Chapter Twenty Three.
Forging the Link.
A pile of rocks overgrown with stunted rhododendron bushes and shaggy, weather-beaten pines, also stunted. Among these a foaming mountain torrent cleft its way, dashing through the deep, narrow chasm which walled it in some fifty feet below. A seldom-frequented path wound around the base of the rocks, passing over a crazy wooden bridge.
On the morning subsequent to the events just detailed Richard Fordham sat among the rocks aforesaid, smoking a cigar. He had lighted it on first arriving at this sequestered spot, and now the glowing end was almost burning his fingers. This showed that he had been waiting there for some time—half an hour at least.
Waiting? That was just what he was doing. But there was no impatience attendant on the process. His gaze had scarcely wandered from the stretch of open meadowland lying between his position and the brown roofs of Zermatt nearly a mile away—yet in it there was no concern, no anxiety.
An object was approaching along the path—a grey sunshade. Beneath this was a human figure—a female figure. Watching its approach, the expression of his countenance underwent a change; but in it there was still no impatience. The expression of that dark, saturnine countenance was one of exultant ferocity, such as might animate that of the concealed leopard as it watches the unsuspecting antelope advance step by step within easy springing distance of its lurking-place.
The new arrival continued to advance slowly until she had reached the rickety wooden bridge. There she paused and looked around as though puzzled.
At the sound of a cough above she started and changed colour, then catching sight of another path, began to ascend to where he stood. This was a platform of rock on the edge of the chasm. It was shut in by the trees in such fashion that any one standing there would be scarcely discernible from without, while commanding the approaches from the quarter whence any one would be in the least likely to advance.
The new-comer was an extremely well-preserved woman of middle age. She was slightly above the medium height, and her dark, flashing eyes and strongly marked brows gave her an imperious look which it needed not the firm jaw and erect figure to confirm. But the expression stamped upon her pale features at that moment was not that of power, rather it was one of apprehension—of undisguisable dread, dashed with strong abhorrence. As she stood there, panting with the exertion of the ascent, or agitation, or both, a chance observer might have discovered in her countenance a curious likeness to that of Fordham himself.