They
reached the summit of the Grand Pic in seven hours, descended into the
Breche Zsigmondy, climbed up the precipice on the further side of that
gap, and reached the Pic Central by two o'clock in the afternoon. There
they rested for an hour, and looked far down to the village of La Grave
among the cornfields of the valley. There was no reason for any hurry.
"We shall reach La Grave by eight," said Peter, but he was wrong, as they
soon discovered. A slope which should have been soft snow down which they
could plunge was hard ice, in which a ladder of steps must be cut before
the glacier could be reached. The glacier itself was crevassed so that
many a devour was necessary, and occasionally a jump; and evening came
upon them while they were on the Rocher de L'Aigle. It was quite dark
when at last they reached the grass slopes, and still far below them the
lights were gleaming in La Grave. To both men those grass slopes seemed
interminable. The lights of La Grave seemed never to come nearer, never
to grow larger. Little points of fire very far away--as they had been at
first, so they remained. But for the slope of ground beneath his feet and
the aching of his knees, Linforth could almost have believed that they
were not descending at all.
Pages:
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93