"I must have been tolerably done up last night," he said lightly when they met at the breakfast-table. "I don't really know how I got to bed. I think I must have undressed in my sleep."
"You seemed half asleep," said Arthur cautiously. "When we separated I was pretty far gone myself. I dare say this strong air has something to do with it."
"It has the effect of champagne upon one's spirits—at least, so they say. I feel anything but lively this morning. However, if you are still in the same mind, we had better try what high latitudes can do for us. Do you feel up to a good climb?"
"Thoroughly—in the very mood for exertion."
"Well, then, old fellow! set to work with a will, for if we intend to sup on anything more inviting than black bread and sausages, we must get back to the hotel this evening. That rascal Karl only half supplied us with bread and meat."
"I could sup on anything after a walk like yesterday's to give me an appetite. However, Master Karl evidently intended that we should return to-day. What a joke he is! If eyes could kill, I should certainly have been slain yesterday when I suggested that we could dispense with attendance."
Maurice smiled: "Poor old Karl! Well, I believe he is one of the few a man can trust. It is my chief reason for keeping him, for really, in some ways, he's an immense bore. That big fellow is as frightened of bogies as a baby. The dark weather we had sent him nearly out of his wits. It was chiefly in consideration for his feelings that I put up at the hotel the other day."
"Then I ought, certainly, to be very thankful to him," said Arthur warmly; "he will think I have made him a poor return. I suppose we may leave our knapsacks under the care of your old woman here?" he continued. "It's all very well to talk of their convenience and that kind of thing; I can only say that my shoulders ached considerably yesterday; they've not recovered yet."
Maurice laughed: "You are a young traveller, my dear fellow; however, I'll be merciful. Leave them here, by all means, and start this time untrammelled. But come! Are you ready? Now, if you take my advice—and I know something of the mountains—you should begin quietly. We can quicken the pace when we get into the swing and get up the wind—two very serious matters, I can assure you."
There had been sufficient thaw to make the roads practicable, at least to men with strong boots and leathern gaiters. Many of the steeper paths were nothing better than watercourses. But this was a matter of minor import to the two men. It took Arthur some time, as his friend had predicted, to get into the swing, and they plodded on for some miles in silence, Arthur turning over and over in his head that tale, so oft told in the silence of his heart, of his first love, which had come upon him like a kind of magic, awakening him to a truer comprehension of life, a fuller appreciation of beauty—the tale which he must tell, before many minutes should pass over, to another—to a man unsympathetic perhaps, and hard. Once or twice he ventured to steal a glance at Maurice. His face was inscrutable. For the moment he was really nothing more than the quiet English gentleman, patient and enduring, as becomes one of his race—manly in his way of meeting difficulties, determined when it is necessary to overcome them. In walking, more especially in climbing, there is abundant room for the display of character, and in Switzerland a young Englishman of breeding and degree may be known at once by his bearing.