“No twisted ankles at this point,” said Richard. Frances nodded. She was concentrating on the varying firmness of the treacherous clumps underneath her feet. The stream was shallow, fortunately. They crossed by choosing stones either jutting up or only lightly covered by the racing water. Frances congratulated herself on having her shoes only wet, and not swamped entirely. And now they began to climb the hill itself, aiming for a point in its shoulder which would bring them just above and behind the house. This side of the hill was dangerously open; there were no trees, only grass and shrubs which ultimately gave way to the rocky spine. Again Frances had the feeling that the hill which they were climbing was the buttress, and the mountain behind it was the cathedral. It was like a finger pointing out of the mountain’s clenched hand. The climb was more difficult than it looked from the road, for there was no path to lead them over the easiest ground.
Two thirds of the climb found the undergrowth thinning out quickly. They paused for breath, while Richard scanned the ground above them. He shook his head as he noticed the increasing number of small screes. It was madness to try to scramble over their treacherous surface; the stones now under their feet were as knife-sharp as when they had been splintered from smashing boulders. The ridge of the hill was of rock, and at this distance there was a dangerous look to the last fifty feet. It would be slow work getting over that. He looked along the side to the place where the hill joined the mountain. Just at that point there seemed to be a slight hollow. It was the bed of a mountain stream, now dry, but no doubt forming a gleaming cascade of water in the spring.
“Our best bet is to strike for the stream,” he said. “It will take us farther away from the house, but the dry bed of a torrent is easier than a miniature precipice.” He pointed to the crest of the hill.
Frances needed no convincing. They began to climb obliquely up towards the bed of the stream, avoiding any falls of loose gravel, and choosing ground where some persistent green still showed. That at least gave them some guarantee of safety.
It was slow work, until suddenly, to Frances’ joy, they met a small track which had the same idea as Richard. It must have begun at the road near the place where the shoulder of the hill had formed a jutting curve, and had traced its modest way parallel to the shoulder’s crest.
“We could have followed this all the way,” said Frances, with some exasperation, following their own course up the hill with a bitter eye.
“No, it began too close to the house. The road at that point might have been watched by Herr Von-und-zu strolling in his nice soft meadow.”
Frances was standing very still. “Well, we only postponed it,” she said so quietly that Richard stopped and turned to see her face.
“Down there,” she added. Richard followed the direction of her eyes. The valley beneath them was no longer empty. Along the road which led from Pertisau a man was riding a bicycle.
“Like the hammers of hell,” Richard said, and swore gently but wholeheartedly. “Don’t move. Keep just the way you are.”
“He looks like an ant,” said Frances.
“Louse, you mean.” Richard was worried. “I wonder now… what did he learn at Pertisau to send him back at this rate? No one there knew when we were returning, except Henry or Bob; and he can’t have been talking to them.”
“I wonder if he saw us. Do you think he would take me for another piece of greenery? There are at least two pieces of scrub near me.” She looked fearfully at her socks but the loam had been reinforced by some mud which she had blundered into on the soft bank of the stream. Richard watched the cyclist as he reached the curve in the road.
“He hasn’t slackened pace yet; it looks as if he might not have noticed us. If he had, I should think he would have slowed up, just to make sure. God, that dog can keep up a terrific clip.”
“What shall we do?”
“There’s still daylight for some time,” Richard said thoughtfully. “Once we are up there we ought to have a wonderful view of the back of the house. Damn it all, if only I had left you in Pertisau, and come by myself.”
“Then you wouldn’t have had either an old English song, or these noises. Let’s go on, Richard. I don’t like the idea of going down the way we came up. And once we get up—we are very nearly there anyway—we might find a decent path on the mountain itself to lead us back to Pertisau. There’s no law against us trying to climb our way back towards the village and if anyone wants to know why we took so long, well then we got lost. That’s all.” But the truth was, she added to herself, that Richard would have gone on if he had been alone or with another man—and that settled it.
Richard still looked doubtful, but he was wavering.
“Well, we can watch from the top for half an hour, and if it all seems hopeless, then I’ll get you back to the road before it’s dark.”
“All right. Let’s move, Richard.”
They started to climb the last stretch of hill.
The path was apologetic. At best, it was little more than a foot broad; at its worst, it effaced itself altogether under slides of stones. As they crossed these slowly Frances held her breath. One slip here, and she would go rumplin’, tumplin’ down the Tankersha’ brae. She kept her eyes fixed on the next step ahead, and avoided looking down to her right. For there the hill now fell steeply away, carved out by erosion into an adequate quarry. If this path had lain across a field you could run along it, she argued. So there was no reason why she couldn’t walk along it here, provided she didn’t know how far she had to fall. And then the green scrub was again growing thickly, and they had reached the bushes and dwarf trees which edged the bed of the stream. The sides of the dry torrent, and even the bed itself, were piled with large rocks. They formed a staircase. A giant’s staircase, thought Frances, but at least if she slipped here she would always have a boulder behind her, to block her fall.
