Though the hut was a crude thing, a triumph of essentials over luxuries, Helen had never before hailed four walls and a roof with such heartfelt, if silent, thanksgiving. She sank exhausted on a rough bench, and watched the matter-of-fact Engadiners unpacking the stores and firewood carried in their rucksacks. Their businesslike air supplied the tonic she needed. Though the howling storm seemed to threaten the tiny refuge with destruction, these two men set to work, coolly and methodically, to prepare a meal. Barth arranged the contents of Karl’s bulky package on a small table, and the porter busied himself with lighting a fire in a Swiss stove that stood in the center of the outer room. An inner apartment loomed black and uninviting through an open doorway. Helen discovered later that some scanty accommodation was provided there for those who meant to sleep in the hut in readiness for an early ascent, while it supplied a separate room in the event of women taking part in an expedition.
Bower offered her a quantity of brandy and water. She declined it, declaring that she needed only time to regain her breath. He was a man who might be trusted not to pester anyone with well meant but useless attentions. He went to the door, lit a cigarette, and seemed to be keenly interested in the sleet as it pelted the moraine or gathered in drifts in the minor fissures of the glacier.
Within a remarkably short space of time, Karl had concocted two cups of steaming coffee. Helen was then all aglow. Her strength was restored. The boisterous wind had crimsoned her cheeks beneath the tan. She had never looked such a picture of radiant womanhood as after this tussle with the storm. Luckily her clothing was not wet, since the travelers reached the cabane at the very instant the elements became really aggressive. It was a quite composed and reinvigorated Helen who summoned Bower from his contemplation of the weather portents.
“We may be besieged,” she cried; “but at any rate we are not on famine rations. What a spread! You could hardly have brought more food if you fancied we might be kept here a week.”
The sustained physical effort called for during the last part of the climb seemed to have dispelled his fit of abstraction. Being an eminently adaptable man, he responded to her mood. “Ah, that sounds more like the enthusiast who set forth so gayly from the Kursaal this morning,” he answered, pulling the door ajar before he took a seat by her side on the bench. “A few minutes ago you were ready to condemn me as several kinds of idiot for going on in the teeth of our Switzers’ warnings. Now, confess!”
“I don’t think I could have climbed another ten yards,” she admitted.
“Our haste was due to Barth’s anxiety. He wanted to save you from a drenching. It was a near thing, and with the thermometer falling a degree a minute soaked garments might have brought very unpleasant consequences. But that was our only risk. Old mountaineer as I am, I hardly expected such a blizzard in August, after such short notice too. Otherwise, now that we are safely housed, you are fortunate in securing a memorable experience. The storm will soon blow over; but it promises to be lively while it lasts.”
Helen was sipping her coffee. Perhaps her eyes conveyed the question her tongue hesitated to utter. Bower smiled pleasantly, and gesticulated with hands and shoulders in a way that was foreign to his studiously cultivated English habit of repose. Indeed, with his climber’s garb he seemed to have acquired a new manner. There was a perplexing change in him since the morning.
“Yes,” he said. “I understand perfectly. You and I might sing lieder ohne worte, Miss Wynton. I have known these summer gales to last four days; but pray do not be alarmed,” for Helen nearly dropped her cup in quick dismay; “my own opinion is that we shall have a delightful afternoon. Of course, I am a discredited prophet. Ask Barth.”
The guide, hearing his name mentioned, glanced at them, though he was engaged at the moment in taking the wrappings off a quantity of bread, cold chicken, and slices of ham and beef. He agreed with Bower. The barometer stood high when they left the hotel. He thought, as all men think who live in the open, that “the sharper the blast the sooner it’s past.”