But matters began to go easier and easier, for at the end of another hour’s tramp they suddenly emerged from the mist, coming out below it, and after a few more dozen steps seeing it like a roof high above their heads.
Here the guide stopped, mounted a stone, and stood looking about him in the evening light.
“I see,” he cried: “we are not half an hour out of our way. Off to the right we shall reach the snow, and then our task is done.”
Melchior was right: in less than the time he had named they reached the place where they had left the great snow slope, up which they had had to zigzag; and after descending it diagonally for some distance, the guide proposed a glissade.
“The young herr shall come down behind me this time,” he said; and after a few preliminary words of advice they started, and rapidly descended safely to the débris at the foot of the snow, from which the walk to the camp was not long.
Melchior soon had a good fire burning, with Gros standing near contemplating it solemnly, while Dale placed their provisions ready.
“Now, Saxe, my lad,” he said, “I congratulate you on your display of honest English pluck to-day. I don’t see that any boy of your age could have behaved better. Come along: coffee’s ready. You must be half starved.”
There was a pause.
“Ready, Melchior?”
“Yes, herr: the coffee smells heavenly, and I have an appetite for three.”