They were both breathing heavily with the effort of hoisting themselves over the rocks which would form the bank of the torrent when the snows melted in the spring. But the worst of the climb was already past. The boulders in the bleached bed of the stream were thinning out, and the ground was levelling. They were approaching the saddle between the hill and the mountain. As it opened out before them they saw that it was broad and gently sloping. They left the stream which was turning towards the mountain itself, and walked quickly over the grass towards some scattered rocks on the saddle’s rest. From there they could see the valley with the red-shuttered house. When they reached the rocks only half of their expectations were realised. All they could see of the house was some blue smoke which curled up lazily over the tops of the farthest trees.
Richard smiled wryly. “Anticlimax department, I’m afraid. It seems I dragged you up here to admire the view, Frances. I’m sorry.”
Frances let her muscles relax. She pushed her damp hair away from her brow to feel the full coolness of the evening breeze.
“You can always study the paths,” she said.
Richard was already doing that. The saddle seemed the meeting place of the paths on the hill and the mountain. If he could get Frances back to Pertisau as quickly as possible, and if the moon was as clear as it had been last night, then he could use the mountain paths to bring him right up behind the house. He could see both of them clearly from here; neither was difficult. Eastward towards Pertisau stretched the first path he would use, which would bring him easily on to this saddle; and then, from here, there was a westward path, cutting across the mountain where it formed a background for the house—he could see at least one track descending from it into the trees which encircled the back of the house. Then he might try some stalking right up to the outskirts of the house itself. Thornley would be a good man to have along; he knew his way about a mountain. It was just as well that he had come up here after all. He looked at the mountain paths, and photographed what he saw in his memory.
Frances, lying beside him, her chin cupped in her hands, had been staring at the forest beneath her. Her eyes fo
llowed the well-marked path, which led from the saddle down through the trees towards the house. This was probably the path which began at the bridge in the valley. She looked at the trees, as if by sheer will-power she might see through them, through the walls of the house itself into that room upstairs. She was comparing her reactions as she had left that house to those of Richard, and the result did not flatter her. She had taken it for granted that their job was over, that there was nothing left to do except send a telegram and then go away and enjoy themselves. She had believed the story about the dog because she had wanted to believe it; it was a subconscious desire to be rid of complications, to avoid any further trouble. Now she knew that she wouldn’t have been able to enjoy any holiday. She would have had to face the fact ultimately that it hadn’t been a dog, and she would have remembered it just as long as she would remember the cry in a Jews’ Alley in Nürnberg.
She suddenly stiffened.
“What was that? Richard, I saw something down there.”
“Where?” He turned to look down the hill towards the house. The path, beginning near where they lay, twisted its way towards the forest. Beyond the last trees the smoke curled from the chimney.
“Down there. Look. The twist in the path hid it… near the trees. Richard, it’s the dog.”
Richard grasped her wrist and the strength of his hand calmed her.
“So he did see us,” he said.
The dog, bounding up the path towards them, had stopped and was looking backwards. When the two men came in sight he again bounded on.
It was von Aschenhausen and the black-haired man. The path was broad enough to let them walk abreast. They carried no sticks, but their hands were deep in their jacket pockets. Their eyes searched the hill around them. Once they stopped while the man looked towards the westward path on the mountain, but it had only been some animal which had attracted his attention. He had quick eyes all right, thought Richard.
“Keep cool, Frances. They haven’t seen us yet.”
Again the men stopped, and this time they separated. Von Aschenhausen left the path, and began to climb directly up the shoulder. His pace had slowed down, but even from that distance it was evident that he could climb. When von Aschenhausen reached the top he would be just about the place which they had first attempted to reach. Richard reflected with some pleasure that the east side of the shoulder, which the German would then have to descend, would cramp his style a little. His plan was to encircle them, obviously. The black-haired man was plodding steadily up the path to the saddle where they lay; the dog bounded ahead.
As they backed cautiously from the sheltering rocks and raced back over the gently sloping ground, Richard was thinking quickly but none the less clearly. Von Aschenhausen had taken the much more difficult way because his companion was probably a less expert climber. So much the better for Frances and himself. He would rather face brawn than brain any day. You could outwit the former. They must make for the bed of the stream; that was their only hope for cover. Once they were hidden by the boulders and the bushes which twisted round them on the torrent’s banks they could follow the bed until they had reached the fields and the woods round the Pletzach, and then they would be safe enough. The incriminating thing for them would be to stay on the shoulder overlooking the house. If von Aschenhausen didn’t find them on the hill they could find an explanation for their late return to Pertisau. And he would have to accept it, because he wouldn’t be able to disprove it. But it all made tonight’s plans almost impossible. They would be closely watched from now on.
If Frances had been thankful for grass under her feet when she had first reached the saddle on the way up, she now almost wept with relief. She could run swiftly on this surface and, what was just as important, run silently. She had the feeling of desperate effort which she used to have as a child when she played cowboys and Indians and she was one of the chased. It was no longer a game, but the old terrifying feeling of strained muscles holding her, of feet sticking to the ground, was still there. She must go faster and faster, but her body refused even as her mind urged her on. She sagged, her heart pounding and a strange thundering in her ears, so that she couldn’t swallow. But Richard’s hand, which had not loosened its grasp on her wrist from the moment when they had first seen the dog, pulled her up and on. They had reached the stream.
