He grinned from ear to ear and nodded.
"It is well," said I, and I followed my guide.
We began slowly to descend the mountain, my guide running nimbly on in front, then standing still at intervals and beckoning to me. This he continued to do until we arrived at the foot of the mountain, and I remember feeling an irresistible and unaccountable impulse to follow my guide more quickly than before.
As the steel is attracted to the magnet, so I felt irresistibly attracted towards the monster. It was as if he possessed some strange magnetic power over me, for whenever he lifted up his finger to beckon to me I felt it impossible to resist following him.
I thought the feeling might be fancy at first, and I attributed my quickened pace against my own will to the impetus given by the steep declivity of the mountain, but afterwards I found that it was exactly the same on level ground.
We walked on further, till we found ourselves at the foot of a glacier, where stood the châlet which I sought.
I knocked and entered, and was welcomed by the owner of the hut, a middle-aged and portly dame with a goître that hung over her breast, and some young children with incipient goîtres.
I told the hostess that I was a hungry traveller, and asked her to give me the best that she had in the house.
Whilst waiting for my supper I warmed myself by the fire and scrutinised the inmates of the cottage. The children seemed very healthy, and not bad looking, if they had not been all disfigured with the family goître, which they all inherited in a greater or less degree. They seemed to be great friends with my guide, gambolling around him and buffeting him unmercifully.
At length my supper arrived, consisting of poached eggs, cold sausage and ham, Swiss cheese, stale bread, and some sort of spirit drunk in the mountains. Having concluded my repast, I lit a pipe, and, drawing up my chair to the fire, entered into conversation with mine hostess.