Fix Bay'nets: The Regiment in the Hills

by George Manville Fenn

But for a time he could only wait on patiently, and watch the bright glow extending, and stealing slowly downward, in a way which suggested that it would be hours before the spot where he stood would be lit up by the full light of day; and, hardly daring to move, he listened, and twice over gave one of his long, piercing whistles, which were echoed and re-echoed in a way which made him shudder and hesitate to raise the strange sounds again.

“It’s o’ no use,” he said. “He’s gone down there, and he’s dead—he’s dead; and I shall never see him again.—Yah! yer great snivelling idjit!” he cried the next moment, in his rage against himself. “The old woman was right when I ’listed. She said I wasn’t fit for a sojer—no good for nothing but to stop at home, carry back the washing, and turn the mangle. I’m ashamed o’ myself. My word, though, the fog’s not so thick, but ain’t it cold! If I don’t do something I shall freeze hard, and not be able to help him when it gets light.”

It was a fact; for, consequent upon standing still so long, a peculiar numbing sensation began to attack his extremities, and it was none too soon when he felt his way down the slope for a few yards, and then turned to climb again. A very short time longer, and he would have been unable to stir; as it was, he could hardly climb back to the place from which he started. Cut he strove hard to restore the failing circulation, keeping his body in active motion, till, by slow degrees, his natural activity returned, and, forgetting the weariness produced by such a night of exertion, he felt ready to do anything towards finding and rescuing his officer.

“There’s no mistake about it,” he muttered, “standing still up in these parts means hands and feet freezing hard. It’s wonderful, though, how these sheepskins keep out the cold. I ought to feel worse than I do, though, at a time like this; but it’s because I won’t believe the gov’nor’s dead. It ain’t possible, like, for it’s so much more sudden than being caught by a bullet through the heart. Oh he ain’t dead—he can’t be—I won’t believe it. Tumbled down into the soft snow somewhere, and on’y wants me to go down and help him out.”

He took another turn up and down to keep up the circulation, and by this time he could move about freely, and without having to climb the ascent in dread of going too far and reaching the perilous edge, with its treachery of snow.

“Getting lighter fast,” he said, “and I shall be able to get to work soon. And that’s it. I’ve got to think o’ that. There’s no help to be got. You’ve got to find all the help in yourself, old man. My! ain’t it beautiful how the light’s coming! It’s just as if the angels was pouring glory on the tops o’ the mountains, and it’s running more and more down the sides, till these great holes and hollows are full, and it’s day once more.”

As the golden rays of sunshine came lower, the mountain in front grew dazzling in its beauty. Minute by minute the glaciers which combed its sides leaped into sight, shining with dazzling beauty, like rivers and falls of golden water; the dark rifts and chasms became purple, lightening into vivid blue; and the reflected light kept on flashing upon hollows and points, till, saving the lower portions, the vast mass of tumbled-together ice and snow shone with a glory that filled the ignorant common lad with a strange feeling of awe.

This passed off directly, however; and, as the darkness on a level with where he stood grew more and more transparent, Gedge’s active mind was searching everything in the most practical way, in connection with the task he had in hand. He could see now dimly that the snow to right and left of him curved over the vast gulf in front—vast in length only; for, thirty or forty yards from where he stood, there was the huge blank face of the mountain going downward, as one vast perpendicular wall of grey rock, streaked with snow where there were ledges for it to cling. In fact, the snow from above hung hen; and there as if ready to fall into the black gulf, still full of darkness, and whose depths could not be plumbed until the light displaced the gloom, and a safe coign of vantage could be found from which the adventurer could look down.

In fact, the young soldier was on the edge of a stupendous bergschrund, as the phenomenon is termed by Swiss climbers—a deep chasm formed by the ice and snow shrinking or falling away from the side of a mountain, where the latter is too steep for it to cling. And then, after a little examination to right and left, Gedge, with beating heart, found the place where Bracy had stepped forward and instantaneously fallen. There was no doubt about it, for the searcher found the two spots where he himself had so nearly gone down, the snow showing great irregular patches, bitten off, as it were, leaving sharp, rugged, perpendicular edges; while where Bracy had fallen there were two footprints and a deep furrow, evidently formed by the rifle, to which he had clung, the furrow growing deeper as it neared the edge of the snow, through which it had been dragged.

Gedge’s face flushed with excitement as he grasped all this and proved its truth, for, between where he stood and the footprints made through the crust of snow, there were his own marks, those made by his bayonet, and others where he had flung himself down, for the snow here was far softer than upon the slope.