At the end of the ridge Stannard's tracks forked.
One row of footmarks crossed a steep snow-bank running up a peak; the
other went along the hollow neck.
"All the outfit went up the neck and then two or three turned back,"
Peter remarked after examining the trampled snow.
Deering nodded. "Stannard sent them back and pushed ahead with Gillane
to look for a line down the other side. When we get across we'll see
what he was up against."
At the end of the neck they stopped and Deering frowned. He had been
longer than he thought and a pale illumination behind a peak indicated
that the sun was low. In the valley below, he saw a frozen lake and a
dark, winding band he knew was timber on a river bank. He had food, and
if he could reach the trees he need not bother about the frost. A
Canadian grub-hoe, made for cutting roots, is a useful tool, and he
could build a wall of bark and branches, light a fire and brew hot tea.
The trouble was, to get down to the friendly pines.
In front of him, a snow-field sloped to a spot at which two uneven,
converging rows of dark rocks ought to have met. The rocks were the tops
of precipices, but the point of their intersection was cut out, and a
glacier began at the gap. Deering could see for a short distance down
the glacier, until it plunged across the top of a steeper pitch, and
when he used his glasses he noted its surface was crumpled, as if it
broke in angry waves. In fact, it was rather like a rapid suddenly
frozen at the top of a fall. Deering knew it was an ice-fall and the
waves were giant blocks. The rocks at the side were very steep and
veined by snow.
"Nothing's doing there!" he remarked. "I don't see Stannard, but he
won't find a useful line. Let's look for the boys."
They turned and, following the tracks along the neck, after some time
went round a buttress that broke the front of the range. On the other
side three people occupied a little hollow in the rock. One got up
awkwardly.
"It's Peter!" he shouted. "Why, Deering, you grand old sport!"
Deering gave Jimmy his hand and noted that his look was strained and his
face was pinched.
"Miss Laura put me on your track and Mr. Jardine wanted to come along,"
he said and studied the others, who did not get up.
"They've had enough," said Jimmy. "We were two nights on the rocks and
the cold was keen. Stannard's gone to see if we can get down the
glacier, but I don't think he's hopeful. Anyhow, let's go back into our
hole. When you wriggle down under a blanket, it's a little warmer than
outside."
Deering joined the others. A jambed stone partly covered the hole, and
the boys' packs, fur coats and blankets kept them from freezing, but he
saw their pluck was nearly gone.
"What about the police?" he asked, when he had lighted his pipe.
"We don't know where they are," Jimmy replied. "Stannard brought us up
the ridge, but from my shack you see another way up at the head of the
valley. I went over to study the ground and thought the climb harder
than it looks. All the same, I imagine the police have tried it. Of
course, when they got to the snow they wouldn't find our tracks, but
they know we're in the mountains--"
"Then, they're south of us?"
Jimmy nodded. "On this side of the range; they'd reckon on our pushing
south and expect to cut us off. Now you see why Stannard's keen about
getting down the glacier!"
"We can't get down; the ice-fall won't go," said Stevens moodily. "I
doubt if I could get down a ladder. My notion is, Stannard knows his
plan's a forlorn hope and Gillane is badly rattled."
"The fellow's a common packer; Stannard ought not to have hired him,"
Dillon agreed. "Still we couldn't wait and when the Revelstoke man sent
Gillane we were forced to start. Anyhow, I'd trust Stannard where I
wouldn't trust a guide."
"He hasn't hit a useful line yet," Stevens rejoined. "We're held up, and
I doubt if we can stand for another night in the frost."
"I'm willing to go back and risk the police," said Jimmy. "Still, we
couldn't start until daybreak and would be forced to camp again on the
ridge. The valley's not far off; if we can make it."
"We must wait for Stannard's report," said Deering soothingly. "When I
was at the hotel the clerk gave me a letter for you."
Jimmy beat his numbed hands and opened the envelope. Then he laughed, a
dreary laugh.
"In a way, the thing's a joke! Leyland's has something to do with a
Japanese cotton mill and Sir Jim writes from Tokio. He's going to
England by Vancouver and sails on board the first C.P.R. boat. He means
to stop for a few days and look me up--" Jimmy studied the postmark and
resumed: "I expect he's at Vancouver now."
"Your luck is certainly bad," Deering remarked in a sympathetic voice.
"Jim's the head of the house; Dick owns him boss," Jimmy went on. "His
letter's kind, and if he'd arrived before, when I was making good, I
might have got his support. I wanted to persuade him I was not a
careless fool; but when he gets to know my recent exploits--"
Deering imagined Jimmy had wanted his uncle to agree about his marrying
Margaret. Since Sir James was a sober business man, the lad had not much
grounds to hope he would approve his nephew's romantic adventures.
"After all, I rather think we'll cheat the police," he said. "They don't
know where we are and when we make the valley we'll hit up the pace.
I've friends who'll help you across the frontier and you can sail for
England from New York."
"The drawback is, we can't make the valley. Stannard can't lead us
down," Stevens interrupted gloomily.