His protest went for nothing. He cried out that it was "damned nonsense!" but no one seemed to hear him. Perchance a man has never been carried shoulder-high by other men on skis before. They would establish a precedent, as Bob declared, and calling the parson and Dick Fenton to his aid, set off bravely for the Palace.
"Where is my brother?" Benny asked them in an interlude. The doctor answered that he had fainted when the gun announced the victory; but that was an enigma to the engineer, and kept him quiet awhile. "When the gun announced his victory. Good God! What victory?"
"I lost it," he stammered presently, "because the mist took me. It seems I was nearer than I thought. Another ten minutes and I would have done it."
Nobody listened to this. They were in the woods now, and went on in a triumph characteristic of Andana. If the music were chiefly of horns and bugles, it mattered little. Major Boodle, among others, had devoted a master intellect to the acquisition of the "yoodle" in various keys, and he practised it relentlessly. There was one fellow who had borrowed a drum in the village, and beat a tattoo with real cleverness. A few mild youths, who always carried revolvers when "on the Continent," produced those far from formidable weapons and shot down the branches from the trees. But, in the main, the voice was the instrument, and was to be heard in a stentorian cheer, or the less musical and more joyous chant of victory.
Some hundreds of the spectators had gone up to Vermala, but many thousands remained on the plateau and were discovered suddenly as the odd procession emerged from the woods. The drift of cloud, which had tricked the aviator into the belief that he had failed, was now but a wall of vapour flanking the precipices across the valley, all the scene stood out, revealed in magic glory.
Heaven knew whence all the flags had come. It was said that the bunting erected by the Daily Recorder had been pulled down by excited hands and distributed among the people. Certainly, every other man carried a flag and waved it perpetually. In their turn, the women waved handkerchiefs while the children ran to and fro hardly understanding what it was all about, and caring very little. Meanwhile, the band blared incessantly, and down at the village the church bell tolled as gaily as an ancient bell-ringer could persuade it to do.
The crowd had waited patiently for its hero to come down from the heights, and directly it perceived the outposts of the procession, all bonds were broken and a wild tumult ensued. A hundred hands fought for the burden, and were repulsed with difficulty. A frenzy of cheers succeeded the intermittent salvos. Men, and women too, fell in the snow and were rolled over and over by the heedless feet of other runners. The one desire was to see the man who had done this thing, and, if it might be, to touch his hand. He, in turn, implored those who carried him to make an end of it.
"Take me to the chalet," he said. And the doctor commanding, they carried him there in triumph, and shut and barred the door against the multitude.
* * * * * * *
Brother Jack had been sitting before the fire in their little sitting-room when Benny came tumbling in. His face was very pale and his eyes wide open. It was true that he had fainted when the signal-gun announced his brother's victory, and the reaction of joy could be detected in the quiver of his lips and his restless hands. Had he been a Frenchman he would have kissed Benny on both cheeks prior to a flourish of words in which platitudes of sentiment abounded. But as it was, he just stood up and cried, "Hallo, Benny!" while Benny said, "Hallo, Jack!" and came and slapped him on the shoulder. The others in the room at this time were at the Abbé Villari, Harry Clavering and the doctor, and these three stood apart that the brothers might talk.