Their run had slowed down to a scramble, but the first large rocks were near them. Richard had let go of her wrist now; they needed the use of their hands to steady themselves through the boulders. It would have been quicker work if they hadn’t had to avoid any clatter of stones. Richard was thankful for what he had been cursing only half an hour ago, for the fact that they had worn rubber-soled shoes today to go visiting, rather than their nail-studded climbing boots.
The man could not have reached the top of the path yet; nor could von Aschenhausen have reached the crest of the shoulder. As the stream bed plunged deeply in between the crags, Richard looked over his shoulder. They were hidden now, thank God, from both the shoulder and the saddle of the hill. There was no man in sight. But there was the dog. It had marked them from the saddle, and instead of waiting there for the dark-haired man, had followed them. It hadn’t barked. There was something uncanny in the silent way it calculated its powerful leaps over the rough stones, to alight on smooth rock. Its speed was checked by its twists and turns, by the way in which its thick haunches would brake suddenly on the steep side of a boulder. But its direction was unerring.
Richard hurried Frances on. They had passed the point where the track on the side of the hill had met the stream, and they were on strange ground now. The bed plunged still deeper, the banks were rockier, and more thickly screened by small wiry mountain trees. Their speed increased, again for the bed was less cluttered with boulders. The stones under their feet were sharp and uneven; those stones would hold up the dog, anyway. And then the stream curved round a mass of rock, and they saw that the narrow gorge before them suddenly ended. In front of them was nothing but space, and the precipice over which the torrents would pour in the spring, falling in a series of cataracts to the valley beneath.
They looked at each other, trying to hide the dismay in their hearts. To their left was the open mountain rising steeply; to their right, over the high bank with its crags and bushes, lay the landslide which Frances had called a quarry. They were neatly trapped.
Frances backed away from the edge of the precipice instinctively. Richard stood, his eyes turned towards the mountain, looking for some short-cut up to that eastward-bound path which would lead them to Pertisau. The ground was open and there was little cover, but if the man had followed the dog into the bed of the stream his view of the mountain-side would be blocked by the height of the banks long enough to let them reach that point in the path where there were some trees and scrub. Anyway, there was no other choice.
And then behind them they heard the panting of the dog. It had followed the boulders on the banks of the stream, and now it was poised above them, eyes gleaming, teeth showing wickedly. Even as they had turned it gathered its muscles to spring.
Frances was the nearer. She heard Richard’s voice behind her, low, urgent.
“Flat! On your face!”
She was hypnotised as the animal, now more wolf than dog, hurled its huge weight down at her. She heard the snarl, saw the teeth ready to tear. Her eyes closed involuntarily as the slavering jaws were aimed at the level of her throat, and she dropped on the ground. She felt it pass above her body, striking something beyond. Richard…Richard… That sound, what was that sound? She raised herself on an elbow, afraid to turn her head, afraid to see. Just behind her, so that she could have touched it with her foot, lay the dog. Its throat was spitted on the steel goad of Richard’s stick. Richard rose, his face white, his hands still braced on the stick’s shaft. The force of the dog’s leap had knocked him backwards on his knees. He tried to shake the animal’s body free from the stick, but the eight inches of steel were firmly embedded. With a grimace
of disgust, he put his foot on the dog’s chest, and pulled the stick as if it were a bayonet. It came out slowly.
From farther up the bed of the stream had come the rattle of stones, as if a heavy man had slipped badly. Richard pointed to the bank on the mountain side of the gorge. Frances rose, and moved with difficulty towards the protection of its rocks. The man would not see them until he had got well round the bend, and then he would see the dog first. There was no time to hide it, even if they could have brought themselves to touch its dead body. Richard followed her, the stick still blood-covered. He should have wiped it on the dog’s coat, he knew; but he couldn’t. He felt sicker than he liked to admit.
“Through there,” he whispered, pointing between two boulders. Frances obeyed, keeping her head and shoulders low. By using the uneven rocks and the thick bushes for cover, they managed to clear the stream’s high bank. The man in the stream bed would not see them, because of the twist in its course. Von Aschenhausen, now probably over the shoulder, might be on the difficult track which had led them to the stream. It had taken them a good fifteen minutes. It would take him as long; there was no easy way.
They paused for a moment. Behind them lay the bank; in front of them was the mountainside, its slope covered with scrub which would hardly reach their knees. They heard the man’s steps now, in the bed of the stream. He would just be coming round the bend now. The footsteps paused and then quickened. So he had seen the dog. They heard his oaths. Richard still hesitated, wondering if they should stay quietly where they were, hidden by the boulders… And then he remembered. The bloodstains. They had laid a pretty track.
“Go on,” he whispered to Frances.
She looked at him despairingly. “I can’t lead. You must. I’ll go over the side.” She pointed to the steep drop down to her right. The landslide which had created the quarry and the cataract behind them had done its work here too. The shoulder met the mountain with a spectacular precipice. Their only hope was to keep away from the treacherous edge and work up towards the mountain path as quickly as possible.