“It bore me well enough, Captain,” said the Professor with a smile.
“That’s just what it didn’t,” replied the Captain, “it seemed to me to bend too much under you; besides, although I’m bound to admit that you’re a good lump of a man, Professor, I suspect there’s a couple of stones more on me than on you. If it was only a rope, now, such as I’ve bin used to, I’d go at it at once, but—”
“It is quite strong enough,” said the guide confidently.
“Well, here goes,” returned the mariner, “but if it gives way, Antoine, I’ll have you hanged for murder.”
Uttering this threat he crossed in safety, the others followed, and the party advanced over a part of the glacier which was rugged with mounds, towers, obelisks, and pyramids of ice. For some time nothing serious interrupted their progress until they came to another wide crevasse, when it was found, to the guide’s indignation, that the ladder had been purposely left behind by the porter to whom it had been intrusted, he being under the impression that it would not be further required.
“Blockhead!” cried the Professor, whose enthusiastic spirit was easily roused to indignation, “it was your duty to carry it till ordered to lay it down. You were hired to act, sir, not to think. Obedience is the highest virtue of a servant! Shall we send him back for it?” he said, turning to Antoine with a flushed countenance.
“Not now, Monsieur,” answered the guide, “it would create needless delay. We shall try to work round the crevasse.”
This they did by following its edge until they found a part where crossing was possible, though attended with considerable danger in consequence of the wedge-like and crumbling nature of the ice.
Hoping that such a difficulty would not occur again they pushed on, but had not gone far when another, and still more impassable, fissure presented itself.
“How provoking, couldn’t we jump it?” said Lewis, looking inquiringly into the dark-blue depths.