"Yes; and his shout soon let me know. He had just been saying he must start soon. After that it was all right. I only had to be hauled up. But you understand now how much we owe to you—both of us."
"Not Mr. Royston!"
"Yes, both of us. I very much doubt whether, after that night, he would have been equal to the return by himself. He found it quite enough, even with the help of a guide. So I think we may pretty well say that you have saved both our lives!"
"I've always longed to be able some day to save somebody's life," she replied gently.
Much more he could have told her, and did not.
He might have described at length that interminable night in his dreary bergshrund prison, where he dared not stir, for fear of falling yet lower. He had found a lodgment on a narrow snow-shelf at one side of the great cleft. Black depths of mystery lay below; and steep snow-walls rose high before and behind him; and the projecting upper "lip" of the shrund overhung his head; and nothing was clearly visible except a strip of sky far, far above. At any moment a fresh fall of snow might overwhelm him; and time crawled on with leaden footsteps, as he waited in his constrained position, suffering acutely from the piercing cold.
He could not see Rob. He was without food, without restoratives, and in hourly peril of death. Vainly, from time to time, he urged his friend to escape while escape was possible, and to leave him to his fate. Or rather—and he put this forward for Rob's sake—to get help. But he knew well that such help must almost certainly arrive too late; and Rob, knowing the same, always cheerily refused, bidding him keep up a brave heart.
Through it all Ivor could not banish Bee from his mind. He saw her face; he was haunted by her soft tones; he recalled little talks with her in the spring; he heard again Amy's utterance outside the Hut. The consciousness of what she possibly felt for him, and floating visions of what in some future day they might become one to the other, alternated with a picture of his life cut short, his career abruptly ended. And with this came self-searchings as to the manner of life he had lived; not indeed a blameworthy life, weighed in ordinary scales; yet not all that it should have been, weighed in loftier scales, seen in the near prospect of the Life to follow. It had not been an irreligious or a prayerless life; yet now, looking back, he felt how much had been wanting in it of whole-hearted devotion to the service of God; and keen regrets for the past mingled with strong resolutions for the future—if he should be permitted to get through safely.
As the fierce numbing cold of night enveloped him, creeping from limb to limb, stiffening every muscle, gripping his very bones, he could hear Royston far above, stamping, stirring, ever and anon shouting words of encouragement.
And once—never after would Ivor lose the impression made!—once, without warning or introduction, in strong distinct tones, Rob repeated the General Confession. Heart and soul Ivor joined in, echoing each familiar petition, and finding in them the full utterance of his own deepest need.