"Never mind: I did find the crystals, and perhaps I shall hit upon
another grotto yet."
"Pray do," said Dale merrily. "But at any rate we will have a few of
the best from the lower grotto in the Black Ravine."
"Yes; and I would have a good search down there," said Saxe: "we may
find a fresh place."
"Well, we shall see, my lad; we shall see."
The journey to the niche was made leisurely enough, with no further
excitement than a false alarm or two raised by Saxe, who felt sure that
they were being followed; but, as he was only laughed at for his pains,
he turned sulky, and went on without looking back. He played with the
goat, which took to him in the most affectionate way, snowing its
appreciation by butting at him when he did not expect the kindly
attention; and he became the best of friends with Gros, who climbed on,
uttering low sighs of satisfaction as soon as Saxe had hit upon the idea
of scratching here and there with the point of the geological hammer,
and whinnying impatiently for a continuance of the titillation as soon
as the boy ceased.
Then the niche was reached, looking quite familiar with the traces of
their old fireplace; the tent was set up and secured with blocks of
granite instead of tethering pegs, and Saxe gave a grunt of pleasure as
he saw the preparations for the evening meal.
"How about the goat, Melk?" he said: "will she want tethering?"
"Oh no, herr: she will not leave us and Gros. Those animals are too
fond of company to go far. They get tiresome now and then from being
too familiar."
The night passed quietly enough. It was cold; and, at the height they
had reached, the stars shone out frostily; but the sleep was deliriously
refreshing, and Saxe rose the next morning ready for a journey to the
Black Ravine. The mule was taken to carry back any specimens that they
might decide to bring away, and the goat insisted upon following, having
apparently no intention of being left alone, and setting Gros an
excellent example in climbing.
In the Black Ravine the two grottoes were well searched, and the lower
one found to be fairly extensive; but no specimens were found worthy of
notice, and they returned to camp.
The next day was spent in another expedition higher up the glacier
valley, which was followed till the snow became so deep as to be
laborious to pass over, and, after exploring two similar ravines to the
last, they returned once more to camp, where Melchior drew Saxe aside to
ask him if he noticed anything.
"Eh? No," said the boy.
"Perhaps I am wrong, then," said the guide. "I thought the tent had
been interfered with, as if some one had touched it."
No more was said; but these words set Saxe thinking till it was bedtime,
when Melchior startled him by saying quietly--
"Don't laugh at me, herr. I do try to be firm, and to set aside all the
old stories of demons, dragons and goblins in the mountains. I wish the
herr would have a watch kept again, for I am afraid that this gletscher
valley is bewitched."
Saxe looked at him for a moment wonderingly, and then laughed.
"Don't let Mr Dale hear you talk like that," he said. "It will make
him cross. He says there is no need to keep watch; and that it is so
tiring."
Saxe had forgotten the incident in the conversation which ensued; and
after the discussion of the plans for the ensuing day, he went to his
sleeping-place to think about the blue-ice grotto at the bottom of the
glacier where the milky stream issued, and lie wondering how far up they
would be able to explore it, and whether it would be possible to get up
as far as the crevasse out of which they had rescued the guide.
"Wouldn't be worth the trouble," he said to himself, in the middle of a
yawn. "Plenty of crystals, but the wrong sort--ice crystals--won't
keep."
It only seemed to be the next minute that he was sitting up in the
darkness listening and realising that he had been asleep. He had been
dreaming, he was sure, but had not the least idea what about; and all he
knew now was that he was hot and thirsty.
He rose and quietly unfastened the little canvas fold which served as a
door, and went out to find the kettle and have a good draught of water;
but it was so mawkishly warm, that he turned from it in disgust, and
began to ascend higher to where the little fall came, down, with its
pure, icily cold stream.
The night was glorious, and as he looked up he felt that he had never
seen so many or such large stars before. So grandly was the arch of
heaven bespangled, that he stopped to gaze upward for a few minutes,
till, the sensation of thirst growing more acute, he went on, with the
towering wall of rock to right and left, and the moist odour of the
falling water saluting his nostrils, as he went close up to where one
tiny thread of water fell bubbling into a rocky basin, edged with moss--
the spot where water was obtained for regular use, its crystal purity
tempting the thirsty to drink.
Saxe placed a hand on the rock on either side, bent down till his lips
touched the surface, and then drank with avidity, every draught being
delicious.
"Make any fellow sleep," he said to himself, as he raised his head; and
he was in the act of passing his hand across his wet lips, when he
became suddenly petrified, and stood there motionless, gazing straight
before him at a hideous object, apparently not a yard away. It looked
misty and dim in the semi-darkness, but plain enough for the boy to see
apparently a huge head resting in a pair of hands, which held the chin
and pressed up the long loose cheeks on either side, curving up the
monstrous mouth into a ghastly grin. The forehead was low, and the
eyebrows were shaggy, while from beneath them glared into his a great
pair of glowing eyes, that flashed at times and sparkled in the
starlight, which rained down on and through a bush of dark, tangled
hair, a portion of which hung below the head on either side, and stood
out wildly around.
There was no movement but in the eyes, and these literally held the boy,
so that for a time he could do nothing but stare at the horrible-looking
object, which seemed to come nearer to him--so near that it almost
touched him; then receded, till it was almost invisible, and once more
stood quite still.
But it was not moving, and Saxe still had sufficient command over self
to know that this effect was produced by the mist from the fall being
wafted between them by the soft night wind.
How long he stood bent forward there gazing at that horrible head Saxe
did not know, but by degrees he began to shrink back slowly, getting
farther and farther away, till he dared to turn and run with all his
might to the tent door, and creep in, fully expecting that the monster
was about to spring upon him till he was inside, when he fastened the
canvas door with trembling fingers, and crept to his bed again, where he
lay down quickly, with his breath sobbing and the perspiration standing
in great drops upon his face. The sensation was upon him that the
terrible being he had seen would begin breaking in through the canvas
directly, and he lay there with one arm stretched out ready to wake up
Dale for help at the first sound outside the tent.
As he now lay trembling there, he recalled Melchior's words about the
valley being bewitched, the falling stones, the disappearance of the
crystals; and he was fast growing into a belief that the old legends
must be true, and that there really existed a race of horrible little
beings beneath the earth, whose duty it was to protect the treasures of
the subterranean lands, and that this was one of them on the watch to
take the crystals from their hands. But in the midst of the intense
silence of the night better sense began to prevail.
"It's all nonsense--all impossible," he muttered. "There are no such
things, and it was all fancy. I must have seen a block of stone through
the falling water, and I was half asleep and nearly dreaming at the
time. Why, if I were to wake Mr Dale and tell him, he would laugh at
me. It was all a dream."
But, all the same, he lay shivering there, the aspect of the face having
startled him in a way that at times enforced belief; and it was getting
rapidly on toward morning when he once more fell asleep, to dream of
that hideous head and see the terrible eyes gazing right into his own.